A little over a month ago, my friend Melissa told me about a type of yoga called anti-gravity.  What is it exactly pray tell?  I hadn’t a clue either and, instead of explaining it to me, Melissa told me to google it.  At first I was annoyed with the fact that she would not just explain it to me, but upon googling it, I realized why.  It’s not that it is difficult to explain: you just wouldn’t get the same effect as seeing a visual of it.  In one of my rare moments, I am providing a picture below (there are very few times when I have a picture accompany a post) :).

Anti-gravity yoga, also known as aerial yoga, does in fact take place in the air, on a hammock that hangs from the ceiling to be exact…or so they call it.  (I personally, feel like it is just a piece of fabric.)  Think of the circus.  Think the dancers that climb up long drapes of fabric that are attached to the ceiling and do tricks on them.  Have you got the picture?  While I have yet to take a class, I’m pretty sure that I won’t be doing anything as advanced as that on them…also, I am scared of heights, and although it doesn’t look like you are far up at all, the idea of hanging from the ceiling on a piece of fabric just doesn’t quite seem normal to me. 

I forget why we never ended up taking a class; it could have been because our schedules weren’t matching up, which is quite common with Melissa and I, but in any event, I have resigned myself to take the plunge and take a class (hopefully with Melissa).  The studio that we were going to go to, as it happens, is a lot closer to my place than I originally thought.  I have passed by it many a time and not even realized that it was there…or perhaps I was just not looking for a yoga studio at the time and it was washed away from my memory (there was a time in my life where I denounced ever practicing yoga again…the idea of practicing it is a very recent revelation).  Though the idea of hanging from the ceiling by fabric isn’t exactly appealing (I have never been one to want to bungee jump, although part of me does want to take a trapeze class…and yes, you can take those in New York; Carrie did it on SATC and there are a few places), the unappealingness kind of makes it appealing, if that makes sense.  The last time I can think of that I did anything remotely crazy was almost two years ago when I was vacationing at Lake Tahoe with my mother and sister, and we parasailed.  I was terrified to do it, but I knew that I would regret it if I didn’t, so I pushed myself.  I don’t feel the same fright with anti-gravity yoga, but I am a little apprehensive about it, and it is definitely not in my comfort zone; which means that I have to do it while I still can.  I feel like every once in a while you need to do something that is drastically different from what you would normally do; it’s how we stay alive, how we keep growing.  If we never challenged ourselves what would be the fun in life?

Aside from the hour or so of hanging in the air, anti-gravity yoga is supposed to be a good workout, and it helps your joints decompress, which is another plus.  Unless you are someone who frequents the chiropractor, that doesn’t happen a lot.  I have been to the chiropractor only a handful of times and am not a fan of the back cracking (specifically the neck cracking)…I felt like my neck was being broken off. 

Because of my fabulousness at planning schedules, I will sadly have to wait two more weeks until I defy gravity, but I feel that it will truly be worth it.