fitness

Exercise bookends: Love letter to Sunday hot yoga

Sam B

I’ve written before about why I exercise on Mondays. Usually I start the week with some combo of running, weight lifting, and Aikido.

So I bookend the start of the week with those things. But I like a different sort of bookend at the end of the week, hot yoga. I aim for the Sunday night class, 8-9 pm, at a little yoga studio just a few blocks from my house.

I can walk over there, bend and stretch in the steamy hot yoga room, walk home, and call it a night. (Tonight also involved the last ever episode of Downton Abbey with my mother, green tea, some laundry, a bath, and this blog post.)

I’m a bit of a weekend warrior when it comes to exercise and I hate stretching so Sunday night yoga helps set all that to right. Especially in the Canadian winter this stiff, non-flexible, muscular person loves the hot yoga room. When it goes well and yoga girl doesn’t ruin my chill it’s also a terrific way to find some quiet and some peace on a Sunday. Namaste, friends.

 

Published by Sam B

Philosopher, feminist, parent, and cyclist! Co-founder of Fit Is a Feminist Issue, co-author of Fit at Mid-Life: A Feminist Fitness Journey, published by Greystone Books.

8 thoughts on “Exercise bookends: Love letter to Sunday hot yoga”

  1. I missed your “Yoga Girl” post before but I’m glad I found it through this one. I really like hot yoga as a physical experience too. But I was driven out by the 24 year old yoga teacher yammering. Also the 50 year old yoga dude teacher bull. It’s a shame that our culture has twisted this practice into pseudo something. I don’t even know what. I just know I now prefer Pilates.

  2. Thanks for writing about bookending and enjoying the hotness of hot yoga. It moves me to consider more seriously trying it. I followed the link back to Yoga Girl entirely to rewatch Angry Yoga, because it is so perfect. 🙂

  3. As a yoga teacher, and a person whose entire life has been transformed partly through yoga, it’s a tough one.

    I don’t talk much, but I do try to get across the idea of mindfulness and using yoga as a way to stop worrying and obsessing by focusing on what your body is doing now. For me, that is the power of the physical practice.

    There are few places in the world where we can hear the message of self acceptance and being at peace with ones thoughts. Yoga is one of them.

    I guess my thought is that if you don’t want to hear that you should choose Pilates or stretching. Yoga can be more. And for many, it is.

    If I don’t like what the teacher is saying I don’t listen. That has taken LOTS of practice. And is another significant yoga teaching for me. I don’t have to agree with how others do things, but I do need to allow them to do them. Unless they are being rude or offensive.

    Just another thought from someone who sees it differently.

    I love. The heat too. It’s cooooold in northern Alberta.

    Anne

    1. That’s okay. And yes, I usually can tune out some of it but this was a bit much especially given the week I’d had. And I’m happy with a general message of acceptance and peace, but this was a bit too directive in ways that weren’t helpful! 🙂

      1. I agree. I went to one class recently where the teacher brought up the idea of trauma. I’m not sure where these ideas come from, but they aren’t appropriate for a public class.

        I teach at our local recovery centre and I try to keep things on breathing and recognizing the body. And a little heavy metal to loved the mood.

        Trauma is for therapy.

  6. Fuck yeah, hot yoga! I’ve been doing it for a couple of months now and I’m obsessed. I’m sure I’d love it even more if I was going into and coming out of the studio into cold air, instead of what we have right now, which is 60-ish degrees at night. Oh well, it still rules.

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