Hot Yoga & Stress Relief – Does it Really Work?
Many exercises help with stress relief – but did you know that hot yoga can considerably lower the very hormonal excretions that are indices for stress in the body? Yoga comes from a Sanskrit pair of words meaning to yoke together or to join. It is only when we become yoked to our higher selves that we become stress-less, but what exactly does that mean? Is yoga a purely physical means to reduce stress or is there something else going on there?
In the yogic philosophy the real you is not a disjointed, hurried, overly strained human being running around in a world of never ending to do lists or responsibilities. The real you is timeless. The real you is so expansive that it need not strive to be anywhere other than you are right now. You need not strive to make more money, have more friends, get more education, and climb the social ladder. The real you is more like Sat Chit Ananda, an everywhere present knowing and being that has no needs or desires because its knowingness encompasses everything. If you were a fish swimming in a sea of water, would you wish or dream for more water? No, you’d already know that it is all around you – you were swimming in it.
Yoga practice helps us to remember that we are Sat Chit Ananda instead of mother, brother, boss, employee, husband, wife, parents, friend, etc. It strips away the labels. When we are doing a series of asana in a heated room, our concentration slowly begins to come absorbed into what we are doing right there in that moment, and although we know that all our worries and concerns will still be there for us if we choose to pick them up again after our practice is over, from the first asana to the last minute of shavasana we learn to go beyond the self-imposed limitations that mistakenly lead us to believe we don’t have enough of something. Whether it is patience, money, time, or any other resource. Practicing hot yoga makes us sweat through those uncomfortable feelings in our bodies so we don’t have to think about it anymore. How many hours have you already spent ruminating about that problem anyway? It is only when you let it go, when you feel another inch of give in your muscles on the mat, or make it to the end of 90 minute session with your body and soul still intact, and dare I say, expanded, that we get closer to the feeling of Infiniteness that more truly represents our Self.
Yes, we will stop making so much cortisol and adrenaline. Yes, our brains will start flooding the body with feelings of bliss and joy – a result of higher levels of DHA and serotonin. And yes! We will feel less stressed, but it is only through moving into and beyond our perceived limitations, both physically and mentally that we start to feel expansive – and there is no stress in the Infinite.
