Yoga to the People!

I know I should do more yoga.

I feel relaxed and my body feels more limber, but it is hard to convince myself to do something that doesn’t always feel like a “real” workout. But, I knew my body and mind needed it so I brought my yoga mat to work this morning with hopes of making it to a yoga class tonight.

Before I even got to work, it was clear I needed it.

Occasionally, I’ll take a cab to work when I’m running late or if I’m feeling a little lazy. It’s $2.50 on the subway and about $5ish to take a cab, so it’s REALLY easy to justify sometimes.

This morning? I walked out of my apartment, got a cab and was getting out my wallet to pay…and I didn’t have my wallet.

So the cabbie turned around and brought me back to my apartment. But I’ve been using a little card case with a keychain attached…so I didn’t have my keys either and had to be let in to my apartment. I was frustrated with myself for being so forgetful, and was REALLY looking forward to yoga.

I decided to do Yoga to the People because I may do Bikram on Friday with Selena and I didn’t feel like paying for two expensive classes in one week.

Yoga to the People is a really low-key yoga studio with locations in NYC, Seattle, San Francisco and Berkeley.

Low-key also means DIRT CHEAP. I paid $7 for my yoga class.

In New York City.

They believe that focusing on yoga as a business prices it out of a lot of people’s reach, which is in direct conflict with the spirit of yoga. Yoga wasn’t supposed to just be something for yuppies with some extra disposable income.

So for a $7 yoga class, there’s no gear that they sell (I was thinking this morning how I kind of wanted to buy short yoga shorts and I almost didn’t bring shorts tonight, so I’m glad I did), there’s no big area to lounge after class. There’s a small changing room and a bathroom and the instructor sits at the entrance to the studio collecting your dolla dolla bills yo. I sprung for a dollar water and gave her $8. (Way cheaper than my cab adventure this morning. )

I did the traditional hot yoga, so it was a 90-minute class. (I just can’t get into calling it a practice. Sorry.) As tight as I feel as a runner sometimes, I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to get a little deeper into things than I have in the past. The room also seemed to be a tiny bit less hot–while I always felt hot, I never felt like I was dying. I was also pleasantly surprised how strongly my detergent smelled, in a good way, as I heated up. Tamsin swears by this stuff, and after smelling how good it is (the scent is easily detected, but not overbearing, if that makes sense), I bought it a few weeks ago. Detergent > stinky sweat. My only complaint about the class is that she didn’t lead us through a relaxation exercise to release tension from each part of the body at the end. And like Liz told me on Twitter, it is pretty cramped in the room–but not so cramped that I had a hard time doing any of the poses.

My muscles definitely feel looser, and my mind’s not racing quite as much. I need to remind myself to do more yoga–I really love how I feel after a good yoga class. (If just so that I can break a damn good sweat and sit here and smell the detergent…)