Gentle Morning Yoga For Stiff Joints

This gentle morning yoga practice is designed to help ease stiff joints and tight muscles, using slow, dynamic movements to wake up your body with care, especially if you live with arthritis or joint sensitivity.

This class is suitable if you:
- Wake up feeling stiff or achy
- Have arthritis or ongoing joint pain
- Want gentle movement rather than deep stretches
- Are new to yoga or returning after a break

We’ll move gradually, with mindful, flowing movements to encourage mobility, warmth, and ease, helping you start the day feeling more comfortable and supported.

Remember to listen to your body throughout, only do what you feel you can, and pause when needed.

Transcript

Hello Flowly friends and welcome to this morning yoga to wake up stiff joints. So often we wake up and we feel pretty stiff in the morning and maybe we think that moving isn't really going to help us, But actually a little bit of gentle movement is really going to help wake up your body nice and gently and get you moving and get you ready for your day. So whenever you're ready, Grab your mat and let's get started. So the first thing that we're going to do is just take a really nice full body stretch. So just stand with your feet about hip distance apart. Not pulling those knees in, Not locking them in place. And then just take an inhale and sweep the arms forward, Reach the arms up nice and high. And just really reach and stretch, Stretching out the whole body. Getting really tall through your spine. Maybe wiggle your fingers a little bit. Take another breath. And then exhale, Just float your arms down nice and gently. Take another breath, Reach the arms up, Big reach and stretch. Lovely, Take a breath in and then exhale. Let's take the arms out to the side this time, Let them come down. Let's take an inhale and sweep the arms out this time and then reach up. And then when you get here, Take a little lift of the heels. So just coming up onto the toes, Just stretching the backs of the calf muscles. Again, Take an inhale and exhale nice and gently. Lower everything back down. Let's do one more of those. Big inhale. This time, If we can, Just lifting the heels up at the same time as the arms. Nice big reach and stretch. Inhale and then exhale nice and gently lower the arms down. Okay, Now we're going to create a little bit of energy, A little bit of warmth in the body. So this should get the blood flowing a little bit and ease into your joints a little bit as well. So what we're going to do is we're going to take a bend into the knees as we sweep the arms up into the air. Nice big reach. Exhale, We're going to let the arms come down. We're going to sink back into the knees. Then we're going to have a little bounce and then we're going to rise up again. Lovely, Exhale, Bring it down. Take a little bounce of the knees. Inhale, We sweep it up. Exhale, Take it down. Inhale, Rise. And we're just gonna keep this going. And it's a really nice way to connect to your breath as well. You're just gently moving the body, Gently waking it up. If you want to, You can get a little faster. Making those breaths that little bit shorter, Bouncing a little bit faster into the knees, But only if you feel that you can. If you're super stiff, Then maybe you want to keep it nice and slow. Keep it going. Inhale to rise. Exhale as we sink into those knees little bounce inhale rise Sometimes it might take you a few goes to kind of find that little bit of rhythm. But once you do, It's going to really start to make you feel awake. And it's going to wake up those muscles and joints, But also just make you feel a little bit more less sleepy. Which is definitely what we want in the morning. Nice bend in the knees reach out. Yeah, Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale, We're gonna go one more. Inhale, Rise. Exhale, Nice. Bounce and then straighten up the legs take the arms up Let's reach, Reach, Reach, Reach, Reach. Inhale. And then exhale, Let's bring the hands down to the heart. Take a moment here. Maybe you close your eyes, Let your shoulders just relax down and really kind of notice how you feel if you went that little bit faster, Maybe. Your breath is like mine a little bit shallow. Maybe you feel that lovely little warming sensation around your body. So this is definitely a nice little move to do, Especially if it's on a cold morning. Know maybe start with your fluffy dressing gown on and then you can take it off as soon as you start to get hot So you start to get toasty again. Lovely stay here just a couple more breaths Perfect. Take a nice big inhale. Saya out. Wonderful. Just release your arms. We're going to take a little squeeze of the knees to the chest now. So when you're ready. You're just going to take an inhale and then draw the right knee in as close as you can. Grab it with both hands. Squeeze it in. You don't have to grab around the front. You could grab underneath your thigh, Whatever works. Squeeze, Squeeze, Squeeze. And then nice and gently drop the leg down. Take it to the other side. Left one squeeze it in always trying to get a nice tall spine as you squeeze in drop it down we don't have to stay there too long obviously compromises your balance a little bit Squeeze it up. Down it goes. Squeeze it up. And down it goes. Perfect let's take an inhale sweep the arms up Take a little soft bend in the knees and then exhale, Float yourself down into a forward fold. Nice and gently. Now you can keep that bend in the knees here. Just take a few moments just to feel that stiffness. You're definitely going to feel it in the backs of the legs. And in your low back. Can grab hold of your legs here or maybe your hands come down to the floor remember you can always use a prop here place a block Or something underneath your hands. Book can work if you haven't got any blocks. Breathe deeply. Exhale. Wonderful and then take an inhale and nice and gently rise up come up into a standing position take your time take a little roll of your shoulders sweep your arms up into the air nice big reach up and then we're just gonna do that one more time take a bend in the knees Exhale, Fold over the legs. Nice and gently, Let your head hang down. Notice again the legs, The back, Hopefully they're feeling a little less stiff now. Take a big breath in. Let it go. And then on your next inhale. Slowly, Slowly rise it up. Take your time. Roll the shoulders, Big sweep up of the arms. And then exhale, Just bring your hands back down to your heart. Okay, So. We're going to do a little bit of a chest opening now. Just kind of open up the calf muscle, Get into the legs, Stretch them out a little bit with warrior one. So come and stand at the top of your mat if you're not there already. Take an inhale, Bend the knees, Just reach the arms up nice and gently. As you exhale, Bring your hands down towards your heart. As you step that right foot back, You can slide it back, Step it back, Whatever works. Nice bend in the front knee. Back here wants to be connected to the floor. Lovely lift your chest nice and proud here have your shoulders just nice and low away from your ears. Now you might place your hands on your chest for a moment. Take a breath. Really kind of notice your legs here, Notice how they feel. So you're gaining a little bit of strength in that front leg by taking that little bend. We're pressing that back heel in that stretching out your calf muscle nice and gently. Now we're going to open up the chest. So we're going to add in a little dynamic movement with the arm. So as you inhale, You're gonna release your hands down. Take your arms back as far as you can, Reaching them up. So go nice and slow so you can see where your shoulder mobility is. And then exhale, Just bring your hands back down to your heart. Maybe you bring them to your chest, Whatever works for you. Inhale, Gently release back again. See how you're opening your chest as the arms go back. Bring the palms together, Exhale, Hands come down. Let's do a few more of those. Inhale, Nice, Big, Really. And exhale, Bring it down. Try and keep your torso nice and straight, Heart over your hips. Take care. Exhale down. Inhale big release take it up And exhale, Bring it down. Wonderful stay here for a moment and take a little straighten up of the front leg so now we're going to add in a little movement with this front knee we're going to be bending into the knee as we release the arms. So we're going to take an inhale, We're going to release the arms just as we did before. Lovely take them up as we bring the palms together on the exhale we bend into the knees we bring the hands down lovely straighten the leg on the inhale as you release the arms again send it up and back And then exhale. Sink it down. Lovely, We're taking our time, Inhale, Straighten the leg, Release up, Nice and gently. Exhale sink it down so what's really beautiful about this movement is you can really marry it to your own breath you can start to move a bit quicker if you wanted to if you start to really wake up but you can stay nice and slow as well and you're still getting that. Lovely nice little gentle wake up. Opening the chest, Getting into the shoulders. And waking up the leg. Couple more, Straighten the leg. Reach up Exhale, Sink it down. Inhale. And exhale. Last one, Inhale. Exhale sink it down lovely just stay here for a moment take a lovely big breath in Sign it out if you want to. Get rid of some of that tiredness that you still might be holding on to. And then when you're ready, Just take a nice big step forward. I always like to when I get my feet next to each other, Take a little shake out of the leg. And then let's take an inhale, Sweep the arms up into the air and exhale down to a forward fold, Nice and gently. Let the legs stretch out. Take a moment. Breathe here, Notice how your legs and your back feels again. Inhale, We take a half lift. Exhale down we go and then nice big breath, Rise it up, Reach, Reach, Reach. And exhale bring your hands to your heart take it to the other side so you're stepping that left foot back or slide the foot back Whatever works, Heel comes down to the floor. Nice bend in the front knee. If this distance feels too much or you don't feel stable, You always bring that back foot in. Make it comfortable for you. Heart right above your hip. Let's lift the sternum up drop the shoulders stay here nice big breath Let it go. Wonderful. Let's take an inhale, Release the arms. So just the arms to begin with, Take them back. And it might feel a little bit different this side. Exhale, Bring it down because you've got that right leg forward. So sometimes it can make the body feel different. Inhale, Release. Lovely, Reach up. Exhale. Bring it down. Keep it going. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale to release. Exhale bringing it down and we always go that nice and slowly to begin with because then you can see where your mobility is today because it's different on every day and that's okay you know sometimes we can reach further back sometimes we can reach higher sometimes we can get lower and other days not so much So it's about honouring our body wherever it is on any given day. Last one. Take it up. Exhale bring the hands down. Hold it here for one breath. Perfect. Then we're going to straighten up that front leg. And then we're going to add in the little movement so when we bring the hands down we're going to be sinking into that front knee When you're ready, Take an inhale, Release the arms back and up, Palms together, Exhale, Sink into the knee, Hands come down. Straighten that leg. Inhale, Release the arms up and back. Exhale sink it down Lovely. Keep it going. Straighten the leg. Keep circling, Bring it down. Inhale. Take it up. Exhale. Bring it down. Inhale. And exhale. Last one. Big release. Take it up. And exhale sink it down Wonderful. Let the shoulders relax for a moment. Take a breath. Let it go. Perfect, Take a nice big step forward when you're ready. Maybe you shake out your legs and your hips again, Just for a second, Then bend the knees, Reach the arms up. Exhale, Down we go into a forward fold. Take a moment here, Notice how you feel. And then let's take a little bit of a rag doll. So bending into the knees, Let the chest. Nice and close. Towards your thighs, Let everything kind of hang freely, Upper body, Head and neck, And then take a little sway from side to side. So you can just let your arms be loose and just sway. Side to side or maybe grabbing hold of opposite elbows might feel good. But just take it gentle, Keep breathing here. Perfect. Wonderful when you're ready just come back to stillness for a moment maybe take a little nod of your head And then maybe a little look left and right a couple of times just to. . . Wake up the neck a little bit as well. Lovely. Then just release your arms. Inhale. Let's ragdoll rise. So slowly, Gently roll up to standing. Arms are just gently hanging down. Let the spine stack. Roll the shoulders once you reach the top. Nice big sweep up of the arms. And then exhale, Let your hands, Arms float down by your side. You can just let your palms face forward. Just take a few moments. Let your shoulders relax. Have that softness in your knees. And just take a few breaths Notice how you feel. Check in with those joints, Those stiff joints. Hopefully they're feeling a little warmer. A little more oil there. And hopefully you're feeling nice and warm and have that little bit of energy, Shifted a little bit of that sleepiness. And we can now continue on with the rest of the day. Take a big breath in. Sigh it out. That brings us to the close of today's. Gentle morning yoga for stiff joints thank you so much for joining me today hope to see you in the next video have a great day

Reviews

Excellent warm up for the morning. St Annes 5-18-26

Hi, my friend! I am so happy that videos are available now. It was wonderful to practice with you again after such a long while. This practice was a great way to get me up and moving and ready for the next thing on my agenda. I appreciate you so much! 🫶🤗✌️🌻☀️