If you’ve ever thought about going to a yoga class, or picked up a pamphlet and stuck it in your bag and thought “Yes! Yoga sounds like so much fun and I am going to do it!” and then when it comes time to register for said class or someone contacts you about it your first instinct was to hide, then this article is for you.

Yoga is a beautiful, sweaty, fun, disgusting mess. I was always daunted by the idea of going to a yoga class-- I’m not small, I’m not insanely flexible and my hair isn’t long enough to put up so when I do downward dog I look a little like Cousin Itt. I have been to quite a few yoga classes, however, and if you think I’m going to say that they were actually really great and that they weren't awkward or weird, and my feet didn’t make a squeaking noise against the shiny floor that was really loud in the awkward silence that is yoga, you are wrong.

Every yoga class I’ve ever been to was exactly like that. I would come in, sit on my mat on the floor in the complete quiet with my back hurting, and then the yoga instructor would start doing moves that made me feel awkward with my body. In one yoga class, the instructor actually moved my leg for me. It was really weird and I never went back.

What I have realized is that yoga is supposed to be a way to get to know yourself-- to become comfortable with your body and find out what it can and can’t do. It is unfair to say that yoga is too hard when there are so many variations to ensure that you are being safe and not hurting your body.

When I look back at all the reasons I hated yoga classes in the past, I can tell that it was just me not being comfortable in my own body. We have a fixed idea of what someone who does yoga is supposed to be like-- maybe he or she goes jogging in the morning, she’s probably Buddhist, she’s thin and incredibly flexible, she’s the one in all those yoga memes on Facebook sitting cross-legged on the top of a mountain with the sun in the background. This, however, is ridiculous. There is no qualification for going and getting right with yourself, and that’s what yoga is: taking a moment and checking in with yourself.

If you are interested in yoga, go for it! If you are interested in having some quiet time to get to know yourself more and gain some flexibility, go for it! Nothing can stop you except you. Yoga is very good for you mentally and physically. Join a yoga class, go in confidently, ignore the back pain and the squeaky floors, and don’t worry about if the person next to you can reach their feet back and touch their head. Focus on you, because chances are you are paying quite a bit for this.

I, for one, will be signing up.