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Monday, May 15, 2006
Why does Yoga have to hurt so much?
I suppose i should have known better. After two solid years of not exercising, one should expect that diving back into it will hurt. I think there should be a little asterisk near that thought somewhere that says, “pain will increase exponentially should the slacker undertake Yoga on her first day back.”
So i went to Yoga at 24 Hour Fitness to finally use that pass that i never use. It’s conveniently located and i get to skip traffic if i go to this class at 5:30 after work. So i headed over there, full of optimism and enthusiasm. In my memory, yoga and pilates are peaceful, soothing, stress-relieving. Oh, I was so wrong.
This particular yoga instructor loves the move “Downward facing Dog.” It looks like this:
It entails excruciating pain in your hamstrings and about 2000 other places that I don’t have names for (if they do indeed exist). Every other second she would instruct us to go into the Down Dog position. Ouch. And then there’s the issue of balance and holding poses for long periods of time. The one i just couldn’ handle was this pose where you balance on one leg and the opposite hand while lifting the other lims parallel to the ground. Example: I balanced on my right leg which remained completely straight, lifted up my left leg up behind me until it was at least parallel with the ground. I used my left hand to help balance me, while the right hand reached straight into the sky. I was sweating like a stuck pig.
Needless to say, i was useless when it came to walking up stairs and moving furniture into my apartment. Then again, i fold in half like a pretzel now with no problem. So my advice is, if you haven’t exercised in a wile, may sure you work UP to it. And don’t go to psycho yoga teachers who probably warm up for class by putting themselves on The Rack and other strange torture devices.