I decided to go to a yoga retreat for a month, which is actually a yoga teacher training programme, in Rishikesh whilst travelling round India as to some extent I’ve never really got yoga. By that I mean, I’ve been to numerous yoga classes but never really understood why it is that people are so evangelical about yoga and come away saying it made them feel or amazing or that it’s changed their lives. As far as I’ve always seen it it’s usually just been a somewhat boring exercise class. I have only ever manage to find one teacher where I’ve properly enjoyed the classes and walked away feeling good but not really any better than had it been a body pump or combat class or the like.

To a lot of people it might therefore seem really strange that I decided this course as the most natural conclusion is just that yoga’s not for me. But there are so many people who are so evangelical about it that I figure there must be something to it that I’m just not understanding. It seems like the problem is me, not the yoga. So I want to try to understand. That’s why I’m here, at a month long yoga retreat, in Rishikesh, where the day starts at 6am each day and there is no caffeine, eggs, meat, sugar or alcohol.