Hello and welcome to today's practice.
Today we will be doing a progressive muscle relaxation exercise.
This exercise is one of my favorites and helps relax your mind and body by progressively tensing and relaxing muscle groups throughout your body.
You will tense each muscle group strongly but without straining and then release the tension to feel a wave of relaxation over the muscle group.
If you have any pain,
Discomfort,
Or injury in any of the muscle groups then feel free to skip the tense release portion and focus only on your breath.
Throughout this exercise you may want to visualize the muscles tensing and then imagine a wave of relaxation flowing over them as you release.
For this practice it's optimal to be seated but you can also stand at your workstation.
Before we begin let's get our body ready.
So do any shoulder rolls or shake out your arms or your legs,
Any neck rolls,
Any movements that you need to release any tension that you naturally hold.
Now we're going to begin to take a deep breath in and then either soften your gaze or if you're comfortable close your eyes.
Allow your attention to focus only on your body and how you physically feel today.
We will start with just noticing how our breath feels.
Take a deep breath in all the way down into your abdomen and then exhale slowly.
As you breathe in notice your stomach rising and your lungs filling with air.
On your exhale notice how the air feels leaving your body,
Either out your nose or out your mouth,
How that feels.
Breathe in and as you exhale imagine tension in your body releasing and flowing out of your body.
And again inhale and exhale.
Feel your body already relaxing with just this breath.
Now let's begin.
We're going to first focus on our face so go ahead and tighten all the muscles in your face,
Squinting your eyelids,
Pulling your cheeks,
Furrowing your brow.
Hold that tension and then let it all go.
Next we're going to lift our shoulders all the way up until our ears.
Hold that tension there and release feeling the tension melt away and feel the weight of your shoulders drop.
Breathe in and out.
If you have noticed your mind wandering then gently bring your attention back to the practice and now to your hands.
Tightly without straining,
Clench your fists,
Hold that tension and then release.
Wiggle your fingers a little bit,
Feel the tension let go.
Now we'll transition and flex your biceps.
Feel the tension build up,
Hold and release.
Enjoying the feeling of limpness.
Breathe in and out.
Now we're going to tighten our triceps by extending our arms,
Straightening our arms,
Not quite locking your elbows but almost.
Visualize those muscles tightening.
Hold that tension and release.
Now we're going to tense our upper back by pulling our shoulders and imagine our shoulder blades touching the back.
Hold that tension there and let it all go.
Now tighten the muscles in your stomach.
Imagine your belly button going all the way back to your spine.
Hold that tension and with your release let a big breath out.
Breathe in and out.
Feel the limpness in your upper body,
Letting go of the tension and the stress that you've been holding there.
Next we're going to tighten our bottoms.
Hold the tension there and then release.
Imagine your hips falling loose and relaxed.
If you are noticing your mind wandering at all,
Just imagine your thoughts on a river washing away and bring your attention back to our lower body.
We're going to tighten our thigh muscles now.
Imagine there's a penny between your knees and you don't want that penny to drop.
So we're going to hold and squeeze our knees together.
Feel the tightness in our quads and our thighs.
Hold that tension and release and let it all go.
Next we're going to roll up onto the balls of our feet,
Feeling the tension build in our calves.
Hold that tension and release.
Feel the weight of your legs sinking down.
Now we're going to focus on our feet and our toes.
Go ahead and curl your toes under,
Building up tension in the bottom of your feet,
The balls of your feet,
The arches and in all your toes.
Hold that tension there and on your next out breath,
Let it all melt away.
Now imagine a wave of relaxation slowly spreading over your body,
Beginning at your head and washing all the way down to your feet.
As you imagine this wave of relaxation coming over you,
Search for any areas that may be tensing again on its own.
As you find an area,
Take a deep breath in and exhale that tension away.
Feel the weight of your relaxed body.
Breathe in and out.
In and out.
And once more,
Breathe in and out.
If your eyes are closed,
Then take a moment to do a couple plinks to return to your environment.
Feel free to shift and wiggle to reorient yourself to the present in your space.
You may have noticed that you feel significant more stiffness in certain areas or certain relief in certain areas.
I challenge you today to repeat the practice of tensing and releasing those muscle groups throughout your day today and see how that feels.
Thank you for practicing with me today.
Enjoy your day.
