Last month, I went on a whim to a free class on a promotional day at Fuel Hot Yoga in Athens. I had been to yoga classes in the past and really enjoyed them, but I had always gone to normal classes at a regular gym or Ramsey, never a dedicated studio, let alone a hot yoga studio! I won’t lie: the first class was extremely difficult. I had to take breaks to sit down and sip some water frequently throughout the class, but that was completely fine. The instructor encouraged us to listen to our bodies and not to push too far outside our comfort zones, especially if we were just starting out. Towards the end of the class, I was so exhausted that I wanted to punch the instructor every time she had us do yet another quick sit-up into a new pose. But when I finished, I was happy and proud (and very sweaty).
I enjoyed the first experience so much that I ended up signing up for a special introductory deal that got me a month of unlimited classes for a great price. Unfortunately, my month is almost up, but here’s what I found out on my journey…
I sweat. A lot.
I’ve lived through 21 summers in the sweltering Georgia heat, so I know what it feels like to be hot. But until I took my first hot yoga class in a room heated to 105°F, I had never experienced my entire body dripping with sweat. Everyone has to bring a towel in to lay on top of their mats so you don’t slip and fall in a puddle of your own sweat. If you look around the room while you’re in an upside-down position, you can see the droplets of sweat falling from people’s upper bodies onto the floor. It’s gross, but after a while, you don’t notice it too much. The heat only really bothered me on the first day; after that, I accepted that I was going to be a sweaty, red-faced mess and just moved on with my life.
I slept better.
For the last year or so, exercise has not been a common part of my weekly routine. Sure, sometimes I walk to class, but that’s not the same as going for a run, pushing yourself in a sweat-sesh at the gym, or enduring a hot yoga class. After I started going to hot yoga regularly, I found it a lot easier to fall asleep at night. And since some of the classes I went to were at 6:30am, it encouraged me to go to sleep at a reasonable hour and embrace the early-bird lifestyle every day of the week. I wasn’t as disciplined as my roommate who went to 6:30am classes three times a week, but seeing the sunrise just every Wednesday was enough in my book. No matter what, going to a class always made going to bed at night feel like a sweet reward that I had earned.
I got more comfortable with my body.
Hot yoga is not the place to cover up your insecurities—it’s WAY too hot for that! People wear what will be comfortable in a room that’s being heated to 105°F, and for most women, that’s a sports bra without anything over it. There are normally a range of bodies in the room; yes, some people are stick thin, but others are curvy or jiggly and everywhere in between. And because they’re all normal, human bodies, they don’t always look flattering in the poses you’re contorting into. No matter how thin you are, it’s impossible not to have stomach rolls when you are curling your entire body in on itself. Instead of looking at the mirror and comparing myself to the people around me, I was more focused on what my body was capable of (and, of course, how agonizingly hot it was).
My mind became a happier place.
During my second week attending classes, I showed up to one in a really bad mood. The last thing I wanted was to exercise, but my roommate was convinced it would help me feel a lot better. Of course, the fact that endorphins are mood-boosting is no secret, but I felt that yoga specifically helped me calm my brain and stop overreacting to the little stressors of my day. The class I attended that particular evening was a yin class, a practice that focuses on holding restorative postures for a longer period of time. It was an hour to breathe deeply, relax, and focus on nothing but how my muscles could move deeper into the stretch. When I left, I was in an entirely different state of mind.
This 360° transformation does not happen every time, but I do find that attending a class helps improve my mood for the rest of the day. And even on days when I don’t make it to class (which is most of them), it acts as a reminder that a few really deep breaths, a moment of stretching, and a glass of water are more powerful than you think.
Little by little, I could feel myself improving.
I did not go into this hot yoga experience with the expectation that I was going to go every single day, or even a set number of times per week. I was going to try to go as much as possible, but in a way that felt sustainable. No matter how frequently or infrequently I went, it was still an improvement from the two or three times I had exercised in the entirety of fall semester.
But even with this unscheduled, off-and-on practice, I could feel myself getting a little bit better each time I went. I could move a little deeper into the pose, or make through the class without wishing it was over. Since each class goes through the same sequence of poses, I found myself getting into the rhythm of the class and knowing what to expect next. I knew when to push myself further because I knew we were almost at the end. And to top it off, working hard and making baby steps of accomplishment feels even sweeter when you know there’s a lavender-scented cold towel waiting for you at the end of every class.
The verdict? Hot yoga is definitely an exercise form that I would recommend to anyone who wants to get a little more flexible and a lot sweatier. If there’s no studio in your area, or the steep prices are scaring you, just start out with some free yoga videos on YouTube to get some of the same benefits.
Photo sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (and cover)