Bikram Helps Fat Loss, yes or no?

As a Bikram Yoga Teacher I get this question a lot: Will Bikram yoga help me lose weight? Recently I found this on the Mayo Clinic website. What I think is great is that it clearly states where/how our fat gets released from our bodies-- through sweat (yeah Bikram heated room) and carbon dioxide air exhaled from our lungs: that's what we start with: Pranayama breathing....so breath and sweat (the only thing we don't do (hopefully) in the room is urinate. On the other side a calorie is the amount of energy used to raise one gram of water one degree centrigrade -- so if the room is doing the work for you --you are not burning the calorie. I have been a teacher for seven years and have witnessed folks who "rely on the room" to get the sweat on. Just like in the gym you have to do the work in order to use the energy to raise the temperature to release the fat. The room aids in the release of the broken down fat. You plus the room equal results. Here's the article:

Question Body fat: Where does it go when you lose weight?
Where does body fat go when you lose weight?

Answer
from Katherine Zeratsky, R.D., L.D.
When you consume fewer calories than your body needs, your body turns to fat for energy. Your fat cells (triglycerides) provide the fuel for this energy.

Through a series of complex metabolic processes, triglycerides are broken down into two different components — glycerol and fatty acids — which are absorbed into your liver, kidney and muscle. Here, these components are further broken down by chemical processes that ultimately produce energy for your body.

The heat generated through these activities is used to help maintain your body temperature. The waste products that result are water and carbon dioxide. You excrete water primarily in urine and sweat and carbon dioxide in air exhaled from your lungs.

Away From Yoga

Recently it was the holidays and I got away from my yoga practice. I moved cross-country -- I started two new days jobs, I moved back into my house -- so many many things: changes-- the new, the old it all collided around the holidays, until it was almost two weeks and I hadn't practiced regularly. If it's possible to feel your own circulation diminish I felt it. Blood, life, went into a stillness --- but not the stillness that we talk about in yoga. The stillness of stagnation -- lack of movement, lack of flow. All around my personal life was filled with challenge...my friends weren't getting along, strangers weren't getting along -- my cousin announced a divorce, a former colleague died. Is it a coincidence that I wasn't practicing -- I can sometimes be superstitious about certain things -- wear a lucky color, but that's about it. No, it isn't that if I don't practice bad things happen: it's that these types of things are always happening and when I don't practice I am not at 100 percent, and therefore dealing with these things throws me (much more than if I do practice). I recently watched two films: Food Inc. and Super Size Me...which also coincided with my yoga practice derailing... It all pointed in the same direction: take care of yourself. If you haven't seen either of this two films they are worth your while. Food Inc. shows how far away we have come from really knowing what is even in our foods, and Super Size Me, shows just how easy it is to get sick from all the fast foods we have readily available to us. Organic food is more expensive and fast food chains are all over working class neighborhoods. Yoga means union -- if we are so far away from where our food is -- if we are so far away from each other's neighborhoods (this includes the NIMBYS!) we are far away from yoga. I went back to class today. My mantra was, "I am at peace in my yoga practice".