Restorative Yoga Practice For Cleansing

This is a recording of a live class I taught for cleansing with Restorative Yoga. The elements of Restorative are here for you to fully relax and give into the moment with full release. This takes time but eventually the body learns it can release and your mind follows! Enjoy!!

Transcript

Welcome,

Everyone.

My name is Hannah Rodriguez,

And today we will be practicing restorative yoga for cleansing.

So to get started,

Let's be seated with a tall spine.

If you want to have your seat with blankets,

You can,

Or a bolster,

You may,

Or just seated comfortably on the earth,

Whatever feels best for you.

Your hands can be just gently in your lap or on the knees,

Palms face up or down,

Whatever feels most comfortable.

And we're going to start with a few cleansing breaths.

So if you want to close your eyes,

You may,

Or you can keep a soft gaze,

But we'll just gently inhale through the nose,

Fill the belly up full,

And exhale out the mouth.

Just release,

And inhale,

And exhale.

Five more breaths like this,

Thinking about cleansing as you exhale,

Releasing the breath,

And just letting out anything that might feel heavy,

Anything that might feel stuck,

Anything that you wish to just let go of.

And then when you're ready,

We'll gently start with some seated cat-cows.

So if you want,

Hands can come onto the knees,

And as you inhale,

Gently lift the chest and lengthen the spine up.

And as you exhale,

Start to round and kind of curl in toward yourself,

Tucking your chin into the chest.

So again,

Inhale,

Lift,

Lengthen,

Open yourself up,

And exhale,

Round and curl.

And as you move like this,

Just keep following your breath.

The eyes can stay closed,

Or you can keep a soft gaze,

And maybe just checking in with your body as you move through this movement.

Notice what parts of the body feel good.

Notice what parts of the body might feel tight or tender,

Or that you need to be aware of.

And if you feel good with this movement,

You can stay like this,

Or if you want to start to add some circling,

You can gently start to melt the chest forward and swing it around,

Moving the chest back and toward the other side.

So starting to circle,

Following your breath.

You can take little circles or big circles.

Notice if you want to get your head and neck involved,

Or if you just want to stay with a neutral neck.

Give yourself three more big circles in this direction.

When you're ready,

Gently switching directions as you come to center,

Noticing how it feels to start to circle in the opposite way.

Notice if your movement needs any pausing,

Or if you want to stay in the circular motion.

Three more circles in this direction.

When you feel ready,

Just come back to center with a tall spine,

And we'll switch the cross of our legs.

So bringing the other foot in front.

Good,

Beautiful.

And then to start our cleansing twist here,

We'll inhale,

Lift the arms overhead.

Exhale,

Start to twist in one direction,

One hand on the opposite knee,

One hand behind the low back.

So stay here for three breaths.

Next,

Inhale,

Arms come overhead,

And exhale,

Gently twist in the opposite direction.

Three breaths here.

When you're ready,

We're going to move one breath per movement.

So next,

Inhale,

Arms come high overhead,

Exhale,

Twist the first direction,

And then inhale,

Arms come back overhead,

And exhale,

Twist the opposite way.

So inhaling,

Lift,

Exhale,

Twist,

Inhale,

Lift,

Exhale,

Twist.

Three more with each side,

Following your pace of breath.

If you feel you want to hold longer on the twist,

You can stay in hold,

Or you can just keep following the breath.

Inhale,

Arms rise,

Exhaling into the twist.

Twice more each side.

Last round.

And then when you're ready,

Back up to seated.

Arms can come down by the side.

If you need any other body movement,

You can take it.

If you need to uncross the legs and add a little bobble for the knees,

Shake out the toes,

Pat the legs,

You may.

And then we're going to set up for our first restorative posture,

Which is going to be a deer pose.

So you're going to grab your bolster,

And you're going to bring it forward at the front of your yoga mat.

If for whatever reason you didn't have a bolster,

You could fold a couple blankets or a pillow.

But we have bolsters here.

If you feel you want some cushion for your hip,

You can place one blanket down at the edge.

And then you're going to set your right hip against the edge of the bolster.

Yeah.

Either way,

You can do it that way.

That's perfect.

So then it shows both,

Both weights.

Yeah.

So right hip is at the edge of the bolster,

And you're going to face your knees to the side.

Okay.

Now,

When you're ready,

We're going to inhale,

Lift the chest,

And exhale,

Twist toward the bolster.

And you're going to crawl your torso down along the bolster.

Now,

The legs might stagger,

The knees might stagger.

That's okay.

Or you can even slide your top knee to face all the way toward the back of your yoga mat.

And then your head can be on the bolster,

Your cheek can turn to one side,

Or you can have your chin or your forehead down.

And then the arms can hug around the bolster,

Or you can have them teeing out to the side or whatever feels most comfortable.

Yeah,

Beautiful.

So with restorative postures,

We hold the posture for a couple minutes so that your body can start to relax and form itself into the props that we're using so that your body can surrender.

And with the theme of class as cleansing,

Notice how the twist is in your body.

It's a gentle twist here,

But as you breathe,

Bring in the vision of the breath twisting and swirling around you inside,

Picking up whatever needs to be cleansed,

And release it out the exhale.

So as you're here,

You'll be here for some time,

So make sure you feel comfortable,

Adjust the body accordingly,

And then see if you can settle into stillness.

And we'll be here for three more deep and cleansing breaths,

And gently when you're ready,

Start to bring wrists underneath the shoulders and slowly press your torso back up.

And gently start to turn so that the bolster's at where your sacrum is,

And then you're just going to gently recline back on the bolster.

Legs can be stretched out long,

Or legs can even be a little bit wider,

And then here you're just simply neutralizing the spine as well as cleansing any of the breath so that you can clean and clear out anything that you twisted or unrooted,

The heart space to be open,

Use the breath to utilize any cleansing,

Polishing,

Just washing over the system,

Cleansing the system physically,

Mentally,

And emotionally.

Deep cleansing breaths,

And last breath here,

And when you're ready,

Gently start to move into deer pose on the opposite side,

So now bringing your other hip to the edge of your bolster.

Again,

Facing your knees out to the side,

Top knee can either face the side or it can even face the back of your mat,

Just depending on what opening you'd like in the hips.

And then here we're going to inhale,

Lengthen the chest,

Exhale,

Twist toward the bolster and start to lay the torso down on the bolster,

Allowing yourself to get situated with the legs.

Maybe you want knees together,

Maybe you want a blanket in between the knees.

Again,

Arms can lay by the bolster,

Hug around the bolster,

T out at the side,

Lay one cheek down on the bolster,

Maybe your chin or your forehead,

Whatever you like,

But again,

Allowing yourself to get set up here so that you're fully relaxed.

You can really allow your body to release into the support of the bolster and the ground.

Breathe into stillness,

This idea of cleansing through your system,

Envision the breath down the spine as it twists,

You envision the breath moving back through the spiral of the spine over time.

Your body soften with each exhale in the shoulders and the neck.

Three more deep cleansing breaths here.

When you feel ready,

Gently start to bring the wrist back underneath the shoulders,

Pressing your torso up tall,

And then again,

Slowly starting to bring your low back to the edge of the bolster,

And again,

Starting to recline along the bolster,

Finding a neutral spine,

Opening in the heart space.

Yeah,

If you want,

You can even T out the arms or even bring the arms overhead,

Just depending on what feels best.

Allow yourself 10 cleansing breaths here.

Notice if anything has shifted,

If you need to release anything out the mouth,

Noticing you cleanse out the bottom of the feet,

Out the armpits,

Through the palms,

Through the mouth and the nose.

And for the last few breaths,

You might even add in a lion's breath.

So as you exhale,

Stick out the tongue as long as you can and really exhale and release everything out the mouth.

Beautiful breath.

And when you feel ready here,

We'll start to move toward our next posture.

So you'll come up to a seat.

If you want,

From here,

You can gently roll to one side in the fetal position.

Slowly press yourself up,

Or you can just lift yourself up off of them.

We're going to set up for a seated forward fold.

We're going to take the bolster with us.

So as you have your feet out long in front of you,

Notice if you need support underneath your knees at all,

You can roll up one of your blankets and place it underneath your knees.

And then here,

When you're ready,

Yeah,

If you want to,

You can elevate yourself on a blanket as well.

Yeah.

Now from here,

We're just going to place this on top of the thighs.

As we hinge forward,

See if you can try and drape your torso over the bolster and just allow yourself to hang.

If you want or can reach your toes,

You can,

Or your ankles or your legs.

It's not necessarily about reaching for length.

It's more of utilizing the support of the bolster to help you ease and relax into this.

Yeah,

You can round your chin into your chest if you want,

Or if you want to try it length long-wise too,

You can also turn the bolster like this so that you can reach for the length of the bolster.

Just notice what feels best for you.

When you're ready,

Finding some stillness as best as you can,

See if you can soften the toes a little bit to allow the fingertips to be soft.

And as you bring in the theme of cleansing,

Notice if you can feel like a washing of the backside of your body,

Breathing up and down the spine,

Filtering through your entire backside.

For three more deep cleansing,

You can gently start to walk.

And if you need some movement,

You can bring hands behind you if you want to gently press the chest.

Or maybe you would like to come up to seated,

Place the feet on the ground,

Knees to the ceiling,

And gently sway the knees side to side and kind of roll on the edge of your hip as you kind of lift your tush off the ground.

Yeah.

Okay.

Up to a seat.

Now we're going to come into a bound angle,

So butterfly posture.

So bringing the bottom of the feet together,

Knees wide.

Now you might want to use a prop.

You might not need it.

If you need something underneath your knees,

You can roll up your blankets like that to support underneath your legs.

You'd have to,

Or you can just be like this.

And then we're going to inhale,

Lift the chest up,

And exhale,

Start to round and curl in.

And you can decide if you want to hug in toward your toes,

Or if you'd prefer,

Yeah,

To bring the bolster out in front of you.

You can kind of drape your hands forward over the bolster.

A bolster or a block might come in handy if you had a block.

Stack a block on your bolster for your forehead,

Or you can put the bolster kind of like on top of your feet,

And then cross your arms maybe.

There's a lot of different ways too.

Yeah.

Oh yeah,

That's good.

Kind of give yourself some height.

Yeah.

Carolina,

If you need more height,

You can put a blanket on top,

And then fold your arms.

Yeah.

And then think cleansing here.

But with the action in the hips,

Think about really cleansing anything along the root sacral chakras.

Notice anything that is a deep,

Heavy emotion that maybe needs some breath,

Needs some stretching,

Needs any release.

Breathing into the hips as you gently start to find stillness as you're ready.

Just notice if you're clenching your jaw or pressing your tongue on the roof of the mouth.

If so,

Just gently add some softness to the tongue.

Maybe find a little space in between the teeth,

Softening the forehead,

Softening the cheeks,

Relaxing the shoulders,

And letting the belly be soft.

Three more deep,

Cleansing breaths.

As you're ready,

Gently start to uncurl the spine.

Come back to a tall seat.

You can just slowly remove the props out of your way for a moment.

And bringing,

Yep,

Maybe the knees together.

You can stretch the legs out.

You can bobble the knees,

Shake out the feet.

Again,

If you want to plant the feet and sway the knees side to side a little bit,

You can.

Perfect.

And then we're going to come to lying on our back for a supported supine twist.

So bring your bolster to your left side,

Which.

.

.

Okay,

So lying down on your back.

And first just hug your knees into your chest.

Yeah,

As you lie down.

If you need to massage the sacrum a little bit,

You can rock side to side or circle the knees a little bit.

When you're ready,

We're going to get set up for the twist.

So lower your left leg down on the ground.

Yep,

So it stretches all the way long in front of you.

And then hug the right knee in.

And then you're going to gently guide your right knee across your body so that it lands on your bolster.

So you might need to scoot your hips over a little bit so that you can twist.

And if you feel the bolster is too high and you'd rather have a blanket underneath your shin or foot,

You can.

Or if you need it to be higher,

You can stack a blanket on top of the bolster to give you a little more height.

And then you're going to tee out the arms.

Yeah,

If you need some weight on your right knee to keep it holding down,

You can drape a blanket on top of the knee as well.

Just to add some weight there.

If you want to get the stretch in the neck,

Maybe you tilt your head opposite way of the knees.

You can just keep a soft gaze and really thinking about how the body is twisted here.

So that gives you the chance to really breathe deeply and twist and cleanse anything out in the body.

Especially physically,

Your torso is turned,

Kind of churned in.

So the organs are bumping into each other in different places.

So that helps to detox,

To release physically.

Letting the face be soft,

Be easy.

Be like this for three more cleansing breaths.

When you feel ready,

Gently coming back to center.

Hugging knees into your chest.

Massaging the low back a little bit as you rock side to side.

Or maybe just keep feet planted on the ground and swish your knees left and right.

You're ready for next side.

Gently move your bolster to the opposite side of your body.

So now it should be on the right side of you.

As you're lying down,

Keep your right leg long on the ground.

Left knee in.

Cross your left knee across the body so that the left hip stacks on top of the right hip.

You might need to scooch your hips back behind you a little.

Pull your leg,

Your shin,

Your foot to rest on the bolster.

Or maybe drape a blanket over your knee for added weight.

Arms can tee out to the side.

Relaxing the toes and the fingers.

Opposite ways of the knees.

Find a space where you can soften here to twist and cleanse you like this.

Three more cleansing breaths here.

Come back to center.

Notice if you need to stay here any longer to even out compared to the other side.

Into neutral spine again and add any other body movement that feels best for you to get yourself prepared for final resting in Shavasana.

Into Shavasana.

Notice if you want any props underneath you.

Anything underneath your knees for support.

Underneath your head.

Maybe on top of your hips for some added weight or to cover up.

Beside you.

Legs can be out.

Toes can flop out to the sides.

We will just take one cleansing breath for a final cleanse as a group.

So let's deeply inhale through the nose.

And exhale out the mouth.

And I'll let you know when it's time to awaken.

But for now,

Just rest.

Allowing yourself to absorb the benefits of your practice.

Feel free to stay just as you are in Shavasana for as long as you would like.

Feel free to stay.

Notice that your body is ready to begin to come back to those.

We start to deepen.

Releasing out completely.

Starting to add gentle wiggles to toes.

Start to circle wrists and ankles.

We begin to stretch arms overhead.

Toes pointing the length back into your body.

You can end by laying here on the earth.

Or if you wish to close your practice seated,

You can slowly roll to one side.

And come up to a seat with a tall spine.

Come up to a seat.

Just bringing your hands into heart center.

Eyes can remain closed or just a soft gaze down at the tips.

Allowing yourself a moment to notice all that you have cleansed and washed away through this practice.

You have restored.

You have renewed yourself to begin fresh.

Close today's practice by bringing the hands to third eye center.

And we bow and say Namaste.

Reviews

Thank you so much, was really good!!!! ♥️♥️♥️❣️❣️❣️

Thank you, Hannah, that was a lovely practice. I wasn't sure how it would work without visuals but your guidance made it very clear just with the audio.

Perfect way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Thank you 🙏 🌺

I will definitely return to this guided practice. It is beautiful.

Thank you for this gift!