Day 3: Feel Inspired

Hey there. What's up? Welcome back. I am super, super pumped to be here. Number three, we're on our way. What's really cool, I'm just going to say this real quick, you know, 20 minutes, we don't have a lot of time, but number three, I'll look back when we're like at number 20 or something, I'm going to miss these days.

Right, so let's take this time now to appreciate number three and not think about like what's going to happen at number 30 or 25 or whatever. Does that make sense? Alright, so now, let's do this. I'm here with you. You've shown up, once again.

It's rock and roll time. But quiet yoga rock and roll. So, as you've probably noticed, we've been doing a lot of like saluting, lunging, that's going to build over time. Here's the thing I'd like you to kinda add to the beginning of this. It's a salute.

So, were' saluting the sun possibly, you're saluting your health, your children, or whatever to add like just a little something to back the movement and breath, a little like intention. Why am I doing this? Okay, it might make sense to you now, it might not. You may have already been doing it. Just a suggestion.

I find it valuable. So, we're going to start with the grounding heart. Earth, sky, heart, breath. I'll do it right here, right here with you. So, palms, chest.

Breathe in. Palms to the Earth. Exhale (exhaling) I'm grounded, I'm here, I've arrived. Inhale, to the sky (inhales) I'm lifted, I'm alive and exhale, I'm back home. Heart.

Okay, when in doubt, do that. (exhales) Breathe in, circle the arms up. As high as you can. Exhale, dive down, forward bend. (exhales) Inhale, slide the hands up half-forward bend, knees bent, long spine. Healthy back we'll call this posture.

Now exhale, bring yourself back down, forward bend, step the right foot back, bring the right knee down and rise up for the lunge. Why don't you take this lunge with intention, breath, everything you've got, the whole package, and just send the hips forward a little bit more. Take the arms up, chest up, rib cage, whole rib cage sorta like tilts and there's just a little bit more space, a little bit more like ahh, this feels good. If it doesn't, obviously leave it out. Transition, hands come down, step the left foot back.

Table top. Breathe in, exhale, your child's pose. Open up the hips for a breath or two. Little wiggle side to side. Okay, before you get too comfortable, come up into table, breath in, breath out, downward dog.

Your next exhale from downward dog, bring the knees down with the exhale, so breathe in with me. And breathe out, knees down. Nice. Take your gaze about a foot or two out in front of your fingertips. Send your right foot back.

Hips square, right toes down, now your left arm, bring it straight out, thumb up. Feel free to lift your right toes, pull the belly in, maybe even work a little bit of that ab lift breath we did yesterday from tabletop. A little bit, maybe not as intense, but inhale at your belly down. Exhale, pull the belly up and in while maintaining the posture, long spine. From your left fingertips, all the way out through the right foot.

Good. On the exhale, bring the left hand down, just below the shoulder, right toes down to the mat, bring your right heel down to the mat as well. Now slide your left toes over six inches as you're creating sort of a kick-stand, a balancing kick-stand there. Put your weight over on to the left hand, supported by the left shoulder. Whole right foot grounded, left toes for balance.

Take your right fingertips and slide them up the left arm to the shoulder across your collar bones and all the way up for what might feel like somewhat of a liberating heart opener, chest opener, upper body opener. Try this, you can see my back. I'm trying to draw my shoulder blades toward one another. One way you can do this, if you bring your right arm out and separate now. Sometimes people come in to this, and they're here but if you really bring the right arm out and then pull the right shoulder blade in to kind of stack over the left, keep that.

That creates just a little bit more stability. Open up, one breath here. (inhales) Good. Right arm comes down, back in to tabletop. Now extend that right leg back one more time, breathe in. As you exhale, it's almost like a little bit of cat pose, you're going to bring the right knee as close the right elbow or even higher as you can.

Pull it up, pull it up, pull it up. Push the ground away. Now step the right foot to your right thumb. Now you're going to lunge on the other side. Breathe in.

Good. Sink the hips forward a little bit like we did on the other side. Chest and heart up, big breath here. And now bring the hands down to the mat, step the left foot up to meet your right exhale (exhales) inhale, lift half-way exhale, fold rolling up on the inhalation and exhale, palms to the chest. Nice, we'll do the other side.

Breathe in and breathe out. Breathe in. Lift half-way, breathe out, step your left foot back, bring the knee down. Reach up, arms up, good. Bring the hands down, step back in to tabletop.

Pause here, breathe in and exhale. Child's. Inhale table, exhale down dog. Good, on your exhale bring your knees to the mat. Extend your left leg back, squared hips, toes down to that left leg, right arm out, thumb up.

Even pull the thumb open to the right a little bit as you lift your left toes as an option. Pull the belly in, long flat back. Stable left arm, left shoulder. (exhales) On the exhale, bring your right arm down, left toes down. Now bring the whole left foot down and slide your right toes over.

So, two things. Right arm under the shoulder for stability. Right knee under the right hip for stability. Joint stacking Now here, instead of just lifting the arm up, slide the left fingertips up, across and to the high. To the sky and open up.

And breathe. Find some freedom in the neck and head. Open up here, good. Now bring that left arm down, come back in to tabletop. Situate yourself, good.

Left leg, bring it back on the breath in. And exhale, knee to as high as you can on that left arm. Push through the palms like you would in cat pose. Push full the belly in. Round out the back a little bit and step the left foot up.

For lunge, breathe in. Breath out. Step the right foot up to meet your left. Forward bend with the exhale. Inhale lift half-way, exhale fold.

Rolling up on the breath in. Exhaling, palms to the chest. Now step, depending on where your mat is, right. So you're going to step in to a wide position here. We're going to be coming to a wide leg forward bend, okay.

Feet are going to stay parallel with one another pointing forward. Bend your knees a little bit. Now push your fingertips into your hip creases. Hips back. Your body here, right.

Your body is long, spine core brace. There's no rounding right now. So here, bring it down, Kinda like cantilevered out right Pause, feel the intensity in the hamstrings or wherever else you might feel it. Maybe stay here with your fingertips supporting you, looking a few feet out in front of your fingertips. Or if you're a little more bendy, on the exhale (exhales) come on down for a breath or two.

We'll let the back of the neck lengthen. Now here, come up onto the fingertips. Point your right toes out to the right 45 degrees or so. So these are like long, deep side lunges is what I call them. So the right knee, start to draw the right knee in the direction of your right pinky toe.

But stay lifted on your fingertips. The sensations are going to be deep in that left groin, inner thigh. And then the right as well I'd say. But the more is in the left side. So you can keep the left foot fully grounded or you can begin to lift onto the heel.

I like to kinda support myself back here a little bit more as I bring my hips back. Totally different position. Somewhere between here and with the heel, toes up version. Okay, so pause there, breathe in. Breathe out.

Straighten the right and travel over to the left. So you got that little feet. So watch my feet right. Straight there. Angle here. Now, as you travel over, there's a little shift.

That's a little more parallel to the front of the mat or back of the mat and it's got the angle on it. (exhales) Makes sure that knee isn't drawn way in or way forward, right. And now try getting up onto the heal (exhales) Now here, go ahead and kinda free flow it. So come up onto the fingertips. Come over to the other side.

And you can approach this with like a sense of like, I'm going to explore, I'm interested in the postures, in the feelings and how they can be useful to me, what kind of space I can create (exhales) The hips tend to be a region of the body definitely for me and a lot of people I think that kinda seize up and get tight. So, where can you and how can you move in a way that feels like you're doing a bit of a service for your body. Okay, you can bring it back to center, parallel your feet. Parallel your feet, back of the mat, front of the mat. Come up onto the fingertips, take a breath in.

Exhale fold. (exhales) Nice, walkover to the front foot, right foot. Step your left foot up to meet your right. Exhale here. Get that little spinal adjustment.

So for me, when I come up like so in that half forward bend, I get the length, pull the shoulders back and then I fold down. (exhales) Feels like a clearing, like wiping the chalkboard you know. Now walk the feet out to the edge of the mat, keep your heals on the mat, and open up your feet about 45 degrees. Push the elbows in to the knees and drop back into a bit of a squat. Malasana. Squat pose, chest up.

You can keep your heals lifted if that's helpful for you. You can also wrap up a blanket or the mat and put your heals up on a higher supported lifted version if that makes sense. Okay. (exhales) You with me? Take another breath.

Let's do it together. Close your eyes, take a deep breath in. Exhale. (exhales) Support yourself. Bring your hands back behind you, bring your bottom down to the mat. I'm going to spin around.

I'm going to roll on down. So roll onto your back. Hug your knees and find a comfortable position. Take a breath, or two even. (exhales) From here, we're going to get in to a little bit of a core, hip, combo here. So it's a knee-to-chest with a little bit of core work.

So start off first by drawing the right knee into your body. And then switch. Shoot the opposite leg. So I've got my left in with my right leg out. I like to lower it a little bit.

It forces me to engage that much more. But if it bothers your back or it doesn't quite feel that right keep the leg up, and even keep it a little bit bent. Okay, so try a couple back and forth. And you can ideally sync the breath. So pause here, breathe in and exhale switch. (exhaling) Stay here, breathe in.

Now lift your chest, your shoulders, lift up, so that's going to force you to get in to your upper and middle, basically your abdominals. Let's just say them all, right. Maximum benefit here. Okay, so here, breathe in. As you breathe out. (exhales) Breathe in and breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out. (exhales) Breathe out. Breathe out. Breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. One more time on each side.

Breathe in and breathe out. Last one, breathe in and breathe out. Nicely done. Hug the knees in gently, lengthen the spine, so draw the chin in to the chest and then put the head back down. Take the arms out into a big wide T position.

Legs 90 degrees, okay. Now here, keep the knees in toward one another, palms down, on your exhale let the knees drift over to the left about half-way maybe or a third. Pause, breathe in. Now as you exhale, get that abdominal lift breath we've been working on. Pull the belly in to kind of brace and ground and then on the left what you're going to do is you're going to ground to the left side of your low back to inspire the movement.

So maybe you can see it. Breathe in and (exhales) all the way over to the right as you breath out there. Now breathe in and breathe out (exhales) all the way to the left. Breathe in. So the core bracing and exhale so breathe out, happened first, that inspires the movement.

Over to the right, breathe in. Breath out. (exhales) Good, one more on each side. Breathe in. Breathe out. Good, we'll finish on the left.

Breathe in, and good stuff. Good, bring it back up to center, draw the knees in. Bring the feet down to the mat, a general, again this is general. It may or may not work for you, but if you bring your fingertips in the direction of your heals, with your feet facing forward, this will for the most part bring the feet below the knees. Figure out how to get your feet below your knees.

I like to teach bridge, we're bringing the bridge, with my arms in this robot kinda shape. Elbows in toward my side body, my rib cage, long neck. Now press in to the feet to lift. And once you kinda max out as far as the hips lifting, walk and press in to ... Well press in to your upper arms, and walk your shoulder blades and arms underneath you as much as you can, reaching the sternum, your chest and belly up a little bit higher.

Press your knees and shins forward to lengthen the thighs. Take a few breaths here. Especially nice after you've just done all the core, open up the abdominals. Now they're come out, keep your hips lifted, walk the shoulder blades out a way from one another, maybe even lift your heals and then roll down slowly. Draw the knees in one last time, bring the bottoms of your feet together.

Let the knees open out wide, bring your arms alongside your body. This is where you take a few deep breaths and you let your entire body collapse almost. Just completely melt and relax. Zero muscular effort, absolute relaxation. Stay here.

I'm going to transition up just so I can close out with you. If you want to close out with me now and then come back down into relaxation, go for it. That way we can kinda connect for a few moments, so don't leave out the relaxation. Take the time to lie down and chill, like completely chill. It's one minute, maybe longer.

But for now, let's close out proper. You and I, that's number three, and I've enjoyed every single moment of it, every single breath. I hope it's helpful for you so far. We're going to build and grow and have a lot of fun. So, bring the palms together as a gesture.

You're bowing to yourself. It's an acknowledgment, like I showed up. I showed up again. That's big! So, Namaste. Thank you. I appreciate it.

Have a beautiful, awesome day. Peace.