Something that improves with age? You.

Is it really a "New Year" if you just get older?

What if you could truly "renew" instead of aging?

It's possible. Without creams, medications, treatments, plastic surgeries. With yoga. Did you ever wonder why yoga is the only exercise regime that actually makes your body feel better as you age? Can you say that about running? Or rock climbing? Biking? Baseball? I can't think of a single other regimen, exercise or sport that reverses the affects of aging; in fact, all of the aforementioned accelerate it.

I started practicing yoga at 15 years old, with a young, unknown TV yogi named Lilias Folan.

Little did I know then that yoga would become my anti-aging secret. After 40 years I can say from experience: yoga is my ticket to aging gracefully.

Lilias, now her in her sixties, can confirm this. I met Lilias up close and personal about five years ago at an Omega Yoga Conference in NYC. She is WAY taller and more stately than she appeared on the small screen - even past age 60, she towered over me (Ok, I am only 5'1"...but Lilias also dwarfed most of the women AND men in the room) as I went up  to thank her for...well, everything...

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3 More Things I have Learned from Sweaty Naked People

In the past 15 years, I’ve touched more than 5000 sweaty, naked people. By choice.

I am a hot yoga teacher.

I mostly frown on public nakedness (I have had several requests to add “nude hot yoga” to our schedule. Not gonna happen.) Hot yoga is the exception.

In hot yoga, you're shedding your clothing... and your secrets. Because like it or not, your body never lies.

I touch sweat-drenched students with the intention to bring you deeper into a pose. And as I hold on, you teach me a lot about what you are willing to let go.

What are you releasing in hot yoga? I can tell you with a single touch...

There you are, mat to mat with people of all sizes, shapes and smells, testing the limits of your skimpiest clothing, your dripping sweat, your ability to focus despite distractions (this is not easy, especially in forward bends.)

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Hot Yoga: Everyone out of the Comfort Zone

Hot yoga is a routine, but there's nothing routine about it.

You do the same yoga poses in every hot yoga class, so the inexperienced might be tempted to think that this kind of routine might create a kind of comfortable, predictable laziness.

I've heard lots of adjectives for hot yoga but comfortable isn't one of them.

Yes, the yoga poses don't vary; Hot Yoga is structured to work your entire body from bones to skin, as they say. Complete each pose and you've just had a whole body workout.

But some people are still a bit mixed up about hot yoga and exercise...

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DIY Yoga?

I was walking out of Trader Joe's, my arms filled with grocery bags (who needs a shopping cart?) when the man ahead of me offered to hold the door. "Thanks, I've got it," I said from behind my brown paper wall.

Immediately I heard the voice in my head say, "LET HIM HOLD THE GODDAMN DOOR OPEN FOR YOU!"

The DIY (Do It Yourself) mantra has got us all a bit hypnotized.

My own song goes like this:

"I don't need no-body; I Can Do It Myself, I'm Independent!"

If that's true, why does no one ever say, "I never want to find my soulmate," or, "My greatest wish is to die alone."

What if we've all been duped by DIY?...

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Is hot yoga too rigid to make you flexible?

"Is it boring to do the same 26 poses every hot yoga class?"

Er...no. Waking up every morning isn't boring. Everytime you do it, it's another fresh start.

"What about how every teacher uses the same words to explain the poses - what's up with that?"

We do it to hypnotize you. We do it to brainwash you. We do it to control you.

Yes, really.

We do it because we're afraid that maybe you're already hypnotized. You're already too rigid. We want hot yoga to wake you up and stretch your...life. Here's what we mean.

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