Sexiness. No, I’m not talking about seeing all of those lean yoga bods in your weekly class… although that may play a role for some of you readers out there. No, here we’re talking about the psychophysiological effects of yoga on body image, mindfulness, body appreciation, well-being, social relationships, and, of course, how these relate to sexuality. All of these positive changes result from a change in embodiment.
Embodiment is the brute fact of having a body. Having a body comes from the primal awareness of one’s organic being: the feeling of being alive. This feeling is a combination of the energy of the living body and its emotions which includes mood, instinct, and drive (Fuchs, 2012). This feeling is allowed by the awareness which consists of the sense of exteroception and interoception which are the feelings and sensations from without and from within the body. Interoception is composed of two distinct somatic perceptions: (a) proprioception of the skin and muscles and (b) visceroception of the inner organs (Herbert & Pollatos, 2012). Interoception and exteroception combine to give a total feeling of embodiment. This embodied experience is called the minimal phenomenal self in the neurosciences and is thought to arise from the flow of sensorimotor signals combined with interoceptive sensations (Solomon, 2017). This term has gone by many names in the history of science of the self. The self or the consciousness that identifies with its own self-consciousness is also known as the experiential phenomenological self (Vago & Silbersweig, 2012), the minimal self (Gallagher, 2000), the agentic I (James, 1892), and the knower or core-self (Damasio, 2010).
Yoga changes the core-self as it changes the experience of embodiment. Embodiment is a state of being, but it is also a process; a developmental process.
Health and Well-Being
To be sexy and to engage in sexual conduct requires good physical and mental health. Yoga’s positive effects on both of these is well documented and so only a handful of exemplary effects need be mentioned here to support the point. It improves cardiovascular functioning (Taneja, 2014); increases muscular endurance (Costa-Shiraishi & Aguiar-Bezerra, 2016); enhances body awareness, eating habits, and spirituality (Dittmann et al., 2008); lowers self-objectification while heightening well-being and sense of embodiment (Impett, Daubenmier, & Hirschman, 2006); reduces stress, anxiety and depression (Pilkington et al., 2005; Shohani et al., 2018); and improves cognitive functioning (Rocha et al., 2012). Psychophysical benefits cut across age and gender. Middle-aged and older adults benefit more from yoga than aerobic exercise in the areas of vitality and mood along with improved sleep patterns (Siddarth, Siddarth, & Lavretsky, 2014). Studies of physically ill people show that they too make gains in health and mood including overall vitality (Annapoorna & Latha, (2011; Bonura, 2007).
As psychophysical functioning improves so too does bodily self-identity.
Body Image
Having a positive body image is crucial for good sexual functioning and satisfaction in both women and men. Female body image is related to reduced distractibility during sex, less self-consciousness, more sexual desire, higher sexual arousal and lubrication, better orgasm, and increased satisfaction (Woertman & van den Brink, 2012).
Yoga is especially beneficial for rehabilitating body image because it integrates the mind and body by through mindfulness of the body. It promotes self-compassion, loving kindness, and the joy of being embodied. It counters body dissatisfaction, guards against disordered eating, and opposes cultural beliefs about ideals of beauty and the perfect form of the body. Practicing yoga leads to a healthy body image (Dunaey & Markey, 2018).
Yoga counters body dissatisfaction which is a causal factor in poor self-esteem, depression, disordered eating habits, negative body image, and personal unhappiness. A study of 46 young adult yoga practitioners revealed that they were very aware of positive changes in their body image. These changes were from physical improvements in their bodily functioning and appearance, gratitude, self-confidence, and tolerance for wider variations in body types (Neumark-Sztainer, Watts, & Rydell, 2018).
Body Appreciation
Body image improves with the increase of positive feelings about the body-self. The effects of yoga on awareness, self-acceptance, and compassion as well as an appreciation for the body’s functionality—how it performs rather than how it looks—all contribute to a healthy body image (Alleva et al., 2020). A part of this comes from an enhanced sense of bodily appreciation. Women who appreciate their bodies are more sexually active (Grower & Ward, 2018). They have higher rates of sexual arousal, stronger sexual desire, higher frequency of orgasm, and greater sexual satisfaction (Brink et al., 2016; Satinsky et al., 2012). Men’s body appreciation is slightly different from that of women. A British study of 439 men revealed that male body appreciation goes up as conformity to masculine norms goes down. Appreciation also goes up as exercise activity increases. Gay men have lower levels of body appreciation because of more strongly internalized appearance ideals (Alleva et al., 2018).
Homan & Tylka (2018) state that body appreciation can be achieved by building gratitude and self-worth, ceasing comparing the body-self to others, and practicing intuitive eating. Gratitude is the habitual orientation toward noticing and appreciating the positive in the world (Wood et al., 2010). Gratitude and healthy eating amplify the positive feelings people have for themselves while lowering their desire for social approval. Gratitude has a wide range of desirable psychological attributes including life satisfaction, optimism, hope, positive attitude, empathy, and forgiveness (McCullough, Emmons, & Tsang, 2002; Neto, 2007). A grateful attitude diminishes psychological distress (Kashdan, Uswatte, & Julian, 2006; Wood et al., 2008). Gratitude is such a powerful component of emotional well-being that the two are almost identical in their psychological effects (Watkins, 2014). Gratitude focuses on the good things in life and then magnifies them (Watkins, 2014). The effects of gratitude have a particularly powerful effect on body image especially in women. Grateful women are more aware of their own desirable qualities and sources of nurturance such as interpersonal relationships, spirituality, or personal and professional competence. Women with high gratitude are less likely to invest their self-worth in their appearance or in the approval of others. Gratitude supports self-worth and positive well-being (Homan & Tylka, 2018).
Mindfulness
One of the strongest ways yoga increases body self-esteem and acceptance is through mindfulness. Studies show that mindfulness and body appreciation in yoga are positively correlated (Cox & McMahon, 2019). Appreciation and improved body image are linked to positive sexual activity. The more a woman appreciates her own body, the better she believes her partner appreciates her body. The more the partner’s appreciation of a woman’s body, the better the woman’s sexual functioning, and the better the relationship (Walters, Lykins, & Graham, 2019).
One study of the relationship between mindfulness and sexuality found positive interactions. It studies healthy people who (a) have practiced yoga and/or meditation for more than 10 years (n = 51), subjects who have participated in a sport for more than 10 years (n = 21), and (c) a control group which did not engage in sports or yoga (n = 145). The athletic group enjoyed less sexual anxiety and sexual depression compared to meditators although these results were not at a statistically significant level. No significant differences were found between the other groups. It did find very positive correlations between all mindfulness measurements, sexual motivation, and sexual consciousness especially in the area of novelty seeking. People who meditate and/or practice yoga have higher levels of seeking novelty or new experiences compared to people who play sports. Novelty seeking as an aspect of mindfulness appears to be an important aspect in sexuality (Lazaridou & Kalogianni, 2013).
Social Relationships
A qualitative analysis of the writings of 1,067 yoga practitioners about how yoga affects them found four distinct themes of meaning common in their experiences.
- Yoga practice leads to personal transformation
- Yoga increases social interaction
- Yoga provides coping mechanisms to weather relationship losses and difficulties
- Yoga leads to spiritual transcendence
The yoginis felt that their social relationships had improved since starting yoga because yoga changed their attitudes and perspectives about themselves and other. They found that they had become more patient, kinder, and more self-aware. They observed that yoga provided a sense of community that was both practical in that they met new people as well as spiritual as they were part of a group which shared values for emotional health and self-actualization (Ross et al., 2014).
Sexuality
Sexual attractiveness is related to physical attractiveness, but they are not identical concepts. Being sexually attractive or “sexy” means attracting and arousing the sexual interest of another person (Taylor et al., 2002). The self-perceptions of being sexually attractive are based on more than just being physically fit. Having a positive body image is important because it is related to the frequency of sexual activity, less self-inhibition, and self-consciousness, and greater self-esteem, confidence, and satisfaction (Gillen & Markey, 2019). Being sexy is mostly about attitude. There are four primary components that convey sexiness: body esteem, gender appearance, sexual self-esteem, and sexual experience. Body esteem is the self-perception that the person experiences his or body as being physically attractive. As WHR and BMI decrease and breast size increases the body self-esteem of women increases (Amos & McCabe, 2016). Body esteem is positively related to sexual desire in women (Seal, Bradford, & Meston, 2009).
Sexual health, well-being, and physical health are all inter-related and so it stands to reason that yoga practice will lead to improvements in sexual health, identity, and functioning (Laumann et al., 2005; Lindau et al., 2007). Anecdotal (non-scientific) reports about yoga and sexuality assert that yoga stimulates Kundalini energy, strengthens the female pelvic muscles, and reduces menstrual problems (Brotto, Mehak, & Kit, 2009). Yoga has been shown to enhance feminine sexual functioning including desire, arousal, lubrication, orgasm, and satisfaction (Dhikav et al., 2009). Yoga increases the male sexual experience including desire, satisfaction, erection, and orgasm (Dhikav et al., 2010) and used to successfully treat premature ejaculation (Dhikav et al., 2007, 2011).
Ultimately, yoga enhances a women’s (and a man’s) sexual well-being by deepening her experience of living in her body (Shroff, 2007).
Closing Thoughts
The developmental theory of embodiment proposes that engaging in embodying activities help situate and center one’s awareness in the body and its immediate actions (Piran, 2002, 2015, 2016, 2017; Piran & Teall, 2012; Swami, 2017). Heightened embodiment is akin to the Maslowian self-actualization experience in that embodied people experience their bodies as vital, powerful, and the seat of self-expression.
A deepened sense of body self-awareness from yoga practice yields a remarkable crop of benefits: better physical and mental health; improved body image; increased body appreciation and self-compassion; more value in the body’s functionality over its looks; enhanced mindfulness which supports emotional health, spiritual growth and heightened sexuality, offering a community for the social interaction of like-minded people. And this all from a deepened sense of personal embodiment.
The research is looking pretty incontrovertible that yoga is the pre-eminent embodying activity (Mahlo & Tiggemann, 2016; Piran, 2015; Piran & Neumark, Sztainer, 2020)… along with lots of benefits.
Paul Shane, Ph.D., LMT
Director, Academic Content
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