Finding Strength Through Steady Standing Yoga Poses

Find renewed strength by getting grounded in steady standing yoga poses. In this 45-minute class, you’ll warm your body, build stability, and create a strong foundation through mindful standing sequences. These poses activate your large muscle groups, enhance balance, and improve posture — helping you feel centered and powerful from the ground up.

We’ll finish with gentle seated stretches to lengthen tight muscles and release tension. Bring any props you enjoy using for support or modification — like blocks, straps, or a chair — and move at your own pace.

Transcript

Welcome everybody. Welcome to this steady standing strength yoga sequence today. On our feet, We're going to feel the ground beneath us and how each yoga pose is affected by our balance. So the way our toes and our ankles, Our calves work as that energy moves up the body, It should feel very dynamic. So let's close our eyes for a moment. My feet are about hip width distance apart. Perhaps that feels good to you. And let's just wiggle our toes around for a moment. Just kind of. . . Imagine the ground beneath you. You might think of being in sand. Or in grass. Or in the dirt, Whatever makes you feel like you're connecting to the earth. Maybe some of you are outside. Clearly, I am not. But we can imagine the earth beneath us and feel that connection. Now just start to shift a little bit within your feet you might see me just subtly moving back and forth between the sides of my feet forward and backward a little bit, Kind of finding the middle. Where it feels comfortable to be. Right in between our pressure points. Big toe, Little toe, Heel. When you found that spot, Hold still once more. And feel the energy moving up your body. So we're rooted very connected very supported by the earth But from that, The energy lifts, It grows up. We'll try to feel this sensation each time we move to a standing yoga pose today. Let's begin. We'll turn to our side here, Or I will turn to my side. You face whatever direction is best for you to see the camera. And we'll start with Sira Namaskara A. Once again, Find those toes, Widen them out, Get your position, And let's begin. Inhale, Reach your arms up to the sky. Exhale swan dive forward reach down you can feel the backs of the legs now this is our first time so if we're tight here we might soften our knees we can just give a little bit of cushion to our back Hands to the shins. Inhale, Halfway lift. Now we can feel that stretch back in those hamstrings. Exhale, Hands come down. Step back. You can drop to your knees here or stay lifted. Let's chaturanga. Inhale, Urva Mukha Svanasana, Upward Facing Dog. Exhale, Shift back to Adha Mukha Svanasana, Downward facing dog. Now what happens here? You might not call this a standing pose because we're bent and our hands are on the floor. But let's still find the connection. Let's spread our fingers wide. Let's press those heels downward. They don't have to touch, But they're reaching. Let's feel the strong base every time we've got something on the floor. And there's always something on the floor. Bend your knees. Look forward. Inhale, Step or hop. Up to your hands. Exhale fold down into your legs Inhale, Reverse swan dive, Reach up to the sky. Exhale, Bring your arms down by our sides. Nice. Let's do it again. Keep our flow going. Inhale, Reach up. Exhale swan dive all the way forward Inhale, Look up halfway lift. Exhale, Hands down. Step back, Drop to your knees, Or stay lifted like I am. Chaturanga. Inhale, Urava Mukha Svanasana, Upward Facing Dog. Exhale, Roll back, Atamukasvanasana, Downward Facing Dog. Good. Feel that firm ground beneath you. Now let's step forward so our feet are hip width distance apart. I'm going to turn myself so that you can see and we're going to grab a block. You may or may not need the block but take it just in case. If you can reach down and wrap your index finger and thumb around your big toe, Then do that. If that's too challenging for your hamstrings, That's why we have the block and we've got different heights. That we can move this block. Now, This is Patagustasana. And we can feel this really well, Our grounding, Our support, If we shift our weight toward our toes. All of a sudden, The big toe, The little toe and the heel are very accountable for the balance of this pose. And let's see if we can pull forward. Good. Now, Alignment is important in this pose. I'll turn to the side and see. If we're leaning back so our hips are behind our heels, We're not getting that full stretch of the hamstring. So when we shift our weight forward, You can see how it lines up the ankles, The knees, And the hips. And it's going to be much more dynamic. Let's take one more breath. Inhale. Exhale nice now if you have your toes bend your knees and take your hands under your feet We might stay bent, Just like I'm showing, Or we might be able to straighten out and that's fine. We might have some kind of combination of this where we're holding the backs of our legs and we're pulling, Or again, We've got our block. Anything works. Let's just go a couple more breaths a little bit deeper here Relax your neck. We're hanging forward, Feeling that weight in our feet, In our hands maybe. Hamstrings are engaged. One more breath. Inhale. Exhale. Nice job. Now let's release. Take our hands away from our feet or our block and look up. Inhale halfway. Lift. Exhale, Hands down, Step back, Hop back, Chaturanga. Inhale, Uravamukha Svanasana, Upward Facing Dog. Exhale, Press back to Adhamakasvanasana. Downward facing dog. Nicely done. Good. Bend your knees. Look forward. Inhale. Step up. Hop up to the hands. Exhale, Fold down into your legs. Inhale, Reverse swan dive, Reach up to the sky. Exhale, Samasthiti. Nice work. Good. Let's step our feet so that they're nice and wide. I'm going to face you, Of course. You're welcome to face whatever direction on your mat so that you can still see. Now we can feel the pinky toe edge of our feet a little bit more. Can you sense that? Can you sense that stretch that goes all the way up the outside of that calf? All the way down to the edges of the ankle. Take your hands to your waist there. Inhale, Look up. Exhale fold forward and we're going to grab that block again Might need it and put it down now if it's easy for you to bring the hands to the floor That's fine. Do that or we've got our blocks and we can adjust them Good. Now press into the floor, Look up, Lengthen, And shift your weight toward your toes. Remember we talked about those hamstrings, And if we lean too far back into our heels, We're not going to make our hamstrings do the work that they need to. So let's shift the weight toward the toes and then fold back down again. Feel free to use your block. You might be more like this, Especially if you're really making those hamstrings be accountable. Do the work, Right? Make your body do the work. Okay, So folding down whatever that looks like for you. Can we feel those edges of the feet? Definitely we can. Let's take one more breath here. Inhale. Exhale. Nice job press into the ground inhale lengthen even here i'm pushing more forward toward the toes of my feet Exhale bring your hands to your waist Inhale, Lift up. Nice work. And let's turn toward our right leg. Now, If you are oriented the way I am, You just simply rotate that leg open. And we're going to move our block over to that right side so it's ready to go in case we need it. Press into your warrior two. Now, How has our weight changed? We've still got that pinky toe edge on the left foot there. Hip. Now let's drop our forearm. Start there and pull overhead. If you feel like going deeper, This is what our block is for. Grab it and put it on that pinky toe side of your foot and then press down into it. Now pay attention to this left leg. Can you still feel that strong pinky toe edge balancing us out? It's still supporting us to find our steady standing strength nice job so this is our parsvakonasana You could also have this right hand on the floor by that pinky toe edge of the foot. Good now straighten up inhale lift engage and this inner thigh right here let's move to trikonasana exhale reach back down if you're using the block put it on the big toe side adjust it however you want it and extend that left arm up to the sky If this is tough on the shoulder, Hand to the hip works just as well. Can you feel the weight in both feet? Can you feel your ankles having to adjust? Mine are just a little. That's okay. That's what we want. Good now let's get a little bit tricky look down bend your right knee and take this right hand forward really far forward like it's a big reach because as we start to lift off We want our hand and our shoulder and our hip and our torso. It needs to be in line. If it were real close right here, It's gonna be much harder to balance. As you reach that length of your torso, It's gonna become easier. Then if you want to unfurl that hand, Feel free. This is a challenging balance. Just do your best. That's all we can ever ask. Good. One more breath. Inhale. Exhale, Bend your knee. Let's just leave that block there. Put your foot down. Find the ground. Much more stable. Take our hands to our waist. Turn our body. Straighten both legs very nice pyramid pose look up inhale exhale fold ourselves forward and let's reach down our leg we're just going to take our hands along our leg those of you who are capable of reaching the floor go for it you'll feel very stable with the hands on the floor if you want to use your block Take it to that arch side of your foot. Good. Now this is Pyramid Pose. If we change our arms, It's going to change the balance in this pose. So let's lift back up and take our hands behind us. Fists together. Grab your four arms. Come to reverse prayer, Whatever works best for you. Inhale. Exhale fold back down Now how do we feel? We don't have our hands on our legs. We don't have our hands on that block. This is a lot more challenging. Our ankles have to work. Our toes have to work. Our hamstrings have to work. Our calves have to work. Steady standing strength. We are building up our strength here. Good. Take one more breath. Inhale. Exhale. Nice. Let's lift up. Beautiful. Give ourselves a little bit of a break. Go ahead and bend that left knee and set it down. And we are now on the floor. Good. Press down into your hip. Feel that stretch. Just getting a little bit of a break there. Nice job. One more breath. Inhale. Exhale bring your hands down to the mat let's just set that block out of the way Lift up onto the left foot. And step your right foot back. Into downward facing dog. Nice job. Swaying a little bit if you want Shifting around. We are done with one side. So let's find balance between both sides as we move on to our left leg. Bend your knees look forward inhale step or hop up to the hand Exhale, Fold down into your legs. Inhale reverse swan dive reach up to the sky Exhale, Samasthiti. Nice job. Step nice and wide once more. We're back to the beginning, But we're going to change this pose just a little bit. If you have a strap, Feel free to grab it. Put it in your hands behind your back, And we're going to widen out as much as we need to. The strap just allows us to get wider as needed. So press into the fingers or the strap. Look up, Inhale, Exhale, Fold forward. So you can see that as I fold forward, I can pull my hands apart along the strap and get more mobility for my shoulders. But let's not forget about our feet and legs. Shift your weight toward those toes. Find that steady standing strength. Feel the hamstrings, The backs of the legs. Really great stretch Good. Now lift all the way up. Inhale. Forces us to use our core. Feel that there. Love it. Exhale, Release our strap. Good. And let's turn toward that left leg. So the left leg into warrior two. Good. Hopefully you have a block close by. I'm going to grab it and place it there so it's ready to go when we need it. Now we need to pay attention to that right pinky toe edge. It's working hard while we're putting all this weight and energy into that left side. Nice sword. Now take your elbow to your side to begin and rotate overhead If you want to go deeper, We can use the block, Pinky toe side of the foot, Or put your hand on the ground on that pinky toe side. That's fine too. Push down into this hip here. But keep that weight, Keep that energy on that left pinky toe side. Good. Building up strength in our left hip while we're supporting with our feet. Hopefully we're feeling warm about now. We're working our muscles. Doing some good work. Let's lift up and straighten both legs. Nice job. Take it to trikonasana. Reach down again. If you're using a block, Move it to the big toe side. Or you can have your hand on your leg or on the foot. That's totally fine. You choose what works. And then this right hand can be in the air or on your hip. We talked about that last time. So feel whatever it is we're going to feel. Two feet on the floor helps us to feel a little bit more sturdy and stable as we move into our challenging balance pose. So let's look down. Bend the left knee and take this hand, Maybe the block with it, Quite far in front. At least the length of your torso. That will help you to find that balance. Lifting and opening up our chest as best as we can. In this challenging pose. Good. I'm keeping my gaze at the floor because this side is hard for me. If you think you can look up, That's great. Go for it. That's the full iteration of the pose. Take one more breath. Inhale. Exhale, Bend your left knee, Put your right foot down, Lift up. Oh, It's like a relief to find the floor beneath our feet, Yes? Take our hands to our hips and let's turn our body. And then go ahead and straighten out that left leg. Inhale, Look up. Exhale fold forward walk your hands down. You might be hands on the leg You might be able to reach the floor. You might want your block Reach for the block. Find your way. This is a very steady position because we've got both feet on the floor, Both hands. On the leg or close to the floor. So take a moment to just breathe and let the body relax a little bit. But we're going to feel how this pose changes if we don't have our hands involved. Good. Inhale, Lift yourself up. Take your hands behind you, Fists together, Forearms, Or reverse prayer, Whatever works best. Inhale, Look up. Exhale fold forward shift our hips back as we go down Now, Can we feel your ankles working harder? Can you feel your toes having to grip? Your leg muscles working harder. All of a sudden we take the hands out of the equation and we have to find that steady standing strength. Let's take one more breath. Inhale. Exhale. Nicely done. Lift up. Whew, Beautiful. Release those hands and let's go down to the floor. Down to the floor and find our low lunge almost like taking a little break right here Feeling steady on the ground. Good. Inhale. Exhale, Bring your hands down to the mat. Lift up onto that right foot. We'll step our left foot back. And we're in downward facing dog. Tugging that chin, Lengthening out the back of your neck. Good. Bend your knees. Look forward. Step, Hop, Or walk up to the hands. And fold down into your legs Inhale, Reverse swan dive, Reach it up to the sky. And exhale, Samasthiti. Nice job. We'll take one more standing balance, Vrakasana, Tree Pose. Shift your weight to your right side and pull that left leg up. Now we can use blocks to help us with this balance. You can put a block right by your foot, Right by your leg, Your standing leg, And just lift it. So you're still feeling that lift, But you can have something to balance on. If you don't feel like you can come all the way off. So maybe use that block as kind of a kickstand and if you feel like you're okay to keep going, Then go for it. Just options, Yeah? You can also certainly be holding on to the wall or a table or something if you want a little bit of support that way as well. So hold that balance. Find that steady standing strength. In that standing leg If you want to raise your arms, Go for it. Good. Here this whole leg is working. Can you feel that hip? Can you feel your core engaging? Can you feel your ankle? It's great. Take one more breath. I almost lost it. Inhale. Exhale come back to the center set it down. Let's shift over to the other side I might use this block on this side. This side is weaker for me so i'm going to get it placed make sure to pull open through that leg pull under through our hips lift there as we start good very nice Keep your breath strong. Reach those arms if you feel like it. We don't improve ourselves if we don't give ourselves a challenge. Now, Of course, We don't push ourselves past What is safe? This pose is pretty safe. Especially for using our blocks using tools to help us along the way as we build our steady standing strength good let's take one more breath Woo, Inhale. Exhale that was more for me this side's a struggle nicely done put it down shift that block out of the way for a moment let's take our final vinyasa bring us down to the floor here we go inhale reach up to the sky Exhale swan dive all the way forward Inhale, Look up, Halfway lift. Exhale, Hands down. Step back, Chaturanga. Inhale, Urva Mukha Svanasana. Exhale, Adha Mukha Svanasana. Find your hands and feet on the floor one more time. After all that we've done, Think back to this first down dog. Does it feel different now? Do you feel steady and strong? And hopefully in control. Good. Nice. Go ahead and bend your knees. Come on down to the floor. Good work. Lift up. Nice job. We'll move into Ustrasana. We'll build up a little back strength and open our chest. We can use a block here as well. I'm just going to put it back between my feet on the highest height and you'll see why as we move through this let's do one arm at a time now if you don't have blocks you can use your feet you can come on to your toes so that the heel is lifted Now let's reach our right arm up and drop the left hand to the heel. Or you can use your block. My block is even higher than my heel. My toes might be on the floor and then I have to reach a little bit further. Yes? Okay. Press our hips forward. Pull our arm back. And we've got all of this open. Sensation through our chest, Through our heart center. And we're not standing on our feet, But we're balancing on our knees a little bit. So we're still being steady right here. Good work. Inhale lift up drop your head down Feel the blood flow back into the head and let's do our other side Reach your left arm. Right hand reaches for the heel or the block. Whatever your modification is. Press your hips forward. Feel that reach. Squeezing in the back. Very nice. Lift up and drop the head down. Drop that hand down. Nicely done. Now we have the option to do both hands. Move with me or maybe you know what works for you. So we can take fists to our back, Press into the hips and pull those shoulder blades toward each other. So we're squeezing the hips forward as we squeeze our back body. Or you can be on your toes and reach for your heels. That's a great option. Or you can be all the way down and reach for your heels. And let your head drop back. With two hands, I think it's kind of hard to use the block. So I would say fist. Or up on those heels is the best option. Nice job. Do your best always. That's all we can ask. Just to do our best Let's take one more breath here. Inhale. Exhale. Nice work. Lift up. Let's let our knees open a little bit wider than our hips. And come down into a child's pose. Ah. Sink down into it. Relax. And just let yourself breathe. Every exhale just gives you a little bit more relax. Good. Go ahead and lift up and let's swing our legs around to the front and we might need a strap we did a lot of great work on our hamstrings with our steady standing pose so this may benefit us as we now are seated on the floor So take your strap to your feet. Sit nice and tall. Inhale. Lift here. Exhale. Walk your way forward. If you are able to reach your toes with your hands, Then you don't need the strap. That's fine. Take a breath. Pull up through the center. Inhale. Exhale. Fold ourselves down. Relax your shoulders. Relax your head and neck. Feel this nice lengthened spine back here. Feel those hamstrings, All that strong work that we did hopefully is coming into play right here. This feels good after doing back bends too. Stretches are back the opposite direction. Good. Now lift up. Nicely done. You can set the strap aside. You won't need it for this next pose. Let's bend the right knee. Left leg stays nice and straight. Inhale. Extend that left arm. Exhale. Hook it on. Or you can hug. And take the right hand behind you. Sit nice and tall. Pull that shoulder back. Send the gaze back. Twists feel so nice after doing backbends just moves our spine around You can squeeze through the center so we get that digestion kind of ramped up. Really great feeling in our body. So this is Mary Chiasana C. What we're doing right now. Good work. Inhale come back to the center exhale release that right leg very nice other side inhale bring that left knee up reach your right arm exhale hook it on or hug whatever you like Right hand to the floor, Pull that shoulder back. Or it's your left hand. Left hand to the floor. Sorry. Pull that shoulder back. Feel that squeeze. In our torso. All the way up the spine. Nice work. Good. Come forward. Release that leg. Nicely done. Let's take our strap. We're going to make sure the blocks are out of the way. We're going to get on our back, Potentially in shoulder stand, But I'll show you a variation in case you don't want to go that far. So let's lift up. First option is to take the strap around the feet and lift them up to the air. This feels great on our back. We need to. We don't have to worry about touching our feet. So, Or touching our toes. So there's one option. This is great feeling. Or if you want to go further. Let's lift up into shoulder stand. Just a little bit deeper. Both options are going to give us some great metabolism boost here. Because all the blood flow is going into your heart. Into your stomach, Into your head. Those vital organs to make them just work. A little bit better. Nice job. Let's take one more breath, Whatever position we're in. Inhale. Exhale. Come on down. All the way down. Bend your knees. If you've got your strap, Let it go. Reach for either your arches. Or your knees. Let's just do a happy baby. And rock back and forth. Sighing it out. We can now breathe. We're not squishing our chest anymore. If you were in that shoulder stand. We're relaxing our low back. And now it's just time to take care of our body, Work out the last kinks from our strong practice today so that we can rest in Shavasana. So let's let our legs float down and scoot a little bit, A little bit far. And we'll just pull our right knee into our chest. This pushes that curve of the spine to the floor, Which is nice. And then take your left hand and guide that right leg across the body to the left extend out your right arm Send your gaze over the hand. Now sometimes it feels nice to place a block. Underneath this right knee, So you have something to reach for. You might try that. We try to be balanced. We want this arm and shoulder to be on the ground. The leg may not be on the ground, And so that's why it's nice to feel that block underneath. Just give a little support. You can try that if you'd like. But mostly what we want to do is be breathing the tension out of our back. We're letting go of anything that feels Like it's holding on. Holding on too tight. Let's take one more breath right here. Inhale. Exhale. Bring it back to the center and let it down. Let's do our other side. Pull the left knee into the chest and just hug it there. And just feel that curve of the spine push down. Some of that relaxation into the hip. Hmm. Guide that left leg across your body if you've got your block ready you can certainly lay it on that block and extend out your right arm. Left arm. I keep doing that. Feel this release through your back. Let it go. Breathe it out. We don't want to carry tension with us into Shavasana. We want it all to be gone, If possible. Wouldn't that be nice? Feel yourself getting heavier and heavier. These last few breaths Inhale. Exhale. And bring that left leg back to the center and lay it down one leg to each edge of your mat get comfortable you might put pillow blocks blanket underneath your knees you might put a blanket over the top of you I don't know just get comfortable and be here so that you can take it in we have found our way to the floor it's like we've come full circle We started standing, Feeling that ground below us, And now we're laying on the ground. To get that full surface area support. I will leave you to it. I'll wake you up with the sound of a bell. When it's time. Okay. Bye. Thank you. Start to wake yourself up. Rotate through your wrists. And your ankles. Point and flex your feet. Stretch your arms overhead to lengthen through your entire body And roll yourself over to one side in fetal pose. Which symbolizes starting over A reset. After our beautiful practice together. Press up to a comfortable seated position. And bring your hands to heart center. I'll leave you with this quote, With this thought to send us on our way. All we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become. Thank you so much for your practice today. Namaste.