Awaken - Rise And Shine Morning Stretch

Start your day off right with this gentle, guided meditative stretch, designed to guide you from slumber to standing. Open up your body by using your breath, and begin to move fresh energy through your system. It's simple: breathe deep, feel better. Enjoy!

Transcript

Good morning and welcome to this brief rise and shine practice designed to guide you from slumber to standing and waking up your body,

Mind and spirit in a very nurturing and joyful way.

It's helping you to start your day off right.

Knowing that it all begins with a breath,

Just take a nice easy inhale and a soft exhale.

Just becoming present and aware in the here and now.

Making sure that you're in a comfortable seat on the edge of your bed or in a chair where you feel supported,

Your feet resting comfortably on the earth and your sits bones sinking down as you sit tall and feel the top of the head floating to the sky.

Taking another soft inhale and a soft exhale.

Letting go of anything you might have carried with you from your sleeping time to now.

Ready to greet this new day,

Allow your hands to float to the heart center,

Touching palm to palm and take another soft breath.

Exhaling and maybe setting an intention,

A word,

Something that might be coming through to you.

And then begin to rub the hands back and forth creating a little bit of heat with friction and then come to place your palms softly over your eye sockets.

Just blocking out any light,

Rounding the spine slightly and letting your head be heavy.

Just surrendering here at the start.

Very humble and then inhale sitting tall.

And then allow the eyes to begin to blink open and use your fingertips to massage the forehead and the skin around your eyes and maybe even tapping softly like raindrops.

Just gently,

Gently waking up the face and allowing your eyes to greet the day in a whole new way.

Seen things for the first time this morning.

And then allow the hands to reach outward,

The arms unfurling with the palms shining forward and just wiggle the fingertips engaging through the arms and on an inhale lift your arms to the sky.

Touching palm to palm,

Lifting through the ribs as you exhale draw the hands down the center line of the body.

Back in front of your heart and then peel the palms apart,

Arms going wide,

Palms shining forward.

Inhale lifting the arms and exhale softening the hands down the center line back to the front of your heart.

And one last time let the arms reach outward,

Inhale lifting them upward,

Touching palm to palm at the top.

Clasp your fingers and flip your palms to face up.

Let the elbows be wide and take an inhale.

Filling up the front body,

The side body and the back body.

Elbows nice and soft and the shoulders engaged and relaxed.

Your face is soft and you're breathing from your belly up into your heart and exhaling completely letting go.

Take another deep full inhale.

Pause at the top and let the fingers separate lifting the arms high to the sky.

And as you exhale bow over your legs slowly just rounding your torso and letting yourself hang heavy.

You may or may not go all the way over but just take a moment to sense a breath into your back and into your hips.

Breathing deep full expansive breaths knowing that each inhale is an opportunity to invite change,

To create flow.

When the exhale is time to release any negative energy.

Take another smooth deep breath inhaling like a balloon filling up and then exhaling all the way to the bottom.

Completely releasing here and once you're empty of air just begin to roll your way up restacking the spine and coming to sit tall.

Take a breath just noticing how you feel.

From there allow the arms to float outward once again palms shining forward.

And then allow the right ear to drop to the right shoulder just feeling your neck muscle take a nice deep stretch and reach long and strong with the left arm away.

Take a nice full inhale and as you exhale drop your chin to your chest take a half moon roll to the other side the left ear finds the left shoulder and we reach long and strong with the right arm breathing into the neck and exhale chin to chest once again on each side just an easy rock breathing into the neck lengthening through the arms and last time gently dropping chin to chest left ear left shoulder reaching with the right.

Very smooth inhale and exhale chin comes to chest and then lift your head just up through center and allow the right hand to float to the bed resting your palm and then lift the left arm to the sky deep full breath and then keep going just sort of swooping the arm up and over taking a beautiful side stretch inhaling into the left ribs feeling the ribs separate finding space in your torso and then gently pressing your way back up and allowing the left arm to find the bed or the side of the chair reaching through the right arm and then just swooping over to that side deep full breath your body loves the breath so just waking it up with this morning stretch and then bringing yourself back to center once again allowing the hands to rest on the knees taking a moment here as you inhale slide the hands up the thighs as you arch your back let your heart reach forward that's your inhale as you exhale let those hands rush back to the knees as you round the spine and drop your chin to your chest just finding a little flexion with breath inhaling and slide towards you lift the heart lift the chin slightly arching the back and exhale gently rounding dropping chin to chest fingers on the knees and then once again inhaling breathing in the breath arching the spine and exhaling gently rounding the spine waking up the vertebrae for the day and then coming back to neutral and lastly just taking a gentle twist allow the arms to reach out and up in line with the ears sitting very tall turn the heart to face the right knee twisting toward the side and allow the left hand to rest on the outside of the right thigh and the right hand can come and rest on the bed behind you or on the chair and just engaging twists through the spine ringing out any negative energy that might have stirred up during sleeping knowing that we don't need to carry it with us take a full inhale and a soft exhale pulling the belly to the spine gazing softly over your right shoulder keeping the eyes nice and light and the jaw relaxed with the next inhale lift the arms back in line with the ears let your heart face forward and then shift it over to the left side the right hand will come and rest on the outside of the left thigh left fingers or palm to the bed or the back of the chair situating yourself here sitting tall on the inhale as you exhale ringing it out twisting gently soft pressure on the outside of the leg and a gentle gaze over the left side just luxuriating and sending the breath along the spine up and down exhaling fully pulling belly to spine one last letting go and then inhale the arms back in line with the ears lifting tall and as you exhale imagine your palms floating a veil of light around you allowing the palms to gently gently float in front of you almost as if you're holding a ball of light and just slowly descending and the ball is going to get heavier and gently fold forward once again allowing your torso to fold over the legs maybe taking the feet a little wider just heel toeing your way to each side and allowing yourself to hang heavy here a deep full inhale and a soft exhale and shifting the weight forward enough so that all of your weight comes over your legs and you're supported in a forward fold allowing the hamstrings to yawn and just taking a moment to feel the strength of your legs the connection of the earth under your feet and allow your palms to flip up and as if you are taking the edge of that veil of light and lifting it as you begin to roll up allow your arms to scoop all the way up and over in line with the ears releasing this veil of light up to the sky opening your fingers wide deep full inhale and as you exhale gently press the arms to the side all the way down just making a full circle of light around you of protection and allow the palms to find each other and then float them back to your heart center and standing tall supported that open mind and heart a soft sense of how you're going to greet this day taking a smooth inhale releasing exhaling coming back to your word or intention giving yourself an inner smile I wish you a beautiful day namaste

Reviews

Phenomenal! The best morning wake up routine I’ve found. Thank you for creating it!

Amazing!!! Post walk stretch.

Your cadence and words and fluidity are lovely. I really enjoyed the beauty of your voice. Susan

Lovely. I did this practice on a yoga mat, but it was still a wonderful way to start the day. I especially like the way you let the protective light drape over us.

Nourishing gentle movement to start my day. Thank you!

A beautiful way to wake up. I love choosing the word of intention for the day.💜

Lovely morning seated mini flow with clear instructions and reminders of the breath at just the right time. Feeling ready to move sweetly into my full day, one moment at a time. Thank you. Adding to my morning playlist.

Adding this to my morning favourites. Very gentle way to wake up my body and mind. Loved the ball of light. Feeling goooood ✨💖

Hello beautiful 🌼🌼🌼thank you so much for the wonderful meditation 🗺️ enjoying the sweet day that is coming 🗺️ be well 🙏 Namaste

This was the perfect guided morning stretch with breathing. I also like the intention setting. It is not too long and not too short. I will repeat this morning stretch for sure

Absolutely wonderful! 🙏🏻💗

Great morning wake-up . Thank you

Ready to start my day.

Beautiful super gentle flow. Lovely light stretches. Soothing voice and music.

Very nice awakening stretch with intention, thank you. 🙏🏽

I really enjoyed this; stretching meditation is one of my favourites. I felt it was a bit fast and I was struggling to keep up at times, which affected the potential benefits somewhat, but, nevertheless, I found it a great start to the day. Thank you.🙏

Perfect. Thank you! ❤️

Perfect and gentle and intentional morning stretch ❤️ Many thanks

Wonderful awakening!

Excellent combination of stretch and meditation