Yoga Practice For Relaxing With Blocks

This practice will have guidance for flowing through the movements with blocks or a bolster. You can certainly use a pillow, thick book, or other replacement if those items are not available. The forward bending focus in this practice is great for relaxing and reducing anxiety. The dynamic movement with holds is also a way to work with the mind-body connection when our mind is racing.

Transcript

Welcome to another practice where you're going to focus on forward bending and really working to get that mind body connection on the same balanced path.

If we're feeling a lot of anxiety or brains going in a lot of different directions,

This practice is really great to really help integrate some of these yogic tools and kind of move some of that anxiety through the body and through movement.

So today this practice is going to utilize a block or two.

You are welcome to use a bolster in the absence of these traditional yoga,

You know,

Props,

Blocks and bolsters.

You could also have a pillow or two or maybe a stack of books or a rather thick book you could use as a block as well.

You can make a yoga tool from anything and yoga is everywhere.

So you know,

Feel free to take a moment to pause this if you don't already have some sort of prop.

This practice will be utilizing props.

So we will actually begin standing today.

So you want your feet about hip width apart.

Your hands can be down by your sides with the palms facing forward.

Like a little string is going from your tailbone all the way up through the crown of your head towards the ceiling.

And this parallel to the floor.

Maybe you want to close your eyes or lower the gaze.

Let's just start by taking a big breath in through the nose into the belly and as we exhale through the mouth,

If that's comfortable for you today.

Inhale through the nose.

Exhale through the mouth.

Inhale and exhale will be through the nose.

Just work on balancing that breath and inhale and exhale.

Once you finish your next exhale,

You can open your eyes as we begin to shift.

We'll go ahead and grab one of our blocks.

Again,

We'll have our feet together hip width apart or facing forward.

We're going to just place that block just a little bit in front of our feet,

Where if we were to reach down,

We could touch it.

Take a second to look at your measurements.

Maybe you want it to be on the tall side so your fingers can rest on it as you reach down towards the floor.

Or maybe you want it on a different side,

On the maybe the shorter side,

Whatever feels best for you today.

Go ahead and take a little measurement so you're ready when we get there on something that feels good.

Now we're going into a forward fold and your knees can be bent as much as they need to here.

What we're going for is getting our hands towards the block,

Wherever direction that is,

As far as how tall it is.

And then also we're really looking to hinge from the hips and kind of lay our upper body on top of our thighs.

So you can bend as much as you need to in the knees to be able to make that happen.

And moving again the hands towards the block.

Our torso may not lay directly on our thighs and that's okay.

It's just the visualization that we're going for.

So now that we're all set up and ready,

We're going to inhale our hands up overhead.

Exhale as we bring our hands towards the block,

Hinging at the hips.

And we're going to start with a few halfway lifts.

So your next inhale,

We'll just lift the upper body only.

So that way it's that same line that we had as we were standing from our tailbone to the crown of our head.

We want to think about that same line.

We're just on a different plane now.

Then as you exhale,

Release back into the forward fold.

As you inhale,

Coming back into that halfway lift,

Maybe you come up on your fingertips.

As you exhale,

Dropping it down,

Back into the forward fold.

We'll take our last halfway lift here.

So the lift,

Maybe you can even adjust your block for the halfway lift,

Making it a little taller.

And then as you come into the forward fold,

Bringing it back down to a shorter version.

And on your next inhale,

We're going to take our arms if that's comfortable,

All the way up,

Leading with our chest,

But we will come to standing.

Again your hands can come to the hips or come up overhead.

And then as we exhale,

We're going to take the full extension there and full fold as we exhale,

Reaching towards that block,

Bending the knees as much as we need to really feeling this in our lower back.

We're feeling it a lot in our hamstrings and we'll want to adjust our knees accordingly so we can kind of shift that stretch into our lower back.

And then as you inhale again,

Coming back up to standing.

And as you exhale,

Folding again,

Reaching towards that block with the fingertips.

And inhale back up to standing and exhale coming back into that forward fold.

So that was dynamic.

And we'll go ahead and stay here in this fold.

Continue to breathe,

Thinking about your breath being nice and even,

Like we were as we were in Mountain at the beginning of this practice,

Just take another breath or two.

So you really let that sink in.

On your next inhale,

You can grab your block on your way up because we're going to move it around or you can leave it on the floor.

You'll come to standing as we move into a pyramid now.

So what we're going to do first is bring our left foot forward.

Our right foot can stay where it was.

And we want it to where we've got this nice little kind of triangle,

Tall triangle with our legs.

And you want your right heel to be down.

And so you,

Our legs are not super far apart here.

Now that hip width,

I want you to look down and make sure that your legs are still hip width apart.

So even though the left foot is forward,

Right foot's back,

You've still got your kind of on skis there.

You've got some distance.

And that block is going to come to the inside of the left foot.

It doesn't have to be right against it.

It can be a few inches to the right of it.

We're going to go ahead and set that up again.

You can kind of take a little measure as you bend forward to place it.

You can say,

Okay,

Do I want it?

Where's the best position for this?

Do I need it tall for my fingertips or where I can place my palm on it?

Or is one of the shorter options the best for me?

Find your best grip measurement there.

And then we're going to inhale,

Both of our legs are straight at this time.

And then we'll take our left hand behind our back and our inhale.

We'll take our right hand up.

And as we exhale,

We're going to fold forward over that left leg,

Which you can bend into it here as we're folding and taking that right hand towards the block.

And then we're going to do some more dynamic.

Your inhale will come to that halfway lift again.

Hand can stay on the block or come up in front.

As you exhale,

Release back down into the pyramid fold.

Inhale again,

Another halfway lift with that left leg here in front.

As you exhale,

Reaching that hand back towards the block,

Crown of the heads coming back down towards the floor.

And then we're going to take a nice big inhale all the way up to standing that left hand is still behind our back,

Keeping that shoulder nice and back.

Think about that right hip coming forward a little bit.

Now that we're in the standing position and we're going to take these full folds like we did with our halfway lift.

So on your next exhale,

Right hand's reaching towards that block.

Upper body's coming over that leg again,

Bending as needed into that left knee.

Try to keep that right heel down.

As you inhale,

Coming back to standing,

Maybe that right hand is on the hip or maybe it's up above your head.

And as you exhale,

Bring it back down into that folded pyramid.

Inhale back up to the upright pyramid.

And then as we exhale,

We'll stay here a while.

Don't worry.

You can even bring your left hand down,

Reaching towards the block also,

Or you can leave it back behind your back if that feels better.

And bending in,

Keeping that right heel down,

Bringing the right hip forward a little,

Left hip back.

Square the hips.

So just continue to breathe.

On your next inhale,

We'll bring it all the way back up.

We'll bring the left foot to meet the right.

And we'll get ready for the other side.

So our right foot's going to come forward this time.

Our left foot stays back again.

Our feet stay hip width apart.

We've got some distance between them.

So even though they're a little asymmetrical,

We are still on our skis there.

We'll bring the block now to the inside of the right foot.

Again,

It doesn't have to be right next to it.

It can be a little more in line even with your left foot,

Just more on the horizontal plane,

Having it be in line with both feet,

Really,

Kind of like a grid.

And again,

Left heel down.

Both legs are straight at this time.

Every time we come into this upright position,

Keeping them straight.

So our legs are not super far apart.

They are a comfortable distance,

A part where you feel nice and balanced here.

Then we'll take that right hand behind our back and our lower back.

And then we'll take the left hand up as we inhale.

As we exhale,

We'll come down,

Bring that left hand towards the block to place our fingertips or the palm on it.

You can bend into that right knee as needed.

We're going to take some halfway lifts here.

Again,

Think about squaring those hips.

So as you inhale,

Halfway lift.

As you exhale,

Fold again over that right leg.

Inhale,

Halfway lift.

Exhale,

Folding back down.

Inhale,

Coming back to another halfway lift.

Exhale,

Dropping it down.

Folding that left hip is coming forward.

Right hip is trying to come back.

And then our next inhale,

Keeping our arm positions the way that it is.

We're really just hinging from the hips here,

Straightening the legs as we come back up to standing.

And then as we exhale,

We're bringing that left hand down towards that fold,

Towards the block.

Our upper body is trying to lay on top of that right leg.

And we'll take a couple more.

Again,

That right leg can bend as much as it needs to.

We'll again inhale all the way back up to standing.

As we exhale,

Folding forward again.

Again,

The knee is not,

We're not bending into the knee,

But we're allowing the knee to bend to help us get into this fold.

As you inhale,

Last one coming up to standing here on this side.

Left hand might be up overhead or on your hip.

And exhale,

Fold.

And making sure that left heel is still down.

Hand is coming towards the block,

Crown of the head is coming towards the floor.

Left hip is pulling forward,

Right hip back.

And just stay for some breaths.

Taking out those inhales and exhales.

Allow the breath to work some magic while we're in this stretch.

And then we'll inhale all the way back up to standing.

And we'll release the hands.

Bring the right foot back to meet the left.

And take a moment to notice how things are feeling.

We'll get ready to move into our next position.

So then inhale the hands up overhead,

Forward fold,

Bring your hands down towards that block.

Sorry,

Maybe move it back towards you.

Your hands are just reaching towards the floor.

Bend both knees as much as you need to.

Inhale while halfway lift.

We'll go ahead and move that block out of the way as we fold back down.

And we'll go ahead and walk ourselves out into a bit of a downward dog.

Or feel free to come into tabletop with your knees underneath your hips and your wrists underneath your shoulders.

Or come into that downward dog,

Heels coming down towards the floor,

Hips are raised toward the sky.

You can bend into one knee and then another,

Maybe take a breath here.

Whether you're in neutral tabletop or downward dog,

In either way,

Thinking about that line from your tailbone through the crown of your head.

You want your neck to follow the natural curve of your spine.

And if you're in downward dog,

Go ahead and come down to tabletop.

If you're already in tabletop,

Fabulous.

If this is a lot on your wrists,

What you can do is either take one block under one hand,

One block under the other hand.

Or you can also come into your fists,

Not putting your thumb on the ground,

But allowing your fists to give you a little bit of height there as well and release some of the pressure on the shoulders.

And you're,

Either way,

Again if this is a lot on your shoulders to be in this tabletop position,

You can also bring your fist or your hand just a little bit in front of your shoulder and help relieve some of that pressure.

And we're just going to come into some cat-cows.

So we'll start with cow.

As we inhale,

We're just going to drop the belly button down towards the floor,

Make sure our shoulders are nice and back as we begin to look up and forward.

And then as we exhale,

We'll round the spine,

Push away from the floor,

Make a cat tailbone coming down towards the ground,

Crown of the head coming down towards the ground.

And then as we inhale,

Coming back up into that cow with that chest opening.

And as we exhale,

Rounding the spine,

Coming back into cat.

Now take a few of these on your own breath.

Again,

Keeping them as even time-wise as possible.

Maybe move around a little bit more,

Just gentle cat-cows are really just opening the spine and the chest.

And continue.

Maybe round it out,

Finish it out with that last exhale.

And then as you inhale,

We're going to bring our knees back a little bit.

As we come more forward in the most comfortable position that we can,

You can bring your elbows in there in this kind of kneeling plank on our knees.

And you can just lower yourself down towards the ground.

Elbows are hugging the ribs on their way down.

We're going to come all the way down to our belly.

There's a more comfortable way,

Please feel free.

The way we'll meet down there is our elbows will be pointing towards the sky.

Our hands will be down by our lower ribs.

As we prepare for cobra,

Our legs will be shoelace side down,

Legs are extended behind us,

Hips are on the floor,

Our forehead,

Maybe you're resting on the left temple or the right temple.

You can also have your forehead down on the ground.

This could be a great place if you want to put that block underneath your head there.

And maybe if you want to take another block and maybe put it in between your thighs,

That way as we lift up into this,

You can kind of squeeze that and get some tension,

But we will not be lifting the legs here.

So if you like,

You can get that extra leg tension.

If not,

We're positioned with our forehead either on the block or on the floor.

Her arms are in position as we inhale.

Just lift the upper body only up.

Our legs are about hip width apart as well.

And as we exhale,

We'll go ahead and release back down.

As we inhale,

Lifting just the upper body up,

Hands can stay on the floor or they can come up a little bit.

Fingertips should be pointing towards the shoulders.

Exhale,

Release down.

And next inhale,

We'll come back up and we'll stay here for a few breaths.

So balance.

If you need to come down a little bit more,

That's fine.

Again,

Thinking about that line in your spine.

So you don't necessarily want to be looking up like you would be an upward facing dog.

You're more just looking towards the front of your mat.

Maybe even just past the mat on the floor a little bit.

Elbows are strong.

You might even feel this in your biceps as you think about your shoulders and shoulder blades going down the back,

Opening that chest.

On your next exhale,

Go ahead and release down towards the ground.

Take a moment,

Rest here.

And then we'll go ahead and take our hands,

Maybe adjust where we can push ourselves up or whatever is the most comfortable position for you to get back into tabletop.

Again,

Maybe you've got two different blocks,

One under each hand.

Maybe you're on your fists.

We've got our knees underneath our hips.

Our feet are also hip width apart,

Shoelace side down.

Adjust your hands to where it's comfortable.

And we'll start by inhaling,

Taking those cows.

Belly button comes towards the floor,

Tailbone tips up slightly,

Chest opens nice and back.

And then as we exhale,

Rounding the spine,

Pushing into the hands,

Tailbone tips towards the floor.

Take some of those on your own breath again,

Nice and even,

Inhaling into cow,

Exhaling into cat.

Just feel that spine,

Keep it going,

Head drops towards the floor in cat.

We're gonna move a little side to side if that feels good.

And we're gonna find a neutral spine here.

Again,

Thinking about that line from the tailbone,

String that's pulling from your tailbone through the crown of your head.

This time it's more horizontal than vertical like when we were on a mountain.

And we're gonna go ahead and come to kneeling.

So our,

From our knees to our toes is not gonna change where it is as long as that's comfortable for you.

Our upper body is gonna come up,

Our hips are on top of our knees,

Our shoulders are on top of our hips.

Again,

Thinking about that alignment,

Now we're vertical again,

A little backwards L.

You can get your hands into this if your shoulders are feeling it and it's not good for them,

Your hands can stay on your hips or can simply kind of rotate around as we take these twists.

Or you can inhale your hands up overhead,

Maybe the palms touch,

Maybe they don't,

They stay parallel.

And as you exhale,

We'll go ahead and open up to the left side first.

So your left hand will come behind your body as you follow with your gaze,

Your right hand will come forward from the body.

So your hands are kind of stretching apart as you look back towards that left hand,

Your hips are facing forward,

But you've just got this nice twist in your upper body.

As you inhale,

Bring your hands back up the center facing forward.

And as you exhale,

We'll take it over to the right side.

And this time your right hand is coming forward.

Oops,

Sorry,

Your right hand is behind you as you look back.

Your left hand is forward as they pull.

Inhale,

Come back to the center.

Exhale,

We'll take it over to the left.

Keep your shoulders away from the ears.

Inhale,

Back towards center looking forward.

Exhale,

Opening up to the right side.

Inhale,

Back to center.

We'll take one more on each side here.

So left,

Opening up into that twist.

Inhale.

Exhale,

Opening to the right.

And then back to center.

And from here,

We're going to move to seated.

So if it feels comfortable to come into tabletop and either take your ankles all over to one side to cross your ankles in the middle,

Or if there's another way that feels comfortable,

But we're going to come to seated.

Move the blocks out of the way if they're in there.

And then we'll actually come to lying on our backs.

So maybe you bend your knees,

You take your elbows behind you as you release down to the mat.

And then we're going to take a block,

One block,

And put it underneath our hips.

A nice base there.

So underneath our hips,

We're going to be,

So you kind of lift up like in bridge,

Place it down.

And then from there,

We'll actually bring the soles of our feet towards the ceiling.

Maybe our knees are a little more straight,

Maybe they're bent.

Either way,

The goal and the visualization I want you to think of is bring those soles of the feet towards the ceiling.

Our arms are down by our sides,

Our hips are elevated.

And as we exhale,

On your next exhale,

We're going to bend the knees in towards the chest.

Again,

So make sure you're nice and stable on this block.

Maybe two blocks feels better,

Either stacked or side by side.

To give you a little more base if you've got a bolster or a pillow,

This is a great time to use this here as well.

And then as you inhale,

Bring those soles of the feet back up towards the ceiling,

Extending the legs.

As you exhale,

Bend into the knees as you bring the heels down towards your hips.

And then as you inhale again,

Soles of the feet towards the ceiling,

Hands are there giving you a nice space.

As you exhale,

Knees come in towards the chest,

Heels towards the hips.

Inhale,

Soles of the feet are going back up towards the ceiling.

Neck is nice and neutral.

Exhale,

Knees come in towards the chest.

Inhale,

Extend the legs,

Just keeping that,

Your hips just nice and hanging out on that block.

Work here with those legs.

Exhale,

Bend the knees.

And as you inhale,

Feet back up towards the ceiling.

Exhale,

Knees back in towards the chest.

And then from there,

Go ahead and place the soles of the feet on the floor,

Knees are pointed up towards the ceiling.

Lift up the hips as you put the weight into the heels,

Remove the block,

Release your lower body back down.

And we'll go ahead and start to bring the upper body up.

So maybe again,

Maybe you bend the knees,

Maybe you come up on your elbows and adjust yourself up,

Maybe you roll over to one side and come up,

Bring the knees into the chest,

Roll up.

However you like,

We're going to come to seated,

Extending the legs in front of us.

So our upper body is going to be upright.

Then we'll have our legs extended,

Knees straight in front of us.

Now find that block again,

And we've got two options here.

One of them is you can sit on the block or bolster on your hips like we did with our hips while we were laying down.

Now we're going to be putting it on the seated side as we're seated.

Or you can place the block at the end of your feet.

You can also use both blocks if you want to take a moment to get situated as we elevate the hips and possibly put a block beyond our feet.

But that part is totally up to you.

Feel free to have as much bend in your knees here as needed.

We're getting a little extra leverage in those hips here.

So you might find that you're able to extend the legs a little more than when we were simply seated and if we were simply seated.

Want to feel this.

So as you're seated there on your block again,

Maybe your knees are bent.

You want your hip points up towards the sky.

If they're not again,

Go ahead and bend those knees or elevate your hips even higher.

You want to make sure that we're able to really hinge from the hips getting into the lower back,

Not just the hamstrings.

And so from here once you're situated,

We'll just inhale our hands up high.

You can also just walk your hands up and down your legs if that feels better.

Again,

If your shoulder is not not loving this today.

We'll inhale our hands up overhead if that's what we're doing.

And as we exhale hinging from the hips,

Bending the knees as we reach the hands either towards that block that's beyond the feet or towards our feet.

Maybe we just grasp our feet.

We'll take some dynamic movement here.

So as you inhale,

Go ahead and bring the upper body back up.

As we exhale,

Upper body folds back forward,

Reaching towards those feet or walking towards those feet with our hands.

Inhale we'll come back up again.

Exhale folding forward.

And this time we'll just stay so we can come back to that even breath in and out smoothly as possible.

These might be bent and extend the crown of our head towards our feet as well with our hands.

We'll be extending the back there with each inhale.

So we exhale kind of folding over just a little bit more.

So it's a little bit of movement here in this.

Exhale fully.

And on your next inhale,

And just everybody walk your hands up the legs,

Bringing the upper body up.

Take a moment.

We're going to come back to lying on our backs.

We'll just do a few bridges to neutralize that spine and then we'll be ready for our Shavasana.

So from here,

Your block,

You can simply remove it.

Again,

Maybe you bend your knees.

We're going to come back to lying on our backs where upper body will be laying on the ground.

We'll have our soles of our feet on the ground.

Our knees will be pointing up towards the ceiling.

Now here we've got some options for our blocks as well for one or two.

You can like we did earlier before we put our legs up the invisible wall,

We can put the block underneath our hips again.

So if you'd like,

You can lift up the hips a little and put the block there.

You can also or additionally put a block in between your thighs with kind of the width,

Find the width that works for you.

It's okay if your feet are a little wider than hip width apart,

But we want them to definitely be at least hip width apart.

Bring your hands down by your sides.

And then on your next inhale,

We're just going to lift up as we squeeze.

If you have a block between your thighs,

Squeeze that block for a little extra leg tension,

Lifting the hips towards the sky.

Using our hands to really think about the shoulders just coming away from the ears even here on the mat.

Exhale release down.

You're releasing some of that tension but still keeping that block there and then maybe your hips rest on the block.

Next inhale we lift,

Lift the hips.

Exhale release the hips back down towards the ground.

Our feet are staying in this nice firm position,

Our shoulders are staying positioned.

If you like on the next inhale,

In addition to lifting the hips,

You can also lift your arms up overhead like you're bringing your fingernails to touch the floor above your head,

Biceps by your ears.

And as you exhale,

You can release the hands back down by the hips.

Take two or three more of those on your own breath,

Inhaling as you lift the hips up,

Possibly the hands.

As you exhale,

Returning to your starting position,

Your feet bent and on the floor,

Hips down,

Shoulders and hands down.

You have that block in between your thighs,

Remember to squeeze as you lift up.

A nice slow and controlled release.

After your last exhale and release down towards the ground,

We'll take just a little mini bridge as you lift that block out from under your hips if you had it there,

Remove the block from between your thighs,

Set both blocks over to the side.

If you'd like to use your blocks during Shavasana in any way that really feels comfortable,

You certainly can,

Maybe you want to rest your head against the block.

Bring your feet out in where it's comfortable,

Maybe they're not width apart,

Feet kind of splaying out.

Maybe your hands,

If you have that block underneath your head,

You could even bring your hands almost like you're just relaxing,

Right?

To touch the block,

Wrap around it as your elbows come down towards the floor for a little extra heart opening here.

Maybe the hands just come behind the head,

Maybe they're palms down or palms up at a 45 degree angle from your hip while they're on the floor.

Remember where it is,

Find a place that's comfortable.

If your lower back isn't feeling good,

You can also put your soles of your feet back on the floor as your knees are bent and just let your knees kind of knock in towards each other.

And here,

Inhale strongly through the nose and exhale through the mouth.

Let your breathing go where it's going to go,

Release any control of that.

Just let the breath naturally as you relax further and further into the mat.

Shavasana.

Shavasana.

Shavasana.

Shavasana.

You're welcome to stay here as long as you like,

Letting the timer run out or pausing.

Whenever you're ready,

Some movement into your body,

Wiggle the fingers,

Wiggle the toes.

Some ankle circles,

Some wrist circles,

Maybe a nice big good morning stretch as you bring your hands overhead,

Biceps by the ears,

Outstretched the legs,

Point the toes,

Really extend.

Maybe you bring your knees in towards your chest.

You can certainly roll up to sitting or roll to your favorite side.

Take a moment to notice how you might feel versus when you started this practice.

When you're ready,

Bring yourself to seated,

Maybe using the arms.

Take your hands outstretched,

Placing one underneath your collarbone on your chest,

The other hand right on top.

So you take one more big breath in together,

Nice and strong,

And exhale through the mouth as you release.

Thank you for practicing with me today.

I hope that this practice with blocks or props helps you move into these postures to get the benefit from them for that mind-body connection that you were looking for.

I hope you have a great rest of your day.

Reviews

Hello beautiful 🌸💐🌸💐🌸Thank you so much for the wonderful yoga session 🎈🎈🎈I’m feeling relaxing and sweet like sunshine 🌎have a blessed day 🕉️Namaste