Durga Flow: Courageous Heart

Welcome to your practice today. Today's practice is Durga, open to courage. Durga is an eight-armed goddess who is gifted celestial weapons from all the different devas to help her defend the Dharma and defend the universe. And she's often seen riding a tiger or a lion, which represents her riding her Shakti and her power. You'll often see her with her left foot lifted, which represents being able to stand not only in our strength, but also in our vulnerability. And she'll have one hand in a Bayamudra, which is the gesture of fearlessness. So let's set an intention together. Taking a moment here, you'll bring your right hand into a Bayamudra. And if you like your left hand on your heart, and you can close your eyes and allow yourself to fully arrive. And imagining yourself to be like Durga, like how could I show up in that way where I could be in my most vulnerable self, but also in my most courageous self. And if you like now bringing the right hand on top of the left. And we'll open our practice here together with some chanting. In our mantra today is Om Mata, Om Kali. So Kali is another form of Durga. And then Durga Devi. So Devi means goddess. And then we'll say Namo Namaha, which means like reverence. And so we'll also be chanting Jayma. So we'll enter this chant here together. Okay. So you're welcome to join in with me whenever you feel like you're ready.

And again, our mantra is Om Mata, Om Kali, Durga Devi. Om Mata, Om Kali, Durga Devi, Namo Namaha. Om Mata, Om Kali. You've got it. Durga Devi, Namo Namaha. Om Mata, Om Kali. Keep going. Durga Devi, Namo Namaha. One more together. Om Mata, Om Kali, Durga Devi, Namo Namaha. Jay Jayma, Jay Jayma, Jay Jayma, Jay Jayma.

Om Mata, Om Kali, Durga Devi, Namo Namaha. One more. Durga Devi, Namo Namaha. If you like now, just bring your hands back in front of your heart and really returning to your intention, your Sankopa for your practice today. We'll seal that in with an Om together to begin our practice. Deep breath and count. Beautiful. When you're ready, releasing your hands and open your eyes and we'll begin on all fours.

Okay, so setting your hands under your shoulders, knees under hips, you can tuck your toes and just take a moment to check out your hands. You want your wrist creases parallel to the front edge of the mat and really spreading through the fingers. There's no space between your hands and the mat and as we inhale, we'll lift the heart. Tailbone lifts and as you exhale, it's like a little Halloween cat moment. So go scoop your tailbone, chin towards the throat. A couple more like that. So dropping into your breath. If you're familiar with Ujjayi Pranayama, you can start to breathe in and out through the nose. A couple cat cows here. One more. Inhale, lift through the heart. Exhale. And then when you're ready on your next inhale, come to neutral, tuck your toes and as you lift your hips, you'll head into downward facing dog. And then take a moment, maybe even walk out your dog. Pedal out the feet. One knee in and then the other. And we're going to take a lion's breath here in downward facing dog. So you'll inhale, take a deep breath. As you exhale, you'll stick out your tongue and make a big sound like you're like your durgis lion. One more just like that. Inhale. Exhale. When you're ready on your next inhale, right leg sweeps to the sky. Big breath in. As you exhale, we'll step the foot between the hands for low lunge. So right foot steps forward, back knee to the mat. Inhaling, the arms reach up. And so just taking a moment here to really drop into the breath, right? So we're in this durgis moment here, lifting up through the heart, staying in the breath. Now as you exhale, it's bringing the hands to the heart, you're going to come onto your back knee and you're going to give yourself a little space here.

Well, inhale to lengthen and as you exhale, you'll twist towards the right. And then the left elbow will find the right thigh and you'll start to sink your hips here to your degree. And the option now is if you like, tuck your back toes and then you'll lift your back knee and you're hovering here for one. Lengthen your tailbone towards your back heel for two. And then you'll take your left hand inside your right foot. On your inhale, take your right arm to the sky and see if you can stack shoulder to shoulder, wrist to wrist. Hug into the midline. If you like gaze towards your upper thumb, if it bothers your neck, just look down. Take a breath here. Inhale. Exhale, hand to the mat. Inhale, plank pose, top of a push-up. You're welcome to head straight to down dog or if you like, it's an exhale to chaturanga. And then inhale, upward facing dog. Exhale, downward facing dog. And really just find your breath once again. If you like, take a lion's breath with me. We'll inhale, take a deep breath. Exhale, stick out your tongue. Get fierce. Beautiful. Now next inhale, left leg sweeps to the sky.

Deep breath in. Exhale, step through for low lunge. Back knee to the mat. You can keep your toes tucked. Inhale, arms reach up. And so really again, dropping into the breath. So working with this energy of Durga, opening to courage, we start to really drop into the seat of the breath. As you exhale and you'll come onto your back knee, hands come to the heart. Now again, we're going to twist if you can from the core. So we inhale to lengthen, exhale to twist, then right elbow to left knee. And then you can pause here. You can look down. You can sink your hips. And then again, the option is to bend or tuck those back toes and lift your back knee and hover here for five. I like to really hug the midline here with the inner thighs. Really find that connection. That's going to allow you to step into your Shakti, right? So that inner power, accessing that. And then right hand to the mat. Inhale, take your left arm out. Shoulder to shoulder, wrist to wrist. Hug in, take a deep breath. Exhale, hand to the mat. Inhale, plank, nice and clear and strong. Now again, you can always head to down dog or we'll take a vinyasa. Exhale, chaturanga. Inhale, upward facing dog. Exhale, downward facing dog. And I like to use down dog as this way to really find that that deeper strength within, right? So I claw the floor like I've got these lion paws. Inner thighs go back. Now we're going to head to the front of the mat. So from here, we're going to walk forward. You'll inhale, look forward, bend your knees, and then slowly make your way to the top of your mat. For this ragdoll, we're going to widen our feet. So take your feet edge to edge if you like. Bend your knees a lot. You'll clasp your elbows and your hands.

And you can just rock out side to side. So this energy of Durga of Shakti, we really want to kind of tap into that inner movement of prana. So this is a place where you might start to feel that. And then release both of your arms, bend your knees a lot, and then like a ragdoll, we'll roll our way up to standing. And then you'll step your feet together, hands of the heart, samasthiti. And then releasing the arms, let's take our vinyasa, arms reach up, inhale. If you like, gaze towards your thumbs, exhale, fold it in, forward fold. Uttanasana, you can gaze towards your shins, bend your knees if you need to. Inhale, halfway lift position. Now as you exhale, you can float back to Chaturanga. If you're welcome to step back to down dog instead, otherwise we'll step or jump back, Chaturanga. And then inhale, upward facing dog. Exhale, downward facing dog. So we'll start adding on here. Inhale, right leg to the sky, deep breath in. Exhale, knee to chest. And then see if you can tap your knee to your left elbow.

Tap it in. Inhale, three legged dog reach. Exhale, step it through. Foot between the hands, the back knee can come to the mat. Inhale, arms reach up. So back to our low lunge. And then as you exhale, come onto your back knee, hands to heart, same twist. We're going to add on. Inhale to lengthen, exhale to twist, take your left elbow to your right thigh. And then when you're ready, tuck your back toes, lift your back knee. We're going to hover here for one. See if you can lengthen. Again, two, three. And then taking your left hand to the floor. Inhale, take your right arm to the sky. Big breath in. Exhale, take our hands to the mat.

Inhale, plank pose. Nice and clear and strong. Exhale, Chaturanga. Inhale, upward facing. Exhale, downward facing dog. It's really tapping into the power of the breath, right? So as you inhale, you take your left leg to the sky. See if you can expand from the navel. Exhale, knee to chest. And then see if you can tap your knee to your right elbow. Inhale, three-legged dog. Reach it up. Exhale, step it through for low lunge.

Back knee down. Inhale, you're doing great. Arms reach up. Big breath in. Exhale, hands to heart, come onto your back knee. Lengthen on the inhale, exhale to twist, and then right elbow to left thigh. And then pausing here, sinking in. And when you're ready, you'll tuck your back toes. Those right toes will tuck. You'll lift your right knee and you're hovering here for another breath or two. Again, find the midline. Take a deep breath. And as you exhale, hands to the mat. Plank pose. Inhale, nice and clear. Now you're welcome to head to down dog or take a vinyasa together. Exhale, Chaturanga. Elbows track in. Inhale, upward facing dog. Roll on the toes, lift the heart. Exhale, downward facing dog. So take a couple of breaths here and really find the ignition if you can from the navel into the inner thighs down to the inner heels. And we're going to head to the top of our mat. So I like to walk in a couple of inches. Big toes touch. Inhale, lift the heels. Exhale, bend your knees, step or jump. Halfway lift on your inhale. Exhale, fold. As you inhale, you'll come all the way to standing. Reverse swan dive, arms reach up. Take a deep breath. Exhale, hands to heart. And then when you're ready, you will head into tree. So finding your center, left foot will be down. Your right foot will lift into tree pose. And so this one's a little bit different today. So your right hand will be on your heart. Your left hand you'll place in a bayamudra. So just like Durga riding her tiger, see if you can step into the focus of prana. You might even start to feel like the energy moving within you. And then just like Durga, you'll lift your right foot if you like exposing the foot, bending the left knee. That vulnerability and power and courage. And then the big toes touch, left hand finds the right. And then we'll take our vinyasa, arms reach down. Inhale, sweep the arms up. Exhale, fold it in. Big exhale, gaze toward your shins. Inhale, halfway lift, fingertips to floor shins. Exhale, step or float chaturanga. Or again, you can head straight to downward facing down. Inhale, upward facing. Exhale, downward facing. And so as we inhale, we sweep the right leg to the sky. I'll take a deep breath. Exhale, knee to chest. And then again, go to the left elbow. This time we're going to head towards a fallen triangle. So you're going to extend the right leg towards the floor, towards the outer edge of your left hand. If you can't, ground your left heel completely. Shift into your right arm. Inhale, fallen triangle. It's like the courageous heart of Durga. Take a deep breath. Exhale, hand to the mat. You'll spin onto the ball of the back foot. Inhale, three-legged dog, deep breath in. This time we'll go to high lunge, crescent lunge. Step your foot between your hands. So right foot steps forward, back heel stays lifted. Arms reach up on your inhale. Big breath and extend through the back leg. Take a full inhale. Back into that twist. Exhale, hands to heart. Inhale to lengthen. Exhale to twist.

And then the left elbow finds the right thigh. Hug the midline. You're here for five. I like to look towards my right big toe. Really find that connection of the inner thighs and my inner energy. Now from here, we're going to transition to warrior two. So as I inhale, I'll slowly rise up and I'll ground my left foot and find my way into Virabhadrasana two. Ribs are over hips, knee over ankle. Arms reaching equally. And then we're going to use our Durga third eye. She's got a third eye. You're going to look at your middle finger. Stay with your breath. And then from here, you'll straighten your right leg. We'll take the back hand to the back leg. We're going to reverse our triangle. So that front right leg is strong. Inhale, reverse your triangle. Get spacious around the heart. Creative heart. Exhale to triangle pose. I'm going to reach out. This is a place where you're welcome to grab your block to place outside the shin.

And then we'll inhale. We'll take our left arm up. And we're here for five. You can gaze towards your upper thumb if you like, or gaze down if it feels better for your neck. And then we're heading towards half moon. So it's balancing pose. So the left hand finds the left hip. You'll gaze to your right big toe. Bend your front knee. I took place my hand down, set my back foot in. And then as I inhale, I shift my right hand about one arm's breath forward. From there, I'll shift into the right foot, left foot lifts, toes point towards the left edge of your mat. You can stay here or you'll take the other hand up shoulder to shoulder, wrist to wrist. Big breath in hell. And then slowly lowering back down into warrior two.

In hell, like nothing ever happened. Exhale Vinyasa, hands to the mat, plank. If you like, chattaranga. Urdva mukha, upward facing. Adho mukha, downward facing. And just taking a moment to allow the breath to even out. Right. That Sama Vritti Pranayama, allowing the breath to be nice and steady.

And then inhale, left leg sweeps. Exhale, knee to chest. And then you'll tap towards the right elbow. Extend the left leg. Ground your right heel. Shift into the left arm. Inhale, right arm peels up. The creator's heart of Durga fallen triangle. Exhale, hand to the mat. Lift the back heel. Inhale, three legged dog, big expansive breath. Exhale, step through crescent lunge, high lunge. Here we go. Back heels lifted, long through the spine. Inhale, arms reach. So the beauty of Durga is that our most vulnerable places become the place from which all of our strength resides, right? So as we exhale, we take our hands to our heart. We lengthen. We exhale, twist. Then it's right elbow to left thigh. And you hang out here. Again, you can gaze down. So it's in these balancing poses especially, I feel like, that we can really tap into that inner power, right? Really hug in. Now to transition, I like to gaze down at my left big toe. And then inhale, we'll rise up into warrior two. Just like Durga, third eye, gazing towards middle finger. Nice and clear, steady breath. And then we inhale, straighten the front leg. Back hand to back leg. We'll reverse the triangle. Get spacious on the inhale. And then triangle pose. Hug in to reach out. So you're hugging to the bones with the muscles. And then the right arm can reach. And so can I find expansion from the center? In the center of my being. And then for our half moon, you're welcome to find your block or right hand or right hip. Gaze to left big toe. Bend your front knee. Left hand can land or find the block. Step your back foot in a half step. Reach the left hand forward. Inhale, Arachandra. Half moon. So Arda means half Chandra moon. And we're here in this really sweet courageous open heart. If you like, gaze up. And then slowly landing down, warrior two. So Vira actually means warrior.

Durga being that warrior goddess or hero. It means hero as well. Inhale. Exhale, hands to the mat. Take a vinyasa. Step it back. Plank pose. Inhale. Exhale. Chaturanga. Upward facing dog. Downward facing dog. And in your downward dog, just taking a moment to again, really ignite the arms to see if you can tap into the power of your navel once again, right? So that hugging in to find the ignition. And we're going to head back to the top of the mat. So from here, inhale, you can lift your heels. Gaze forward. If you like, walk up or step or jump to the top.

Halfway lift. Exhale, fold. And taking a moment here and a couple of moments in uttanasana. Bend your knees if you need to. Really find that sense of connection to earth and heart. So the line of energy that runs up in towards the heart. And then on our next inhale, we'll slowly reverse swan dive all the way to standing. Hands can connect. Exhale, hands to heart.

Second side for trees. So your right leg will stay down. Your left foot will lift. If you like, using your hand to place the foot. And then the left hand will be on the heart. Right hand in a bayamudra. I'm just taking this moment to, to stand in your strength. So it's like a strength to Durga, right? This way that she's able to, to stand strong, even in her most vulnerable moments, right? When she's in the battle on this field of Dharma that she finds herself in. And if you like here, you can also, again, lift the left foot off the leg, bend the right knee. And then step the big toes to touch hands of the heart. Samastitihi. And it's a beautiful moment to, to bow your head in and just return to your intention, your song kalpa for your practice today. What are you calling in? What are you ready to, to stand in in your own life? How am I willing to show up in this most courageous heart of mine?

And when you're ready, arms release. Inhale, spacious heart, arms sweep up. Exhale, folded in. Big bow. Inhale, halfway lift. Either walk to down dog or again float back. Foreland staff pose. Inhale, upward facing. Exhale, downward facing. Beautiful. And then from here on your next inhale, strong in the legs, you'll shift towards a plank pose. So coming in towards plank, right? And as you exhale, you'll take your forearms to the mat. And then we'll interlace the hands together if we need to, or the forearms will be parallel. And we're heading towards dolphin dog, shishubhasana. And so for that, we'll lift the hips and you'll walk your feet in. So for dolphin dog, I like to widen my feet quite a bit. I'm going to interlace my hands together and just take a moment to find the power of my arms, inner thighs go back. You can also take the hands into prayer, mudra, this reverent seal in the hands and really take the pinky edge of your hands into the mat, inner thighs back. Beautiful. Now you can stay here, or these are dolphin pushups, which are really sweet. You can interlace your hands together.

I'm going to look forward as I inhale, I'm going to shift my nose towards my thumbs. If you like, you can really reach the nose outside the hands and you'll exhale, go back to your dolphin dog. So you might just shift like an inch, like you'll inhale here, exhale back. Let's do a couple more. So inhale, shift forward. You can tap your nose, exhale, shift back. If you have a sweaty nose, you can leave yourself a little, a little mark. Come back to dolphin dog. Let's do one more. Tap it. Come on back. Breathe and then go ahead, take your knees down, extended child's pose. Reach your arms out, touch your finger pads and fold in. Return to the breath. A lion's breath. If you like, here together, deep breath in. Exhale, stick out your tongue. Let any of the funk go from behind the heart. And so settle into your breath. So really allowing the, that some of Ritti Pranayama to return again. So even breath.

And as we inhale, we're going to come back onto our knees. You'll set your forearms down again. So these are called arm sweeps. So it's that same position like forearm plank where you want your elbow and your wrist crease. If you can, in the same line, the hands are down and then we'll step the feet back. So we're in this forearm plank position. And so this is just like a side to side that we're going to do here and then shift into the left arm and inhale, reach my right arm up. Exhale, take the forearm down. Inhale, left arm. Exhale, right arm. So side to side. Inhale. And so you'll go with your breath. And allow the breath to lead the way. So Durga has eight arms. So we're building our our arm strength today. Two more. Right side. Left side. Beautiful. And then from there, knees down, tuck your toes back to that extended child's pose. Take a moment.

Toes can stay tucked or you can untuck your toes. Getting into the arms today to free the back of the heart. And as you next inhale, come back to all fours. Set your forearms and we'll extend our legs back, but we're going to come onto our thigh. So this is Sphinx pose. The thing is about Sphinx is that you control how deep it is. If it feels too deep to have the elbow crease in alignment with your shoulder, just walk your hands away from you. If you feel like you need to, you know, deepen it, walk your elbows in. Forearms are down, tops of legs are down. Take a moment, gaze towards your navel, thighs go down, low belly hugs in. And as you next inhale, you're just going to curl the chest forward like you're lifting the sternum to point forward. Allow the breath to awaken the back of the heart.

And you'll stay here for just a moment. This is called a core lift. So you're going to keep the top of the feet down. I'm just going to walk up here to make sure my feet are on my mat. Now from here, we'll inhale, heart forward. As you exhale, tops of the feet are down, you're just going to look towards your navel. And then thighs down, inhale, lift the heart. We're going to do five of these. Exhale, lift, gaze towards your navel, thighs down, inhale. Can I be courageous in the heat, right? Exhale, that's three, thighs down, inhale, heart forward. Exhale, four, one more, inhale, exhale. Beautiful, thighs down, inhale, the heart looks forward. Now to come out of this, we'll exhale, take our elbows to the sides and let's take a moment if you like, forehead on your hands.

You can rock out your hips if that feels good. And then you'll come to all four. So hands pull back, tuck your toes onto all four as we go. We're taking a shoulder stretch here together. As you inhale, right arm reaches out, exhale, take your right arm under the window of the left arm. You'll take your right shoulder towards the floor and then the left arm can reach out. Thread the needle. I like to really work on tacking this right hip back so there's a nice sense of alignment and length and you're welcome to tent the left finger pads a lot and twist under your armpit. Pause here. And then I push into the finger pads of the left arm to come out of here. So when you're ready, slowly rise and then set your hands back down. Let's take a cat cow here just to neutralize. Inhale, exhale.

We find that Halloween cat shape and then the right hand stays down. Inhale, left arm reaches out, exhale, weave the arm under and through, left shoulder towards the floor, left cheek and left ear to the mat, and then maybe extend your right arm. Again, I like to use the finger pads and use that to really find that twist in the ribs. So our Shakti gets bound up in the hips and in the shoulders, right? So allowing that prana to release so we can really access our power like Durga. And then into the finger pads of that right hand, I push and slowly come up. Beautiful. Take a cat cow just to neutralize. Inhale, exhale. Beautiful. Inhale, find neutral and then it's downward facing dog. Tuck your back toes, lift your hips. Adho muka. Lion's breath together. Here we go. Inhale, deep breath in. Exhale. And then you might want to grab your block for this next sequence. So leave it towards the right side of your mat and we'll head back into our downward facing dog.

And then on your next inhale, the right leg sweeps to the sky. As you exhale, step through for warrior two. So right foot forward, back, foot spins to the ground. Inhale, just like Durga, Virabha and Drasana too. And just as we did before, we'll take our reverse triangle. Front leg straightens, back in the back leg, flip the front arm open, reverse your triangle inhale, triangle pose, exhale, hand to leg, floor. If you like the block here, you can place your hand on the block. Ooh, teach a trikonasana. And then on our next inhale, we'll bend the front knee and you'll reverse your warrior. So here you go. Reverse warrior, deep breath. And then exhale, either elbow to thigh for side angle pose or take your hand to the block. So your block, you can place it the highway, my way or the highway, hand on the block, stack the shoulder and the wrist. And then from here, the arm can sweep side angle pose. Now, if you have the bound version of this in your practice, you're welcome to go there. And so to bind, we take the arm inside and we reach the arm under and through, and we look to bind behind the right thigh. The main thing here is to feel like you're laying back into your own heart. Now, if you're comfortable here and your hamstrings are happy, you can toe heel this back foot, left foot in just a little bit. And you might take a moment in a bound triangle, take a breath, both hands, all your durga arms release inside of your right foot. You can step your block out to the side and you can toe heel your right foot a little bit wider. Lizard pose. And then from here, hands, plant. And I'm going to lift my sacrum quite a bit.

We'll turn all of our toes to face the left edge of the mat for Prasavita Padottanasana. So I like to check my stance here, toes are parallel, heels are parallel. So readjusting the stance if I need it. And then from here, halfway lift, exhale, fold. And then we'll interlace the hands behind the back for Prasavita Sea Arms. So it's like a yoga mudra. Start to release the arms when you're ready towards the left edge of your mat. You can even shake out your head. Yes. Shake it out. No. I like to loosen the grip quite a bit here to let the shoulders go. And then gently releasing hands to the floor, halfway lift inhale, back towards lizard. You'll walk to the top edge of your mat, right toes turn out, left heel lifts. Hands plant, step it back, plank, vinyasa or downward facing dog. For vinyasa, we'll go to Chaturanga. Upward facing, downward facing. Second side, inhale, left leg sweeps. Exhale, step through, warrior two. Foot between the hands, back foot spins to ground. Inhale, left arms reaching forward, gazing towards that middle finger. And again, if you like, you can make sure your block is behind your left shin. Straighten your front leg, back hand to back leg, reverse the triangle. Inhale, triangle pose, exhale, reach out, out, out, out, out, out, out, hand to leg or block, opposite hand to sky. So you can be here, enjoy the breath, gazing towards thumb. Inhale, you'll bend your front knee and you're heading right into reverse warrior, flipping that left palm open, deep breath, inhale, side angle pose, either elbow to thigh or hand to block, right arm sweeps towards ear or heading towards that wrap in a bind. So if you took the wrap before, you'll take the left arm in front, you'll find your bind behind that left thigh.

And then I like to scoop my tailbone and then feel like I'm laying back into my own heart. All of our hands release inside the left foot, pop your back heel for a moment and lizard, widen your left foot to find more access into the hips. And then lift your sacrum a lot, turn all your toes to face the right edge of your mat, prasarita padottanasana. Again, prasarita see arms, interlacing the hands. A couple of breaths here. Arms release under the shoulders to the mat, halfway lift, inhale, walk back towards the top of your mat, back heel lifts. And we're just going to step back to downward facing dog. So from here, step it back to downward facing dog. And then your knees land, you'll sit on your heels.

Child's pose, arms reach out in front of you. And then in your next inhale, we'll slowly walk up. And we'll come to sit on our heels and you're welcome to use your block for this. We'll sit in vajrasana. If you'd like to have that support underneath your hips, you're welcome for that, to take your block. And we'll inhale, take a deep breath. And as you exhale, you'll twist towards the right. Allow yourself to find some space, drop back into your breath. Inhale to center, exhale to the left, soften your eyes and your jaw. It's a little bit of sweet release. And then as you inhale, come to center, we'll come to lie on your back and you can have your block handy for this.

Set it to the side, kind of lie down and we'll set up for bridge pose. So you're on your back, feet are hip distance apart, arms are by your sides. As you exhale, your low belly will hug in, you can scoop your tailbone under a little bit. And then as you inhale, you'll lift your hips. Now, you're welcome to use your block for a more passive version of bridge, or you'll inhalate the hands gently behind the back, shrug shoulders under a little bit to come off your neck. And you're here for satu bandha sarvangasana, inner thighs rolled down. And it's like that sense of the courageous Durga heart lifting up towards the sky. Breathing, take another breath here. And then slowly to release the arms can sweep up and the heels can lift off the mat and slowly roll your way down. Nice work and hug your knees into your chest. Give yourself a hug.

I'm starting to bring our awareness a little bit more into that inner body, like that closing of the eye of Durga, that third eye. And then tapi baby pose. So as the feet shine to the sky, you can hold the outer feet or the inner feet or the heels, like whatever calls to you. If you're feeling a little bit more tension here, you can also just hold behind your own thighs. And just take a moment to roll through the low back to tack the hips down and release all that shakti bound up in the hips. And then inhaling knees to chest. You'll keep your right knee in, let your left leg extend to the floor. Left hand to right knee, you'll bring your right knee towards the left, you can tee out your arm gaze to the right. If you like close your eyes. Soften the breath. Where can you release some tension here? Inhale through center. Right leg down, left knee draws in, right hand, left knee, teeing out your arm, gazing towards the left.

Don't forget to breathe. Now as you inhale to center, go ahead and look for your block. We're going to take what we call active reversal or v-parita krani with a block. So you'll plant your feet like you're going to bridge, lift your hips, place the block out of the sacrum. And then from here, we'll bring the legs up. Now I like to adjust my block so that I'm not really doing much work. So you don't want to be working here. This is a letting go. You can allow the legs to get heavy, you can close your eyes, and allow the breath and the prana to start to settle into the heart, like sand and hourglass, like there's a sense of just allowing everything to return home to the heart. And then when you're ready, the knees will bend, feet will plant, and you can lift your hips off the block and set your block to the side. And we'll set up for shavasana. So the legs go wide, the arms go wide. You can lift your heart to reset the shoulder blades underneath the back and then close your eyes once again. And you're welcome to stay here in shavasana or join me in a seat. so do all my kamun namah jai ji maha jai ji maha jai ji maha If you're still in Shavasana, when you're ready, bring some small motion back to your hands, to your feet.

If you like, wiggling your fingers and your toes and rolling to one side and pausing there for a moment, and when you're ready, you'll join us in a seat. This is a moment where you can bring your hands together in front of your heart in Anjali Mudra. If you return to your intention, your sankopa, and maybe even offer up your practice here in some way, a loka, samastah, sukino, bhavantu, we all beings be happy and free, we all beings in peace and safety and live free from fear. And we'll close with a sweet Aum together, big breath in hell. Thank you so much for sharing your practice today, namaste.