Somatic Morning Yoga Flow

Greet your day with a full-body nervous system reset. This gentle morning yoga practice combines breathwork, somatic movement, pandiculation, and chakra balancing to guide your body from stress into calm presence. You’ll activate the parasympathetic nervous system, tone the vagus nerve, and restore balance from the inside out.

Transcript

Doing somatic yoga first thing in the morning is a wonderful way to set the tone for your day. I invite you to join me in this beautiful morning practice that resets your nervous system and helps you ground within your body. Remember you can always opt out of anything that I might suggest if it feels uncomfortable to you. We're going to do a beautiful moving meditation that will wake up each part of our body and it's connected to the chakras. Place your hands beside you on the surface that you're sitting on. Feel free to close your eyes or leave them open. We're going to do what's called a faux yawn. Begin to settle in if you're closing your eyes like I am, Lovely. Start to feel your sit bones against the surface you are sitting on. Notice the textures of that surface beneath your fingertips. Beginning to dial into your presence. You are here about to start your day. When you are ready, Send up your arms over your head. Begin to tense up, Pushing your shoulders towards your ears, Curling your hands into fists. Start tensing slightly, Slightly. We're mimicking a yawn, How the body reacts to a yawn. Notice how your cat and dog wake up when they tense up their body. It's the same thing. So tense, Tense, Tense. A little bit more. Sigh out. Bring your arms down to touch the earth again. We're going to do one more and if one was enough, No problem, Just be. Whenever you are ready, Round two. Bring your arms up. Begin to tense, Pushing those shoulders towards the ears, Curling your hands. Completely release, Even shake out your arms and your legs. Place. That was a common simpandiculation. It signals to your brain that the body can relax at the neuromuscular level. How did that feel? Perhaps you are sensing body parts tingling or you feel more alert. These are common reactions. Another way I like to see it is your body is asking you to hold space for it. Perhaps you can say yes today. If you had your eyes closed, Gently open them. We're going to flow into what's next, Coming into tabletop. If you're sitting on the edge of your bed, Just push up like we are, Pushing up into a standing position. Bring your legs hip-width. Do not lock your knees if you can. Keep them buoyant. Let your arms come by your sides and begin to lock in with your feet, But gently, Gently, Just feeling your feet against the ground. I invite you to next explore something with me, Swaying side to side. Start swaying on your feet side to side, Whatever direction you want to start. You can sway with your heels, Lift it up a little bit. If you do feel more rooted today, You can just keep your entire foot down. Experiment with swaying like this. I encourage you to add on now. Instead of side to side, Go back and forth. Maybe you'll fall, Like I almost did, And that's part of play, Which is also how we can learn to balance. Side to side, Front and back. What we're trying to do is find our center. Find it and land somewhere in the middle. Feel your toes, The balls of your feet, Your arches, Your heels. Notice the feedback coming in from your feet into the floor. Imagine your body rising up from that, Like a strong tree. Begin to hear or note the familiar sounds in your morning. Perhaps there are birds singing outside, Or you might hear faint traffic noise, Your coffee maker percolating, The dog snoring, The cat meowing. Hear all those sounds now. These sounds, So familiar, Are part of your safety network. You are in your private space where you can work things out and be. That in fact, You are also the center of these familiar things. Just like the sun, How it rises every day. It's consistent, Constant. You could also be that consistent, Constant force for yourself when you need it. We're now going to flow and use our prana, Because breath is also a signal to the parasympathetic. We're going to start supporting our crown area, Our head, And also our throat chakra. Begin by dropping your chin towards your chest, But opening your hands and placing your palms against your forehead. Noticing how you can support yourself. Add a little tension even, If it feels good to do that. What that means is pushing your forehead into your hands and your hands into your forehead, But not intensely, Slightly. Just see how that feels. What we're going to do next is inhale and open the throat chakra. Pushing your head back, Inhale, Pushing up, Letting your throat open. This is your communication tool that you may have lost, And now you have it back. Exhale, Drop your chin, Keep cradling your head. Always remember, Whatever we're doing, Whether we're doing rocking on the heels, You can opt out of these things at all times. If this doesn't feel good to you, Just sit and be, Or stand and be. Second time, We're going to do this two more times. Inhaling, Pushing up, Opening your throat chakra. Now you can try and speak your truth, The truths you couldn't speak before. Exhale, Drop your chin, Rest for a moment. Last one, Inhale, Greet that morning. Let those sunlight drops slip through. And yes, Now you can consider boundaries, Boundaries that you were unable to set before. Drop your chin, Drop your hands by your sides, Bring your head to center. We're going to flow next and open our chest. Place your left hand on your heart space, Your right hand over it. Begin to see if you can breathe into your heart. As you inhale into your belly, Can you send that breath upwards towards your chest, Feeling the heartbeat beneath your hands. The heart chakra is representative of many things, But one of the things I love about it is it represents moving forward. Let's do that by flowing now. Inhaling, Opening your arms up, Bring your chin up, Look up to the sky, Greeting high, Saying hello to yourself and to the morning and the sun, Encasing your heart again, Knowing that you can protect it, But that you can also open it when you have choices. Inhaling, We're going to do this two more times, Opening up, Bringing your chin up, Looking up, Serving, Even if you can, Looking left and right. That feels too activating, Don't. Now exhale, Come into a self hug, Placing your hands on each shoulder. Can you give yourself a future, Knowing that you deserve one, Last one. Inhaling, Shining, Giving yourself a soothing touch. Downwards, We're going to place our hands on our navel, Which is basically over your belly button. Place your hands there, Begin to add your breath, Exaggerate it slightly. When you inhale, Fill up your belly, Expand it, Act, Feeling it, Coming back in towards your body. Prana is your source. It's one of the biggest things that helps your nervous system. Inhaling, Pushing out, Filling up yourself with life, The outside world that you can maybe trust life. And that's what your solar plexus chakra is. It's about your instincts. We're going to flow, But try to flow out through your back body as well. So when you inhale, Inhale through your back body and exhale, Contract on both sides. And then also bring in your side body. When you inhale, See if you can breathe through your ribs. We're going to bring our arms up and then forward. Three movements each. Dial in now with me if you can. Opt out if you can't, No worries. Begin by keeping your knees buoyant as much as possible. Inhale through your side body, Bring your arms up, Maybe putting your hands into like almost a star position. Beautiful. Exhale, Contract your sides. Two more times. Inhale through your side body, Stretching up and into yourself, Knowing that you can trust you, But then be able to trust others. Last one. Inhale, Side body, Exhale, Bring your arms down. We'll switch up to the front. And this time, Try to breathe through your front and back body as you bring your arms up. Let's begin. Inhaling front and back body, Bring your arms up, Opening from the front and the back, Sending that sunshine in both directions. Exhaling, Coming down with your hands and arms. Next one. Inhale, Front and back, Shine, Shine, Shine. Bring your arms up, Keeping that star shape with your hands. Exhale, Come down. Let those arms rest on your thighs for a moment. Last one. Inhaling through the opening now, Getting ready for your day, For the rest of your week. Next, We're going to touch upon our sacral chakra and our root chakra. Your sacral chakra is below your belly button. You can bring your hands there. And as you breathe, You can feel also your breath filling that space. Your root chakra is around your tailbone area. These are so interconnected because your sacral is about connection and your root chakra is about steadiness, Safety, Being grounded. And when we connect to ourself and to others, We do so by having both in place, Feeling that safety so that you can connect to others. We'll flow with this. How we're going to do that is come into a curl, Coming into like a semi-mini squat here and flowing with a curl, Like a cat curling up and coming down and touching the ground. But if you can't just stay up or even coming up higher if you want and just doing a little mini curl, Giving yourself options always. And then we're going to shoot up and root down. So let's do this together. Coming into like a mini squats, Inhaling again, Bringing up prana and inhaling and curling into that cat, Sending that sunshine out your back. Exhale and coming back into that little mini squat or standing up higher, Inhaling, Curl and touching the earth, Knowing that you are supported, Pushing up and selling like a star because you feel safe. Coming back down in that mini squat. Last one, Curling. I'll do it from the front so you can see curling and then coming down, Exhaling, Touching earth, Pushing through your feet, Your room. Ah, Beautiful. Next, We're going to balance the center of who you are by doing a little side bend and bringing our foot out. And I'll show you how this works. This kind of completes the sequence of opening each chakra for the day. How that works is we can breathe into our side body as we did before, Bringing your arm up and you can add a little dance move if you like. Or another option is to bring your elbow up if it's hard to bring your arm up and or just keep your arm up and not incorporate the dance move. But let's try to do this together and see what happens. Again, Keeping your knees buoyant, Using your prana, Inhaling through the side body. I'm going to do my right side first, But whatever side works for you, Start there. Inhale there, Filling it up. I mean, You can put your hand and feel how your breath moves in this part of your body. And perhaps this is even new to you, Not breathing in the side body. It could be a strange concept, But trying it. Inhaling, Bringing your arm up and then adding that dance move. Exhaling, Coming back in. Again, This even plays with a little bit of balance, Not intensely but slightly. We're going to do two more. Inhaling through that side body, Feeling with your hand how it fills up, Billows. Bring up your arm and then back. Last one on this side. And if you can try, Try to even direct the side move from your ribs. So bending through your ribs, Inhaling. You can see how my body kind of moves to the side naturally. Inhaling, Coming back. We'll do the same thing on this side. Touching your ribs again to feel where your breath comes from and where it goes. This is a lot of also body awareness. Ready? Inhale through your side body, Bringing in your arm now and then adding the touch of your toes. You can even play with it and come up and down, But no need to if you don't want to. Exhaling, Coming back. Centering again before we do the two more and putting your hand here to begin to feel how the breath moves. Inhaling through your side body, Bringing up your arm overhead, Feeling that adding your foot. You can even turn your foot, Play around as I said, Or keep it here. Or even if you want to press your foot down, Sometimes that feels nice. Coming back, Exhaling. Last one. Adding your hand if you like. I always do. Inhaling, Adding that bend, Throwing in the foot. Does your body feel open, Aligned? Maybe you can bring this sense of centeredness and openness into your life, Into your day. But if something feels far away, That's okay, Too. We treat ourselves with loving kindness and non-judgment. Perhaps you had your eyes closed. If you did, You can open them. It was amazing to spend our morning together. This is a wonderful practice to do daily if you like. It was incredible to connect. And it's really sunny here, So I hope it's sunny where you are. Sending love today. We'll see you next time.