BUTT YOGA

My journey in yoga from porn to videotape to classroom to teaching

Feb 17, 2025

I was asked to substitute a yoga class. When I looked at the title of the class it was “Butt Yoga.” I was like, “Kinky!” I remember watching a pornographic film with the same title and prepared by gathering all my butt plugs and anal beads in a duffel bag. It was soon that I discovered that “Butt Yoga” was actually “Buff Yoga,” a yoga class with weights.

I learned a couple of lessons from this mishap. Firstly, my aging eyes don’t see like they used to. Secondly, always wash your anal toys after use, as “I’ll take care of it in the morning” is a fucking lie and you’ll find yourself hit in the face with a nuclear blast that smells like a decomposing mouse.

I started doing yoga because I was lifting heavy weights, running and essentially doing zero stretching. I found a videotape called Yoga For Flexibility with Rodney Yee and after using my abacus to calculate how much it would cost me with tax, I bought it and used it religiously for a couple of months. I found my body opened as much as my asshole had from all my previous years of butt yoga. Surprisingly, so did my mind.

One day while in Triangle Pose I had a revelation. I was thinking of keeping it to myself, remembering how the Book of Revelations fucked up so many people’s peace of mind, who after reading it were forever waiting for a six-headed dragon to come down and rain fire out of every head and destroy the world, not too dissimilar to another pornographic film in my collection entitled “Gonorrhea Orgy.” I thought, “If I could relax under the tension of this posture, what would my life look like if I could relax off of the mat under the tension of an argument or other life stressors?”

I soon graduated from the videotape to taking classes at yoga studios. Since I was an athlete, I liked the Power Yoga flow I learned from Rodney Yee and if I class matched that I was like, “I love yoga!” If the class was slower, I was like, “I hate yoga!” Just like going into Baskin Robbins and knowing which flavor you want, why would I suffer Mandarin Chocolate Sherbet, a bizarre combination of chocolate and orange, when I could get Rocky Road with all the nuts and marshmallows? (I actually liked Mandarin Chocolate Sherbet, and only feigned my dislike for it for comical purpose. If that was something you were attracted to, I saved you a disastrous ice-cream date with me and will now return to my proper place in the Totally Unappealing folder in your mind.)

It was after taking tons of vinyasa classes where I found that I was leaving the yoga studios exhausted, that I realized I was looking for something else on my yoga path. I was also getting into the so-called “spiritual” aspects of yoga, hoping to learn the alchemical secret which would allow me to transform Rocky Road into Mandarin Chocolate Sherbet, as according to The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali that is one of the siddhi magic powers that yoga is supposed to transfer to a serious practitioner.

I found Restorative Yoga, where you would use bolsters, blocks and blankets to support yourself in relaxing postures for 8-10 minutes per pose in order to calm and rejuvenate the nervous system. In my militancy, I was like, “This is what yoga is about, BE-ing and not DO-ing!” On account of my drooling, I ended up being given a choice to either wear a bib or leave the studio.

Being the rebel, I wore a bib and left the studio—because no one is going give me a false choice, besides the election system where both Democrats and Republicans are spawns of the same Devil seed. This reminds me of the porn film called The Devil’s Seed, that what it lacked in plot it made up for in costuming. I also shopped for a discrimination lawyer but no one would take my case, saying that no judge would buy that I had a medical condition that caused me to drool. I sued the lawyers for discriminating me from being a client because I identified as a drooler. Needless to say, the case was dismissed with prejudice. I shouted, “What kind of courtroom is this that acknowledges prejudice? I guess this is because you are following Maritime Law!” At the urging of the judge, the bailiff tossed me out of the courtroom.

I found Yin Yoga, where you held postures for 5-7 minutes without the force of gravity supported in the same way as in Restorative. I liked it and was like, “Vinyasa is too yang. Restorative is too yin. But Yin Yoga, despite its name implying otherwise, is the line between the two extremes of the Yin-Yang!” I even took a 25-hour teacher training in Yin Yoga and started teaching it.

I soon discovered that while Yin Yoga was not as drool-inducing as Restorative, “All Yin and no Vinyasa makes Jack a dull boy.” I lost my luster. Someone would tell a dick joke and instead of laughing, I would say, “That’s really sophomoric.” I didn’t even recognize who I was anymore and I didn’t like this new lack-luster Satya.

I shared with you my yoga history, well honestly, just for the jokes. But also to show you how one, okay me, can come into a situation with a bias, but, just like any held belief, sometimes with experience the preconception of bias will unclench its death grip—unless it involves a hatred for Donald Trump, in which case even shutting down ILLEGAL immigration in a single week will be looked on with the same distaste as when the woman who invented the ice-cream flavor Mandarin Chocolate Sherbet went to the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Factory and pitched mixing chocolate and orange. “You got your chocolate on my orange. You got your orange in my chocolate. Can you see how we could market it?” and was told by the CEO there was no “we” in Reese’s and dismissed her with prejudice, as he hated stupid women, and had his bailiff throw her out of his office, without even a counteroffer which included a bib.

I ended up signing up for a 200-hour yoga teacher training, not necessarily to become a yoga teacher but because I wanted to dive deeper into yoga. I graduated in 2006 and have been teaching ever since.

Which brings us to “Butt Yoga,” which my new bailiff friend explained to me was “Buff Yoga.” I came in with a bias and a bib. “This is not real yoga!” “Slinging around a set of dumbbells and doing body sculpting exercises is a bastardization of yoga!” I didn’t prepare for class more than a thought or two, not because I felt this fiasco didn’t deserve even a minute of my time where I wasn’t getting paid but because I never prepare for a class and instead surrender to the yoga gods and various prop comedians who teach through me. “While you’re in a deep lunge, pick up your sledgehammer and smash the watermelon at the front of your mat. You can thank the spirit of Gallagher for this one!”

What I found was I was pleasantly surprised! I had a good time creatively figuring out in the moment how to add exercises into the sequencing, where to place the dumbbells for a more connected flow and even a few spiritual lessons came through. I still thought the class was a bastardization of yoga, like using a chainsaw on its side as a shelf for an orchid where no self-respecting chainsaw would still be able to identify as a chainsaw.

“I was born a chainsaw but now identify as a flower shelf.”
“Sounds a little gay, no?”
“Fuck you! I’ll chop you to pieces!”
“Funny, I never heard a flower shelf say that.”
“Flower shelves are fluid, you bigot!”
“If you want to sue, you’ll need a fake judge like Merchan or Engoron to win your case. Probably best to just accept that you’re a gay chainsaw and you like fish sticks.”