I'm just going to invite you to lay down on your back with your palms facing up and your legs are relaxed and heavy on the floor.
Your feet can roll slightly outwards and tilting your chin slightly towards your chest,
Elongating the back of your neck,
Finding Shavasana.
Just connecting with the breath,
Noticing your abdomen rise and fall and just observing.
Just to get centred on our practice today,
We're going to start off with a physiological sigh,
A small breathing exercise to bring us right into relaxing the nervous system,
Developed by neuroscientist Andrew Huberman.
So we'll begin with breathing in through our nose,
All the way down past our diaphragm,
Allowing our tummy to fill.
And then breathe in one more time.
And then exhaling slowly out the mouth,
But not blowing quite hard enough to blow out the flame.
And we'll do three more.
Inhaling through the nose and exhaling,
Blowing a lip's purse slightly,
As though we're blowing through a straw.
Release.
Another breath to fill up.
And then exhaling slowly out the mouth.
Last time of the physiological sigh,
Inhaling and then exhaling slowly,
Releasing,
Feeling it falling away on that out-breath.
And just relaxing and allowing our breath to return to normal.
Just observing from the seat of the observer.
I'm going to gently guide you through some poses.
All the poses are going to be either lying,
Sitting on all fours.
The first one we're going to start with,
As we're lying on our back.
As we're going to bend our left leg,
Our knee bent,
About a 45 degree angle.
We're going to lift the right leg and crossing our ankle of our right leg,
Just in front of the left knee,
Forming a right angle with the right leg.
Just reaching forward towards the left leg now and clasping our hands.
Just above the area behind the knee and gently pulling this towards you.
Feeling an activation of the inner thigh of the right leg.
As you connect with your breath,
Breathing in,
You can hold this pose as long as you wish to.
But for the purpose of today,
We're going to hold each pose about four breaths.
Just exhaling that fourth breath now,
Releasing the hands from the left leg,
Uncrossing the right leg down.
I'm going to bring that right leg up about 45 degrees,
Lifting up the left leg,
Putting that outside of that ankle of the left leg in front of the right knee,
Making a right angle with the left leg.
Reaching our arms forward and clasping our hands just behind the right knee and bringing that up towards your torso.
Bringing some flexion in to the inside of the left leg.
And once again,
You're welcome to stay in this as long as you like.
And on this recording,
We're going to stay here for about four breaths.
And releasing the hands.
And from here,
We're going to move into the bridge pose.
Knees bent about 45 degrees,
Walking our heels up towards our glutes.
Tilting our chin towards our chest.
Going to inhale now,
We exhale,
Lifting our hips up towards the ceiling.
Walking our shoulder blades towards the centre of our spine.
Some people like to clasp their hands behind the back,
Really opening the chest,
But just do what's right for you and what feels like a nice opening through the chest and heart area.
And connecting with our breath.
Nice and deeply and exhaling out through the mouth.
And in your own time,
Just releasing.
Coming down onto the floor.
Lowering vertebrae by vertebrae from the shoulder with the tailbone touching last.
And we'll just take a breath here to integrate.
Now from here,
We're just going to roll onto our right hand side.
And make our own way into all fours,
Into tabletop.
Our knees are under our hips.
Our hands are stacked under our shoulders.
And we're going to get ready to do our Bidalasana,
Majjhi Asana,
Our Cat-Cow Pose.
So when you find yourself ready to go in your tabletop,
You may like to move a little bit in tabletop if you feel any tensions in this area.
Just have a feel into where these might be.
Might be through the shoulders,
The hips.
You might feel like doing a figure of eight with your hips.
Might feel like moving forward,
Backwards,
Side to side with your shoulders.
Just having a feel into what's alive in your body right now.
And moving to meet that.
And just inhaling up into our Bidalasana.
Inhaling up the head and the sit bones,
The spine dips down,
Our Cow Pose.
And then we're going to exhale,
Dropping our head,
Arching our spine up like that angry cat.
And tucking our sit bones.
Just inviting you to move from the tailbone first.
Just adding a little fluidity to the spine.
As we inhale again into our Cow,
Dropping the spine,
Feeling the release unroll through the spine.
And lifting the head to gaze up.
And connecting body to breath,
Moving with your breath.
We're going to take four more here.
Dropping the head,
Arching the spine.
Moving head up,
Sit bones up,
Slightly concaving the spine.
Back cat,
Dropping the head,
Arching the spine.
Continuing in your own breath space.
Just inviting you now to meet back in Tabletop.
And from Tabletop,
We're going to move into Thread the Needle,
Which is just going to stretch those muscles down between our shoulder blades.
And to do so,
We're going to begin by taking our right hand,
We're going to lift it and thread it underneath our left shoulder.
Sliding our right cheek down to rest on the floor.
Gazing over towards our left,
Elongating the back of the spine.
And hopefully feeling a nice opening across the back of the shoulders.
Breathing in,
Breathing out,
Releasing.
Just bringing forward that right hand again,
Sliding it back,
Returning it to the table top position.
Right hand is back under our right shoulder.
We're going to do the same on the other side.
Taking our left hand,
Lifting it up,
Threading it underneath our right shoulder.
Bringing our cheek down towards the floor.
Resting our left cheek on the floor,
Gazing over towards the right.
Connecting with the breath.
Breathing in,
And exhaling.
And releasing from here,
Just bringing that hand back now.
Putting our left hand back into our tabletop position.
And connecting with our breath.
From our tabletop,
We're just going to drop down into our child's pose now.
So bringing our knees to,
If we're using a mat,
Roughly about the outside of the mat area.
Bringing our big toes into meet.
We're walking our hands forward and lowering the forehead to the floor.
Breathing in,
Breathing out.
Now this pose can be as active or relaxed as you like.
You might like to walk the hands forward,
Activating the arms.
Activating the spine,
Lifting the sit bones.
Or you might like to relax,
Just enjoying the weight of your forehead on the floor.
And having your arms heavy and relaxed.
Just feeling into what's right for you.
You might feel the feeling of the opening through the hips,
The nose,
And exhaling at the mouth.
Just going to bring our attention to the layer of our psyche,
Of the mental area.
Maybe it's feeling like busyness of the mind or mental chatter.
We're drawing our attention to that now.
And as we become aware of it,
As we inhale,
We're just going to bring our attention to that area.
We're just going to release that out through the area between our eyebrows.
Releasing it down into Papatthwa Nuku below.
And seeing it fall away with our out-breath.
Out through,
Sometimes known as the third eye chakra.
In Sanskrit,
The Akhna Chakra.
Sensing everything,
That busyness from our mind.
Inhaling a sense of peace and relaxation.
And exhaling and releasing what we no longer need down into the earth below.
You're welcome to stay here in child's pose as long as you are comfortable to.
And on this recording,
We're going to have three more breaths here.
Breathing in a sense of peace and relaxation.
If the visualization of color works for you,
Feel free to pause.
To add color.
And exhaling what you no longer need and just noticing that falling away.
The release through the Akhna Chakra.
Seeing it disappear.
Away from the child's pose,
Back into our tabletop.
So just lifting our sit bones slowly.
Bringing our knees back in under our hips.
Our hands under our shoulders.
From here,
If you would like to,
You may like to move into Sphinx or Cobra.
Feeling into whatever is best for you.
If you're moving into Sphinx,
Just going to bring our legs out straight behind us.
Our toes are facing down to the floor.
Our hips are meeting the floor.
We're going to bring our elbows into right angles.
Our forearms touching the floor.
And inhaling from the hips.
Lifting up the head and shoulders.
Dropping our shoulders away from our ears.
Leaving that chest open as we're in Sphinx.
If you would like to add a little Cobra here.
You can also bring your hands underneath your shoulders.
Pressing your hands into the floor.
And just moving with what's comfortable for your spine.
A backbend,
Whatever works for your body.
Lifting up the eyes and the head.
And this pose increases the blood flow to the pelvic region.
And opens the chest area.
And whenever you're ready,
Just releasing that.
And you might like to place one hand down on the floor.
Then the other.
And bringing your cheek down to rest on the back of the top hand.
And just having a little recovery from Bhujarasana.
We're going to walk through the option of Dog now.
So when you're ready,
Making your way back into Tabletop.
And we're going to lift up our sit bones towards the ceiling.
The balls of our feet to the floor.
Really connecting the pads of our hands to the floor.
So that we're protecting our forearms and wrists.
The sit bones come up towards the ceiling.
And we're in the shape like a mountain.
Arumakanaasana or Downward Dog.
You might like to walk the Dog here.
Lifting up your left heel,
Pressing it down to the floor.
Then your right,
Lifting it up,
Pressing it down.
And pedal left to right,
Walking the Dog.
You may like to bend your knees here,
Really lifting those sit bones up.
Elongating the spine.
Or you might like to,
As you inhale,
Almost going on your tippy toes.
Bringing up your heels onto the balls of your feet.
Then exhaling the heels down towards the floor.
Skipping the back of those legs,
A really nice stretch.
Just adjusting it to whatever feels good for you.
And whenever you're ready,
Just gently bending those knees down.
And coming back into Tabletop.
Feel free to drop into a Child's Pose and take a few breaths here if you wish to recover.
And pause this recording.
And from Tabletop,
We're going to move and make your own way to meet in a seated position.
So we're going to be sitting on our sit bones with our legs out.
Bringing them out wide in front of us now.
And bending our knees.
And then reaching forward to grasp our toes.
We're keeping our spine nice and straight.
While doing so,
This is really stretching those nice big hip muscles.
And connecting with our breath.
Breathing in,
Peace and relaxation.
And exhaling what you no longer need.
And as you connect with your breath,
This is quite a dynamic pose.
And the big muscles that run down the back of your legs may soften with the breath.
And if it feels comfortable to you in your practice only,
I just invite you to gently and incrementally straighten the legs a little.
Paradanasana is a pose where you feel the benefit of staying in it for quite a few breaths for a decent amount of time.
Because as you connect with your breath,
Your body yields and softens.
And becomes more supple.
So we're just going to stay here for a few breaths.
Making really small adjustments to whatever is comfortable for you.
And exhaling.
And on the next exhale,
We're just going to release.
You might like to just give your legs a little shake out.
And just release some of those big muscles that are working quite hard there.
And from here,
While we're in a seated position,
Just going to take the soles of our feet to meet one another.
Bring them together.
Pulling them up towards our pelvic area and allowing our knees to come down towards the floor on the outside at the same time.
A cobbler pose.
Our spine is straight,
Our shoulders are lowered,
And our eyes gaze forward.
Breathing in.
Breathing out.
Just energetically bringing those knees down towards the floor either side of us.
And we'll just stay here for four breaths.
Breathing in.
Breathing out.
Just taking that fourth breath now.
Exhale.
And release.
And from here,
I'm just going to invite you down to where we started.
Coming back into a lying position again.
Just going to invite you to roll over onto your right hand side.
With the palms of your hands together.
Your knees are at 90 degree angles also on the right hand side.
Taking our left hand,
Just bringing it up along across our right arm,
Across our chest,
And down out parallel on our left hand side.
And inhaling,
And as you exhale,
Just turning to gaze over towards your left.
So your arms are at nine o'clock and three o'clock.
Your knees,
About 45 degree angle,
Rolled over towards the right.
And in the lying twist,
Just feeling a nice,
Relaxing activation through the spine.
And an opening of the right side of the body.
In this recording,
We're going to stay here for four breaths.
But in your own time,
You can stay here as long as you feel that you need.
Breathing in.
Breathing out.
Breathing in.
Bring that left hand back over towards the center.
Bringing our knees up to the center straight in front of us.
And while we're here,
You might like to hug your right knee all the way up to your chest,
Straightening your left leg with the toes pointing up to the ceiling.
And then swapping over,
Dropping down the right leg,
Bending up the left leg,
Hugging it to your chest,
Straightening the right leg with the toes pointing up.
Now bringing up both your knees,
Giving your chest a hug.
And then rolling over onto your left hand side.
Knees are drawn up to a nice 90 degree angle on the left hand side.
Bringing the left arm out straight.
The right arm on top of the left with the palms joined together.
Just going to inhale.
As we exhale,
Taking the right hand,
Bringing it along the left arm across your chest.
And all the way out to the right hand side,
Just turning to gaze over towards the right.
And connecting with the breath.
Breathing in.
Breathing out.
Just staying here for three more breaths.
Inhaling on that fourth breath and releasing.
Coming out of the supta masandrasana now and coming back into asavasana.
So just returning to lying on your back.
Just inviting you to have your palms facing up.
Arms down by your side.
Legs out with your feet rolled out gently and relaxed,
Facing outwards.
Tilting the chin slightly towards the chest.
Elongating the back of the neck.
Back into savasana.
Breathing in all the way down to our tummy and exhaling out the mouth.
Just to finish here,
We're going just to do a short body scan.
So to start with,
We're just noticing our body lying on the mat.
And all the contact points where our body meets the earth,
Papatuanuku,
And feeling ourselves supported by her.
We're just going to bring our mind's eye all the way down to our right foot.
Noticing our right foot.
Our ankle.
Our calf.
Our shin.
And up to the right knee.
Noticing all the little muscles around our knee.
Noticing the muscles around our knee feel relaxed.
Now bringing our attention down to our left foot.
Our left ankle.
Our left calf.
Shin.
And knee.
Noticing all the little muscles around our knee.
Feeling those little muscles feel heavy and relaxed.
Bringing our awareness up our thigh.
Of our right leg.
Then our left leg.
As we breathe in.
And release with the exhale.
Now bringing our awareness up into the pelvic area.
The hip.
The abdomen.
And all the way up the spine and across the back.
Noticing our chest.
Our shoulders.
Our fingers.
And bringing our awareness up our neck.
Across our jaws.
We're here now and get ready to return to the room.
You might like to give the fingers a wiggle.
The toes a wriggle.
And just inhaling now.
Bring the hands up high above your head.
