My First Bikram Yoga Class (AKA Hot Yoga)

Before this morning, the closest I’d ever come to doing yoga, was owning a pair of yoga pants. On a scale of one to ten, I’d rate my flexibility as a four. In primary school, I was repeatedly punished for “fidgeting”, and in High School, I spent an inordinate amount of time, in trouble for talking. (Holding still and being quiet, has never been my strong suit).

Still…..my friends went on and on about Bikram Yoga, which is the latest craze to sweep the pockets of Uptown Jamaican Housewives. The strange thing was, whenever someone would talk about Bikram, they’d say negative things with a positive tone of voice.

For example: “I felt so dizzy at one point, I thought I might pass out.”

Now read that sentence again, as if you were saying: “I just won a thousand bucks!”

It was creepy, to say the least. Creepy enough to pique my interest.

One by one, my friends dropped like flies into this burgeoning cult of Hot Yoga. 105 degree room, be damned! Of course, I resisted as long as humanly possible, but it was inevitable. I aspire to become an Uptown Jamaican Housewife, therefore, I had to face the Hot Yoga trend, like Usain Bolt faces a finish line.

This did not come without concerns. Would I throw up? How would my body feel for the rest of the day? Would I suddenly gets arms like Madonna? Would I be pummeled by a sudden migraine? One of my friends said it made her cry–would I cry?

Facing my fears, head on, I spent the twenty-four hours prior, downing gallon, after gallon, of room temperature water. I stretched, intermittently, throughout the day and night leading up to the class. I made sure to eat a light dinner, and a hearty breakfast (in between my drug-induced, restful sleep), way in advance of the 9:00AM start time. I packed my bag with my Yoga Matt (OK, that’s another way I come close to doing Yoga), and TWO full length towels. I. Was. Ready.

The thing is….I didn’t throw up. I felt dizzy at some points, but the instructor assured the class that we should feel a little dizzy…..the dizziness was our bodies waking up…so I kind of just pushed through it. Of course, the postures were extremely new to me. Even with my years of dance experience, many postures seemed so outside my realm. It wasn’t bad and I wouldn’t say it was good, either. It was simply, a TOTALLY different experience from anything else I have experienced, thus far in my life.

Then I started to think about the two friends I was doing the class with, today. One friend recently endured Natural Child Birth. The other is a third grade teacher, at an all-girls school. Both drive regularly, around the traffic cesspool, that is Kingston, sometimes at night! Both are capable of enduring minor ailments, such as headaches, and stomach aches, without relinquishing themselves to bed rest. The teacher had gastro for weeks WITHOUT NOTICING.

Clearly, these women and their capabilities, were way out of my league! Yet, somehow, I just followed the instructors voice straight through into the next pose, without stopping. I feel as if Hot Yoga was even more of a mental challenge, than it was a physical challenge.

Yet…..I am still trying to make up my mind about it. There was a definite mind-body connection. The poses aired on the side of sadistic, at some points. The stretch I got in my hamstrings, was priceless. But all together, I still haven’t been able to tick a box marked Good or Bad.

So let me walk you through it, step by step:

We go into a room, (fans off), that is HEATED (as if Jamaica in July isn’t a balmy 99 degrees at all times), and lay our yoga matts on the floor. We put down a towel on top of the matt, so we don’t slip. Then we keep the second towel until the end, so we can dry off, as if we just got out the shower. The instructor is a foreigner, (I heard he is Italian, but I’m not sure). He wears a headset, a small pair of shorts, and a ponytail (at the end, he was wearing a towel, and I wondered more than once, if he’d abandoned the shorts, all together). His body is amazing, by the way. My first thought upon seeing him was, “I wonder if my husband would try this yoga thing?”

A woman (his assistant), who is so thin, I can see every bone in her body, demonstrates the poses as he speaks, auctioneer-style into the microphone.

His accent takes a little getting used to, so at first, it’s as if his voice is a continuous buzz. I try to follow the assistant as best as humanly possible, but she is not a human–she is something else. I would say she is mainly skeleton, but “skeleton” implies “bones”, and the way this lady contorts her body, it is fairly apparent that she doesn’t have a single, stiff bone in her body. At one point, I wonder if it is okay to just stop and watch her, mouth open, in out and out, awe. She is literally defying gravity, and the laws of anatomy, all at once.

We do each posture twice, resting in between.

Although the class was NINETY minutes long, the first hour flew by pretty quickly. I attempted to do some version of every pose, and tried to concentrate on my breathing, and myself in the mirror, as the instructor advised. There was no music, I realize now, but I didn’t miss it. The instructor’s voice sort of overcame my own thoughts, and I slipped into this hazy place for a while, where everything was quiet and peaceful. (Oxygen deprivation, perhaps?). We did mostly standing poses, but the poses on the floor were my favorite, because in between, we got to lay down and breathe. Before I knew it, class was over, and I hadn’t thrown up. (Go me!) I did soak two towels in sweat, however, and continued to sweat, even after I had showered.

Then I went back to feeling perfectly normal. I’ve kind of been waiting, since class ended, to feel somehow different. I have been waiting for that cultish, deep, un-abiding love to hit me, like it hit so many of my friends. But then it didn’t. I don’t feel compelled to sign up for a week of unlimited Hot Yoga. I don’t feel more energized, or even more tired. I feel fine. Like….normal?

However…..I think I have figured out why Bikram has been having such a wondrous affect on my friends. These friends of mine are busy. They have kids running around, screaming all day. They have jobs that keep them constantly moving. They are generally caught in a mixture of noise and commotion and thinking about the needs of others, all day long. When they go to Bikram, they finally have a moment of peace. It always feels good to sweat, and the gentle breathing patterns are extremely therapeutic. They get to have quiet time alone.

My entire life is “quiet time alone”. I lead an extremely stress-free existence, as a Novelist, blogger, and stay-at-home-wife. I spend the entire day asking myself: what do you feel like doing now? I don’t need Hot Yoga like they need Hot Yoga. My entire life is Hot Yoga!

That being said, I would be willing to do Hot Yoga again, in future, but I don’t think I’m gonna plunge into it like a religion, anytime soon.

 

Have you tired Hot Yoga? What do you think about it?

Wait, Wait, Wait! Before you go….check out my terrific, funny, BEST SELLING Amazon Kindle Novels: The New York Catch, New York Socialite, New New York, New York Series, Red Rock Cafe, Midlife Wife.