Whether you’re working hard to become pregnant or it’s the biggest surprise of your life, learning you’re expecting brings a wave

of questions and considerations, especially regarding your hot yoga and Pilates practice.

To continue practicing or not, that is the question.

There is a specific Bikram Yoga Pregnancy series designed to strengthen and support changing bodies and, growing a little human! In the pregnancy series certain poses that could be contraindicated during pregnancy are avoided and either you rest or they are replaced with poses that offer more support, health, vitality and wellness during pregnancy, labor and delivery.

With May being Mental Health Awareness month, I wanted to personally shine the light on the mental aspects of the mind we develop every time we take a 26 and 2 hot yoga class.

Every time you step on your mat, along with the dripping sweat, improved range of motion, and all the other goodies, you practice and develop faith, concentration, self-control, determination, and patience, which brings equanimity to the mind.

Having the yoga room be a safe place for all students is paramount to what we teach and what we strive to create.

Within this place of safety, the yoga room and our hot yoga practice simultaneously acts a powerful tool to teach ourselves what we like to call “good discipline” that will help us in all aspects of life.

What does this mean you ask?

I could not believe there wasn’t a one-page checklist that existed with all the legal instructions for owning your own business! This was a time of releasing my chokehold grip so I could allow the growth that can be. And often this growth doesn’t come by way of ease, or an easy candyland game path. Usually, I’ve found mine riddled with potholes, no-parking signs, unanswered questions, and sometimes defeat.

One of the many gifts of Bikram Yoga I love is cultivating the powerful tool of re-framing negative self-talk. Seeing yourself on your mat in the mirror is powerful. If you’re like me, you also have (what I lovingly refer to as) my itty bitty shitty committee that takes control in my head.