Let's surrender the grip of tension in our muscles with restorative releases and healing self-massage.
You are worth this time to gently care for your physical body.
So come into a space where you can move around for a few stretches,
And have a pillow or a bolster nearby for later.
Sit tall,
Rub your palms together quickly,
And lightly cup your palms over your eyes,
Allowing overactive thoughts to be soothed.
Inhale and release fully,
Again a deep breath,
Feeling eye-tightness melting.
Let your hands rest down on your thighs or your knees.
Take another deep breath,
And feel your body right now.
What is here to be felt?
Is your body resisting ease or restfulness?
Breathe in a way that is spacious and soft.
Perhaps place a palm on a tense spot in your body.
Press your palm into this place.
Feel and breathe.
Turn your hands down and start squeezing your shoulders up towards your ears as you breathe in,
And drop your shoulders down with a clearing breath out.
A few more times,
Bringing more mobility and blood flow into stuck muscles as you squeeze your shoulders tightly up,
And fully drop them down as you exhale out your mouth.
Inhale your shoulders squeeze up,
Exhale relax them down.
With deliberate slowness,
Circle your head in both directions.
Shoulders remain aligned over your hips.
Roll your head in both directions for your neck.
Slow it down.
Pause the circling and lean your right ear to your right shoulder.
Breathe deeply.
Notice what is going on in your body and what kind of breath can you offer in response.
Notice tightness without judgement.
To the other side,
Lean your left ear over to your left shoulder.
Breathe fully.
Slow it down.
Roll your chin down to your chest and feel the back of your neck.
Enjoy two more breaths,
Feeling your neck muscles soften.
Gently lift your head up.
Switch the cross of your legs for just a couple more minutes of seated restorative releases.
Reach your arms up overhead with a full inhalation and pressing your palms together,
Bring them down through the center in front of your chest while exhaling.
Keep moving your arms with breath.
Inhale up and exhale into prayer.
Take five more rounds of reaching your arms up on the inhale and down through prayer on your exhale.
Slow movements.
Breathe in a way that is spacious and soft,
Gently ceasing these movements.
Cross your arms in front of your chest so your hands are on opposite upper arms.
Start to slide your hands up and down,
From shoulder down to elbow,
Up to shoulder,
Like you're warming yourself up in the cold.
Calming the nervous system and signaling a deeper arrival into relaxation.
Make your way into child's pose,
On your shins,
With your forehead on the floor or resting your forehead on a pillow.
No rush at all.
Feel and breathe.
What is here to be felt?
Breathe in a way that is soothing and that supports your relaxation.
Feel your body surrendering further and further into child's pose and down into the earth.
With each exhale,
Let any tension melt.
Come up onto hands and knees,
Tabletop position,
On all fours.
Arc and round your spine.
Inhale to open your chest and gaze forward.
Exhale to round your back and draw chin to chest.
Cat-cows.
Inhale,
Opening the front of your spine.
Exhale and round,
Opening the back of your spine.
Without rushing,
Slow it all down.
Take your time to find a standing forward fold.
Your feet on the floor and folding your body down over your legs.
In this standing forward fold,
Separate your feet a bit and bend your knees.
Feel,
Breathe fully,
Relax.
Give your low back and hamstrings a kneaded release with knees bent several inches and sway sweetly from side to side.
We will arrive onto our seats with a hip-loving seated butterfly fold.
Perhaps place a cushion under your sitz bones.
Bend your legs out to the sides with the soles of your feet together.
Breath by breath fold your upper body down,
Without forcing.
Lengthen each breath.
Let go of the holding.
It takes time and everything is slowing down.
Come to lie on your back,
Placing a pillow under your upper back and another pillow under the back of your head.
Reach your arms wide on the ground,
With your palms facing up.
Soften your physical body with breath.
Relax tightness around your neck or your chest.
Ungrip tension in your low abdomen,
Low belly.
Let yourself rest in this space.
Let go and surrender into the support beneath you.
Remove the props from under your back and lay flat on the floor.
Bring both knees up into your chest and place a pillow between them.
Twist your bent legs all the way to the right side and relax them onto the floor.
Stretch your left arm out to the left.
In this restorative twist,
What is here to be felt?
Breathe easily.
In your own time,
Switch sides.
With the cushion between your knees,
Twist to the left.
Relax and breathe on this side.
Slowly come up to seated to complete this relaxing practice for your body and mind.
Take your fingers onto your chest and begin tapping your upper chest side to side with all ten fingertips.
Tap side to side,
Towards each armpit and up and down,
Always below your collarbones.
Enjoy cleansing breaths as you tap.
Rest one or both palms on your chest and connect to how these restorative releases and how the healing self-massage has impacted your body.
Breathe fully into your lungs and your upper chest.
What is here to be felt?
Is it pure relaxation?
Is it a slower state within?
It takes time and everything is slowing down.
Your body is worth this time.
For a silent thank you to the body and a thank you to your breath,
Move slowly back into your day,
Drink plenty of water,
Keep it slow,
And I hope to connect with you again another time soon.
