Gentle Chair Yoga

Enjoy this 10-minute gentle chair practice with Missy, wherever you are in your day. Missy Brown, founder of DPK, is devoted to serve and feels deeply honored to have the privilege of sharing these practices with others.

Transcript

Hi,

It's Missy Brown from Deep Play for Kids.

I'm so glad to be here together.

I'll be sharing a chair yoga,

Desk yoga,

Bed yoga short practice with you.

I'm finding I'm sitting a lot these days at my desk and I'm sitting a lot in chairs.

Right now I'm not leaving to go anywhere,

But at times I'm often sitting in a car or on an airplane or a train.

So I thought it would be nice to take a few minutes and share a sitting practice together.

So find somewhere that you'd like to sit if you aren't already doing that.

So again,

It might be in a chair or at the kitchen table,

At your desk.

You can sit on the bed,

Anywhere that you'd like to have a seat.

And find a comfortable place to sit.

If you'd like,

You can allow your eyes to gently close or find a soft gaze down towards the floor at something that's not moving.

And feel your feet on the floor.

If your feet don't reach the floor,

I'll take a moment and invite you to go get some blocks or books or a pillow or something to put under your feet so that you don't need to strain to try to reach the floor.

And allow yourself to land and arrive.

Connect with your breath.

Notice wherever you feel the breath,

There's nothing that you need to do.

It's perfect exactly as it is.

Sit up tall and find length.

And allow your chin to drop down gently towards your chest.

And then lift your chin and allow your head to gently drop back.

Rotating back and forth,

Chin to chest and then the head coming back as if you were saying,

Yes.

Yes,

I'm here in my body.

Yes,

I'm here in my life.

A few rounds of yes.

And then come back to center.

And if it's saying no,

Move your head very gently from side to side.

No,

In this moment,

I don't need a yoga mat or a yoga class.

I'm practicing health and wellness in my body right here where I sit,

Gently bringing the head from side to side as it's saying no.

And then come back to center to neutral and begin drawing circles with your nose all around the room.

So up to the ceiling,

To the side wall,

Down towards the floor and over to the other side and reverse direction.

So after rotating in one,

Rotate in another,

Making these circles as large or as small as feels comfortable for your neck.

And then allow your head to come back to central,

To center to neutral.

Pause and notice.

I often hold a lot of tension and tightness in my neck.

So taking a few minutes to move my head and neck in different ways can help release some of that tension and tightness.

Now bring your right hand to your left knee,

Your left hand behind you and gently move into a twist without forcing.

You don't need to go very far with this twist,

But gently bring yourself into a twist,

Twisting over to the left.

Each breath in and out in invitation to deepen the twist.

Again,

Without forcing or straining.

And then very slowly unwind,

Come back to center,

Allow your left hand to come to your right knee,

Right hand comes behind you for a gentle twist to the right side.

Again,

Each breath in and each breath out in invitation to go a little deeper in the twist or stay right where you are.

This is the perfect destination.

You don't have to get any further.

And then as you feel ready,

Gently unwind,

Coming back to center,

Hold on to the chair with your left hand and allow your right arm to extend up and then arch over to the left.

Coming back and forth in this arch like a swaying palm tree.

Arching over and coming back up a little bit,

Arching and straightening.

And then allow your right arm to come down,

Come back to center and reverse the direction.

Allow your right hand to now come onto the chair,

Extend your left arm up and begin to arch over to the left.

Coming in and out,

Swaying a little bit back and forth in this crescent moon like a swaying palm tree.

And then come on back up to center.

Bring both arms down by your side.

Sweep them up overhead with a sun breath up on an inhalation and then bring them back down on the exhalation.

We'll do that two more times.

Inhale,

Sweep the arms up overhead.

Exhale,

Bring the arms down by the side and one more time.

Breath in,

Sweep the arms up and a breath out.

Sweep the arms back down and pause and notice.

Does your body feel like it's waking up?

Do things feel like they're a little more loose?

Beginning to wake up the body or move stale and stuck air.

And then extend your arms in front of you and begin making circles with your wrists in one direction and the other.

Noticing any little cracks that you hear.

Hello wrists,

Good morning wrists or good afternoon wrists.

And if you'd like,

You can keep your feet on the floor or perhaps extend your legs out in front of you.

Bring your heels down to the ground or lift your legs up into the air and you can make some rotations with your ankles.

Just like with your wrists,

You can do this movement with your ankles or keep it just in the hands and allow your feet to stay planted on the earth.

And then begin to bring that to a close.

Come back up to a neutral seat.

Extend your arms behind you and they can reach behind you on the chair or to the back of the chair or if you'd like,

You can have your hands come together behind you.

We'll be folding forward.

So take a nice breath in and as you release your breath,

Gently fold forward.

Again,

No need to strain or force coming only as forward as your body is able and willing and interested in doing in this moment.

And then slowly come back up to seated.

Bring your hands to your knees.

Tuck your chin into your chest,

Round your back towards the space behind you like a cat.

Now reverse and slightly gently arch your spine with your heart shining forward.

Again,

Moving back and forth a few times,

Rounding like a cat and arching like a cow.

One more time,

Rounding like a cat and arching like a cow.

And then come back into neutral.

Feel what's happening in your spine.

Notice what's happening in your body.

Where's your mind?

The beating of your heart.

And then drop back into your breath,

Just like when we started.

Back into your breath.

Soft breath in and a soft breath out.

I wish you a beautiful day as you return to wherever you were before we began.

Reviews

This was just the morning chair yoga routine I've been searching for! Thank you and namaste!

Just a perfect way to begin chair yoga for an 80 year old. Very gentle.

This is a really gentle short exercise that I'm happy with.Im totally unfit and unfit for work due to chest pains.This sequence is just enough to be starting with for now.With clear and easy instructions Thank you.

Excellent! Perfect guidance. (I would luv a version with gentle background music.) Thank you for sharing 🙏🏽✨

Thank you so much 💐💐💐for the sweet chair yoga practice 🔆 my body starts smiling doing this🦋stay safe 🙏Namaste

Thank you so much. Your instructions were perfectly clear! I’ll be back!