Yoga has transformed from an ancient spiritual practice into a competitive, commercialized, multi-million dollar industry. And for a practice rooted in renunciation, yoga is making some people very rich. YOGA INC. poses this question: Can yoga survive the war between the sacred and the profane with its good karma intact?
Esak Garcia is a star on the burgeoning competitive yoga circuit, but his ultimate goal is the Olympics, a dream instilled in him by his controversial guru Bikram Choudhury. This so-called "Bad Boy of Yoga" has copyrighted his popular yoga style, and those who teach bikram yoga without playing by his rules are hit with crippling copyright infringement fees. But can anyone really "own" yoga? In today's yoga world only the marketplace has real meaning, where everything is up for grabs from yoga shoes to chakra panties. The new mantras are Standardize and Supersize. In the race to cash in, yoga chains ("McYoga"?) are popping up everywhere, putting the smaller studios out of business.
Greed, egotism and the search for enlightenment come together in this original, irreverent portrait of spiritualism and capitalism colliding head on.