I took one yoga class for 8 weeks or so. I loved the stretching part. I hated the "help" and the yoga "mumbo-jumbo." When one instructor insisted in maniuplating my post surgical shoulder I came very close to smacking him where it really hurts.

Here are two recent NYT articles on the subject that you may want to consider when evaluating your prospective yoga classes:

The Delicate Art of Adjustments
Piotr Redlinski for The New York Times
GENTLY, PLEASE Jason Ray Brown and Frances Taylor-Brown, a married couple who teach at Zenyasa Yoga and Wellness Studio, illustrate adjustments to poses.
By EMILY S. RUEB
Published: February 11, 2011

THINGS can get awkward when a group of strangers strip down to their spandex in a steamy, sweaty room. This is especially true in yoga class, where getting into a camel pose, for instance — thrusting your hips forward while kneeling — can feel, well, a bit “porny,” as Claire Dederer put it in the prologue of her memoir, “Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses.”

see link for the rest:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/ny...sq=yoga&st=cse


Rebel Yoga
James Estrin/The New York Times
Tara Stiles, who attracted a following with YouTube yoga videos, says, “My life is a bunch of people inside the computer.” At right, in her studio in NoHo.
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ
Published: January 21, 2011

TARA Stiles does not talk about sacred Hindu texts, personal intentions or chakras. She does not ask her yoga classes to chant. Her language is plainly Main Street: chaturangas are push-ups, the “sacrum” the lower back. She dismisses the ubiquitous yoga teacher-training certificates as rubber stamps, preferring to observe job candidates in action.

See link for the rest:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/23/ny...sq=yoga&st=cse