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In this post:

Introduction

I was very kindly gifted a gorgeous CompleteGrip™ Eco Yoga Mat from Complete Unity Yoga. It was at this point that I realised I’d never told my yoga story on this blog but had always wanted to mention it with regard to how it personally helps my mental health. I’ve always been into the idea of how movement can help both physical and psychological well-being and have a decently long history of yoga in my own life.

My Own Yoga Practice

I’ve practiced yoga on and off for several years. My first experience with it was when I borrowed a ‘yoga for children’ book from the library at around age 10. I remember attempting to copy the pictures in my living room while my mum tried to watch the TV behind me. After this, I only went to the odd class or two throughout my younger teenage years as it just wasn’t something that was readily available in my local area. It was only when I left to go to university that I was able to join a weekly hot yoga class as part of my gym membership. This was where I truly fell in love with it. My teacher was patient, knew my limitations and tried to help me to grow from them. Unfortunately though, despite my love of the sport, it came with mixed emotions.

I had spent a significant portion of my younger life riding horses. One of the backbones of riding is holding a specific position no matter what and retaining absolute control and communication of the horse you’re working with for that session. This type of form and posture naturally does not lend itself well to flexibility in my opinion. Of course, there are professionals out there who can probably do it all – ride beautifully and contort perfectly into every yoga pose in the book. I am nothing like these people.

With this in mind, it isn’t hard to see that yoga frustrated and continues to frustrate me at times to this day. As an avid gym-goer, I had it in my head that I’d find yoga ‘easy’ and quickly master it but it simply never happened. Despite going to weekly classes for the three years I attended university, my forward folds never changed. I still can’t touch my toes and I look like I’m being lazy or not trying when I try to bend forwards for a pose. Regardless of my frustration though, I still keep going to classes at my local gym and have an at-home routine. For me, working through negative feelings about my own ability is a way of working on how I deal with other difficult emotions in life. There’s no point in beating myself up over something I can’t change and I feel it is important to continually practice a form of self-acceptance via doing an activity that brings these feelings to the surface.

A further reason of why I continue to practice yoga is the apparent benefit to menstrual wellbeing. As someone who loves all things cycle related, maintaining a healthy hormonal balance as well as minimising negative symptoms such as PMS is something that is often at the front of my mind. Studies have shown that a regular yoga practice is able to provide a number of emotional benefits to females within the menstruating age group such as decreases in anger, depression and anxiety (source). A study also showed that yoga may be able to reduce menstrual cramps which is definitely a win for me – I am someone who has struggled with cramping ever since my periods began.

Why I Love Yoga

As I just touched on, yoga has numerous health benefits. Aside from it being a personal tool for working through challenging emotions, I wanted to mention some other interesting benefits I learned about during my research for this post. I have linked the studies on each point for your reference.

Reduced stress (source)
Improved sleep compared to a non-active control group (source)
Decreased depression, decreased average pain levels and increased energy in those experiencing chronic pain (source)
Improved emotional well-being in those undergoing breast cancer treatment (source)
Reducing suffering that often comes with chronic urologic conditions (source)
Slightly better outcomes for those suffering mild pelvic organ prolapse – although more research is needed on this one! (source)
Improved sexual satisfaction in female MS sufferers compared to a control group who did not do yoga (source)

While I realise that some of these points are fairly obscure, I never knew there were so many specific studies relating to yoga out there. I’d always known that yoga was good for flexibility and helping with relaxation but I hadn’t really considered it could go further than that.

Complete Unity Yoga Review – Eco Yoga Mat

As mentioned at the beginning of this post, I was gifted a lovely new mat from Complete Unity Yoga to review. On arrival, I was thrilled to see that the mat was packaged in just paper and paper tape making it recyclable. Unfortunately, this isn’t common practice with brands selling eco-friendly products so it’s always very much appreciated.

My first impressions of the mat were very positive. The colour is really nice and the natural jute adds a nice contrast to the plum colour. I also had high hopes for the grip given the feel of it under my fingertips. The overall feel of the material is spongy enough to support joints but thin enough to facilitate balancing poses.

Another few factors I noticed as soon as I opened the outer packaging was that the label states 3 trees have been planted and that the mat is ethically made and environmentally friendly. These things personally make me really happy to see from a product.

On trying the mat out for a yoga flow, the grip truly lived up to my expectations. I felt able to go more deeply into poses as I was no longer worried about slipping. I also noticed less wrist tension during movements where my weight was on my hands – likely because I was able to relax my fingers rather than subconsciously clawing for grip. Normally, I wear grippy socks during my practice as I can never get enough leverage through my feet but this was no longer a problem for my bare feet on the CompleteGrip™ Eco mat. Something trivial I also noticed was that the mat unrolls and rolls back up far more easily than my low-cost usual mat (which is very lightweight and quite poor quality compared with this one). I foresee this mat lasting significantly longer than mats I’ve had in the past as the material feels much more durable, unlike many others out there where the thin foam splits or shreds apart over time.

Having not tried any products from Complete Unity Yoga before receiving this mat, they’re now definitely high on my list for consideration when I’m next in the market for yoga or meditation equipment. For me, their company values align with my own (eco-friendliness, high-quality products) and I really love my new mat to a point where I definitely look forward to my practice.