WHEN a video of Finlay Wilson doing yoga in his kilt was posted on YouTube it very quickly became a viral hit. Within an hour it had a million views and to date it has been seen 56m times, turning the 30-year-old yoga teacher into a bona fide internet star.

But, in an interview with The Sunday Herald Wilson spoke about the darker side of his life and how his yoga has helped him overcome a number of serious personal crises, including sex abuse, depression, and low-self-esteem.

A new book, Kilted Yoga, features Wilson showing people the potential physical and mental benefits of yoga, but it has also helped him deal with some of the problems in his own life.

Wilson grew up in Lanark and now runs a yoga studio in a converted church in Dundee, but he says it took him a long time to come to terms with being gay. He then struggled with his self-esteem and with the sexual abuse which he says happened in his childhood and was perpetrated by someone outside the family.

But it wasn't until he started doing yoga, as well as meditation, that he started to feel like he was getting things under control.

Wilson says he first began to address the sex abuse when he was on a yoga training workshop in South Africa and he later went to see a therapist. He also found writing about his experiences in a journal helpful.

“The nightmares start at four,” he says. “I have memories before then, but there was clear point where I remember going away for the weekend and, from that point on, the nightmares start.”

Wilson says he has not approached the police about the matter and has also talked about the difficult relationship he has with Police Scotland because of what he sees as failures to properly investigate homophobia against him and his partner.

When Wilson became an internet star earlier this year, thanks to the YouTube video which featured a cheeky shot of him baring his bum, most of the reaction was positive, but there were problems. A handwritten letter was left at his flat in Dundee, threatening him and his dog, and last month his partner had his car tyres slashed. Wilson feels it was naked homophobia which has not been taken seriously by the police.

"I've developed an iron hide when it comes to online trolling," he said. But he feels that the homophobia he has suffered should have been better handled by Police Scotland and that they have repeatedly failed to call or visit him when they said they would.

"The police said, 'Have you done anything to aggravate anyone?' I don't really hide on social media, I'll talk about mental health and what it's like growing up being gay."

Police Scotland said they could confirm that we were investigating a hate crime reported by a 30-year-old man from Dundee. They said the inquiry remained ongoing as they were following positive lines and the complainer [Wilson] had been fully updated as to its progress.

A spokesperson said: "Our role as a police service is to ensure that all our communities are safe and feel protected and all reports of hate crime are robustly investigated, with those responsible brought to justice. We actively encourage people to come forward and report if they have been abused because of any characteristic and we hope that more people are doing so rather than staying silent thinking nothing can or will be done.

"All members of our community can help by challenging or reporting this kind of behaviour when they see it or know it has happened. No person should feel victimised or marginalised in society as a result of hate, intolerance or ignorance."