Hot for Hot Yoga!

It’s always the Warrior II where I start to fizzle. 

Halfway through the standing series, heart going 100+ beats a minute, and here I am, drenched with sweat in a heated room. Yesterday it was really hot, more than usual. The instructor asked, “Does it feel hotter in here today than usual?” I politely nod but think to myself, “Omigod yes.” I glance at the wall thermometer and it reads 109⁰ Fahrenheit. No wonder I’m dizzy. Of course, it’s not just the heat. By this time, I’ve been through what seems a hundred downward facing dogs and their associated flows, runner’s lunges, eagle poses and the like. (If you’re into yoga, you’ll know what these are. If not, never mind.)



The Warrior II pose appears easy enough. Just stand with your feet apart, one facing straight ahead, the other at a 45 degree angle.  The leg with the foot facing straight should be bent, and the arms should be held up, parallel to the floor. It’s the arms that get me. By that point in the workout, I could very well be holding up 100 pound weights with each of those arms, they feel so heavy. Yesterday was no exception. Fortunately, once the warrior series is over, I seem to start to get my second wind. By this time I’m dripping perspiration, donning sweat beads from my forehead to my ankles. I make sure not to wipe the sweat from my body, as I’m told it is a natural insulator that actually helps to keep the body from overheating. However, the pesky perspiration does manage to make it into my eyes sometimes, so I have to wipe that out.

So why do I put myself through this? Believe it or not, for peace, health and harmony.  It all started last summer, when after finally getting over a two-month bout of bronchitis, I registered for a summer class in my graduate school program. For various reasons I had been unable to take a class during the previous spring semester, so I was looking forward to spending the summer taking my online class, as it was in a subject that interested me: health communication. Just a few days before the class started, I was stunned to learn that it was not the three-month course that had been listed on the university website, but rather an accelerated, three-week intercession class. So I was about to begin a course where I would have to pack three months’ worth of work into three weeks!

I crammed a lot of information about health communication into my head over the next three weeks. Fortunately, I came out of it alive. A lot of the information seemed to go into one side of my head and out the other, as the class entailed absorbing so much information in so little time. But one thing about the class did resonate with me.  Initial readings in the class analyzed the various perspectives on health and what is considered “healthy.”  Generally, the western world considers healthy to be “not sick.” Yet eastern philosophy views health much more holistically. Maintaining health is not merely about fixing body parts that are “broken.” Rather, true health must take into account many different factors affecting the body and the human psyche. Physical, yes, but also mental, social and spiritual peace of mind.

This more holistic view of health made sense to me. And last May, as I was running myself ragged, trying to spend every spare moment on this fast-track class, be a mom and a wife, and also meet deadlines and prepare for the big annual meeting at work, I realized that maybe I wasn’t where I needed to be. If nothing else, I realized that while I might not have been sick at that very moment, I certainly did not consider myself to be healthy. I promised myself that once I was past the chaos of the summer class, I would do something, anything, toward becoming healthier.

I chose yoga because I sought more than just physical benefits. I was seeking something that could help me decrease my stress, calm my spirit, nourish my soul – something that could enhance my efforts to focus and concentrate. A quick search on the computer netted a host of yoga options, but it was the “hot yoga” option that intrigued me. Why, what is that?

Basically, hot yoga (specifically, the particular hot yoga I practice, Moksha Yoga) is power yoga practiced in a 95-105 degree room.  The heat of the room helps to loosen up the joints. And, of course, you sweat. I found a Moksha Yoga studio near my house and, as I had promised myself, I went to my first session the first week in June 2010. Sessions last anywhere from 60-90 minutes. I believe my first session was 75 minutes. The first time I opened the door to the heated room proved to be enough of a shock to the system, as if a sauna had hit me in the face. Admittedly, during that first session, many times I silently screaming to myself, “I’m dying! I’m dying!” Not to mention I was a first-timer in the room with some experienced yogis who had the ability to manipulate their bodies in some pretty serious ways!

I came out of that very first session completely bedraggled. Yet, I felt great! While the poses are physically intensive, they also require focus and concentration. Breathing, above all, is the most important part of the process. So as I came out that first time, feeling that I had just had my butt kicked, I also felt somewhat cleansed. I felt cleansed in a physical sense, as all that sweat had helped to remove toxins from my body (plus I was also drinking lots of water in the process). But I also felt cleansed from within – emotionally and spiritually – as the practice enabled one to release the stress and bring focus back into life. And then there’s the breathing.  One instructor would always say that when your mind gets cluttered and you’re feeling totally overwhelmed, or when a sense of exasperation invades, “Always come back to the breath.”  It is amazing how the answer for achieving calm can be found in the simple act of breathing. Being a nervous person of sorts, I’ve started to incorporate “simple acts of breathing” into my life more often and can indeed feel the impact.

As for me, I’ve kept up with my hot yoga. It seems I can only go so long without a fix. Sometimes I attend frequently, other times more sporadically. How often I go depends on what else I’m doing, how I’m feeling (tend to not go when I’m feeling the winter blues, which is actually the time I need to go most), and whether I can afford it at the time. Nevertheless, after all these months, I’m still very much “hot for yoga,” or “hot for hot yoga,” and anticipate I’ll be practicing it for some time.

Now, if I can just get beyond that Warrior II. . . .