Feeling tense? With beer drinking and cursing, rage yoga can help

Practice brings incredible joy afterward, instructor says

Photo credit: Heather Robinson.

You know how sometimes when something is getting to you, you just want to scream and cuss?

Rage yoga could be the best way to do it.

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Instructor Ashley Duzich says it will get you "zen as f---" and bring you incredible joy afterward.

The practice involves relieving stress through mudras, promoting enlightenment and clarity, and relieving tension and anxiety -- all by doing yoga while drinking and cursing.

Well, I'll be damned if that doesn't sound like quite the treat.

Duzich is a yoga teacher teaches in Houston. She said she stumbled on rage yoga through a Google search as she was going through a low point. Her regular yoga practice of 10 years was not serving her the way she needed.

"I absolutely loved (rage yoga). This is something that needs to be out there," she said after learning of it.

She became so passionate about it that she flew to Calgary, Alberta, to meet with the woman who invented it, Lindsay Istace, and to train so that she could teach it, too.

Duzich said she's heard people yell all kinds of things in her classes, from cussing out the person who cut them off in traffic to speaking -- er, yelling -- their mind to their boss.

"I told you to do the dishes!"

"F--- the patriarchy!"

Photo credit: David Tong.

Duzich, who has a background in teaching yoga at mental health hospitals, said rage yoga is a good way to let go of things you're bottling up. Instead of exploding at someone you care about, yell it out while practicing yoga and drinking beer. It's simply another tool to help us.

She said she is very conscious of people who suffer from alcoholism and makes it a point to talk to each person separately.

"I try to be very cognizant that not everybody drinks," she said. "If you want, you can go have a beer ... or water."

Duzich’s class in Houston at Brash Brewery -- a heavy metal brewery that promotes big, in-your-face beers -- was, for some time, the only class offered in the country.

At last check, there were more classes made available in more areas, from instructors who have gotten their rage yoga certifications. It’s unknown how they’ve been affected by the pandemic.

Rage yoga classes are available online, too, if there’s not a session near you yet, or you’re not comfortable going out.

A certification program for rage yoga is also available, but those who are interested in that certification will need to have a pre-existing understanding of yoga and teaching yoga. They will be asked to provide proof of their 200-hour training.

Duzich said she wants to give the tool to others -- as many others as she can.

"I want to get as many people certified in the country as possible," she said.

What do you think about rage yoga? Would you like to see it practiced near you? Tell us in the comment section below.

This story was first published in 2019. It has since been updated.


About the Author:

Dawn Jorgenson, Graham Media Group Branded Content Managing Editor, began working with the group in April 2013. She graduated from Texas State University with a degree in electronic media.