Day 4: Child's Flow

Welcome back. Nice to see you. This is day four. We're going to move right into this. We're going to start with a new opening called Child's Flow. Start in Child's Pose. You know where that is, my friends. So this is a little bit of a flow. And we'll go through the first portion, kind of slow, and then we'll move on. All right. So find your Child's Pose.

Let's take two full breath cycles just to kind of say we're here, right? You're here. You're ready to practice. So inhale, fill the body. Exhale, let it go. Inhalation followed by the exhalation. Inhale into Table Pose.

Bring your feet or your knees hip width. The exhalation, what it'll look like and feel like possibly, is drawing the hips forward. So you're on your kneecaps, right? The idea is to come from the kneecaps to the tops of the thighs to the middle of the thigh. And then as you start to kind of get a little compression in the back and before the shoulders dip into the ears, you bend your elbows.

So exhale, begin to bend down like a reverse upward dog or cobra. All right. So I hope you got that. If not, we'll do it again. Inhale, come through cobra and exhale, push all the way back into Child's Pose. This is something that, you know, three out of the seven days a week, I will do in the morning just to kind of get my spine and hips warmed up. So you breathe in into Table. Exhale, that reverse cobra up dog.

So the exhale takes you all the way down. Inhale, lift the chest through cobra. Exhale, push all the way back into that rounded back Child's Pose. Inhale, Table. Exhale, lower down. Inhale, cobra. Exhale, push all the way back into Child's.

I'm going to try one thing a little bit different here, just thinking maybe that didn't work for you. So if it didn't work for you, try this. You inhale into Table, and you do the knee lower down version, right? The knee chaturanga. So you bend your elbows, and it's a knee plank.

Lower all the way down. That keeps out of the low back, at least for the reverse portion. Then you come into the cobra pose here, like a nice little mellow cobra, and you push all the way back into Child's Pose. Okay. Let's try that one more time. Inhale into Table. Exhale, lower down. Bend those arms.

Hug the elbows into the side body. Inhale, cobra. Exhale, all the way back into Child's Pose. Good. Let's get a little bit more spine work here through Cat-Cow. So inhale, Table. Pause. Exhale. Inhale. Let the belly drop.

Lift the sit bones. Chest forward. Gentle gaze forward. Exhale. Chin to the chest. Push and round out the back. Shoulder blades spread apart. Tuck the tailbone and gaze toward the thighs. Inhale. Come through Cow Pose. Exhale. Round out. Into Cat. One more time. Inhale.

So Cow Pose. You really like drop the shoulder blades toward one another. Arch the back. Tip the pelvis forward. Sit bones up. And then exhale. Full expression in Cat Pose. Low belly hugging up and in. Inhale. Back into Tabletop. Curl the toes under. Actually, let's pause, right?

So don't curl the toes under. Let's take a wrist stretch. So take the hand, left hand, turn it over. So the fingertips are pointing back toward your left thigh. You can turn that palm back over. Try bringing the right palm facing up. So it's definitely like you can do one at a time or you can do two at a time, depending on how intense that is for you.

And you kind of lean back. And one more little wrist stretch, not little meaning it's insignificant, but if you turn your wrist forward, fingertips back on one hand or both, and just kind of lean gently back and forth. Good. You can do that with your breath as you exhale. You kind of lean into it. You inhale away from it. Shake it out. Roll it out, whatever you need to do, right? We've got to take care of these wrists.

Now curl the toes under and lift up into Downward Dog. Downward Dog, as always, right? Walk it out. Personalize it. But make sure spine is long. Always looking to extend and lengthen and have that neutral spine. Maybe you lift the heels high, engage the quads, keep the quads engaged and press the heels back down.

Let the head relax and prepare for the dynamic go-to flow. You've been there before. We used the blocks before. We're going to give it a shot today without the blocks. But if that is something you prefer, please grab your blocks and set it up. Let's lift the right leg up on the breath in.

On the breath out, send the right foot to the right pinky. So it's up and out wide. Good. Now come up onto the fingertips and begin that cycle. And we'll just do a couple here. This time I want to show you a different breath pattern.

So the first one will be neutral. On your exhale, let the hips come down, right? Maybe tip to the left a little bit. Then you pause here, breathe in, and exhale straighten the right leg. So what we're looking to do is have the exhale available to us coming into the hip and into the hamstring.

So you pause here in the hamstring pyramid stretch, breathe in, and then exhale all the way down to whatever threshold feels appropriate for you. Pause, inhale, exhale, long pyramid pose. Good. Back into the lunge. Feel free to stay longer there or revisit it. Back into the lunge, the right hand behind the head.

Prop up on that left hand in the best way you can, right? So that your wrist isn't fatigued. Maybe it's a fist. Maybe it's the tented fingers. You might have your own special style, but make sure that your wrist is supported.

Inhale, roll open. So find that twist, that twisted lunge. Exhale, right elbow toward the left forearm. So you'll see if you kind of draw into cat pose, it's very similar. I'm rounded here.

I'm flexing the back. I'm pulling up through the belly and the elbow toward the forearm. Inhale, roll open, grab the twist. Exhale, elbow toward the forearm. Inhale, bring it up.

And exhale, the right hand back down. Lift the foot up off the mat, the right foot up, to step back into downward facing dog. Good. Here's where you kind of like realign. I'm always talking about that.

Like downward dog, catch your breath. Realign with your purpose, your why. Lift the left leg up on the breath in, and with as much control as possible, step the left foot to the left pinky. We'll go through the same breath pattern. So here, breathe in, breathe out.

Let the hips sink down. Pause here, breathe in. Exhale, maybe tent up on the fingertips. Straighten out your left leg a bit. Maybe you fold or round out a little bit, similar to cat pose again.

Inhale, exhale, hips come down. All those little subtle movements to add a little flavor to it, right? Pause here, breathe in. Exhale, straighten out the left leg. You don't have to lock it or have it super straight.

What's available to you? Good, now come back into the lunge. Support up on that right hand. Right wrist is feeling good. Left hand behind the head.

Open up, find the twist, find the rotation. Good, exhale the left elbow toward your right forearm. Inhale, send it out and up. Exhale, left elbow toward the forearm. One more time, breathe in.

And breathe out. Well done. Good, take it up one more time. Breathe in and then exhale the left hand down. Good, pause here.

Look forward, inhale. As you exhale, step the right foot up out wide. Sit down into the squat for a moment and then rise all the way up on the breath in. Exhale, all the way back down. Squat pose.

Step back into plank pose. So this will be the first time we visit this vinyasa transition, right, lowering option. So for this one, we're going to bring our knees down. Exhale, lower all the way down to the mat. Elbows stacked up over the wrist.

Point your toes back, drive the feet down into the mat. Strong legs, lift the chest, little baby cobra on the inhalation. On the exhalation, push back into tabletop. Inhale, curl the toes under and exhale, down dog. Lift your right leg up on the inhalation.

Step it out to the pinky on the right. Pause, inhale, look forward. Exhale, step the left foot up, squat. Inhale, all the way up, breath in. Exhale, all the way down, squat.

Step back into plank. Bring the knees down. Exhale, chaturanga or low push up down to the belly. Stretch the legs out, get the long cobra tail there. Inhale, lift the chest, little spine extension there.

This time curl the toes under and push all the way to downward dog. If that was too much and it didn't quite make sense for where you are in your body, you transition through tabletop like we did the prior set up. Lift your left leg up on the breath in. Exhale, step it out to the left pinky. Pause here, inhale, and exhale, step the right foot out.

Sink the hips down into squat, finish the exhale. Inhale, rise all the way up, palms to the chest, exhale. Inhale, bring the arms up overhead. Exhale, come down through the squat. We'll move breath by breath on this one.

Inhale, step back into plank pose. Exhale, knees lower down. Inhale, lift the chest, cobra pose. Exhale, downward facing dog. Inhale, lift the right leg up, hip height.

Exhale, one time knee to elbow, strong core. Inhale, send it high. Exhale, send the right foot to the right pinky. Pause, inhale. Exhale, left foot transfers forward, sink down into the squat, finish the exhale.

To inhale, rise all the way up, all the way back down into squat. That's the exhale. Inhale, plank pose. I'll lower down this time without the knees. Exhale, low push up, low plank all the way down.

Inhale, lift the chest, cobra pose. Exhale, downward facing dog. Inhale, lift your left leg up. Exhale, knee to that left arm. Inhale, send it up.

Exhale, left foot, left pinky. Pause, breathe in. Exhale, right foot, out wide, squat down. Inhale, rise all the way up. Good job.

Exhale, palms to the heart. Okay, sweep the arms up overhead. Let's transition down to the closing, our relax and release. We've been here before. So you come down, squat down, come on down to your seat.

Hold the knees in and roll on down to your back. Squeeze the knees in gently just to kind of lengthen out through the low back, if that's something you feel and experience. Bring your feet down below the knees. We'll do a couple bridge roll ups here. As you inhale, lift the hips, fingertips up toward the ceiling.

Lift up, reach the arms all the way back with the palms facing up. Good. Exhale, coordinate the arms landing on the ground as your low back touches down. Two more. Inhale, lift the hips, reach the arms up overhead.

And exhale, slowly roll down the spine to your low back, arms alongside your body. One more time. Get the full expression. Get as big and open and spacious as you can in the front side of the body. And exhale, lower all the way down.

Nice. Good. Extend the left leg out, lift it up off of the mat six inches or maybe all the way up. Hug the right knee in. Good.

Lift the chest up toward the right knee. We'll focus a little bit more on core here. Release the hands alongside your body. Good. On the exhale, switch legs, lift your chest.

When you bring that single leg in, lift the chest even more. Good. Exhale, switch. Exhale, switch. Exhale, switch.

Three more on each side. Exhale, one. Exhale, one. Exhale, two. Exhale, two.

Exhale, three. Exhale, three. Good. Both knees in. Bring the feet down to the mat.

Shift your hips over to the right. Extend your left leg out, arms reaching out. On your exhale, take the left hand on the right thigh and twist to the left. Good. As you're beginning to close out, begin to feel, you know, feel like you've accomplished something for the day.

Feel as if you've, you know, it's like, it's so easy for you to look back on the last, say, 18 minutes of this practice and pick yourself apart, right? Maybe you can focus more on, as you exit back out, some of the more positive things to be grateful for. You're able to actually do this. Let's switch sides, right hand on the left thigh, left arm reaching out. You're actually able to do it, meaning like you're able to breathe and move and yeah, maybe it's not perfect in your mind, but I think there's a lot of benefit to acknowledging what you can do versus what you can't.

Bring it back out. Realign yourself on the mat. Stretch the right leg out. Stretch your left leg out. Let's see if we can find a little time here for a final relaxation.

Stretch the back of the neck, arms resting alongside your body, and right away, you and I take the biggest breath yet. So big, full breath in. Open the mouth and exhale. Do that as many times as you'd like, focusing on that really nice, long, big exhale, right? As your body responds, gets the message that it's time to relax, time to let go.

Always feel free to stay as long as you'd like or join me by stretching the arms out, stretching the legs out, like right here as you begin to come back out of the practice and up to a seated position. It's like refreshed, renewed perspective, roll to the right side. Push up to sit. Here we are again. Look at that.

Day four. Done. That's huge. So bring the palms together. Namaste.