On Hot Yoga and Shedding

 went to hot yoga for the first time the other day.   Fifteen pounds overweight, no steady exercise in a while, I sauntered into the studio. Long running tights (hey, they are lightweight!), short-sleeved running shirt, running shoes and socks, and a fleece.  (I was cold…).  I walked to the desk and discussed attending class, and was handed a signup sheet and release form.

I had plenty of time, so I people-watched. Slender girl in bikini. Older woman in more sturdy bikini.  Dancer type in boy shorts and sports bra. Older fella in shorts only. Barefoot.

Each carried a yoga mat and water. I picked up my purse and stretched it wide: altoids, sunglasses, credit cards, and lipstick. No mat, no towel, no water.

Clearly, I was failing what my mother would call the-most-important-test. What to wear. Her voice said in my ear, “Quick, go home and change before anyone sees!” No time for that.  I went back to the desk.  “Do you supply mats or water?”  Yes, mats were rentable for a small fee.  I purchased water for a larger fee. I walked into the locker room and noticed, as I tucked my purse into the cubby, took off my fleece, shoes and socks and tucked them into the cubby, that the regulars were stuffing things into their cubbies.  I might be okay; I could blend in.

Into the practice room, a steamy 103 degrees. I looked into the room and thought, I wonder where the instructor puts her mat, I don’t want to put mine where she usually does. “I’ll just ask someone!” I thought.  As I opened the door to enter, I noticed the sign “Silence is observed in the practice room.”  Gulp. Okay, just guess where she won’t be and put my mat there.

As the hour went on, I noticed how profoundly I did not belong. I was unable to do the poses, including the repeated transition poses.  I shook holding the poses I could do.  I was not familiar with, and could not follow, the instructions of the very fit yoga master who walked about the whole time.   I spoke into the silence, “Oh sure, wrap my arm around my ankle.”  “Who does that?” “You’ve got be kidding me!”  “I am dying.   Any minute, no pulse.”  “Down, before you f’ing faint!”     Whispers really.  I’m sure no one heard.

I’m also sure no one else saw a black tunnel narrow before their eyes, three times, during the class. Not passing out was what doing my best looked like. The girl to the left of me?  Her best looked like art: long limbs, beautiful movements of graceful strength, impeccable form.   She even breathed in and out at all the right times.   Both of us, doing our best.

And I was not alone in my pool of sweat.  We all had one. The sweat ran down my back, my legs, in between my toes, and down the sides of my face.   Dripped off multiple points of my body; nose, belly, elbow, knee.

I have been retaining water due to any number of reasons;  too much salt, not enough water, hormones, tight clothes, bad food choices.  My body was delighted to get rid of the water.  It worked at it.  I would find that I lost a pound of water weight in that hour – a testament that it needed to go.  And I stank.  Because I have not been the healthiest lately, my sweat was putrid.  Like the skin off a growing snake, I shed that waste from my body so that I could continue my journey a little brighter, a little better.

The yoga instructor told us as we started, “This is not about comparing or competing in any way.  YOU are the only person in this room.  Give yourself the gift of doing only this for these 60 minutes. Go into child’s pose when it gets too much for you.  Take care of, be concerned with, only yourself.”

I listened to her as best I could.  I offered praise that the girl to the left of me set a great example that I could follow and for her inspiring beauty, I giggled when I wobbled, I listened to my body say “child’s pose” multiple times and for long periods of time.  I watched the achingly slow clock.

It was not an hour that I would like to repeat and I am glad it was not documented. But it was a needed hour.  A reset hour.  An hour to touch base with my body and apologize for neglecting what it needed, to thank it for taking me to yoga and helping me live through it.  And I belonged because I shared a common purpose with people I did not look like:  be present in this practice for 60 minutes, do the best we can, allow our bodies to tell us how much they can take and honor that limit.  And shed the toxic.

Updated May 2019.