Week 4: Fire Body

Welcome to week four. Today we're going to explore fire. And my curiosity around fire is being able to show up more from my experience. All of it. Everything that's showing up in my life, I want to be in it. I want to live. I want to be in life. And physiologically we have a tendency to turn away from things that are uncomfortable and to move towards things that are comfortable. And I have a curiosity, and actually even the energy of curiosity makes us turn more towards our experience. So when I'm feeling something that's uncomfortable, I'm curious about it. What is that that's making me turn away? And what can I do to move towards it, to look, to see more, to feel more? So my hope with these practices is that we are learning to be more inclusive rather than exclusive of our experience. Are we able to move in new ways? Are we able to show up more fully in our life off of this yoga mat? I'd love to hear from you and hear how it's going. Let's begin our practice. You'll begin laying down. You'll most likely want two blocks for your practice, and it's okay if you don't have them. Okay. So lay down and bend your knees, place your feet on the floor. Find a couple big breaths here and feel the ground. Breathing deeply. Arriving to your body, arriving to your practice, arriving here, which is very much about being here in your body and about being in whatever space you're in, stepping into your life. We explored push in the earth suite sequence, and we're going to play with a little bit more of that right now. So begin by pushing one foot down into the ground and notice what you notice about that. What goes up as something goes down. Push your other foot into the ground. Notice what happens there. Gently roll to your side and press into your hands. Come all the way up towards your seat. And as soon as you arrive, let yourself melt back down. And you can find any shape once you get down. And then again, push yourself up to a mid-level shape all the way up to your seat and let yourself melt back down. And you can melt however you want, finding your own creativity to get down to the ground. And once again, pushing to come all the way up to your seat and then letting yourself melt back down, feeling the touch of the ground. Roll to your side, push yourself all the way up to stand, sequencing up through the body. And once you arrive upright, melt back down, finding your own creative pathway to come all the way back down to the ground. And again, rolling to the side, pushing into the hands to push and sequence your way all the way up to stand. We'll go down and up several times. I'll count so that we can experiment moving with different tempos. And I want to give you permission to play with moving off of your yoga mat a little bit. We have this container, which is helpful for some things. And then it's really nice to move in different ways at different times for different reasons and to play with moving on and off the yoga mat. So letting yourself move creatively, finding your own pathway will melt down in 10 seconds. So melting down in 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, coming up in 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, down in 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, up in 9, up in 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, down in 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, finding new pathways up in 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, down in 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, up in 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, down in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, up in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, down in 4, 3, 2, 1, up in 4, 3, 2, 1, down in 3, 2, 1, up in 3, 2, 1, down in 2, 1, up in 2, 1, down in 2, 1, down in 1, up in 1, down in 1, up in 1, down in 1, and rest. A moment to take it all in. Notice the echo.

Notice the residue. Be with your breathing body. Be with your aliveness. And start to stretch out long through your hands and your toes. Roll to your side. Press into your hands and come into downward facing dog. So how do we take some of that freedom that we just felt with melting and pushing up to stand? How can that apply here in this familiar form of downward facing dog? It's like you're spending time with a good friend and seeing them with fresh eyes. Walk yourself forward to a standing forward fold. Rise all the way up to stand. Reach your arms skyward and release your arms down standing in Tadasana. Feel your feet rooting down into the ground on an inhale. Reach your arms up to the sky. Exhale, fold forward over your legs. Inhale, breath halfway, rise. Exhale, step into your downward facing dog. Inhale, breath, come forward to plank. Exhale, lower all the way down to your belly. Bring the tops of your feet down. Inhale, rise into a low cobra. On an exhale, press into your hands. Bring your sitting bones back towards your heels, pausing in child's pose. Full round of breath here. On an inhale, rise up on your shins, hips up over your knees. Reach your arms up towards the sky. On an exhale, come forward to all fours. Grab hold of your blocks if you're using blocks with me. Bring your hands onto the lowest level of the blocks and head on back to downward facing dog. Press into both feet, both hands. And then shift your way to your left foot and inhale, reach your right leg up towards the sky. Exhale, come forward to plank. Bring your right knee into your chest. Try hovering your right foot right between your hands. On an inhale, reach your right leg back up high to the sky. On an exhale, come forward to plank and hover your right foot forward. One more time, inhale. And exhale, hover your right foot forward and then set it down. Inhale, rise up for high crescent lunge. Exhale, release your hands back down. Step your back foot forward to meet your front foot. Inhale, breath, lengthen halfway, arda uttanasana. Exhale, fold forward. Inhale, rise all the way up to stand. Root down, lift your arms skyward.

Exhale, release your arms to your sides. Inhale, arms rise. Exhale, fold down. Inhale, breath, halfway rise. And exhale, bring your hands down to the floor and step back to downward facing dog. Inhale, breath, come forward to plank. Exhale, lower to your belly. Pops to the feet down. Inhale, rise into low cobra. Exhale, press into your hands, child's pose. Inhale, rise up onto your shins, hips up over the knees, reach your arms skyward. And exhale, release your hands down. Hands can come back to the blocks and then back to downward facing dog. Root through both hands, shift more weight to the right foot. Inhale, left leg rises. Exhale, come forward to plank, bring your left knee into your chest, hover your left foot forward between your hands. Inhale, breath, left leg rises. And exhale, hover your left foot forward. Inhale, left leg rises. Exhale, hover your left foot forward and set it down. Inhale, reach your arms up. Exhale, release your arms down and step your back foot forward to meet your front foot. Inhale, lengthen halfway. And exhale, fold. Inhale, hands all the way up to stand. Root down, lift up, arms skyward. And exhale, hands alongside your body. Inhale, arms rise. Exhale, fold forward. Inhale, breath, halfway rise. And exhale, step back with your hands on blocks, downward facing dog. Inhale, breath, come forward to plank. And we're going to flip onto the tops of the feet again. Root down through the tops of the feet and slowly begin to send your chest between your upper arms for your upward facing dog, staying very lifted and strong in your legs. On an exhale, push into your hands, lift your hips high, back to downward facing dog. Inhale, right leg rises. And exhale, step your right foot forward between your hands. Bring your back heel down. Rise up for warrior two. Push down into your right foot. Inhale, straighten your leg and reach both arms skyward. Exhale, open up wide for warrior two. Just one more time like that. Exhale rooting down to rise. And exhale, open up wide for warrior two. We'll inhale here. On an exhale, release your hands down. Push down into your hands, hover your front foot off the floor and step it back to plank. Option to stay here in plank or one more time with up dog coming to the tops of the feet, slowly descending the pelvis, sending the arms between the chest, rather between the arms. Lift the chest up, up dog. And then push down, hips high, downward facing dog. Inhale, left leg rises. Exhale, step your left foot forward between your hands. Bring your back heel down. Inhale, rise up for warrior two. On your next inhale, push down into the ground, straighten your front leg, reach both arms skyward. And exhale, open up wide for warrior two. Again, inhale, rooting down to rise. And exhale, opening up wide for warrior two. Find a full breath here. On an exhale, hands lower down to our blocks. Push back to plank, covering the front foot off, stepping it back. Staying here or find the tops of the feet. Slowly come into upward facing dog. Push into your hands back to downward dog. Inhale. Exhale, bend your knees, step forward towards the front of your mat. Inhale, breath lengthen halfway up, arda uttanasana. Exhale, breath fold forward. Inhale, rise to stand, rooting down, lifting up. And exhale, arms come down.

Tadasana. Pausing, noticing. Inhale, breath, arms rise. Exhale, fold forward. Inhale, lengthen the spine and step your right foot back to a lunge. Bring your right hand down to the floor, or you can bring it down to a block and reach your left arm up towards the sky. Root down through your inner leg, so feel the big toe mounds, the inner heels, the inner legs. And begin to spiral from behind the navel, up through the solar plexus and the heart center, and then the throat and the eyes. On an exhale, release your left hand down. Walk your hands forward. Your hands can be on the floor or blocks. So to shift more weight into your front foot, lift your back foot off the floor and straighten your left leg. We're going to inhale here, keep your spine really long. Exhale, lower your right toes down to tap your left heel, keeping your legs straight if possible. Inhale, straighten your right leg. Up and back. Exhale, lower the right toes to tap the left heel. Inhale, watch your right leg back up. Exhale, lower the foot to tap the left heel. And inhale, lengthen it up. Two more times like that, imagine that the air is thick. So exhale, lowering. Inhale, lifting with some resistance, pressing against thick air. Exhale, lowering. Exhale, lifting. Find the fire in the back of your legs. And now bend your left knee. Step your right foot about three feet or so away from your left foot. Walk your hands back a little bit, again to the floor or blocks. And begin to straighten out your front leg and let your heart come forward. So we're working towards a pyramid. It might be a great place to stay right here with the spine nice and long. Or if you can get some movement in your pelvis, then you'll tip your hips and start to move the pubic bone away from the navel. Maybe even release the head. Keep the reach through both legs, including the inner legs. A couple breaths here. Notice how your body moves when you breathe. Inhale, breath, lengthen up part way. Exhale, bend your front knee, bring your hands down to the floor and step back to downward facing dog. So we've done a couple of shapes on one side. Notice what you notice about the two sides of the body. How do they feel different? Inhale here. Exhale, bend your knees and transition to the front of your mat. Inhale, breath, lengthen up part way. And exhale, fold. Inhale, rise all the way up to stand, rooting down to lift up. And exhale, release your arms down to your sides. Lift your arms up, inhale. Fold forward. Lengthen up half way and step your left foot back to a lunge. Bring your left hand to the floor or up towards a block and reach your right arm up towards the sky.

Finding your spiral. Start to find both legs rooting, including the inner legs. And then we'll start to spiral from the low belly. Let every segment of your spine spiral. Check in with your neck. Does your neck feel compromised here? Let your neck be free. So it's finding support through the lower parts of the spine. Can you get the middle back to spiral? On your next exhale, release your hand down. Walk both hands forward out in front of you. Shift more weight into your right foot. Lift your back foot off the floor. Lengthen your spine long so it's a variation of warrior three. So we'll try to keep both legs extended. Inhale. On an exhale, lower your left toes to tap your right heel, trying to keep the legs straight. And then inhale, lift the left leg back up. And exhale, lower the toes to tap the right heel. Inhale, lifting it back up. And exhale, lower to tap. Again, imagining the air is thick. With some resistance, inhale, lift the left leg skyward. And exhale, lower the toes to tap. Inhale, lift the legs skyward. Exhale, lowering to tap. Inhale, lifting skyward. Exhale, lowering to tap. Inhale, lifting the left leg up. And then this time we'll bend the right knee. Step the left foot back, preparing our bodies here for pyramid pose. Walk the hands back. Begin to elongate the front leg and lift the chest, finding some length here to the spine. You are welcome to stay here. If the backs of the legs allow it, you'll tip your hips a little bit more. Keep the energy going through the back leg.

And if it's appropriate for you today, you'll let yourself round. Keep finding the inner legs. Be with your breath, your breathing body, your moving body. And exhale. Inhale, lengthen up part way. Bend your front knee. Step your back foot forward to meet your front foot. Fold forward over both legs. Bend both knees. Inhale, reach your arms up for Utkatasana. And exhale, bend your knees even more, practicing your squat. Root down through your feet, come up, find a big circle with your arms, and fold forward. Lengthen up part way. Fold forward again. Rise all the way up to stand. Reach your arms up. And exhale, release your arms down. Shift weight into your left foot and step your right foot back, preparing for a revolved triangle. Similar to that stance we were just in for our Pyramid Pose. Root down through both legs. Inhale, reach your right arm up towards the sky. Exhale, begin to tip your hips. Reach your right hand forward. I'm going to grab a block. A block can come to the inside of your front foot on any level. And we'll start to elongate our spine forward, letting our tailbone face back. And then once again, from the low belly, start to spiral through the belly, through the solar plexus, through the lungs and the heart. And then eventually spiraling up through the throat and maybe even through the eyes. And really important to include your back leg, including your whole body all at once, breathing, staying with your experience, whatever is arising for you. This is a challenging shape for many of us. Release your hand down. Step your back foot forward to meet your front foot. Then both knees, Utkatasana. Push down into both feet. Come up to stand and release your arms down right into the second side. Step your left foot back. Lift your left arm skyward. Start to tip your hips, finding your length as you come forward. Bring your left hand down to the inside of the front foot. Again, feel free to use some height for that left hand. And we'll let our tailbone face back and we'll start to play with spiraling from the low belly. Every segment of our spine can spiral at the same rate. So everything is participating. Eventually moving up through the heart center, through the throat center, you can lift up through your right arm. You might even start to spiral through your eyes. We're breathing, we're moving, the shape oscillates. So there's a moment of moving towards the twist, a moment of moving away. We're in our experience, we're in our whole body. And release your hand down. Step your back foot forward to meet your front foot. Bend both knees. Rise into Utkatasana. Push down into both feet. Straighten your legs and release your arms down. Widen your feet a little bit wider. So your feet are outer hip width distance. Bend both knees and bring your forearms to your thighs. Experiment with dropping your hips down even more. So maybe your hips are the same distance from the floor as your knees.

And now without lifting your pelvis anymore, see if you can hover your forearms off your thighs. Sit down just a little bit more. Pausing, breathing, staying with what's here, staying with heat. Notice any preferences that arise. Staying just a little bit more in your experience. Dropping the hips down a little bit more if possible. Feel weight moving down through the balls of the feet, down through the wide heels. A few more breaths. Maybe come all the way down, bring your sitting bones towards your heels. Push down into your feet, come up, reach your arms up, walk your feet a little bit closer together and release your hands down to your sides. Inhale, arms rise. Exhale, fold forward. Step your right foot back to a lunge and lower your back knee down. At this point, you might grab a blanket and put it underneath your right knee for a little bit more support. From here, we'll let our pelvis travel back. We'll bend the right knee even more, reach back to hold on to the ankle, and now re-bend your front knee. You're welcome to stay in low lunge with the back foot on the floor. If it's okay for you, you'll come up and bring your left hand to your left leg. Hug the back heel in. Start to let the thigh bones move apart and that may inspire a lift to the left arm. Lengthening the whole front of the spine. Even experiment with including your eyes, maybe lifting your gaze. And we'll release. Find a moment in downward facing dog and notice the difference between the two sides. Step your right foot forward between your hands. Lower your back knee down to your mat or to your blanket. Shift your pelvis back, bend your back knee, hold on to the ankle, and then bend your front knee again. Bring your hand up to your thigh if you feel supported to do so. And now begin to lengthen through the whole front of the spine, up through the skin of the belly. Right arm can rise if that feels nourishing. And then the whole front of the spine is lengthening up and back. Start to release. Bring both hands down and press back to downward facing dog. Lower your knees down if you're using a blanket, move it to the side. And we'll start to transition all the way down onto our bellies. Rise into a low cobra. From this low cobra begin to extend your arms back behind you and lift up through your legs. And now use that length that we just found through the front of the legs to move back. Can you move back through the lower, middle, and upper quads? And then again lengthen up through the whole front of the spine. Press up through the palms. Palms will face up towards the ceiling for this variation. Couple more breaths. Again, being in your experience and whatever is arising for you. And slowly release down and rest for a moment with your forehead on your hands.

Or you can turn your head side to side. Let's come back into Shalabhasana. Letting the arms come back, chest lifts, legs lift. This time you have an option to bend your knees, reach back and hold onto your ankles and then we'll rise up through the heels and through the crown of our head. Again lengthening back through the lower, the middle, and the upper quads. And slowly lower down, again resting on your belly. Bring your hands underneath your shoulders. Press back to a child's pose. Think of this like a breathing spot. Softening to feel the touch of the ground. Let your belly move when you breathe. Feel your back body. And gently roll all the way up to your seat. And come onto your seat and let your legs open up so you're wide, making the shape of like a letter V. The knees are bent. And we'll bring our hands together just to hold so they're not touching the floor. Let's inhale here. Get long through the spine and on an exhale turn both knees to the right. Inhale, breath, come back up, knees up. And again hands aren't on the floor. Exhale, knees to the left. Inhale, breath, knees up. And exhale, knees to the right. Inhale, knees up. And exhale, knees to the left. This time we'll inhale, let the knees rise. Exhale, send the knees to the right and then pause here. Lift your whole left leg off the floor. You'll shift more weight to your right hip. You'll probably really feel into your side body here. And now again without your hands helping, you'll start to send your left leg around, externally rotate the left leg and maybe bring the left shin on top of the right shin. Now that may not have made it. And so feel free to bring your left shin in front of your right shin. And again we're trying to do this without moving our leg with our hands. From here, bring your hands back behind you and start to widen your upper chest. Lift up through the top of your sternum. You are welcome to stay here. You can always find more support by sitting up on a blanket. And if it's available, you can start to tip your hips, walk your hands forward out in front of you. Might even feel nourishing to bring your forearms down. But remind yourself that this is a self-care practice. So be kind, be gentle, let your practice be nourishing and curious. Again breathe in such a way that there's movement in the low belly, movement in the pelvis and a feeling of moving in and out of the shape.

If we move right into our edge, it can oftentimes feel like there's a hardness. So come back away from your edge so that there's movement. Press down into your hands to slowly walk yourself back up. And then again we'll reverse it. So hands come together so they're not on the floor. We'll see if we can lift the left leg, send it back and then again inhale, knees up and exhale, knees to the left. Lift your right leg off the floor and slowly rotate your right leg all the way around. Guide it into external rotation and then maybe the shins can stack or the right shin goes in front of the left. Bring your hands back behind you, root down through your finger pads, rise up through the upper chest, widen the upper chest. Feel free to stay here, feel free to sit up on a blanket if you need more support. And if it would be nourishing then you're going to tip your hips, bring your hands forward out in front of you and maybe come down a little bit more again finding that sweet spot where there's movement, finding the energy of curiosity that lets us move closer to our experience. Looking for the heat and the discipline to stay with our experience and slowly press into your hands, come all the way back up, shift your weight back so you can again lift your right leg up, send it back, lift your knees up. Again experimenting without using your hands can you guide your legs to Baddha Konasana. So right foot in, left foot in, soles of the feet come together. Notice if that's new for you if you usually use your hands to move your legs. It's a really good practice for cultivating strength and flexibility. Again we'll bring our hands back, start to widen the upper chest, lift the sternum and again you're welcome to stay here or feel free to fold forward. We're here for just a few breaths. If you have folded forward slowly begin to come back up and this time we'll bring our hands to our outer knees and bring the legs together. Extend your legs forward out in front of you and imagine that there is glue on your heels, gluing your heels to the floor and now from the ankle joint you'll just find a gentle flexion point to the to the feet and when this happens you'll start to feel, especially if you don't bend your knees, a little rocking that moves up through your pelvis and up through your spine and you'll get this little yes like movement in your head. And now let's experiment with that laying down. So start to lay down on your back and again imagine that there's glue on your heels so they're not sliding on the floor. Your knees stay long, they're not bending and then flexing and pointing the feet from the ankle joint to allow this rock to move through your whole body. This heel rock reminds us that we are one whole body, everything's in communication, everything is in dialogue. So from the movement of the ankle joint we get movement through the whole body. Find a nice big inhale here and exhale let that go. Hug your knees into your chest, send your legs over to the right for a supine twist, meeting with the support of the ground, support of gravity. Letting the whole spine spiral bring your knees back up and send your legs to the other side. Again feeling the ground and softening, letting breath move, following the movement through your whole body. Now when you're feeling balanced come back to center, hug your knees into your chest begin to prepare your body here for Shavasana. Coming into your Shavasana, Shavasana translates as corpse pose. So here we're deeply practicing a letting go of everything that we think we know so that we can be right here in present time with what is right here in our body, in conversation with everything that is around us. In this moment can we let go of having to do anything or having to go anywhere. We don't have to track anything and probably the most significant is that we don't even have to be anyone. What is it like not having to know, rather melt into the freshness of present time. And we'll be here together for a few minutes.

So. Thank you. Thank you. Being in the freshness of your present time experience, widen to be here in the body and also very much here in the space that you're in. Listening for sounds with your whole body.

Begin to explore some movements, waking up to be here in the space. When you feel ready, transition to your side. With the help of your hands, come all the way up to your seat. And we're going to sit together for a little while, so grab something to sit on so that you're comfortable here. Stay with your sensation and with whatever arises for you.

And begin to create a pause or space between sensation and your reaction to it. So if you feel an itch, can you stay with the itch before scratching it? Or if you feel the need to adjust, can you stay a little bit longer in the sensation before adjusting? And there is a heat or a discipline in being able to pause in our full experience with whatever is arising. Without having to change your breath, let your attention rest on your breath.

How can we be with what is here without needing it to be different? Can we be with our breath exactly as it is? When we create pause or create space between sensation and action, our action becomes less reactive and more responsive. We have choice. We're here, sitting down right in the center of our life.

Stay with your body. Be curious about moments that feel like you step outside of your body. Moments that feel like you step out of your experience and be curious about the process of coming back into the body, into sensation. Stay with your body. Stay with your body.

Arriving more fully for what is here right now. Your breathing body. If your eyes are closed, gently open them and experiment with being very much here in your body and very much here in the space that you're in. Again, opening up wide to be inclusive of your experience. Let yourself look around. Can you see what's here without leaving your body?

This week I'd like you to notice places that feel urgent or areas that feel a little bit more reactive and practice pause. I know for myself that shows up a lot with my relationship with my phone, where I'll sometimes just, it's all of a sudden in my hand and I don't even know how it got there. And so I've been practicing like when I feel that urge to do something, I just can I pause in the experience that is arising. Sometimes it shows up for people around sugar. I'm sure there's multiple ways that it's showing up in all of our lives. So just take a moment and reflect on that.

And then can you sit with whatever's arising for five minutes and notice what's happening to the sensation in the body and also notice what happens. How does the action change after you sat with the sensation for a few minutes? OK, so try that. Let me know how it goes. And then for a writing prompt for you for this week, take a moment and consider something that you're not looking at and then write about why you're not looking at it. And things that can show up for me is like different relationships I'm in or my relationship to money or in my where I live, there's a lot of homelessness. So just like areas that I'm not paying attention to and I'm just going to look don't have to do anything.

I'm just going to look and notice the sensations that arise and give that a try and let me know how that goes. OK, so this is heat. This is discipline. And there is a heat that arises from staying with our experience. Let's bring our hands out wide, stretching out through our hands and slowly begin to bring your hands together. Notice the shifting sensation between the hands, the shifting sensation at the skin and underneath the skin as the hands come closer and closer and closer. And eventually the hands will touch. And when they do feel them touch and follow that touch all the way back to your heart.

So much gratitude for our time together. Thank you.