Learn about Sunshine Yoga Shack: Yoga & Aerial in Mansfield, TX

Welcome to Sunshine Yoga Shack. Have you been to the studio yet? I love this place. If you haven’t been, you’ve got to come. We have got an amazing group of yogis and aerialists that attend class every day. It’s quite the community, and I love seeing everyone come into the doors and just start chatting.

I know at some places you might have practiced yoga, you go in and it’s kind of intimidating. It’s really quiet. Or maybe there’s a clique of people over in one corner, and they don’t really include you, and you feel a little self-conscious.

Well, I remember feeling that way a lot over my yoga journey. So I started this place because I wanted a place where everyone felt welcome. Everyone could come in and take class and not worry about what they look like. They don’t know anything about yoga. They don’t know anything about aerial.

Just come to class. You learn as you go.

We break every class down to help that very first-timer and also to challenge someone who’s been to a thousand yoga classes. So we are an all-encompassing yoga studio, and we want everyone who is interested in yoga coming in and taking a class.

So I want to talk to you today about our classes.

We have lots of different things on the schedule, and if you don’t know anything about yoga, you might not really understand what we’re talking about. So let’s start with our Hot Vinyasa Yoga.

Our Hot Vinyasa Yoga is going to be at 95° in the room most of the time. Sometimes it gets a little hotter and sometimes it’s hard to get it to 95, but most of the time it’s 95. We’ve got 80% humidity and it feels amazing.

When you’re practicing Hot Vinyasa, what does that mean? It’s going to be our challenging yoga class that offers arm balances, it offers inversions, and you’ll see a lot of high to low planks or vinyasas.

Typically, traditionally, a vinyasa is a movement through a series of postures with breath. So it can be anything, but typically we’re talking about high plank, low plank, upward-facing dog, and then into downward-facing dog. And that would create a vinyasa.

In Hot Vinyasa Yoga, we’re going to move through challenging sun salutations and we’ll offer those arm balances and inversions and give you a nice sweaty practice to your breath.

We invite you to do what you can and start where you are.

We never want you to force or strain through any of our yoga practices because all yoga should be done with effort and ease. And if you’re straining, if you’re holding your breath or out of breath, that stops being yoga and maybe it turns into something else.

We want to keep it traditional but offer lots of variations that fit everyone’s body.

Our Hot Vinyasa class—this is Power Yoga. So if you come and take Power Vinyasa Yoga, it’s the same thing as the Hot Vinyasa Yoga, but there’s no heat. The room is heated or it’s right at 78°.

So it’s perfect for someone who wants a challenge but they don’t like the heat.

Now we’ve got Hatha Yoga—and here we call it our Deep Hatha Yoga.

So what is Hatha? Hatha is the sun and the moon, and we merge them together to create a traditional, balanced yoga class.

Again, we move through sun salutations with breath. We hold the postures a little longer than in the power classes, and we move a little slower.

This is going to encompass a sauna—so powerful, activated yoga postures. And at the end we’re going to have more of the yin yoga, which is the moon, the release, the softness leading into a meditative state.

So we’ve got the best of both worlds.

It’s not going to be something that’s going to strain your body or leave you depleted, because you should never feel depleted after practice. You should feel energized.

Hatha, or the Deep Hatha Yoga, is perfect for all levels. Actually, you should be able to attend any of our classes whether you’re a beginner or very experienced yogi.

Now if you are just starting out or you have limited mobility, you should try our Yin Yoga, Nidra, and Sound.

If you’re asking, what is that? What does that mean?

Yin Yoga is deep release yoga postures on the ground. This is for your connective tissue. We hold the postures 3 to 5 minutes, and we’re leading the body into a relaxed state.

Yin Yoga is not restorative yoga. It is actually using release to support the body and it allows gravity to draw you deeper into the postures.

As you stay in the postures, there should be no flexing of muscles. It’s that deep release. So the connective tissue has time to untangle scar tissue, tension, tightness, and even trauma.

As you work through about 30 to 40 minutes of the yin postures, then we add in a Yoga Nidra meditation.

It’s a very specific type of meditation. It’s a guided meditation and it helps to reset and rewire the brain.

The science behind it—through brain scans of the practice—shows 20 minutes of Yoga Nidra is equivalent to 2 hours of REM sleep.

So this is going to help reset the central nervous system and train your body and your brain so you get better sleep, taking you to a deeper state of relaxation each night.

Now, you might not be totally aware of everything that happens during Yoga Nidra, but you cannot do it wrong.

You do get better at it every time you come to class.

And you’re like—better at what? Better at relaxation.

That’s very important for the quality of our life.

Also, when we finish the yin, when we finish the meditation, we do a Sound Bath.

So you’ve got 5 to 10 minutes of sound healing or just the sound of the singing bowls, and they’re going to resonate in your body at a cellular level.

Imagine trying to relax but then you’re put into this environment where everyone is also coming to a relaxed state, and then you feel the vibrational effects of the singing bowls.

They’re going to resonate at your body at the cellular level and help the body start to relax deep within.

This is helping you calm the body and find that relaxation state.

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Aerial Yoga at Sunshine ✨

Now, those are the traditional yoga classes that we have.

Then we have something a little less traditional: Aerial Yoga.

When you practice aerial yoga at Sunshine, we’re not a circus school—we’re a yoga studio.

We’re using breath and movement to guide your body and your mind to a stronger state.

How do we do that?

We start in the fabric and then begin to move through traditional yoga postures using the fabric for support.

We practice about 30 minutes of this. You’ll feel great decompression in all your joints while also building strength through resistance with the fabric.

Then we’re going to teach you an aerial skill.

Usually, it can just be one skill, but we’re going to build some skills together to create this sequence of events—or this great aerial vignette.

You have to learn how to use the aerial fabric. It’s not something you’re going to come in and instantly know what to do.

You’ve got to learn how to do it.

It takes body awareness. It takes listening to instructions.

But even beginners can come in and be successful.

However, you have to come in with that state of mind that you want to learn.

Every day is a different experience.

There are so many different variations and options with aerial, and hopefully you come and you learn to love it just like I do.

It is habit forming.

If you’ve been in the aerial class, you know who the aerial addicts are.

It’s a good time for everyone and we hope that you want to try it as well.

Join Us at Sunshine Yoga Shack

That covers all the regularly scheduled classes at the studio.

Just look online at the classes, pick one that fits your schedule, pick one that fits your interest, and come and have a good time with us here at Sunshine Yoga Shack.

We look forward to seeing you!