Welcome thanks for joining today we're going to work on getting deep into our stretches to restore our body release pressures and tension and get everything nice and warm and fluid so let's close our eyes and first start to connect with our breath in and out just through the nose to help us release tension.
Even before we begin.
When we slow our breath down,
We slow our natural responses to that fight and flight syndrome that sometimes happens in our body when we get stressed.
When we get tight.
So we're gonna slow it down.
So we can pay attention to what's going on.
And hopefully release tension.
As we're stretching Then when we link our movement with the breath,
We get yoga.
Called union.
So let's open up our eyes.
Take your arms by your sides here.
Inhale nice deep breath reach up to the sky Exhale,
Release it down.
Let's take one more inhale.
Exhale release it.
Nicely done move on to all fours Let's start out with cat and cow,
Easing through our spine,
Warming our hips a little bit,
And releasing just tension through the whole back.
So let's drop our belly down,
Shoulders roll back,
Inhale,
Send a gaze up to the sky.
Exhale,
Round through the spine,
Tuck and lift.
Pull those hips up and under.
Feel yourself rounding through each vertebrae.
Inhale arch belly drops down so i'm gonna gaze up to the sky Exhale,
Round through the spine.
Tuck and lift.
Inhale,
Arch.
Exhale round.
One more time,
Inhale,
Arch.
Exhale round.
Come back to neutral.
And let's extend our right arm up to the sky as far as you can.
Feel that reach through the shoulder and the chest.
Then take your right arm underneath your left.
And lay yourself down onto that right shoulder and head there and you can extend your left arm forward You can just have it bent here.
You can wrap it behind your back if you'd like.
And feel that simultaneous stretch through the chest.
Shoulders and upper back.
Good.
Inhale,
Press up.
Unwind yourself.
Bring both hands back to the mat.
And let's do the left side.
Reach the left arm up to the sky.
Feel that unfurl and have a pinch in your chest.
Exhale slide it underneath your right arm lay yourself down side of the head and you can keep this arm here you can reach it forward that's my favorite option you can take it back behind your back that's another great option choose one that works well for you stretching out that shoulder and upper back.
Do it.
Come back to neutral.
Let's unwind ourselves and lift up onto our toes.
Take our first downward facing dog.
So here's where we start to stretch into our ankles and our calves.
They might be pretty tight because we haven't warmed a whole lot.
So feel free to gently pedal through your feet if you'd like.
Or if this is too much,
Just stay on your knees and reach forward here.
That works too.
Do what you can.
Feeling that engagement.
Nice.
Now let's walk our feet up to our hands.
We are going to be staying nice and calm and slow and steady today,
But we do want to warm our bodies.
We are going to do a vinyasa.
Let's roll up through the spine.
Good.
Take our hands back behind us as we lift so that we're pulling our shoulder blades toward each other.
And as we press into our hands,
Guide those shoulder blades down and just let your chest open and your gaze float to the sky.
And just feel that lift.
It helps to lift our mood when we can lift our chest.
There's a little of that.
Psychosomatic kind of movement and energy connection.
Good.
Now release those hands.
Let's move into a vinyasa.
We'll take it nice and slow.
Inhale,
Reach our arms up to the sky.
Exhale,
Swan dive forward.
Go ahead and reach down as far as you can.
Do not feel like you have to touch the ground.
My arms do because I have long arms,
But you do not have to.
Let's take our hands to our shins.
Halfway lift,
Inhale.
Feel that stretch through the backs of those legs.
Exhale,
Bring your hands down.
And let's step back to all fours.
Then bend your elbows and lower yourself down to the mat.
So we've got our arms in a great position here for Cobra Pose.
Press into the floor.
Inhale,
Lift up.
Feel that squeeze in your back.
Exhale,
Lower it down.
Again,
Inhale,
Lift up,
Pulling those shoulder blades toward each other back there.
Exhale,
Lower it down.
One more time.
Inhale,
Lift it up.
Exhale,
Lower down.
Press onto our knees.
Let them open just a little wider than our hips.
And we'll sit back to Child's Pose,
Relaxing our neck,
Relaxing our forehead.
Just drop it down onto the floor.
Or if the floor feels far away,
Here's a great way to use a block.
Place that block underneath your forehead.
Good.
Feeling that reach,
That lift.
Very nice.
Come back up again to all fours here.
And we're gonna take our left foot forward.
Now,
If you have knee issues and you want to put your blanket underneath that back right knee,
Feel free to do so.
Otherwise,
Let's just start with our hands on our knee here.
We're going to gently press forward.
Now make sure that this left knee does not push forward of your toe.
We're just pressing down,
Getting into this hip flexor a little bit and squeezing through our right hip.
Good.
Now let's go a little bit deeper toward the floor.
Take your hand down.
If it doesn't comfortably reach the floor,
That's why we have a block.
Put your block underneath your hand.
My arm is too long,
So I'm going to move the block,
But you feel free to keep it there if you'd like that.
So place that right hand on your hip,
And we'll take our left hand,
I mean the right hand on the ground,
Left hand can come to the hip,
And we'll pull that shoulder back.
This low back right through the sacrum area.
Now feel free to reach your arm to the sky if you want to take it a little bit deeper in through the chest.
Good,
And here's our last option.
You might bend that right knee and reach back and grab the toe.
Just a little bit more if you want.
Take your steps as you can.
Inhale.
Exhale,
Place your hands down.
And let's lift up onto our back toe.
So I've got my left knee bent and my right toe is lifted,
My right knee.
Now start to move your hands through the middle.
We're going to walk ourselves over to this right side and change directions.
Now you're in that right hip.
And then walk your hands back over.
To that left side bend into that left hip.
One more time.
Move it over.
Softly,
Slowly moving through our hips.
And back over where we started into that left leg.
Good,
Good.
Drop the knee down.
Let's reach our arms up.
And we're in Anjanasana.
Now,
If this is too much shoulders,
Take your hands just down to your knee,
And that's perfectly fine.
Good.
Beautiful.
Inhale.
Exhale,
Hands come down to the mat.
Lift up onto that right toe.
Drop your heel and raise up.
And we're in Warrior One,
Virabhadrasana A.
Good.
So left legs forward.
Let's open up our chest a little,
Drop that right hand down,
And just keep reaching through that left arm.
Feel that stretching through our back.
Even while we are engaging our muscles and our legs.
Inhale.
Exhale,
Reach that right arm back up.
Inhale.
Exhale open up to warrior two virabhadrasana b and we started to warm our hips a little bit as we went back and forth in that little I don't know,
Spider,
Whatever that was,
Little ninja pose.
We can still feel this into that left hip.
Good.
Let's change directions.
Lift up through our legs.
Switch our feet.
So we're moving over to our right side.
Bending into that right knee and right hip.
Good.
Very nice.
Beautiful.
Let's take a breath.
Inhale.
Exhale windmill our hands down to the mat Step our right foot back.
And into our downward facing dog.
And we're getting ready to do the other side.
Let's just do our Cobra again.
Inhale,
Come forward.
Drop onto our knees.
Drop onto our chest,
Onto our stomach.
Pull those elbows back right by our sides.
Three cobra.
Inhale,
Lift up.
Feel that squeeze in our back.
Exhale,
Lower down.
Inhale,
Lift up.
Exhale lower down.
Last time,
Inhale,
Lift up.
Exhale lower down very good work press onto our knees let them open a little wider than your hips and sit back to child's pose.
Remember the option of taking a block.
And pressing your forehead onto that block.
Just in case you don't want to go so deep.
Good.
Gently lift up.
We might need this block.
We'll just put it off to the side in case we need it.
And let's step our right leg forward.
So now we've got that right knee in front.
Place a blanket or anything that you want underneath your left knee.
Take your hands to your knee and shift forward.
Now remember,
We're not pressing this knee over our toes.
So we're wide enough that we're going to get a good stretch here and we're not going to injure or strain our knee at all.
Good.
Now let's start to move into our twist.
You're gonna go as deep as you want.
Begin by bringing the left hand to the floor.
You can use your block.
Then the right hand comes to our hip so we can pull that shoulder back.
Stay here if you want or go a little deeper.
Extend that right arm to the sky.
Feel that opening through the chest and shoulder.
Want to go a little bit deeper?
Bend.
Your toe.
And reach back and grab it.
You go as far as you can.
You Inhale.
Exhale replace the leg and bring your hands down and let's lift up onto the toes of that left foot And we're going to spider ourselves across.
Walking across just like we did on the last side.
Over to that left leg.
Feel it through the hips.
We're going nice and slow.
You can feel those joints moving around down there.
Stretching out.
Hips-like fluid movement.
Hips are connected to the water element.
They like to be fluid and flowing.
Let's go back one more time.
So we get back into our right side.
Woo!
Very nice.
And drop that left knee to the floor.
Untuck your toe.
Reach up.
And we're in Anjanyasana.
If that's too much for the shoulders,
Remember you can be here.
And that's a great option.
Good.
Inhale.
Exhale,
Bring your hands down.
Lift up onto that back left toe.
Let's drop our heel.
And raise up.
We're in warrior one.
Virabhadrasana A.
Good.
Little chest opener.
Drop this left hand down.
And keep reaching our gaze on that right arm to the sky.
Good.
Inhale,
Lift back up.
Exhale,
Open to warrior two.
Virabhadrasana B on this right leg.
Feel that hip opening and that deep press into the inner thigh,
Into that hip.
Lift up,
Switching sides.
Change your feet.
Back into that left hip.
Left leg.
This is where we started,
So we're kind of coming back to home base,
I guess.
Good.
Inhale.
Exhale,
Windmill the hands down to the mat.
Step your left foot back.
And come into Downward Facing Dog.
Nicely done.
Deep breath inhale with the left leg up and back behind you Exhale,
Bend your knee,
Bring it into your chest,
And let's keep going to set our leg up for pigeon pose.
So my left leg is going to come parallel to the top of the mat as much as we can.
Now this may mean that we've got a lot of lift in our left hip here.
So you might take a block,
Anchor it underneath your left hip there.
If a block is too high,
A blanket works really nicely.
It's a little more comfortable perhaps underneath that hip.
And then the other thing I like to do is take a block in the front.
I'm going to move that block for me just because it's too high for me.
But I like a block in the front.
So as I start to come forward into this pigeon pose,
I can rest my forehead on this block.
And for me,
That is a great option.
We want to try to keep this left leg parallel to the top of the mat as much as we can.
We're going to feel this into the outer left hip.
Pretty intensely.
And now it's your job to just lay here and rest.
And let the hips release.
Breath by breath.
Trying to let them go.
Let go of tension.
Good.
Let's take one more breath here.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Gently press up if you've got a block underneath your left hip move it We're gonna sit down on to our left hip Our left knee is already bent,
And the right leg,
We're going to pull it around,
Up and over.
To Ardha Matsyandrasana.
If this is too tight on your knee or your legs,
You can stretch out that left leg.
So right leg's over the top,
Left leg is straight,
Or you've got it bent,
Whatever works best for you.
Inhale,
Lift your left arm up.
Exhale hook it on to that right knee or you can hug Then take our right hand behind us and send our news back.
And we feel this nice deep twist through our entire spine.
Starts at the base of the spine,
Goes up to the mid-back,
Goes up to our shoulders,
Upper back,
And even the chest opens as we draw that right shoulder.
Nice job.
Inhale.
Exhale come back around nicely done unwind our legs and let's extend them forward.
Good here's where we might utilize a strap grab your strap Place it around your feet.
This is just so that you don't have to feel like you have to grab your feet if you don't have the flexibility yet.
Take a nice deep breath.
Inhale here.
Exhale,
Walk forward along that strap,
Reaching for the feet.
If you can grab the feet,
You can forego the strap.
Do your best.
Take a breath.
Inhale.
Pull up through your center of your body.
Exhale,
Fold back down into it.
Relaxing our shoulders.
Relaxing our neck.
Just feeling that deep stretch.
Through the hips,
The low back,
The hamstrings.
Everything releasing.
You Good.
One more breath here.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Gently lift up.
Nicely done.
Let's release our strap.
Set it off to the side,
Grab our blocks and things,
Move them to the other side.
And bring our legs around.
Let's just lift ourselves.
Nothing really fancy there up to downward facing dog just so we can repeat on our other side correct So here we go,
Right leg,
Lift it up and back behind you.
Pull that right knee into your chest.
Keep going until you can place your right leg forward.
Parallel to the top of your mat.
Now place your block underneath your right hip or a blanket or whatever if you need it.
Personally like it in the front Do whatever you need to do.
Let's lay ourselves down.
And try to relax through our breath.
Slow and steady breathing to help that right hip release tension.
Every exhale is a little bit of a release.
Good.
One more breath.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Gently lift up Remove any blocks that might be in your way so that you can sit down onto the right hip.
We're going to swing our left leg around.
Now remember that you can extend your left leg.
Or you can bend it under,
Either way is just fine.
Extend that right arm.
Inhale.
Exhale hook it on or hug it left hand to the floor sit tall Pull that shoulder back.
Send your gaze behind you.
Feel that deep spiral.
Low back,
Mid back,
Upper back,
Shoulder.
It's all there.
It's all there.
One more breath right here.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Come back around.
Nicely done.
Extend our legs out.
Grab your strap again.
Second time when we do a pose,
I like to see if it's changed at all.
See if it has.
Let's take our breath.
Inhale.
Exhale fold forward walking our way down Maybe since we've done both sides now,
You can feel a little bit more depth.
We're a little bit more balanced either way we're gonna just keep breathing pulling up and in through the center of your body stretching down deeper into it Feel that link through the hamstrings,
The hips,
The low back.
It's all.
Every exhale just gets us a little bit closer.
A little bit more release.
Good.
Inhale,
Lift up.
Nice job.
Exhale,
Release your strap.
Very good.
Let's set it off to the side.
We're going to come down onto our back.
Have a block close to you.
We'll use it in just a moment.
So come on down.
Take your arms just by your sides here.
And feel the low back on the floor.
Before we begin our bridge pose,
Let's just make sure our low back is relaxed.
So pull that left knee into your chest and just hold it there.
Pushing that curve of the spine to the floor.
And release.
Pull the right knee into your chest.
Holding it there.
Feeling that low back relax.
And release nicely done now bring our arms by our side and let's start to roll up one vertebrae at a time So as we lift,
We'll press our hands to the mat.
Or you can clasp your hands underneath and roll those shoulder blades underneath if you'd like a little bit more chest opening.
Shoulder stretching.
Either way is just fine.
Now feel how this engages our back body.
So we feel our glutes squeezing,
Our hamstrings engaging,
Our low back is lifted.
But we stretch out the front of the body,
The chest.
The throat,
The quadriceps.
It flexors.
Inhale.
Exhale,
Release your hands,
Lower it down.
Nicely done.
Pull your knees into your chest just to reverse that pressing that curve of the spine to the floor.
Good.
Even while we're stretching,
It's good to build strength.
So we're gonna do that same bridge pose one more time.
Good.
We do a lot of forward bends in yoga too,
So this is a really great way to work on our back body.
Take your arms by your sides again.
Ready?
Inhale,
Roll it up.
Either just press your hands to the mat or keep going.
Clasp them underneath.
Feeling that stretch through the chest.
Shoulders,
Quadriceps,
Hip flexors,
Back body.
There's so many things going on.
Good.
It's all about building up strength.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Release those hands.
Go ahead and come down.
I'm gonna get my block a little closer.
Bring your knees into your chest and just circle again.
This last bridge pose,
We're going to use our block.
So that's why hold it closer to me.
I had it far,
Far away.
Good.
So let's take our feet back to the mat and we'll use our block to lift onto it.
Now it has three different heights.
You can go the lowest,
You can go the middle height or you can go very tall.
It's totally up to you.
I'm going to go middle today.
Let's take that block underneath.
And just rest down on that block.
Good.
Middle is my favorite.
I like to go high sometimes,
But it's kind of a small little platform to balance on.
So that middle is a nice platform for your low back.
And you can press it right there.
That base of the spine so we get a little myofascial release because we've got a block underneath us plus we don't have to work so hard so now you can relax your glutes you can relax your hamstrings and we just stretch the front of our body You just feel that lift there.
Good our arms can go wherever they want my arms want to float out to the side a little bit If you take them all the way up to the side,
You might feel a little chest release,
Which is nice as well.
Good.
So just feel that lift.
Without any effort.
We can start to let our body relax a little bit.
Yes,
We've kept things slow and steady but we've been getting deep.
So we've been utilizing our muscles and.
.
.
Our energy and now we want to change that energy a little bit make it much more restful I feel like I could stay here all day.
Now before we come down,
Let's stretch out our hip flexors a little bit.
So take your right leg and straighten it out.
Do you feel that right through the front of the hip?
Really nice stretch there.
Good.
Bend your right knee.
And go ahead and straighten out that left leg.
And feel that hip flexor in the front.
We spend so much time seated with our,
You know,
Bent at the waistline and this is such a great way to lengthen that muscle that's just right through there.
So hopefully this feels nice to you.
Good bend your knee again nice job let's come off that block Set it off to the side and one more time,
Pull your knees into your chest.
Because it just feels so good now to push that curve of the spine to the floor.
We're going to finish off with a spinal twist to try to release any last remaining tension that we might have.
So drop your legs over to that right side.
Take your arms out to a T.
And then let your gaze go over to the left.
And relax.
Feel your shoulders reach so we've got a nice stretch in the chest,
Especially on that left side pectoral area.
We've got our low back.
We've got our outer left hip here.
So nice.
Just relax.
Become one with the floor.
Take one more breath.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Bring your legs back to the center.
And let them fall over to the left.
And turn your gaze over the right.
And we'll get the same benefits into the low back,
That outer hip.
Across your chest and shoulder,
And even into our neck.
Very restful into this twist.
One more breath right here.
Try to release anything else that you're holding on to.
Let it go.
And then come back to the center.
And let your legs extend out now if you have lower back struggles you can put your bolster or a pillow a blanket or your blocks underneath your knees and that will really help Feel free to put a blanket over the top of you.
Take your arms by your sides.
Just be comfortable.
This is your time to get comfortable.
I will leave you to rest.
I will wake you up with the sound of a bell.
So just enjoy this restorative moment where you take it all in.
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.
You roll over to one side in fetal pose with just a grateful awakening.
Awakening to a new day.
Filled with possibilities,
A new moment,
I should say.
Let's press up to a comfortable seated position.
And bring your hands to heart center.
I'll leave you here with this quote by BKS Iyengar,
One of the fathers of modern day yoga.
He said,
Yoga is a light which once lit will never dim.
The better your practice.
The brighter your flame.
Thank you so much for your practice today.
Namaste.
