Like a Butterfly in a Cocoon: Aerial Yoga Swings Into Sierra Vista

By R.J. Cohn 

If you have always wanted to dangle in the air like a trapeze artist, you don’t have to run away to join a circus.

Instead of swinging from trapeze riggings 50 feet off the ground, you can do it safely and more therapeutically in Sierra Vista through aerial yoga at My Yoga Community Center on State Route 92 next to Nirvana’s My Cup of Joe.

In a novel twist that takes traditional yoga to a new level, aerial yoga allows you to suspend mid-air cocooned in a silk hammock mounted from the ceiling while performing yoga poses and movements, many which aren’t achievable on the floor.

“It offers another option in stretching your body, giving you a wider range of motion while being supported by a swaying hammock,” says My Yoga studio owner Justin Westbrook, who has a M.A. in yoga therapy. “You feel calm and invigorated, both during and after the workout.”

Yoga instructors like Westbrook – who opened his studio in 2022 offering seven different forms of yoga -- say aerial yoga builds strength and flexibility along with helping to reduce stress and anxiety.

“The resistance you get from the apparatus when you pull and climb on the hammock provides you with a kind of exercise you can’t do on floors,” says Westbrook, one of the studio’s two aerial instructors. “Plus, it promotes a sense of relaxation by being cradled in a hammock that’s also supporting your body, even when doing some inverted positions.”

Also known as anti-gravity yoga, the practice combines yogic postures with elements of Pilates, dance and a touch of acrobatics. But you don’t have to be a super-limber acrobat or a top-level athlete to get the swing of aerial yoga. All you do is let the hammock do the work. 

The swaying and almost-floating sensation from the suspended hammock gives a sense of weightlessness, which – according to a study in a Research and Dance Education journal – reduces anxiety and promotes contemplative states. Proponents say the hammock’s support also provides deeper relaxation, releases tension in tight muscles, can improve blood circulation and relax one’s nervous system.

“I see a lot of exhilaration and smiles when people try it, even for the first time,” says Westbrook, “especially after they step into the hammock and become inverted. There are a lot of different varieties of yoga like restorative and chair yoga. Aerial yoga is another form, and everyone has been asking about it.” 

It’s been so popular since Westbrook introduced it in February that he currently has a waiting list for people wanting to try it. Offering one weekly session with nine hammocks, Westbrook is planning to expand classes by the end of summer. He also offers private classes for those seeking more of a one-on-one approach or have conflicting time schedules.

“Aerial yoga is simply another form of exercise that creates movement in the body,” says Westbrook. “We have community members from 7 to over 60 doing it. Everyone, regardless of body size, has been successful at it and are enjoying themselves participating in this. It’s been wonderful seeing community members taking to aerial yoga like this.”