I started very young with martial arts. At the age of seven. I approached martial arts because I was, in between brackets, a little bit bullied, at school, in the courtyard and so I was looking for self-confidence, I was trying to win my fears, my shyness. So, my grandpa suggested me martial arts, and from there, in short, all my path. Martial arts became an integral part of my existence, and then I met yoga when I was twelve, thirteen years old. And so, two great loves that I cultivated until they merged one with the other. So martial arts elements with the traditional poses of yoga, and then the meeting with Francesca, that comes, in short, from the world of fitness.
Francesca is the co-founder of Odaka Yoga. As Roberto, she is one of the 14th Yoga Alliance International Australia Master Yoga Platinum, the highest recognition issued by the yoga industry7. Moreover, Francesca has recently become the chief editor of "the world's largest and most influential yoga brand"8 the Yoga Alliance International online Journal (see text footnote 7, respectively). As she summons up:
I take a slightly different route. I am the generation of Jane Fonda. I did not have any intention whatsoever to do yoga. I love movement, I come from aerobics and suits, you know those eighties style, in lurex and when I was studying at university I also started to teach aerobics and then there was this gym in Rome where they were doing some yoga courses, and my sister who was studying psychology told me: "Look, let's go, I want you to have this experience," [she said it] once, twice, three times, and in the end I said: "Ok, let's go." It has been really like a revelation for me. From there on I have never abandoned the yoga mat. This incredible contact with the body, that was not only a tool for movement but that really talked to you, it was really like, oh yeah, I found my way, so to say. I found what I wanted to do in the world. And with Roberto we have, I love anatomy, all that more structured part that concerns movement that married very well with Roby's [an affectionate term for Roberto] creativity and this fusion with martial arts and yoga. And so slowly, slowly everything gained structure.
As Francesca approached the practice of yoga she was struggling with anorexia. Luckily, thanks to her dedication to the practice and "the physical realization of certain things," as she says in our interview, she managed "to overcome it."
Simplifying, Odaka Yoga is then the expression of Roberto's and Francesca's respective experience and proficiency with martial arts and fitness. More precisely, it is the outcome of the merging and complementing of their different expertise in the development of an innovative style of postural yoga characterized by a simultaneous reliance on Asian and Western systems of knowledge. However, when Roberto and Francesca met and began their lifelong journey together, Odaka Yoga, as we know and practice it today, was not yet formalized. It was only in 1993 that the word "Odaka," as much as Odaka Yoga's teachings, were subjected to copyright. However, "Odaka" was already used as an acronym of the martial art and yoga studio founded in Rome and run by Roberto since 1984 (later also in partnership with Francesca) which was called Oriental Disciplines Arashi Kyo Academy (O.D.A.K.A). As Francesca further explains:
Arashi Kyo is the name of Sensei, of Roby, when he was European champion of Karate. I mean [we taught] many styles but the acronym adopted was Odaka, and so everyone [said]: "I am going to Odaka," "I am going to Odaka," "Odaka," "Odaka."
O.D.A.K.A functioned as a hub, a place for practical experimentation and philosophical discussion over the meaning and purpose of martial arts. Its main goal was the diffusion of specific disciplines as means of inner knowledge and spiritual search to favor the perfect mind and body harmony development of each individual9 Most Notably, Roberto was teaching two martial arts systems he had created: Shin Jitsu Ryu and Wi Yoga Wakan. These martial systems emerged at the intersection of Roberto's experience and experimentation with Karate Shotokan, Ju Jitsu, zen, Hatha and Raja yoga and offered already the philosophical and practical bases for what later on would develop and evolve as Odaka Yoga. Of course, Francesca was also instrumental to the development of Odaka Yoga through her extensive experience in the world of fitness and yoga and her martial arts apprenticeship under Roberto's guidance.
Today, Roberto and Francesca travel the world to share their hybrid style of yoga and are considered among the most influential contemporary teachers. For instance, Roberto has also been featured in 'Om Yoga Magazine UK' as one of the three world leaders in new, contemporary forms of yoga10. Their style has evolved into a transnational organization with centers across four different continents and a hectic calendar of events such as festivals, workshops, and teacher trainings that take place continuously all over the world and whose online diffusion has been further fostered by the current Covid-19 pandemic. Summarizing, Odaka Yoga is constituted by two different but parallel pillars: one is the discursive and practical reference to Asian systems of knowledge such as yoga, zen, and martial arts, whose main influence comes from Roberto's experience, experimentations and creativity; the other, is a focus on Western science and medicine, and more specifically on anatomy and biomechanics, primarily inspired by Francesca's background in the fitness world.
Odaka Yoga further developed internationally because of a serendipitous happening, or more specifically an epiphany, that brought Roberto and Francesca to drastically re-imagine their life. After their martial academy shook due to internal conflicts, its key members took different routes, and Roberto and Francesca moved to Australia where they were planning to open a new studio and continue their work of dissemination and martial explorations. As discussed by Francesca, watching the 'The Last Samurai' (2003)11. at the cinema represented a turning point in their life:
Everything started because 1 day we were living in Australia, in a beautiful place where we practiced with joy, and "The Last Samurai" came out in the cinema, and we went to watch it...we were in Melbourne and we had just rented a beautiful place for a new yoga studio. We left [the cinema] and Roby did not talk for a couple of days. I said to him "What's happening? How are you feeling?" He replied, "Look, I touched the soul, deeply, and I feel I need to go to Japan." And in that moment, I thought "Give him a couple of days and he will be over it." But it did not happen. Instead we terminated the contract [of the yoga studio] and we sold everything we had in Australia [where] we were only a step away from the permanent visa. There was our best friend that was saying "I mean, you don't speak a word in Japanese, you know nobody, but where do you want to go?" But instead his soul had launched this message, such an intense message that we moved there. The first year, the first few months in Japan were rather difficult, but then the local community begun to open up.
Roberto and Francesca have a background as practitioners in one or more martial art(s). More precisely Roberto practiced Karate Shotokan and Ju Jitsu (in both of which he hold a Fourth Dan Black Belt) next to zen, Hatha and Raja yoga; while Francesca practiced Karate (earning a First Dan Black Belt under Roberto's tutelage) next to a lifelong practice with different styles of yoga and fitness.
Both Roberto and Francesca reached a level of competence, confidence, and charisma that did not only allow them to gather a following, but also to transform a local martial arts academy into a transnational organization praised for its innovative character by some of the most influential voices of the contemporary yoga industry (e.g., Yoga Alliance).
Roberto and Francesca were not the official gatekeepers or lineage holders of their original system (e.g., Karate Shotokan, Ju Jitsu, Hatha or Raja Yoga). However, Roberto was the founder of two different martial arts (e.g., Shin Jitsu Ryu and Wi Yoga Wakan) that in due time, and with the contribution of Francesca, morphed into Odaka Yoga.
Roberto and Francesca started to practice martial arts and yoga as an answer to a personal crisis that aggravated them. More specifically, when still a child Roberto was bullied and attempted to exorcize his fears through the martial arts, as suggested by his grandfather; while Francesca, already familiar with the fitness world as she was teaching aerobics as a side job to her study in business administration, found in yoga an effective tool to cope with and resolve her anorexia. A Further moment of crisis was represented by the disruption of their Oriental Disciplines Academy in Rome, which brought the two teachers to Australia where they continued their martial explorations. Finally, Roberto's conversion following the vision of "The Last Samurai" functioned as an epiphany that proved instrumental in the further internationalization and popularization of Odaka Yoga.
Roberto and Francesca, each of them through their own expertise, devised a solution for their personal problems through a revised martial and human development system, in this case Odaka Yoga. More specifically, through the formulation of their "new concept," "Live Centered, Liquefy Your Limits, Embrace The Power" and its "principles of transformation, adaptability and interior strength," Roberto and Francesca provided an existential answer to the fears and health challenges encountered in their youth while also offering a seductive path cable to equip its practitioners to face the flexibility demands, performative requests, and uncertainties of contemporary neoliberal societies.
Although Roberto and Francesca are still alive and well, there are preliminary elements to postulate that their death will eventually create added chaos, thus fuelling the cycle of creativity among future generations of practitioners and possible lineage holders, a fascinating topic in itself that here cannot be competently explored.
Watching 'The Last Samurai' prompted Roberto to silently question his current life and ongoing projects, further challenging his long-standing, and ever evolving "martial habitus" (Brown and Jennings,) which, in all fairness, was already shaken by and re-adapting to the recent disruption of his academy. Because of these crises Roberto and Francesca re-located to Japan, where they creatively managed to further innovate their martial style and finally obtained international recognition. Recalling Jennings' (:69) six stages of his theory of martial creation in the light of the biographical remarks here discussed it is possible to provide the following analysis of the birth and development of Odaka Yoga: 
As Jennings' (:66, emphasis in original) comments, these six stages can be summarized in the following declaration: "A martial art is founded by a disciplined, habitual martial artist who creatively transcends personal and social crises." Here, Roberto and Francesca learned from their teachers (of whom unfortunately I know very little if not nothing), practiced extensively and creatively, achieved a status within their respective fields and finally were able "to create something new and create a new method of achieving it" (Jennings,:66). As testified by the biographical sketches here provided "[t]he overall process of creativity is a potentially lifelong process, but it also comes with fleeting and intensive moments of (sometimes epiphanous) creation" (ibidem).
Enriching Jennings' theory of martial creation with a closer look at Roberto's and Francesca's habitus and positions within the martial arts, yoga, and fitness fields, may further help focusing on important elements in the birth and development of Odaka Yoga. First, Roberto and Francesca managed to adapt and transform their respective "martial" (Brown and Jennings,) and "fitness" habitus (Sassatelli,) into a specific declination of "yogic habitus" (Di Placido,) hybridized with martial arts and fitness elements. This signifies that their old-habitus and its schemes of dispositions, developed at the intersection of the martial arts, fitness, and yoga fields, progressively changed as they moved away from the center of the martial arts and fitness fields, and toward the center of the yoga field. In other words, we may say that Roberto and Francesca successfully managed to exploit and convert certain types of capitals that granted them their previous positioning in the martial arts and fitness fields, into useful resources to acquire an ever more central positioning within the yoga field. For instance, next to their previous teaching expertise and pedagogical know-how:including in the martial arts founded by Roberto, yoga, and aerobics:they exploited the "bodily" (Wacquant,) or "physical capital" (Shilling,) developed, acquired, and secured through their lifelong involvement with different martial activities and fitness practices, to build an image of successful, competent, and innovative teachers. In so doing, as they skillfully converted their proficiency in the martial arts and fitness worlds to create an innovative hybrid style of yoga, they also contributed to the reproduction of the relationship of homology between the broader field of power, and the martial arts and fitness field. Simplifying, via their capitals (e.g., economic, cultural, physical, and so on), Francesca and Roberto secured a dominant position within the martial arts and fitness fields, while also managing to remain in a dominant position in their successive and progressive involvement within the yoga field.
Finally, I would like to conclude this section with a short analysis of the manners in which Roberto's and Francesca's biographical remarks could be effectively accounted for through the lenses of Foucault's "epimeleia heautou." First, Odaka Yoga functions as a moral framework that guides practitioners' conduct and teleological orientation in the world, more specifically through its concerns for practitioners' health and processes of self-transformation as filtered through the concept of "Live Centered, Liquefy Your Limits, Embrace The Power"; second, it offers the possibility to convert one's attention from the outside world toward one's own interiority, thus promoting a specific ethic of self-care, self-actualization, and self-transformation that is already well-established in Western renditions and interpretations of Asian religious and spiritual resources; and third, it offers an array of practices, or technologies of the self, through which practitioners are invited to cultivate, interiorize, and master the specific worldview advocated by the school and deepening further their self-transformative experiences of conversion in the light of the discourses and practices advocated by the founders. Interestingly enough, it is also as a consequence of a dedicated engagement with martial activities as care of the self, that Roberto and Francesca managed to successfully adapt and change their martial and fitness habitus, and progressively translate their capitals, skills, and expertise from the martial arts and fitness fields into the yoga field.
The next section is entirely dedicated to a discussion of Odaka Yoga's conception of health through an analysis of its understanding of the body as framed at the intersection of Asian and Western systems of knowledge.
Odaka Yoga presents an understanding of the human body framed at the intersection of Asian and Western systems of knowledge. In other words, the Odaka Yoga body is built on a hybrid conception of health, simultaneously inspired by biomedical/anatomical and esoteric/spiritual principles. In the following I provide two extracts that testify to this hybrid conception of health. The first field note was written right after a teacher training weekend held in Milan in the Winter of 2018. Here, Francesca warns me against hyper-flexing the legs and instructs me about the physical cues to notice in order to know if a movement is more damaging than benefiting:
We are going through a short sequence that involves the stretching of the leg, calf, tight, and quadricep. Each one practices individually, Francesca walks around, looking and giving suggestions. One knee on the floor and the other leg stretched in front, heel, and big toe on the floor. When I try to place the sole of the foot on the mat I feel a burning unease around the knee and on the back of it. I almost lose balance and my back stiffens up too. A perfect yogi! I then do the pose stretching the leg but touching the mat only with my heel and it goes better. As Francesca passes by, I tell her what I felt when I tried to bring the sole to the mat. She then looks at me and says: "You should never hyper-stretch anything. Especially if you feel the stretch behind the knee or at the end of the calf and of the tight, closer to the knee. If the warmth, the stretch is not at the center of the muscle then bend the knee. It means you are working beyond the capacity of your muscle and you are forcing it" (16/12/2018).
In the second field note, taken during a weekly class at JustB, the Milanese headquarter of Odaka Yoga where I undertook the greatest part of my research, Beatrice, Odaka Yoga teacher and studio owner, evokes the energetic constitution of practitioners' bodies:
After this intense, central part of the practice we move in a standing position. The transition is done from the dog bringing one leg in between the arms and then the other following it. Beatrice says: "Slowly unwind your back, vertebra after vertebra, the arms opening, as large as you can. The palms meet over the head and come down slowly with the elbow open and the finger well-spread. Open again. The hands meet and come down, this time the wrists rotate and the arms are again open, with the elbow at ninety degrees and the palms open." We repeat this and similar movements a few times [this movement is known as ki flow by Odaka Yoga practitioners] and then we move on to the performance of a warrior sequence. At the end of this sequence while we are again standing at the beginning of the mat, Beatrice says: "Now place your hands a few fingers below your belly button. Here is the tanden, the center. All our own energy comes from this energy center, all movement comes from here. It is known in all Oriental traditions as the most important energy center (31/05/2018).
The first fragment depicts Francesca's attention for the technical aspects of the practice and more specifically for a practice oriented toward anatomical details and injuries prevention. The body that emerges from this type of attention is substantially a biomechanical and medicalized body. The Odaka Yoga's website seems to further reproduce this vision:
Odaka Yoga re-educates the body to move in its entirety by reawakening the intelligence of our bodies. Specific sequences are created for different areas of the body while working on postural alignment in order to prevent muscle, skeletal, and tissue injury. During an Odaka Yoga session, muscles are activated with balanced and functional movement that simultaneously strengthen and elongate12.
Biomechanics, as advocated by Odaka Yoga, is the study of the structure and functioning of the human body in motion. Its two main aims are to enhance performances and prevent injuries. Biomechanics implies a specific idea of the body: an object to be closely scrutinized for the discovery of its most functional (read natural and effective) movement patterns. The result of this reification is that the body, seen through the lenses of biomechanics, becomes a "medicalized body" (Robbins,), understood as that specific body amenable to scientific scrutiny and thus exposed to a certain "medical gaze" (Foucault,).
As Foucault has poignantly shown, between the end of the eighteenth century and then throughout the nineteenth century, the body was substantially re-casted as an object of knowledge at the intersection of science and medicine. From this perspective, biomechanics can then simply be considered as a later development of the epistemic transformation traced by Foucault in his genealogical study of the emergence of modern medicine. The medicalized body is then dissected by the medical gaze which penetrates its secrets, uncovers the mysteries of its functioning and translates them into a visible system of representation where bones, muscles, tendons, and organs are simultaneously: (a) seen as self-standing objects; (b) seen as the parts that form the medicalized body. The pedagogical consequences of this understanding of the body as much as its influences in shaping a specific conception of health based on anatomy and Western medicine, are among the most obvious implications of the Odaka Yoga body as a medicalized body. In fact, the primary consequence of this displayable body is that through the lenses of disciplines such as biomechanics, the body is potentially detached from its experiential dimension to acquire instead a more visual, object-like, anatomical identity (Foucault,; Robbins,). This is precisely what grants the suspension of the body as the locus of personal experience, and promotes the legitimization of different areas of expertise to emerge, where doctors, scientists, couches, and yoga teachers become the qualified holders of the hidden truths of the body. Here, next to "re-education," "alignment" and "protection from injuries," Odaka Yoga wants to cultivate, this time through the "activation," "balancing," "strengthening" and "elongation" of the muscular band, a very specific declination of the medicalized body13.
On the contrary, in the second field note proposed at the beginning of this section, Beatrice depicts a portrait of practitioners' bodies as primarily grounded in their energetic constitution. Here, the "liquid style approach" of Odaka Yoga, obtained by merging the martial arts flow of inner energy, and the zen spirit of quieting the mind with yoga postures, produces a practice akin to "an unremitting motion, a wave-like movement, a process where no interruption occurs between one pose and another." This type of fluid movement "aims to dissolve physical, mental and emotional tensions, while soothing the mind with immediate action"14. More specifically:
Once the restraint is transformed, our habitual pattern of movement and thought is dissolved and each position creates space for a dialogue between our deepest fears and the possibility of overcoming them. The Odaka flow allows for us to go deep within ourselves and become "liquid." Odaka Yoga allows you to embrace adaptability while keeping an inner peace. It becomes a complete fluid and transformative body-mind experience....and one you will not forget15.
At the heart of this conception of the body there is the "subtle body" model, that specific understanding of the body where its energetic structure interacts with and affects the anatomical or physical body of the practitioner (Johnston and Barcan,). This model, first popularized in the West in the nineteenth century by the esoteric writings of the Theosophical Society, has its origins in the 'Upanishads', a collection of Sanskrit sacred texts, more specifically the 'Brhadaranyaka Upanishad' (IX-VI B.C.E), the 'Katha Upanishad' (V B.C.E) and the 'Taittiriya Upanishad' (V-VI B.C.E) (Samuel and Johnston,; Mallinson and Singleton,). The 'Taittiriya Upanishad' describes a subtle body model composed of five sheaths (koshas). These koshas are, in the context of yoga soteriology, a series of interconnected layers that range from gross energy (matter) to progressively more refined subtle qualities, the subtlest of which are the states of dreamless sleep and liberation (samadhi). They are, from the grossest to the finest: anna-maya-kosha (physical body), prana-maya-kosha (energy body), mano-maya-kosha (mind body), vijnana-maya-kosha (consciousness body), and finally ananda-maya-kosha (bliss body) (Samuel and Johnston,:33).
The subtle body model presented in the Upanishads, and later re-elaborated by the yogic, tantric and other Asian traditions, is constituted by a series of focal points (chakras) connected by specific conduits or channels (nadis) through which the subtle breath (prana) moves. According to this subtle body model, the flow of prana-within and across these sheaths-determines not only the physical and mental state of individuals, that is, their health, but also the plausible acquisition of supernatural powers, immortality or liberation (White,). In other words, according to this theory, when yoga practitioners perform physical postures (asana) or breathing exercises (pranayama), among other practices, they are not merely engaging or manipulating the physical body, but also the (ephemeral) energetic substrate of their being. As Johnston and Barcan (:30) rightly underline:
[i]ntervention in one [sheaths] of necessity means intervention in others. The dominant belief is that changes in this energy (in this subtle body) at any level:mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually:will bring about changes to all other aspects of the individual.
This is exactly the theory behind Odaka Yoga's reliance on the subtle body model as an integral part of its hybrid conception of health. From this it follows that Odaka Yoga's transformative potentials are entirely based on the healing power of prana as it freely circulates across the different layers of practitioners' subtle bodies, "a union that aims to dissolve physical, mental and emotional tensions" through the "flow of inner energy."
At this point, it is important to note that the subtle body of Odaka Yoga is not purely derived from the yoga tradition just discussed. On the contrary, it presents two main, although interconnected, differences: first, it downplays the importance of the breath as a conduit for prana emphasizing instead the importance of fluid movements; second, it ascribes specific importance to the energetic reservoir known in many Asian martial arts as tanden (or dantian). In relation to the former, Odaka Yoga subdues yoga's traditional emphasis on the breath to the importance of fluid movements. Here, the "liquid style approach" is obtained by merging (a) martial arts elements, (b) a focus on the inner flow of energies, and (c) the emulation of the yielding nature of the Ocean waves with yoga postures. In fact, it is through this liquid style and its fluid movements that the energy circulates across the different koshas, allowing practitioners to transform their physical, energetic, mental, emotional, and even spiritual makeup. In relation to the latter, Odaka Yoga reframes yoga's traditional subtle body model focused on chakras through the idiom of Asian martial arts. Here, the tanden, or more specifically the lower tanden16 (hereafter simply tanden), becomes the most prominent energy center of the practitioner's body. The tanden corresponds to the first two chakras of yoga' subtle anatomy (muladhara and svadhistana). According to Asian martial arts it indicates the reservoir of one's own vital energy, what in the yoga tradition is usually known as kundalini, a dormant snake coiled in the muladhara chakra whose stimulation, awakening and vertical rising across the other six main chakras is seen as bearer of supernatural powers, longevity and/or enlightenment (Eliade,). Partly following this model, the tanden is simultaneously understood as an energetic and spiritual center: it is not only the main source of ki (the Japanese equivalent of prana) but the center of gravity of the body itself, the center from which all movements spring from as previously evoked by Beatrice during her class.
Nonetheless, to return to my main argument, the most important aspect of this model, whether we see it as belonging to the traditional model introduced in the 'Upanishads', or a later re-interpretation imported from Chinese medicine or the martial arts, is that it displays a model of the body that is substantially antithetical to the anatomical and biomechanical conception of the medicalized body previously discussed. This signifies that if the medicalized body:as a whole or in its parts:responds to a meta-narrative where scientific and medical discourses are woven together making the body an object to be closely scrutinized by a plethora of experts; the subtle body is instead regulated by the flows and functioning of energy, which is itself comprised:according to yogic philosophy:by the constant interplay between the grosser and the finest koshas. This specific understanding of the body, then, gives rise to a very particular conception "...of embodied subjectivity in which matter and consciousness are not understood as ontologically distinct but as varieties of 'energy' resonating at different densities" (Johnston and Barcan,:25). Here, the medical gaze described by Foucault loses all its representational and explanatory power and the truth of the body returns to become a mystery which science and modern medicine cannot competently understand just yet. Moreover, where the medical gaze fails to bring into light the invisible, practitioners' direct experiences of this invisible flow of energy, as the following field note demonstrates, become the primary epistemological ground on which the subtle body model can be understood and made sense of. Here, I discuss the sensuous and emotional dimensions of being able to perceive one's own inner flow of energy at the end of an Odaka Yoga practice:
The emotions and the energetic sensations that the practice and the final relaxation induced in me are exhilarating. I feel like walking to Beatrice to tell her that every single lesson I do with her I feel like crying. But I stay put, sitting on my mat, while everybody else is slowly getting up, and going to the changing room. When the traffic is somehow slowing down, I also stand up and go to take the spray and the tissues to clean up my mat. As I walk toward the corner where the cleaning supplies are, literally a few meters away from my mat, I feel my body is light, relaxed, open. I feel happy. I really feel a great amount of vibrations in my belly area, especially in the upper belly part, and flows of relaxed energy all over my limbs (31/05/2018).
At a practical-discursive level the body proposed by Odaka Yoga is simultaneously: (a) a medicalized body understood through the lenses of anatomy and biomechanics; (b) and a subtle body, framed according to traditional yogic and martial arts subtle anatomy. This tension is well-exemplified in the following fragment extracted from an interview with Beatrice:
With this practice modality that is fluid but not too fast we work exactly on prana, on the energetic quality. It is an energetic quality where you are not exhausted, it is tiresome, but never extremely tiresome. You sweat but not too much. The body is always thermoregulated and is never over heated. Also, when you sweat a lot, you actually sweat a lot because outside is really hot, so you are self-regulating. [This style] creates a sort of energetic charge. In this way we work a lot on the connective tissue. And [to work] on the connective tissue means working on the emotions, because it is in the connective tissue that the strongest emotions pass through.
Beatrice's narrative underlines how, according to the subtle body model, the "liquid style approach" of Odaka Yoga and its primary focus on energy work, is inextricably connected with a manipulation of the connective tissue of practitioners' bodies, that in turn is linked to practitioners' emotions. We can then clearly see how this model, thanks to the constant interplay across sheaths, offers the right philosophical and discursive foundations to frame a practice where energy work, physical work, and emotional work, are not only manifestly overlapping on an epistemological level, but are also experientially accessible to the practitioners. Yet, what is perhaps of greater interest is that this interconnectivity among sheaths is here reframed through the language of modern medicine, and science, with terms such as "thermoregulates," "self-regulating," and "connective tissue," making it almost impossible to disjoint these two registers. The medicalized and the subtle body are no longer recognizable as separate bodies. Discourses belonging to these two different registers are then simultaneously mobilized to reciprocally legitimize one another, and strengthen their respective therapeutic, self-actualizing and self-transformative framings of the body.
In the next section I provide a brief discussion of how Odaka Yoga' conception of the body is epitomized, reproduced, and embodied by its ideal-typical practitioner, the Odaka Yoga Warrior.
The Odaka Yoga Warrior is the ideal-typical practitioner capable "to live centered in the middle of chaos17." This signifies that the Odaka Yoga Warrior maintains her "center" and a "calm mind"; it seeks to "transform" herself cultivating "new balance" and "inner strength" while embracing the adversities of life and its "challenges." For the Odaka Yoga Warrior:
Challenges should be thought of as opportunities, because that is exactly what they are. Without challenges, we cannot attain inner power. This makes challenges essential to growth. When we give into challenges without any fight, we embrace the empowerment (emphasis in original)18.
This ideal-typical practitioner emerges at the intersection of the practical-discursive logics of Western medicine (with its anatomical and biomechanical principles) and Asian systems of knowledge (and their fluid movement and inner flow of energy) next to their respective models of the body and conceptions of health. Moreover, the Odaka Yoga Warrior is simultaneously a product and a "solution" to the uncertainties, flexibility demands, and challenges of contemporary Western societies. Having extensively inquired into Odaka Yoga's conception of health in the previous pages I devote the remaining of this section to a discussion of the affinity between the Odaka Yoga Warrior and a neoliberal mode of thought. As the Odaka Yoga's website argues:
To become an Odaka Yoga warrior means to become adaptable, flexible, and fully integrated: a complete fluid and transformative body-mind entity. When moving in the Odaka flow, muscles are invited to engage in a new way which strengthens them and, in turn, creates movement in the mind. If the connective tissue is tense, muscles are no longer able to move freely because the entire body tenses and tightens, and so does our mind19.
I would like to underline how the Odaka Yoga Warrior is not merely the outcome of the meeting between the practical-discursive universes of Western medicine and Asian systems of knowledge but is also the expression of the particular ethos of contemporary neoliberal societies. In fact, "[t]o become an Odaka Yoga warrior means to become adaptable, flexible and fully integrated," or in other words, "a complete fluid and transformative body-mind entity." This depiction of the Odaka Yoga Warrior:as much as its elective affinities with challenges, growth and empowerment:I argue, substantially adheres to the normative biopolitical injunction of self-care, flexibility and self-responsibility that characterizes contemporary neoliberal societies across social domains, such as higher education, sport and the labor market (e.g., Andrews and Silk,; Belanger and Edwards,; Gonzalez-Calvo and Arias-Carballa,; John and McDonald,). Understood in this light, the Odaka Yoga Warrior is:thanks to her self-control, self-mastery, and constant work of self-cultivation:able to fruitfully merge the central tenets of the medicalized and subtle body models within a unified therapeutic framework of fluid self-care and self-actualization. If this analysis is correct, then the Odaka Yoga Warrior is a particular declination of the "neoliberal yogi" discussed by Godrej, that is, a yoga practitioner whose conduct is substantially in alignment with the dominant paradigms of self-care, self-conduct and self-responsibility of contemporary neoliberal societies. Here, Foucault concept of "biopolitics," defined as the control of the welfare, wealth, longevity, and health of the population through the pervasive government of individuals' conduct, becomes a useful heuristic tool to theorize about the interconnections between Odaka Yoga's discursive focus on heath and self-transformation; its practical repertoire oriented to the problematization of practitioners' health, its maintenance and cultivation; and the type of power:or in Foucault's terminology governmentality:that dominates our everyday conduct as much as the ethos of our contemporary societies. These reflections point to the fact that, as much as it is pivotal to understand martial artists' positioning within the broader field of power in order to fully understand the martial systems that they create, it is also important to understand the broader ethos of a field, of a social group or even of an entire culture, to fully account for its conceptions of health and the manners in which they may be discursively framed, reinforced, or in certain cases also disqualified.