Age backwards
I would use my well-honed reporting skills in the service of my own quest. Simply put, this was a personal mission-my way of facing my own loudly ticking clock-but a journalistic one as well. (Read another Prevention reader's case for hot yoga.) It was all part of a yearlong investigation into "turn back the clock" strategies, a journey to discover (and experiment with) ways to slow the aging process-my aging process. I was here because I had vowed to try a long list of activities, as well as treatments and therapies-and ways of thinking-that held the promise of increased energy and vitality and a happier, healthier, younger me. Oh yes: I was here to push myself out of my exercise comfort zone. Why, I asked myself (dabbing at my nose and trying to recover my dignity), was I putting myself through this? I took a ragged breath. During one particularly challenging Downward Dog sequence, I slipped, slid across my puddled mat, managed a spectacular face-plant, and gave myself a bloody nose. This was my first foray into Bikram, or hot, yoga, a 90-minute workout performed in a high-temp, steamy environment said to enhance both muscle flexibility and detoxification through (let's be classy about this) "profuse perspiration." I was dripping onto my yoga mat, creating little puddles as I moved from posture to posture, leaving sweaty hand- and footprints in my wake.
Age backwards series#
The air was thick with the exertions of two dozen hardworking, mostly midlife women who were inhaling, exhaling, grunting, and groaning their way through a vigorous series of 26 yoga poses.