I'm on a mission at Tom's Guide this spring and summer, and it's simple: try as many weird and wonderful workout classes as I possibly can, and report back on what I find.
This is my first class in our new "Workout Workshop" series, and it didn't fail me.
My dreams finally came true: I tried puppy yoga.
Anyone who knows me knows nothing makes me happier than when I’m flowing through a sweaty hot yoga session or playing with my four-year-old rottipoo Daisy, so imagine how uncool I played it when I got invited to combine two of my big life loves — yoga and puppies.
My first thought was this: is puppy yoga ethical? So I did a little digging into Take A Paws, where I'd be attending my first class. Thankfully (from what I know), they are.
The charitable business donates 5% of profits to a chosen shelter or charity, and puppies are carefully selected from local breeders close to each studio, offering pups the chance to learn basic socialization skills before leaving the litter.
Animal workout classes are hot right now, from puppy yoga to exercising with goats, bunnies and kittens. But animal welfare is my top priority, and with that box ticked, I headed into my first 60-minute puppy yoga class to find out what I’d learn.
Here’s how it went down.
What is puppy yoga?
Imagine a pile of pups aged eight to 11 weeks, with breeds ranging from dalmations to labradors, padding around in your yoga class. That’s puppy yoga in a nutshell.
Classes are held in small, safe studios with equally small group sizes to minimize the chances of overwhelm or stress. Each class starts with the do’s and don’ts you’d expect from exercising with animals, then the puppies are released from their pen and given the chance to roam about. And the yoga begins.
While they play, nap, or nibble (I seemed to get the brunt of the nose nibbling), your yoga instructor guides you through a gentle yoga flow — you can do as much or as little yoga as you desire — while giving short breaks to engage with the puppies.
Bliss.
I tried puppy yoga for the first time — here’s exactly what happened
Here's what I learned.
Class started with a safety demonstration
The Take A Paws team takes puppy yoga ethics seriously, so before any pups are released into the class, you learn how to hold them safely and when to give them space. If they’re sleeping, don’t wake them up!
Despite the constant urge to scoop them up for cuddles, yogis are encouraged to let them approach of their own accord, and each mat comes with a few toys to play with if you’re lucky enough for any pups to give you special attention.
I did minimal yoga — and I don’t care
My instructor Tiri led our group through a gentle yoga routine involving stretching, twisting exercises and some beginner-friendly flows.
Unsurprisingly, there wasn’t a huge amount of yoga on the menu, given that I had two puppies sitting on my chest and face (at the same time). However, yoga in all its forms has a strong mindfulness component.
One of the most mindful activities out there includes playing with animals. An article, “The Power of Pets,” published in News in Health, found that interacting with animals can decrease cortisol (the stress hormone) and lower blood pressure.
Frontiers in Psychology published a review of 69 studies on human-animal interaction and found health benefits for social attention, mood, stress-related parameters like cortisol, heart rate and blood pressure, plus benefits for fear and anxiety levels.
The researchers believe the oxytocin system plays a key role. If you’re unfamiliar with oxytocin, it’s a hormone that impacts human behavior and reproduction and is commonly known as the “love hormone.”
A wealth of research supports the benefits of animal-human interactions for oxytocin and physical wellness. Science Direct even published a systematic review of 129 studies assessing human-dog interactions alone, and found increased heart rate variability and oxytocin and decreased cortisol markers in over half of the studies including these parameters.
Yoga or no yoga, puppy yoga has health benefits.
It was unbearably cute
Nearly every dog, minus one or two at the time of writing (one is a chunky girl called Hope, who I had my eye on!), has already been snapped up from the litter, which is pretty lucky, or else I’d have probably tried loading them all into my gym bag. I mean, it's hard to get much cuter.
I was lucky enough to attend on "labrador day." After a sleepy start, the pups livened up and came to join our session. Good luck if you’re there for the yoga, because these puppies love a cuddle and a climb, with no part of the body off bounds.
It’s the most relaxed and present I’ve felt in a while, and the puppies must have felt the same way because they all curled up for a nap on us afterward.
The dopamine hit was unmatched
Animal therapy can promote calm and relaxation while boosting mood, and I’ve always found being around dogs helps regulate my nervous system.
If you’re unfamiliar with the autonomic nervous system, you have two strands: the sympathetic and parasympathetic.
Your sympathetic nervous system is your fight-or-flight state that controls hormone responses like cortisol and adrenaline. It’s pretty clever at helping you tackle danger. On the counter, the parasympathetic system is your rest, repair and recover state.
The jury is out on how long it takes to “come down” from fight-or-flight, but it’s thought it could take around 30 minutes, which is a pretty long time. And given the body can’t differentiate between actual and perceived danger, everyday stressors like a missed train or out-of-hours work email could trigger it.
I felt incredible after just one hour of puppy yoga, and I’ll definitely be back
I’m quite an anxious person and was diagnosed with combined ADHD a few years ago, so finding relaxing activities is important for my mental and physical wellbeing, and this one did the job.
I felt relaxed, calm and more centered immediately afterward, and the good mood continued to reach far into the day.
The next time breathing exercises don’t do the trick, I might seek a puppy yoga class instead!
If you plan to attend a puppy yoga class yourself, I highly recommend digging around into potential companies first and ensuring their ethos and ethics align with yours.
Things to look out for include knowing where the puppies come from and if the company is connected with a charity or shelter.
More from Tom’s Guide
We're launching "The Workout Workshop," which is a series on the weird and wonderful workouts you can find out there in the world. Keep your eye out for classes and more throughout the year. In the meantime, why not give these a try?
- Is walking backward good for you? We asked an expert
- You don't need squats or lunges — I tried this 30-minute standing HIIT workout, and here's what happened to my body
- I tried the 75 'soft' challenge for a week — here's why I'm going to stick with it
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