Yoga Is Medicine

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Yoga Is Medicine

Mid-Michigan's ONLY *original hot yoga* in the Bikram-Ghosh lineage! 100% LOCALLY owned. Classes th Visit the website for information on how to prepare.

Bikram Yoga is a specific system and method, and it is THE Original Hot Yoga! Every class we offer is Bikram's Beginning Yoga Class, which is a Therapeutic Hatha Yoga practice for ALL levels, body types, and ages - particularly beginners and those with limited mobility. BYCA is 100% locally owned and is the ONLY school within 40 miles that teaches this yoga system; ALL staff are trained in the Ghosh-Bikram lineage. Every teacher has a minimum of 1000 hours of experience and training, plus a long-term ongoing education requirement beyond that. The exact sequence of yoga postures is accessible to everyone and improves the function of every muscle, joint, bone, organ, and cell in the body. All classes 90 minutes; no late arrivals or early departures. Please visit http://www.bikramyogacapitalarea.com/how-to-prepare/ several hours prior to your first class, for important information. For holiday schedule updates, see http://www.bikramyogacapitalarea.com/schedule/

PUBLIC/BEGINNER CLASSES:

M 9:30 am, 5:45 pm
Tu 9:30 am, 5:45 pm
W 9:30 am, 5:45 pm
Th 9:30 am, 5:45 pm
F 9:30 am, 5:45 pm
Sa 8:00 am, 10:00 am
Su 9:00 am, 5:45 pm

There are also Mon/Wed NOON classes and Tu/Th 6:15 am classes by INVITATION ONLY. Minimum practice requirements apply. Contact school owner for consideration. Intermediate classes are held on Friday afternoons, on select dates. Weekend workshops are also held and will be announced in advance.

02/07/2026

Feeling restricted and struggling to breathe in Rabbit Pose? You're not alone; it's a common challenge, especially when you're new to the practice!

Most practitioners and teachers of The Original Hot Bikram Yoga know the directive phrase “Postures Holding Stillness, Breathing Always Normal.” But we forget - or never grasped - the final four words of this directive:

Which are:

“According to the Posture.”

Yes, there is a specific breathing technique that coordinates with each of the 26 postures!

As you learn how to apply these techniques, you will be able to:

— feel stronger in each posture

— create more relaxation in each

— enable more comprehensive stillness

— hold stillness for more time

— GAIN energy in the class rather than deplete it

— dramatically improve the sustainability of your practice

One example is Rabbit Pose.

Rabbit Pose (*Sasangasana)* is a head-to-knee pose where the spine and torso are flexed forward. Anytime we do this, the body is restricted from taking a complete, muscular inhale. So if we try to take a “deep breath”, we will likely feel stuck or that we “can’t breathe in Rabbit Pose.”

The key is actually to NOT take a deep breath once you’ve started rounding the spine.

The key is to EXHALE slowly and completely

Over all, we learn to understand the specific breathing techniques in each posture. When you get the technique right, you'll find ease and relaxation even while you're challenged!

Watch to learn the secret to breathing well. And let me know your experiences and questions!

02/05/2026

Struggling with Locust Pose (also called *Salabhasana*)? I mean, who doesn’t? That’s the one where your body is squishing your arms to the floor, and the palms are on the ground.

(note: it is so great for helping to reverse carpal tunnel, and for helping to heal so many other arm and neck issues!)

Regardless of how high you can get your legs, breathing can be challenging at first.

After all, the position of your arms - and the contraction of your back muscles - somewhat restricts the movement of your rib cage. So, if you are trying to take deep breaths in the posture, you are likely going to feel stuck, or extra challenged.

Here's a tip to reduce your struggle: Instead of trying to take a full, completely expanding inhale as you lift your legs, try to find a middle range for your breath.

Do not try to completely inhale, nor to completely exhale. You’ll create more stability if you take shallower breaths.

Just make sure that “shallow” does NOT mean fast, nor panicky.

Using a middle range of the breathing range of motion should ideally be directed towards being smooth, well-controlled, and ultimately slow.

I’d LOVE to hear how this goes for you! Try it out for a few classes and leave a comment below.

02/03/2026

Struggling with Camel Pose? You're not alone!

While it is true that we need to push the hips forward, and we need to learn to breathe well while backward bending the spine, there is something MISSING in most teaching of this posture.

What else do you need to do with the lower body?

There is an opposite force that is needed to stabilize the posture.

And that is a deliberate downward pressure… or pushing down of the feet into the floor… or leaning into the tops of the feet-ankles!

The “hips forward” needs to always be done IN COMBINATION with this more subtle - yet necessary - effort of feet-ankles being grounded.

Because camel posture needs a firm stability. This - and all other postures - is NOT about how far you can go or how bendy you are.

The magic that happens here is both instantaneous AND long-term.

Your abdominal wall will learn to relax. Your breathing will be able to shift into relaxation. Your nervous system will respond accordingly. It is so amazing.

I’d love to hear how this goes for you!

Leave me a comment here.

01/30/2026

What if I told you that “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, YOU’RE WRONG.”?

Let’s explore.

What does it really mean to say “I can!” or “I can’t!” to yourself, during your yoga practice?

What does it mean to say “I can’t.” when it comes to trying yoga in the first place?

Or to say to me after class, “I can’t do that one,” referring to a specific posture.

Or to say about your favorite posture: “Oh yeah, I can do that one!”

The fact is that all of the above statements take us out of the present moment.

That century-old Henry Ford quote (”Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.”) is only useful in the context of noticing positive and negative self-talk.

But it distracts and diverts us from paying attention to the present moment.

It CATEGORIZES the posture, and seals the posture into a STORY. Neither of which have to do with the attending to the subtlety of what is happening in your breathing and your body.

Also, consider this: is there really one single moment, over the course of your years of practice, when “can’t” turns into “can”?

I hope not. We are learning every moment that we practice. We are attempting the postures always. Are there “ah-ha” moments, when you experience a breakthrough of understanding, muscle control, relaxation, or other technique? Sure! But those will be happening for as long as you practice. There is INFINITE learning in every asana.

I beg of you to NOT put postures into the “I can’t” box. And to set aside the tendency to say “I can” only when a posture is going according to expectation.

Watch your language! ;) It DOES matter.

01/28/2026

What is a mind-body connection, really?

And what does it have to do with the constant, simple instruction in an Original Hot Bikram Yoga class?

Well, the “dialogue” as we call it, is the key to some of the most powerful mental benefits.

It is the exact method that we use to create and sustain a constant connection between the thinking mind and the physical body, in the present moment.

By putting your concentration on the teacher's exact words—like "arms”, “left”, “right”, “stomach in”, etc. you establish immediate links between the mind and the body.

And as you train your discipline to sustain this concentration, breath by breath, minute by minute, you get to experience a meditative state.

Where no new stress is created, and the stresses of yesterday start to dissolve.

It is a miracle!

01/27/2026

Is Bikram Yoga “too intense”?

Is it just for the “Type A”, ultra-competitive?

If you read the tabloids which run the internet and masquerade as journalism, you might think this is the case.

But the gossip is not the reality.

The beautiful Paradox of Intensity is that the class is not inherently intense.

Each and every practitioner, each and every day, is the one who chooses how intensely to practice.

Yes, the postures are the postures.
Yes, the room is heated.
Yes, it is a 90-minute situation

But if we don’t take ownership of how much we do or how hard we push, we remain disempowered.

When we realize, through our own physiology and breathing, that WE can dial up or dial down our efforts, we work towards freedom.

I learned this the hard way, i.e. the best possible way, when I fractured two vertebrae in my lumbar spine. Just 9 months into my practice, I was gifted the experience of being forced to back off, slow down, and concentrate in a way that only pain and injury can bring.

It is really a miracle. I’d love to hear your experiences and stories about intensity in the Original Hot Bikram Yoga!

01/24/2026

For the first several months (and years!) of your yoga practice, it is really important to allow for a "trial and error process".

Every day, your body is different. Your mind is different. And your energy is different. We are not machines, and we are not consistent.

Unfortunately, if we expect our human body systems to perform like a machine, we can reject the yoga process very quickly.

Or we can give up when we hit the first obstacle.

But it is not that the body actually is the problem.

It is a problem of philosophy, a problem of expectation, a mistake in approach.

Yoga, especially Bikram Yoga, will reveal underlying patterns like:

—stress
—dehydration
—emotional eating
—foods that make it more difficult for your body to thrive

So, make sure to attend as frequently as possible as a beginner. And ASK when you run into an obstacle, or an excuse, or an injury.

Give yourself opportunities to try different things—from what you eat the day before to when you drink water.

You'll learn so much about yourself if you keep showing up!

01/22/2026

If you don't have a lot of faith in your own body, you're not alone.

Our culture and education have given us little to no training in how to build that faith. So we often end up in a cycle of distrust and dislike of the very thing that gives us life.

The good news is that there is an entire world of training, right here, accessible to you, every single day.

In our Bikram Yoga hot room, you not only build faith by your own accomplishment, you are also guided by leaders and fellow students who are doing the same thing.

I cannot overstate how important it is to have a community of others who are building that faith, step by step, moment by moment.

A community of encouragement, try-again attitude, internal discipline for concentration, and constant support for the process.

Step into our hot room and start building your faith and courage, day by day, class by class!

01/20/2026

What you should NOT be doing in a yoga class:

—Move most of the time, only resting at the end
—Breath however you feel like it
—Exhale by your mouth while practicing postures

Yoga is here to help you calm your nervous system, not to be just another exercise class, not to be a “stretching” class.

This is your friendly reminder that the Original Hot Yoga (Bikram Yoga) is NOT exercise in a hot room, even though you get all the benefits of exercise.

It's very different from North American “yoga” or “hot yoga” or “flow” classes where you are constantly - or mostly - moving.

Traditional hatha yoga is defined by:

—Stillness
—Smooth, even nose breathing during all postures
—Specific breathing techniques, according to each and every posture
—Rest in stillness after each posture.

All of these things contribute to a calming down of the nervous system.

When you’re ready to step off of the stress train, you know where to find us.

12/25/2025

Merry Christmas Yoga Buddies! I wish you a wonderful day with your dear ones.

Oh such beauty and healing and community in this place over the seasons and years! I send a wish to you all for a warm and healthy day, everyday. And not just a wish, but action you can take to create it.

See you back in the hot room tomorrow at 6:30 and 9:00 am. Plus the weekend morning classes as usual. It's gonna feel sooooo good!!

12/20/2025

Congratulations and WOW on this Fall Yoga Challenge!

This might be the best challenge board I've seen yet.

Look at all of the yoga you all did!

Tomorrow's 9:00 am winter solstice class marks the official end of the challenge, but feel free to finish up some more classes this coming week and keep on putting up your stickers!

See you in the hot room!

12/18/2025

One of the most common mistakes made in North American Yoga is the removal of a regular rest posture, or savasana, after each floor posture. Others just shove the rest posture all the way to the end of class.

It is understandable, honestly. The problem-solving and linear parts of the mind (left-brain stuff) cannot grasp that Savasana is a “something”. They think it is nothing. Which, to those parts of the mind, it is, in fact, nothing. The left brain demands a problem to solve or a task to accomplish, and in savasana, the only thing there is to “do” is to concentrate, on the breathing and the body, in the present moment. Total right brain stuff.

So….yoga teachers with just a few years of practice, or those who have not yet come to appreciate the depth of importance of Savasana, or who have learned from others with this view….will cut it out of the class, as if it is the least important part of the practice.

But, did you know that Savasana (rest posture) is actually the most important posture in class? Here is what savasana provides:

1. the immediate and most acute circulatory benefits that each posture is designed to create
2. time for the active posture (that you have just completed) to *act back on* the body systems
3. a sometimes uncomfortable rest for the problem-solving mind
4. a balancing of the autonomic nervous system, so that the yoga class does not continue to contribute to a physiological stress response
5. a balancing of relaxed, abdominal breathing, to contrast with the active, muscular breathing techniques that we perform in the active postures
6. training towards deep relaxation in a very short time, a skill that we all take out into the world with us.

….and so much more….

Address

1355 E Grand River Avenue
East Lansing, MI
48823

Telephone

+15178628926

Website

http://www.yogaismedicine.com/

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What is Bikram Yoga and the Mission of BYCA?

Bikram Yoga is a therapeutic yoga system and specific method; although it is THE Original Hot Yoga, it is very different from any of the other activities now called “hot yoga”! Bikram Yoga Capital Area (BYCA) was built and founded in 2013 by Ann Chrapkiewicz, an experienced instructor in the Ghosh-Bikram lineage (BYTT ‘04). Our mission is to transform the lives and health of those in Greater Lansing who are willing and open to the possibility of healing and change through a committed yoga practice.

We accomplish this by 1) offering Bikram's Beginning Yoga Class, a nearly 50-year-old Therapeutic Hatha Yoga practice for ALL levels, body types, and ages - particularly beginners and those with limited mobility, 2) creating a supportive, encouraging, dedicated community, and 3) providing scholarship assistance to those in financial and/or medical need. BYCA is 100% locally- and independently-owned (not a franchise or chain) and is the ONLY school within 40 miles that teaches this yoga system. ALL staff are trained in the Ghosh-Bikram lineage. Every teacher has completed a minimum of 1000 hours of experience and training, plus a long-term ongoing education and mentorship requirement.

Statement of Accessibility and Effectiveness:

The exact sequence of yoga postures is accessible to everyone and improves the function of every muscle, joint, bone, organ, and cell in the body. The direct instructional method allows those of all backgrounds and ages to practice with precision and safety. The heat improves accessibility to those with stiff joints and muscles, and improves the effectiveness of the vascular and pulmonary benefit. The stillness that dominates the class retains the principles of therapeutic hatha yoga and allows those with acute injury and chronic pain to practice and receive benefits.