$5 Karma kicked my butt
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From time to time, my roommate comes home drenched in sweat, a carton of coconut water in hand. I usually greet her from the couch, a carton of Cheez-Its in hand.
But not today. Today I decided to be the hot yogi of the house. For the first time ever, I tried hot yoga.
Now, full disclaimer, this wasn’t actually my first yoga class ever. My work offers free yoga classes, which I attend a couple times a week (on good weeks, when the stars are aligned). BUT, this was my first yoga class in a 90 degree room, which is quite a different experience.
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Since I live in Plaza Midwood, I decided to walk a mile or so to Yoga One, centrally located on Central Avenue. (Okay, so I drove there. Whatever.)
I signed up ahead of time for the $5 Karma class because, duh, that’s an incredible deal. I didn’t realize this when I signed up, but our teacher, Liz Smolin, said the profits from the Karma classes go to charity.
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I’m not going to pretend it wasn’t intimidating to walk into this class of about 40 people ― at least as a newcomer. I usually do yoga with four to five coworkers in a spacious, heavily air-conditioned room. As soon as we started chanting “om,” I started wondering if I was in the wrong place. I didn’t feel very “om,” I felt very “sweaty.”
But as soon as we started flowing, I started feeling it. I quickly realized why my roommate offered to let me borrow her yoga towel ― SO MUCH SWEAT. And I wasn’t even the sweatiest. The teacher placed a few extra towels on the ground near a couple yogis to soak up their pouring “glisten,” as she called it. It was sticky, it was smelly, and it was, exciting? I couldn’t understand how everyone around me was striking poses so seamlessly, like yoga gods and goddesses disguised as real people, strolling our Charlotte streets in lulu.
After the class, I talked to the woman sitting beside me, Desiree Kube, and asked how often she comes to yoga. For every time I was catching my breath in child’s pose, she had a least one leg in the air, so I figured it wasn’t her first day. I was right. She said she does yoga every single day. When I asked her about it, she said that it helps her relieve tension. “Nothing can change how I feel after,” she said.
And, I have to admit, I did feel a little different for the rest of my day. I felt a little more energized. I stood a tiny bit taller. I even ate not-fried sushi for dinner (with a small Cheez-Its appetizer at home, of course). You know, just being healthy and stuff.