Healing in the Heat
The power of hot yoga is helping me heal.
When I moved back to the city after a short stint living in a rural village, I swapped my daily commute into Sheffield – a cramped and soul-sucking train journey – for a monthly yoga pass at Soul Fire Studios.
This was the first step I took towards investing in and choosing myself. Exchanging a tedious chore for a nourishing yoga practice felt like such a novelty, and it still does six months later.
Beyond the joy of dedicating time to move my body every week, I’ve found that the fiery heat of a hot yoga class provided a powerful space for me to heal after a huge change in my life. It has been a sanctuary, where I can bring everything to the mat and shed what I need to.
The trick with hot yoga is to let the warmth in instead of our natural reaction to fight against it. It can take a couple of classes to get used to, but over time that practice has become meditative for me. It has helped me to see that I can manage life’s little frustrations, have more patience, trust in myself and adapt to discomfort when it shows up.
On the mat, as the sweat drips from my eyelashes and I let the heat wash over me, I’m able to go inward and access the parts of me I make little time for in life – the physical me, the intuitive me, the me who believes I can do this, both inside and outside of the class.
On a difficult day, I feel held by the heat.
On a good day, I feel charged with the strength to keep pushing forward.
In each class I go through the embodied motions of life with twists and turns, stretching and reaching, before folding, bending and taking a minute when I need it.
After a strenuous balance where I put my all into standing tall, I’m back with my chest against my thighs and my arms hanging at my feet as I flop into recovery.
Isn’t that a great metaphor?
After six months of showing up for myself instead of being hunched over on that slow train, my yoga practice has become a ritual. In the heat, I can shed the layers I collect throughout the day and come home to myself again and again.
