Yoga Sess 3.8.24

This is a transcription of a yoga practice. The instructor encourages mindfulness and offers guidance on various poses and stretches. The practice includes seated meditation, stretches for the arms and legs, twists, hip openers, and balancing poses. The instructor emphasizes deep breathing and finding joy in the present moment. The practice ends with a child's pose and a puppy pose. I invite you to stay mindful of where you're practicing, how you're practicing, because I cannot be there to offer hands-on for any adjustment. So, moving mindfully. We can get started in a cross-legged position. Hands either facing up or facing down. Gently close your eyes. Inhaling deeply through the nose and exhaling through the nose. Taking a moment to arrive into this space. Finding joy in sitting with the present moment. Finding awareness of our sit bones and legs resting on our mat. How our palms, the back of our palms, are also resting on our legs. Sensing that with each breath we take, our spine, you can imagine our spine growing longer. Creating space in between your vertebrae. And when you're ready, you can keep your eyes closed or open them and take a deep breath in, just bringing those palms to touch up overhead. And bring it through in prayer position. If you feel called, I invite you to set a dedication or some purpose in your practice. And to someone or something you feel will benefit from the energy you will create here. Beautiful. Beautiful. And when you're ready, you can open those eyes, take a breath in. Let's take a stretch, almost like a morning stretch, however feels good. Nice exhale, bring your fingertips down to the mat. Let's reach that left arm up overhead and take a gentle stretch, sending our weight down into the earth on our right side. Maybe that elbow touches the mat. If not, we can keep a straight arm sending energy through all of our fingertips. Keeping that left hip bone on the earth. Nice and released. Take it to the other side. We're bringing that right arm up overhead. Sending our weight into that left arm, maybe bringing the left elbow onto the earth and really sensing what we can push away from the mat. So we have that energy coming through the left arm, through our spine, into that right hip bone. Let's stretch, open up. To the right side and come back. We'll take one collective breath in to breathe in. And let's exhale. We're going to take it one more time, this time inviting a twist. So let's stretch that left arm up overhead, sending weight into that right arm. And as we stretch that left side body, let's send our gaze down to the mat and just take a gentle twist. So maybe you find a little bit more length in the side of your ribcage or the space, I would say your armpit space. Let's take a couple twists, looking up to the sky and down to the mat at your own pace. Up high and down to the mat at your own pace. That stretch happens in the scapula area, what is called anatomically. When you're ready, come back. Let's take a collective breath in. Maybe activating belly buttons is fine. And one more, reset. Let's take it to the left side. So sending our weight into that left arm, right arm up overhead. When we arrive, really stretch from the edge of that finger tip to our foot bone. Take some gentle twists. So look down at that mat. And just bring your torso towards the earth. And come back. I sense a deeper stretch in my mid-back. Continuing to connect and deepen our breath. One more. Beautiful. Come back to center. One more breath in. And we can transition into tabletop position. Let's take some gentle circles of the hips to the left. It can be as small or as big as feels good. And take some to the right. To the right. And noticing, right? We're taking these small circles, but sense how the different parts of our body are also getting free massage as we do this. Great. Let's tuck those toes and take a couple of cats and cows. So lifting that nose up to the sky, maybe taking a breath in to cow and exhale to cat. One more. Maybe as you exhale, really empty out your lungs as much as you can and let that bring an activation to your deep core muscles. Let's take three more. Maybe smiling. And I'm stretching my toes as much as I'm stretching my palms and fingers. Beautiful. Beautiful. When you're ready, we're going to take a floating tabletop. So press as strongly as you can into the earth, so much so that your knees lift just a centimeter off that earth. Let's take three collective breaths here if you can, breathing in. In. Exhale, belly button to spine. Maybe your muscles start to shake. A favorite teacher of mine says, when your muscles shake, it's the issue of leaving the tissue. So one more breath in. When you're ready, straighten those legs and come into a downward dog. Bend that right knee. And switch, bend that left knee. Keep alternating. Beautiful. And let's take a moment to find awareness here in downward dog. So we're sending energy through the soles of our feet and our heels. Sometimes I like to imagine, when I say send energy, it's like sending light. Imagine almost like a laser beam that you're sending past your heels. You're sending that light also past and through those palms, through, past your fingers. And as we do that, we can find more support from laying thin our spine. Nice. When you're ready, let's do something a little different. Let's walk those palms to our feet and come into a forward fold, grabbing those elbows, rocking side to side. Letting the weight of the head guide the spine. Place those palms on the earth. Take a flat back up. And release. Let's roll up vertebrae by vertebrae. So we'll bend those knees generously. And roll up slowly. Into mountain pose. Deep breath in. Bring those palms to touch overhead. Big stretch like a morning stretch. And wander down. We'll take a vinyasa here. The palms come to the earth. You can step or hop to the back of the mat. And before we slow, let's take three breaths here. Collective exhale out, bringing the belly button to the spine. Breathing in. And exhale. One more deep breath in. On that next exhale, bend those elbows into our first chaturanga. And we're going to take a deep breath in. And a deep breath out. One more deep breath in. On that next exhale, bend those elbows into our first chaturanga. And you can either come up into upward facing dog. Or sphinx posture. Sometimes that feels better for me as I'm just warming up. And transition back. Into downward dog. Let's bring those feet to touch behind us in downward dog. Lift that right leg up into three-legged dog. Take some ankle circles to the right. And ankle circles to the left. Nice. And when you're ready, bring that knee forward. Let's take three pulses. So almost touch the mat. And lift up. Almost touch the mat. Lift up. Knee almost touches the mat. And I lift up. And when you're ready, you can transition. I like to touch my nose as I transition into that lunge. Bringing that left knee on the mat. Sending arms up overhead onto the asana. Just taking a moment to find the deep stretch. The front of this left leg. And I'm really imagining my weight center. So my hips, they don't only go forward. But they move in a three-dimensional plane. So the direction goes down. It goes forward. There's a fullness in the movement. If you'd like a challenge, you can untuck that back toe. Or tuck that back toe if it's untucked. And come up into a regular lunge. We're actually going to place that foot at the 45-degree angle to transition into a warrior pose. Sensing our spine in with knees or legs. Sending energy past those fingers. Really here you can see that straight line from my middle finger to the other middle finger. A 90-degree angle with that front leg. Let's take a reverse warrior. Exhaling. And come forward. Send those arms. We'll transition into a vinyasa. So send that leg back into plank. Try to run those upward-facing dogs. And downward dog. We'll send that left knee in the right. Resetting. We'll take that slow to the other side. So bring those little feet to touch behind you. Downward dog. Sensing a deep stretch in the calves, in the achilles. And send that left leg up into finger the dog. Take some gentle ankle circles one way. And the other way. And when you're ready, bend that knee. We're going to take the same pulses. So send that left knee towards the mat. And up, belly button to spine, knee to chest. Two more. Great. On that last one, transition through into a lunge with that right knee on the mat. Sending those arms up overhead. And I'm encouraging myself and all of us here practicing to really imagine that belly button going in and back towards my spine as I send my waist center forward. Beautiful for a challenge. Tuck those back toes, come into a runner's lunge. And then rotate on that back heel to transition into a warrior two. Finding awareness in our body, in our breath. A 90 degree angle with our front knee. Stretching those toes. Sending energy past those fingertips. Let's take a breath in if we have to for that reverse warrior. Really stretching the side body. And inhale. Those arms forward, transition back to plank. Chaturanga. Upward facing dog. And downward dog. Let's practice a little bit of balancing here. So this is available to you on your next breath. Lift that right arm up off the mat. And send it towards that left leg. Wherever feels good, whether it's the ankle or the hip. Finding both a twist and a little bit of a balance. Go a little bit past the frame of our left arm and relax and come back to downward dog. The next breath, let's lift that left arm up and bring it to that right leg. Pressing away from the earth. And let's come back. Let's actually roll through the spine. So from downward dog, this is a little bit of a unique transition. Let's send energy weight into our upper body. And as we do so, really imagine activating deep core to roll through that spine. Come back to chaturanga. We'll do another upward facing dog. And from here, let's transition into a child's pose for a moment. Keeping your knees either as wide as the mat or zipped close together. Maybe resting your forehead on the earth and gently rocking your head side to side. Beautiful. When you're ready, let's lift. Bring those knees to parallel and we'll take a puppy posture here. So we're creating a 90 degree angle at our knees and we're sending our upper body down towards the mat. You can either place your chin on the mat or your forehead. Take three collective breaths here. When you're ready, let's roll again through and we'll come to land in sphinx posture. So really sensing how the elbows are underneath the shoulders and we can press away from the mat. And as you do that, nothing's moving. Your palms are glued to the earth but you can find more activation in the back, in the side body. Nice. And when you're ready, just relax down. And we're going to transition back into a seat, either cross-legged or you can hero pose here with the knees together. We're going to take eagle arms before we practice a little bit of eagle posture standing up. Extend those arms out to a T, maybe wiggle those fingers in and let's cross left over right. Take your root of arms, eagle arms. If it's available to you, on your inhale, send that chest up, gaze up to the sky, elbows reaching up. It's very intense for me but some people have a lot of range of motion here, looking up, maybe tilting and arching that back. One, breath in. And long breath out. It's actually bound. Just send those elbows maybe towards the knees. Relax down more. And come back to neutral, relax. Bring those arms up again into a T. And on the other side, so right over left. Cross those arms. Bring maybe those palms to touch, fingers to touch palm and we're taking eagle posture in the upper body on the other side. Breathing in. And exhale. On your next breath in, let's really let that inhale come from the lungs and the diaphragm. Send that chest up. Your elbows follow, your head comes back, your eyes, your focus goes up to the sky. One breath in. And one breath out. Come back, gently take a bow. It's like we're on a stage. Send those elbows to the knees. And release. Shake it out a little bit. And we're going to try to keep standing however feels best. It takes a little bit of a balancing process. So let's actually shake both of my feet. The top of my feet feel a little tight. Shake it off a little bit. And we'll take the full expression of eagle posture. So send your hips back into chair position, spreading those toes like if you had webbed feet. Send those arms, if you would like, up overhead and come into chair position. If this is available to you and you want to practice, bring that right leg across the shoulder. You can take the wrap around. And let's cross the right arm underneath. Come into full expression. Finding your drishi, your focus, forward. Left eye and right eye being split by your arms coming through that midline. If you want a challenge, maybe touch those elbows to the knees. And release. Let's take it to the other side. Reset. Spreading those toes. Sending those hips back, belly button in front. Chair position. Bring that left leg across the shoulder. Cross it over the right. And your arms can come the opposite way. So left arm underneath. If you want a challenge, maybe send those elbows, touch that knee. Finding your focus. Bring it in. Let's take a forward fold here. Send those hands maybe to the top of those feet. Your hands. Shake your head no. Not your head yet. So from here, you bring those feet to a touch of the floor. And let's practice this maybe two weeks ago. Coming into seated position from chair position. So come up into chair. And here I'm sending those hips back. And really experiment. So the more I bend at the hips, the more I can bend at the knees. Keep going as much as you can, bending at those ankles. So you're sending those arms forward. Your chest comes to the left arm underneath. And slowly come down to this hip bone. And take three collective breaths here in both postures. And exhale if you want a challenge. Straighten those legs. Feeling the power. Get our feet forward. One more breath in. And exhale. From here, on that last exhale, we are going to rock back. Big happy baby. And we're going to ground onto the earth. So happy baby, I'm grabbing. For me it's more comfortable grabbing on the instep of my foot. The inside of my leg. But you can also grab on the outside. And move however feels good. Maybe rocking side to side. If you feel called to come into stillness. And recognizing how perhaps the body and the mind feel different than when we started. And whenever you feel ready, you can either come to shavasana or a seated position. If you have time in your day for a short meditation or a long meditation, feel free to stay here. Otherwise I'd like to thank each of you for taking the time to practice with me today. You can bring those arms up overhead. Deep breath in. Palms to touch. Touching that third eye, the forehead. The lips. And the heart center. I'd like to thank each of you for joining today. If you have any questions...