Hips and Glutes

Hi, welcome back to the mat, thank you for joining me today. Today we're going to work on hips, front and back of the hip. So make sure that you've got your two blocks ready and you may need a blanket today just to support the knees, you might want to keep it handy as well. We're going to close our eyes for a moment and connect with our breath and we're going to practice Ujjayi breath, the victorious breath today. So go ahead and close the eyes, enjoy the rise and fall of your breath.

Have a couple of normal breaths just to check in and clear your mind with each inhalation. Let go of resistance and tension with each exhalation. The breath is so wonderful to help us really anchor into the present moment to use this opportunity to really clear and start your practice off by being present. Now start breathing in and out through the mouth so we can feel the constriction of the back of the throat. So as you inhale and exhale it's almost like you're making the sound of the ocean constricting the back of the throat, almost like you're blowing on glass, you're blowing on glass and trying to fog it up.

See if you can hear the sound. Keep the same qualities but just close the mouth as you continue inhaling, pausing and exhaling. Inhaling out all four parts of the breath, inhale, pause, exhale, pause. Give yourself three more rounds. Good, so you can tap into this breath at any time you'd like today.

You can try to keep it moving throughout the practice but during some of the quicker parts of our practice we're going to use this breath to see if it can sustain us and help us lengthen out the breath during some more challenging postures. Go to move your blanket out of the way. We're going to lie on the back and once you get onto your back with your knees bent, go ahead and keep the knees bent and we're going to circle the knees, drawing them into the chest and circling them away. As you exhale draw the knees into the chest and as you inhale circle them away and you feel this nice release, this massaging action on the outer glute, the back of the hip. You're drawing the knees into the chest as you exhale, circling the knees away from the chest as you inhale.

The slower, the wider, the fuller the circle. The more you'll feel between the connection of the torso and the limbs and this is an area where a lot of us get blocked. We have challenges in the lower back of the hips and these circles can be so nice to release before we start. Go ahead and switch to the direction, keep choreographing the movements with the breath, inhaling the knees into the chest, inhaling the knees away, exhaling them in, inhaling them away. Give yourself one more round in this direction and then we're going to keep the knees bent but bring the bottoms of the feet together for bada konasana and then we're going to add a little bit of core work here.

Inhale the arms over the head, really simple movements, cat and cow tilts of the spine. As you exhale, release the arms by the side and then engage your core, draw the navel to the spine, press the lower back to the floor. As you inhale, reach the arms over the head, you'll feel the lower back lifting off of the floor and as you exhale, engage the core. Stay with these for the next seven, eight rounds or pulse and add a little core work. As you exhale, bring your palms reaching for your toes, head looking straight up, lift the head and shoulders off the floor and as you inhale, send it back.

Exhale, reach for your toes, look straight up so you're not crunching the neck, you're disengaging the core. Inhale, send it back. Exhale it forward, inhale, send it back. Five more, keep pulsing with me, keep following your breath. Last four, reaching with the inhale, contracting with the exhale, looking straight up so you're not contracting the muscles in the neck and it's all localized in the core muscles.

Last two, and last one, good. As you reach your arms over the head, keep the right leg where it is, straighten the left leg so you're creating a nice reclining tree pose. We'll take our side stretch to the left, left hand grabs the right wrist, real nice breath into the right side body, feeling the side body with a full deep inhale. Keep the left foot engaged and active like you're standing on your tree leg. Come on back to center with the arms, release the arms, place the right ankle on top of your left knee, draw the left knee into the chest for your reclining figure four.

We're going to try the no hands variation for this one, so keep your palms on the floor. As you exhale, press the heel away from you. As you inhale, sorry, as you exhale, draw the knee into the chest, that feels better with the body and as you exhale, send it away. Exhale it into the chest, inhale, send it away. If this is any tension on the lower back, slide your palms underneath your seat.

We're going to do five more if you'd like to make it a little bit more intense, hands behind the head and draw it in as you move towards your knees. Exhale the knees in, elbows lift off the floor, pulse with the breath. Last two, last one, good. Lower the left leg, slide the right knee on top of the left. As you twist to your left, nice release for the lower back and then we're going to do a little hip opener here, so come on back with your knees and then keep that right knee nice and wide, open the hip and then as you take your twist to the left again, let the right knee drop towards your right ankle, opening up the front of the hip.

So you get a nice hip opener and you can add the side stretch here, excellent. Go ahead and draw the knees into the chest, give yourself a little rock from side to side and go ahead and extend your right leg and bring the left leg into tree pose, left arm over the head, side stretch it to your right and invite the breath to be slower, fuller, deeper into the left side body, really enjoy the breath here. Great as you come back to center, release the arms, no arm figure four, place the left ankle on top of the right knee, draw the right knee into the chest, inhale the right leg away from the chest, draw the right knee into the chest as you exhale, inhale the knee away. Same opportunity, we got five more maybe add the elbows if you did that on the other side. Use that pulse, draw the navel to the spine and try to keep the drishti or the focus looking up so that you can focus more on the lower and mid abdominals.

Last three, I lost count but it's better to do extra than not enough, right? Last two, the last one, lower the right leg to the floor, slide the left knee on top of the right, cross the legs, let the knees drop over to your right for that nice spinal twist releasing the lower back. Nice big inhales and really surrender and soften with each exhale, great. One more round of breath, nice big inhale, surrender and soften with the exhale. As you journey back to center, go back to your figure four with the left leg, keep the left leg moving away from the body, drop the right knee over to the right and imagine the left knee dropping towards the left heel, the ankle, opening the hip and then moving into the side stretch.

Come on back to center, give yourself a little hug, draw the knees into the chest, cross the ankles, we'll play with a little rock and roll forward and backward. After a couple of nice massages along the spine, rock up to your seat and then we can swing the legs around right into table pose, palms underneath the shoulders, knees underneath the hips. So from our table pose, we're going to take a different variation of our cat and cow tilts here. Where your palms are, replace them with your forearms. Our cat and cows with the forearms on the floor, round the spine as you tuck the chin towards the chest, pull the belly up, cat tilt the spine as you inhale, look forward, move the heart forward, let the belly move, drop towards the floor.

Inhale round, push forward and down into your forearms, draw the navel up and back, inhale, look forward, lengthen the heart, roll the shoulder blades back. Give yourself one more round, inhale, take the dirty forward, great. Keep the forearms where they are, walk your feet back till you're in forearm, plank and then from forearm plank, slide your right hand close to your left elbow, swing your hips over to the right, easy forearm plank, step the left foot behind for your kickstand. So right arm is across, left leg is bent behind. Bring the left hand just inside of the left thigh.

As you inhale, reach the left arm over the head, reach for the front of your mat. As you exhale, lower the hips but try not to touch the floor with your hips. Inhale rise, a little bit higher, exhale lower. Give yourself two more, see if you can lift up a little bit higher and really stretch the left side body, push down with the right forearm, last one. All the way up, come on back to your forearm plank, lower down, bring your left leg into tree again, either below the knee or above the knee and we're going to try tree in our forearm plank, tuck your toes under, lift your hips.

If you get bored here, never get bored in your practice, if you get bored, walk your fingertips forward or lift the right arm off the floor for a little strength work. Two more breaths, one more, lower down. Sphinx pose, draw the shoulder blades back, move the heart forward, release muscles in the front body so you're stretching the core after the core work, roll the shoulder blades down and back. Keep the left hand across, tuck your toes under, set up for your forearm plank, pivot your heels to the left, step the right foot behind, bend the right leg, right hand inside of the right thigh, inhale up and over, push into your toes, really reach and stretch the side body, exhale lower down, keep your hip off the floor, reach for the toes, inhale it up and over, a little bit higher, press down into your forearm, lower back down, you got two more, lift, extend, big breath, exhale, slide it back down. Last one, lift, rise, spiral those hips back, forearm plank, lower it down.

The right leg's gonna move into tree this time, below or above the knee, guide your heart forward, tuck your toes under, tree forearm plank, stay right here engaging the core or walk the left fingertips forward or lift them off the floor, for three, keep the right knee lifted, for two, for one, lower down, straighten the right leg, replace your elbows with your palms and start to move into a low cobra with the inhale, pulse back down with the exhale, engage the thighs, press down tops of the feet, lengthen the heart forward as you inhale, rise, exhale, pulse it back, one more round, lift, press back to your table, walk the hands of palm print forward, tuck your toes under and move into that first down dog, pedaling out the legs, one at a time. If you want to return to that Ujjayi breath, find it in the back of the throat. Bend both knees, press the chest towards the thighs, look towards the thumbs so your couch tilting the spine and then draw the shoulders forward, cat tilt to your plank. Bend the knees, cow tilt the spine, exhale round the spine, cat tilt, one more round of breath, inhale, cow tilt, good, exhale, cat tilt, come on down with your knees, lengthen forward with your heart, bend the elbows and see where you can pause and hold. This might be your chaturanga or shoulders the same height as your elbows might be your chaturanga or lift the knees off the floor, two more breaths, one more, lower all the way down.

Back to your cobra or maybe moving a little higher to the up dog. Knees as wide as the mat, big toes together, press back for child's pose, reconnect with the breath. Let's go ahead and come on back to our down dog, tuck your toes under, take it for a little hip flow here, inhale the right leg to the sky, bend the knee, keep the down dog, don't move the shoulders forward and as you bend the knee, keep the knee bent and just start to circle the knee away from you as far up and back as it will go and then back into you. So you're making a half circle with your right knee, exploring your range of motion. Try to keep the down dog really active, don't move the shoulders forward, isolate the hip.

The next time you bend the knee and open the hip, pause and reach back in the direction your toes are pointing and straighten the right leg, perfect. That's your point A, point B, fire hydrant pose, right leg out as far to the right as it will go. Press back to point A, two more pulses right here. Last one, stay with the right leg out to the right, fire hydrant pose variation and then walk your left hand out to the left, three o'clock with the right leg, nine o'clock with the left arm. We lift the left arm for two, one, replace the left hand.

Take a big inhale, step the right foot to the front of the mat, lower the left knee to the floor, swing the left toes around behind you and then turn and face the long side of your mat with your shoulders. Bring the palms right into prayer with a low parsvakonasana, draw the elbow right inside of the right thigh. Before you twist, lengthen the spine and then press the left palm into the right. Inhale lengthen, exhale rotate, get a nice hip opener as you open the side body, if you'd like you can split the palms. We're coming up for a little warrior two.

This is little Wade in a little warrior two. Your little person in a little warrior two, enjoy this little low pose, really grounded, really easy in this opportunity and then bring your left hand to your left IT band, flip your palm for a little peaceful wear. As you sink into that right thigh, hang out right here or if it feels nice, bring your fingertips to the floor and then re-engage, draw that right leg forward and really open up through the side body. Good, come on back to center, windmill the leg around and the palms inside for your lizard pose. You might have to walk the right foot off to the mat, stay here or bring your elbows to the floor.

Opening up the back hip, going deeper if you want to, threading the arms under and through. Good, replace your palms. Right leg to the sky, bend the knee, open the hip, shake it out. Good, take a vinyasa, move to plank pose. Always the opportunity of lowering the knees to the floor, cobra, sphinx, up dog, listen to where your back bend needs to be right now in your practice.

Send it back to your down dog. Back leg to the sky, bend the knee, draw the knee into the chest, keep the down dog and circle the knee away from you, isolating the hip circles, keeping down dog without moving the shoulders forward. Explore your range of motion through the hips. Last one, open the hip, draw the left toes back and then in the direction of the left toes, start to straighten the leg, open up the front of your left hip and then draw the left leg forward, variation of fire hydrant pose, extend the left leg back, pulse with the breath, engage that ujjaya breathing anytime you'd like to or try to keep it steady. Send that left leg back, last time, keep it forward, draw the hips forward, keep the foot as far off the floor as possible, walk your right hand out to the right, keep it on the floor or lift it off, three, two, one, wonderful.

Draw the knee into the chest, step the foot forward, lower the right knee, swinging the right toes right around behind you, lining up your left heel and your right knee, palms into prayer, bring the elbow inside, lengthen the spine and press down with the right hand. Nice side angle posture, lengthening and rotating. If you'd like to split the palms, take it a little deeper. One more round of breath, back to our little warrior, sink into it and then our peaceful warrior, right hand to the IT band, left palm to the sky. If you want to go deeper, fingertips to the floor and then sink into that left knee.

Windmill the hands inside of the left leg, swing the right toes around, you might have to heel toe the foot off the mat or out towards the edge of the mat to come down for a deeper expression of your lizard pose. Toes can be on the block or the floor, keep hugging your left knee towards the midline and find the spot where you feel, wherever that is for you and keep going back, returning to the breath. Great, walk the hands back, tuck the right toes under, release the right knee, left leg to the sky, shake it out, open up the hip, move it around, move forward to your plank pose, lower all the way down. Guide your heart forward, we're going to play with fingertip cobra pose, so really slide your ribs and your heart forward, stretch the front body and then actively press down with the tops of your feet, come up to the fingertips just outside of the rib cage, exhale, release the breath and inhale, lift up, exhale, inhale, lift up. Keep pulsing with the fingertips or release the hands and hover them, last two, last one, bring the palms to the floor, rise up to your version of the back bend, sphinx, cobra or up dog, press back to your child's pose, knees as wide as the mat or a little wider than the hips, draw the chest back.

So from our child's pose we're going to look forward, slide forward by bending the elbows out to ten and two o'clock, exhaling forward and as we inhale we'll hug the elbows in and lift up to our version of the back bend, exhale back to your down dog, we're going to do some workups so this is a great time to reconnect with your ujjayi breath, inhale the right leg to the sky, exhale, step the right foot forward to warrior two, line up your heels, windmill the palms up, line up the shoulders right over the hips, draw the right knee towards second and third toe, lift your right heel off the floor, pulse into that front quad, keep pulsing, knee moving over the ankle, one more round, sink into that right heel, reach back with the left hand, strong warrior two, take a big inhale, windmill the palms down, vinyasa, right leg to the sky, lengthen forward to plank, lower down knees option, cobra up dog, exhale press back to your down dog, same leg right leg to the sky, back to the ujjayi breath if you lost it, exhale step the right foot to the front of the mat, windmill back up to warrior two, guide the hips so they're in line with the shoulders and the long edge of your mat, you may need your block on this one, we're going to play with transitions between warrior two and half moon pose, easier if you step the back foot in, reach forward with the right fingertips about a foot beyond the toes and then shift your weight forward, lift your left leg the height of your right hip, inhale the left palm to the sky, step straight back slowly, inhale, exhale reach, playing with these transitions and trying to smooth out the transitions, slowly step it back, you got two more, practice makes perfect right? Step it forward, open the hip, keep the left leg active, step it back, last one, step into it and hold, draw your right rib cage forward, your left rib cage back, keep the left leg active, inhale the left palm to the sky, drishti straight down is much easier than taking the drishti up, step back to your warrior two, windmill the hands inside of the right leg, keep the right leg where it is pointing straight forward and take a nice slow arc to your left, straighten the right leg, walk the hands a little bit more towards your left and re-bend the right leg, straighten the right leg, walk to the left, maybe it's just a quarter of an inch, maybe it's a little bit more, re-bend the right knee straight over the second third toe, last one, nice side stretching lizard variation here, now when you straighten the right leg you can turn the right toes to join the left, basurita palms underneath the shoulders, turn the toes out slightly and we'll play with our crouching tigers moving from side to side, the lower the hips are the more you'll feel, you can pull the toes off of the floor of the straight leg foot, try to keep anchoring the heel down on the bent leg, two more rounds whether you're using the hands or not using the hands, last round finishing off with the right leg, basurita forward fold, lengthening the spine, softly folding, don't forget about your breath, lengthen the spine, bring your hands to your hips, rise all the way up, turn your toes out and your heels in, straighten the legs, extend the arms for star pose, index middle index and thumb touching and then as you exhale bend your knees over your ankles, bend your elbows, variation of goddess pose, inhale straighten, lift, exhale sink a little bit deeper, pulse with your breath, last two, the last one we're going to see what it feels like to lift our heels off of the floor and go deeper into the quads, yeah, one more round of breath, lower the heels to the floor, just in time, straighten the legs, slide the right arm under the left, eagle the arms and take your palms to the left, let your right ear drop to the right, come back to center with the palms, as you lift the elbows to the sky bend your knees slowly, imagine your tailbone is going straight down, draw the navel up and back, rise up slowly, turn your toes forward, flip your left palm to the sky, bow, see how close you can get the left palm to the floor, if the palm touches the floor just keep walking it back and then if you want to feel more, lengthen the crown of the head forward so you get a nice stretch on that left shoulder, one more round of breath and then go ahead and release the arms, palms are right underneath your shoulders, lengthen the spine, this is where you have the opportunity for a headstand if you'd like, tripod headstand or you can move into a passerita forward fold and interlace your hands behind the back, if you're doing your tripod headstand you might want to walk your feet in and bend the knees if that's how you get into it, if you can get into it from passerita, the head touches the floor and then your hands creating a little tripod so they have to be quite far behind you, squeeze the elbows in, push down and then press down, lift your hips, if you'd like to play with the baddha konasana variation you can always bring the bottoms of the feet together, keeping our hip theme, keep breathing wherever you are, connect with the rise and fall of your breath, for those of you that are in passerita we're coming down to meet you right now so we'll lower back down, splitting the legs, engaging the core, touching down, palms underneath the shoulders, inhale the left palm to the sky, thread it under across and through, grab onto the right leg wherever you can grab it, calf, ankle, side of the foot, inhale the right arm to the sky, drape it around the waist, now if you feel enough resistance right here draw the left ribcage towards the right thigh, stay there or bend your left knee towards second and third toe and start to draw the ribs towards the thighs, just to give a little bit more resistance, side body stretch and hamstring stretch, great we're going to pivot both feet to the right a quarter turn, left palm to the floor, right hand to the sky, spinal twist and then go ahead and lower the right hand down, lower the left knee down we're going into our little hip opener before pigeon, heel to your right foot off the mat and then keep the palms right underneath the shoulders and just let your hips rock from side to side, release the back leg a little bit and the outer right hip as you rock from side to side, if you're setting up for a pigeon and you normally use blocks now is a great time to get your block handy, we're going to walk the right foot across the mat over to the left, lining up the right heel with the outer left knee, it doesn't matter how close the heel is towards the left quad, just so that the knees safe, if you're using a block put it under your right glute and then on our pigeon there's a tendency to lean to the right, so see if you can lean to the midline and internally rotate your back leg, lift the heart and as you exhale fold just a little bit into your pigeon, see if you can take the cat tilt out of the spine and keep moving forward with your cow tilt, move slowly with the breath, lengthen with each inhale and soften with each exhale, we hold a lot of tension in our hips, that connection between the upper body and the lower body, sometimes purposefully contracting your right glute and releasing it helps you release some muscles you're not even aware that you're unconditionally gripping or contracting. If you need to feel more lean to your left just a little bit we're going to be here for another five breaths, try to surrender into the pigeon, go back to the focus and the rise and fall of the breath, maybe go back to the ujjayi, relax the muscles of the face and the jaw, walk your hands back, right leg to the sky, so tuck the left toes under, release the left knee, inhale the right leg to the sky, open the hip, shake it out, move it around, if you want to celebrate being done with side one flip your dog, step the right foot behind the left, open it up, come back to plank, lower all the way down, cobra up dog, back to your child's pose, give yourself a moment to reconnect with your breath, take your disti forward towards your thumbs, bend the elbows, slide forward, exhaling, inhaling to cobra or up dog, exhale back to your down dog, inhale the left leg to the sky, bend the knee, open the hip, exhale step the left foot to the front of your mat, warrior two, pivot your right heel, line up the heels, windmill the palms up, check that your back hip is not too high, lower it to meet the front hip, reach the arms out, same height as the shoulders, drishti over your left thumb, and then we're going to play with those pulses, lift your heel off the floor, pulse forward and back, really ground and root yourself into the back foot as you pulse, try to keep reaching back with the right hand so you don't lean forward with the left, keep sinking into it, keep pulsing, where's the breath, go back to the jujai breath, last one, lower the left heel down, be in the warrior two, two more breaths, windmill the palms to the floor, left leg to the sky, lengthen forward to plank, vinyasa, lower down, cobra or up dog, press back to your down dog, same leg, inhale the left leg to the sky, bend the knee, open the hip, step the left foot to the front of the mat, right back to warrior two, home base, warrior two, take your drishti forward, you might need your block in front of you, step your back foot in, reach forward with the left fingertips just outside or along the pinky toe side of the foot, and then step, lift the right heel, the height of your right hip, inhale the right palm to the sky, bend your left leg and step right back, focusing on the transitions between warrior two and half moon pose, trying to smooth out the transitions, keep your focus on that one spot, helping you with your balance, rise up with your inhale, reach, step, slow things down, notice where you're weak in your transitions and slow that area down so you can help really build the muscles, the supporting muscles for your balance, are you ready? Let's stay in half moon pose, reach forward, lift your right heel, try to get at the height of your hip, spiral your left ribcage forward and your right ribcage back, keep the right leg active, drishti is down, much easier for the balance, or you can slowly track it up to the right hand, step back to your warrior two, windmill your palms inside of the left leg and start your slow journey to the right, a nice arc to the right, a foot or two to the right, pause, keeping your hands on the floor, slowly straighten the left leg, re-bend the left leg, sink into it a little bit deeper and straighten the left leg, if you can go deeper while the leg is straight, walk your hands over to the right a little bit more, re-bend the left leg, more resistance and then last time, straighten the left leg, if you've got any more space to walk to your right, pause there and then bend that left knee right over second and third toe and feel that side stretch, wonderful, from here go ahead and pivot your left foot to join the right, walk your hands so that they're right underneath the shoulders, lengthen the spine, turn your toes out so that we can move right into our crouching tigers here, shifting your weight to the right, bending the right leg, shifting your weight to the left, bending the left leg, maybe lifting the toes of the straight foot off the straight leg off of the floor, maybe using the hands to keep you upright or maybe playing with some versions without the hands. Keep the seat low so that you feel more, great, come on back to your pasarita, lengthen the spine, forward fold, if you're starting to get a little deeper, you can walk your hands through reconnecting with your breath, bring your hands to your hips, rise all the way up, turn your toes out and your heels in and we're going to open the hips one more time, bring the index and thumb together, straighten the legs, reach the palms to the sky, variation of star pose and then exhale, bend the elbows, bend the knees, drop into it, inhale, reach up, straighten the legs, squeeze the inner thighs together, exhale, bend into it, three more pulses with a breath, each time you reach up, lift your heart, connect with a breath and each time you exhale see if you can go just a little bit deeper, last two, last one we're going to try this on the tippy toes, so drop into the pose first then lift your heels off the floor, see if you can drop into the hips a little bit more, two more rounds of breath, you should feel those legs firing up, one more round of breath, lower the heels, rise all the way up, straighten the arms, slide your left arm underneath the right and we'll take the right palm, drop it to the right and let the left ear drop to the left, we're going to take eagle arms into our goddess pose, bring the palms back to center and as you drop lift your elbows to the sky, two more rounds of breath, one more and then slowly rise up, pivot your toes forward so the heels and toes are in the same line, short side of your mat, flip your palm, your right palm to the sky, lengthen the spine, forward fold, passerita with your eagle arms, if you want to feel more walk the hands back and if you still want to get more into the shoulder keep the hand back and lean the crown of the head forward so you get that nice stretch on the right shoulder, great guys, release your arms, palms underneath the shoulders, lift the sternum and chest, we're going to take passerita c, bend your knees, let the forehead drop towards the floor, let the crown of the head drop towards the floor, interlace your hands behind the back and before you straighten the legs just pulse the wrist over the shoulders, see if you can find a little space here, moving the wrist up and back, giving yourself a little pulse, trying to find a new set point each time you move deeper into the posture, when you find that spot for the shoulders keep them there then you can start to straighten the legs a little bit deeper, back to the breath if you lost connection with it, really nice, release your palms to the floor right underneath your shoulders, lengthen the spine flat back, left hand stays right hand to the sky, big stretch, inhale the right arm up, exhale thread under, crossing through, grab onto the left leg wherever you're able to reach, hold on to it, left arm to the sky, keep it up or drape it around your waist, guide your right ribcage towards your left thigh, stay here if you need to feel more resistance, bend your right leg, bend right knee towards second and third toe, you'll feel that wonderful side body stretch and a little bit more depth in your hamstring on the left side, excellent, spin your toes a quarter turn to the left, right hand to the floor, left palm to the sky, twist it out, lengthen the spine, spiral your right bicep forward, push back into your right heel and then lower the left hand down inside of the left leg, we're down, lower the right knee to the floor, heel to your left foot off the mat to the left and then palms underneath the shoulders, just give yourself a little rock from side to side, releasing the left outer hip and opening the front of the right hip, two more rounds, pulse with your breath, good, going back to center, we'll set up for pigeon pose, heel to your left foot across the mat, remember each leg is different if you need to make different modifications with the left, make sure to do that, block underneath your left hip or lie on the back, take figure four, left heel lines up with the right knee and then when you find your posture, when you find your seat here, lift the sternum, lift the chest, see if you can resist the lean to the left and start to draw towards the midline and then lengthen forward from here, if possible keeping the cow tilt of the spine, the extension of the spine instead of rounding the spine, keep lengthening forward with each inhalation and then you can soften a little bit deeper into each exhale, maybe moving your palms forward if that feels good for your body.

Just relax into wherever you're at here for another couple more breaths, contracting the left glute and quad and releasing to let go of some tension, maybe shifting the weight to the right a little bit more if you need to feel more, we're guiding your ribs forward, great release the jaw on your next exhale, nice big inhale, walk your palms back, we're going to come back to this pose in just a second but we're going to flip our dog first so tuck the toes under, send your left leg to the sky, bend the knee, open the hip, right leg can be straight or bent, celebrate, every chance you get, celebrate, step right back to your pigeon and we're going to swing the right leg around for double pigeon, so if double pigeon is a little challenging for your body, you've got a couple of options, you can put a block underneath the most weight-bearing knee, the left leg and just focus on opening the right hip with the right foot flexed, if this is intense for you then just work on the left leg, left ankle on top of the right knee and keep walking the chest towards the thigh, okay, so finding our double pigeon whatever is right for our body, left leg is on the bottom or figure four with the left ankle on top of the right knee, stacking up your little fire logs, one on top of each other, trying to keep the feet flexed and let me turn towards you here so that you can see some of the options and the variations that we could do from here, block underneath the knee or you can bring the hands behind you and start to press the knee down, this second variation is really nice to open up the hip flexors, keep pressing the knee down and then lift your seat all off the floor and then come on back, you can take your last couple of breaths either here or forward folding, if you are in figure four with a left leg on top, we'll just go ahead and switch legs, if you are in double pigeon we'll do our little magic trick switch, let your right foot drop to the floor, bring your hands behind you, keep the toes and feet where they are, even after doing this for 20 plus years it's still fun for me, got to keep our practice fun right so that we keep coming back to our mat, we're doing the right leg on the bottom, left ankle on top setting up our fire logs, you can have the block underneath the right knee, you might put the hands behind you to lift the chest as you invite the knees down or you can open the front of the hip by lifting the seat off the floor and then for your last couple of breaths maybe walking the hands forward, great, slowly rise up moving into upavistha konasana straightening the left leg, taking it out to the side and straightening the right leg, this posture is a great spot for putting a block underneath your seat or a blanket underneath your seat especially if it's hard for you to keep a tall spine, so move your cushion out of the way and see if you have a tall spine before you forward fold, if not grab the block or the blanket, keep the legs active and flexed and just like we did before we're just going to spider crawl the fingertips forward trying to keep the spine elongated and extending instead of rounding, so find that spot where you can keep moving forward with an extended spine and if you can't go any farther with the extended spine then stop there and then you can move into your fold, but keep going as far forward as you can extending the spine and tap into your breath, find the spot where you can breathe into it and hang out into the posture, wonderful, two more rounds of breath, one more and then come on up, so I'm giving you two options, one is just a nice release in malasana with a block either by you or under you for your seat, so our malasana pose really nice opener for the hip but also a nice stretch for the quads from those standing postures, you can put the block underneath you, this could be your spot to stay right here, if you feel like flying and you want to join me in titivasana put one block behind each leg starting in malasana, your hands have to be facing forward so I like to put my hand behind my calf and push forward to snuggle my shoulder under and then place the block on my hand, notice that my fingertips are facing forward and I just take this malasana sitting on my shoulders, the elbows are hugging in and I'm moving my ribs forward, stay right here or start to walk your toes towards each other maybe lifting them off the floor and crossing them, once you get those legs crossed this is a great spot to stay, if you feel like letting those legs fly titivasana let the legs go back out to that same variation you were doing in upavistha canasana and lift, fly, fly, good, that's a good one to practice with some cushions underneath your bum go ahead and lower back down, move your blocks to the side and we're going to take a little recline on the back, so go ahead and swing your legs around, lower onto your back, good, take a little twist to release, so feet as wide as your mat, some soft wind chill wipers, the next time your knees drop to the right place the right angle on top of the left thigh, we did a lot of hip opening so we're going to close the hip up just a little bit, internally rotate it, take the IT band stretch here, return to your breath, great, then go ahead and walk your left foot back to the center of the mat, use our muscles of adduction we did a lot of opening, we'll close things up a little bit, cross the right leg on top of the left or try eagle legs, wrap the right foot around the left ankle and we'll drop our knees slowly over to the left for a nice releasing spinal twist going back to the breath, we can let go of the ujjayi now and just move into a nice soft relaxed breath that prepares us for our shavasana as we move through our finishing postures, go ahead and release, heel toe your feet as wide as your mat, a couple of wind chill wipers before you drop your knees to the left, and then once you drop the knees to the left place the left ankle on top of the right IT band, walk the right foot off of your mat, internally rotating that right leg, nice release for the outer glute all the way down the IT band and then we'll go ahead and heel toe the right foot to the center of the mat, this time sliding the left leg on top, really squeezing the inner thighs towards each other and then if possible slide the left toes around the right ankle and we'll shift the hips to the right, drop the knees to the right for a nice spinal twist, extending the left arm, really enjoying the exhales, softening, great, go ahead and unwind the legs and we'll just finish with a nice rolling back massaging bridge pose, so as you inhale reach the arms up and over the head, lift your hips off the floor and then as you exhale roll down vertebrae by vertebrae, nice and slow engaging the core as you lower down, let's try one more of those preparing for our shavasana, nice big inhale enjoying the breath and then really dropping one vertebrae at a time as we lower down, if there's any last little movements that your body needs before you stretch out to shavasana, honor that, otherwise extend the legs, let the toes turn out, shoulder blades squeeze towards each other, palms up, relax the muscles of the face and the jaw, see if you can let go of any working any contracting any effort in your body and thank the body for taking you on the journey today, not only today but every day, we have to remember it's such a blessing to experience embodiment and never take it for granted, let go of any controlling of your breath, let the mind be free from any doing and bringing in a sense of ease and peace, let it go and surrender into your shavasana. Thank you. God bless. Start to bring the breath back a little fuller, a little deeper, followed by any intuitive movements, maybe it's turning the head, maybe it's bringing life back to fingers, toes, or any body part that is helping you bring that life back to the body. Enjoy one more stretch.

Reaching the arms over the head and one more hug, drawing the knees into the chest, wrapping the arms around the knees, rolling to the right for a breath or two in your fetal pose, keeping the eyes closed and neck relaxed to help yourself up to your seat. Turning to that pulse and that energy, maybe feeling the energetic body expanding with each inhale and hugging back to self with each exhale. Let it take you two or three breaths before your eyes are fully open. Thanks for joining me today. Keep sharing and keep connecting. Be the peaceful warrior. Namaste.