Now this is more like it I think to myself, draped over a bolster, the heat of the room and the scented oils lulling me into dangerously sleepy territory. I can't actually tell if the heavy breathing in the rest of the room is ujjayi breathing or just people verging on actually snoring.
I felt after my traumatic Bikram yoga experience (read about it here if you are interested) that I deserved a nice relaxing form of yoga. So I decided to take a yin class...which let's face it might as well be renamed “nap yoga” or “yoga for lazy people”.
The room was pretty hot, but not seventh circle of hell hot. It was also nicely scented with soothing essential oils so if there was a stench of sweat it in the room was covered by Eau de lavender oil so I couldn't detect it. We were told to get out four blocks and a bolster and lay down on our mats to start the class. So far so awesome. We then proceeded to go through a slooooooow routine involve mostly seated or lying poses. Yin yoga goes for deep stretching, there was a lot of stretching out of thighs and hips and shoulders. But whilst lying flat on the ground hence avoiding that unpleasant exercise feeling. We want as little of that as possible, lets face it. If we wanted that feeling we'd be at the Bikram studio.
The class progressed further and thankfully got no more challenging, it was about an hour and a half long and we held each pose for several minutes at which point you were nearly asleep and drooling on your bolster...only to to be rudely awakened by the instructor and told to move to the next position.
I also have the feeling our instructor might have been Glinda the Good Witch. At one point I was completely settled in a seating position, for some reason my eyes popped open and I swear she whipped her head round immediately as if she knew someone was less than restful in her class. She also wandered round the class dispensing little massages, seeming to know exactly who needed what.
The only bad thing I can say about this kind of yoga is that with all the props you found yourself messing about with them whilst trying to get into the perfect position that you could hold the pose and feel a stretch but not feel like an overstretched rubber band. What seems comfortable initially can become uncomfy after a few minutes, even in a restful pose. This meant there was little flow in the actual class as the teacher had to help people do a lot of adjustments. But it was amazing and pretty much the most restful experience I've had while actually awake.
I guess another downside is that obviously you're not burning much in the way of calories. But I guess, since you clicked on an article titled “Nap yoga”; you're not looking for exercise are you, you lazy bum? No criticism here, any time I can tell people I'm attending an exercise class when I'm actually going to nap in a hot room in some weird shapes named after animals I consider a pretty big win.
In all seriousness. This is a really amazing form of yoga and I recommend any yogis to take a class or follow a video in yin once or twice a week if you are practising vigorous forms of yoga like ashtanga or Vinyasa flow. I can really recommend Yoga with Kassandra.You may well find you get more stretch in a class like this because your body is so deeply relaxed it just gives a little more. You may find it time it helps you get into more challenging poses in your other practices. There's no need to do it in a hot room, but I would recommend trying at least a class in a warmer temperature even if you're not particularly fond of heat, because it's just a really pleasant and incredibly relaxing. You will sleep like a baby afterwards, so an evening class in this type of yoga is always really pleasant. Plus it's always great to leave class with a bit of a sweat, then you can at least pretend you had a workout.
@catonwheels got you a $1.56 @minnowbooster upgoat, nice! (Image: pixabay.com)
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