Grounding Flow

Hello, everyone. I'd love to share with you a leg and hip practice today. And this is a great practice for if you're feeling ungrounded. So it's a way to really bring some strength and stability and some connection into your feet, some connection to the planet. I also want to mention that this is a chaturanga-less practice. So it's a great practice for you if you want to get moving and you want to get off of your wrists. So in the standing forms that we'll be doing, you might want a yoga brick. If you like that in half moon or revolved half moon, you'll want to grab that. And then I also have a blanket just for some support at the end of the practice. And let's meet at the top of the mat. So grounding down through your feet. If you use an ujjayi breath, bring that in. You might even close your eyes and feel your feet here. Invitation is to deepen the breath if that's accessible and listen to the breath. Beautiful. Let's inhale our arms up. Exhale, fold forwards. Let's inhale our right leg back into a long little lunge. Exhale here. Press down through your feet. Inhale, you can climb onto your knee to a high lunge. Hands on your pelvis. Let's neutralize the pelvis so it's neither tipped forwards nor tucked under. And exhale, drop your right knee almost to the floor. Inhale it back up. Maybe working for straightening that leg. Exhale, lower. Inhale, lift. Last one if you like. Invitation is to lift your arms up. Exhale, lower. Inhale, lift up. Maybe straighten the leg for one more breath. Inhale, reach up. Exhale your hands down to find your downward facing dog. Next inhale, take your right foot forwards. You might exhale there. Either climb up on your knee or come right up to your lunge. Hands on your waist. Find that neutral pelvis. And then exhale, lower your knee almost to the ground. Inhale it back up and maybe straighten out your leg a little bit. Exhale, lower. Inhale, lift. Last one you might take your arms up. And then take a breath, maybe lifting through your thumbs, lifting the back ribs off of your pelvis. Maybe straightening your leg a little bit more. And then let's exhale our hands to the floor. Step forwards into a forward fold. Press your feet down. Inhale, come all the way up. Exhale your hands down. Feel your feet. Inhale your arms up. Push down through your feet. Exhale, fold forwards. Left leg back. Exhale there. Inhale, come up. This time you might have your arms up the whole time. Exhale, lower. Your left knee, inhale, start to straighten that left leg. Exhale, lower. Cubic bone and tailbone shoot down towards the floor. Exhale, lower. Inhale, lift. One more breath here, getting a reach through your lumbar spine. Next exhale takes you into a downward facing dog. Next inhale takes your left foot forwards. Exhale there and inhale, come up. Invitation is to have your arms up the whole pulsing variation. Exhale, lower. Inhale, lift. Lower. Left. Lower. Lift maybe. Reach up through your ribs and start to straighten your back leg any amount. Feel the power in your legs. Hands down. Step your back foot to meet your right, your left foot. And fold. Inhale, come all the way up. Exhale, hands down. Beautiful.

I'm going to turn to you so you can see this. So standing on your left leg, bring your right knee up into your chest. Hold your hips and try not to move your hips too far forwards. So pull them back. Then we'll make some controlled hip circles in our right hip. So knee out to the side. Then roll the knee in. Take it down. Extend the front of the hip. Reach the knee behind you. And then inhale it back in towards your chest. Exhale out to the side. Roll it in. It's like you're kicking a hacky sack with your outer right ankle. Knee down. Extend the front of the hip without moving your low back. And then knee up. One more without thinking about it so much. Breathe with it. Bring the knee into the chest for one breath. Kick out through the leg. Exhale down. Ground your right foot right away. Inhale your left leg up. And then hands on the waist. Take the knee out to the side. Roll it in. It's like you're hacky sacking here. Take the knee down. Extend the front of the hip.

Take the low back staple. Inhale it in. Knee into the chest. Out to the side. Internal rotation. Knees together. Extend the front of the hip. And then one more. Breathe with it without thinking too much. Steady through the pelvis. Hips back in space. Bring the knee up and then kick out through the leg for a breath. Exhale. And from the top of the mat, you might need your block for this. Let's step out to the left side of the mat and turn towards triangle towards the left foot. Adjust your stance. Come up and over your left hip joint. Strong legs. Choose your block or the place where you want your bottom hand. And you might take your right arm up. Take a breath. Look down. Take your right hand by your hip. Sprinkle your left fingertips to the left a little bit or you're holding your block for half moon. Right leg up and maybe right arm up. Let's take a breath there. Right hand to the ground. Turn your gaze to the ground. And then revolve half moon. Take your left hand on your pelvis or reach it up. Maybe look up. Take a breath. Compact your hips to the center there to take your right foot down. Inhale. Come up. We'll come into a revolve triangle. So hips back. Exhale. Maybe a block or your right hand underneath your face or to the outside of the foot. Hand on the pelvis if you like or up into the air. Let's take a breath there. Let's look down. Inhale. Come up. Take your hands forwards. Sweep them back behind you. Either interlock your forearms, your elbows, or you might even take a prayer position up the back if you like. Breathe in. Hips back. Spine forwards. Fold over the left leg. Let's take a breath there. Shift the weight into your front foot.

Come onto a pivot on your back foot. Start to come forwards onto toenails of the back foot and then reach the back leg up. Warrior 3, you're welcome to take your arms out of this position. Let's take a breath. Lift off your bottom hip joint. Back foot slowly finds the floor. Inhale. Come up. Open up to the side. Step to the top of the mat. Let's step out again to the left. Triangle towards your right foot. So come up and over your hip joint. Left arm up. Ground through your feet. Then take a full cycle of breath. Hand down. Look down. Take your fingertips or your block slightly to the right. Half moon. If you want to challenge yourself you can look forwards or up. Energize your legs. Left hand down. Turn your navel down. Hips face the ground. Lift your back leg up and start to twist into a revolved triangle. Right hand on the hip or maybe up. Broaden your collarbones. Squeeze your hips to the center. Then one more breath. Let your back leg come down. Think about revolved triangle in your feet. Inhale. Come up. Exhale. Left hand down. Either underneath your nose or to the outside of the foot. Either hands on the hip or up. And breathe a breath there. Hips and skull move away from each other. Feel your back foot. Ground through the back foot. Inhale. Come up. Reach your hands forwards. Exhale them back. Take the clasp that you prefer or prayer at the back. Inhale. Hips back. Spine forwards. Fold forwards and find a breath. Instead of collapsing on your hips lift off of your hips by pressing your feet down. Turn onto a pivot on your back foot. Weight to your right foot. Come onto toe point and then lift into a warrior three. You're welcome to unhook your arms. Breathe in. Breathe out. Let your back leg come down to find the ground. Open up to the side. Exhale to the top of the mat. Big step out to the left again. Warrior two towards your left leg. Adjust your hip so you don't feel jamming. Arms float out from the shoulders. Breathe in and out. Take your right hand down your right leg or you might float it. And your left arm up and overhead. Breathe in there. Feel your legs supporting your spine. On the next inhale come up and into extended side angle for a breath. Elbow to knee or hand to the outside of the foot if you like. Find that long line. If you'd like to take a breath press your feet down with a little more challenge. Extend your left arm out and roll your bottom lung towards the ceiling. Inhale come up. Now turn onto a pivot on your back foot. Take your right elbow across to find your variation of twisted lunge or twisted side angle. You're also welcome to keep your back foot on an angle but make sure that your hips squeeze into the center. You might open up your arms. And then feel your back foot windmill up.

Step to the top of the mat. Big step out to the left again. Warrior two towards your right leg. Feel your feet. Reverse it here. So you might plant your hand. You might float it. Let's take a breath. Lift out of compressive areas in the spine. Come on up on your inhalation. Exhale. Elbow to knee or hand to the outside of the foot. If you'd like a challenge for a breath, press into your feet strongly and float that bottom arm. Roll your bottom lung towards the ceiling. Inhale come up. Can turn onto a pivot or keep the angle. And exhale come across for your twist. Squeeze the hips to the midline. And press the feet down to lift off of the hip joints. Windmill it up here. Turn to the side. And exhale to the top of the mat. Keep our left foot forwards. Take our right leg back to warrior one. So find your stance. You don't need to aggressively square your hips but more press into your back heel. So you feel that long line. Lift your back ribs up. Maybe hands together. Look up. Take a breath. Hands to heart here. Again, shift onto a pivot on your back foot. Shift the weight into your left foot. Come onto a toe point and prepare for warrior three. So your arms can go forwards for more challenge. They can go back behind you to open the front chest or stay at the sternum. See if you can draw your abdomen in and lift your leg a little higher. Now we're going to clear the floor and come on up to standing. Just going to turn so you can see here. Draw your right knee in towards your chest. Hands on your waist. Let's come back to those controlled hip circles where we're not moving our hips too much. Breathe with it. You know what to do. So just finding those hip circles and squeezing your left hip into the midline. For a little more challenge, you might try this with a longer lever. So with a straight right leg. Yes, it's a lot harder. Breathe with that. And then as you bring your knee into the chest, either grab onto your knee or if you like, take your toe or the outside of your foot and stand nice and tall. Let's take a breath. Try to keep your hips from moving too far forwards. And then you can take your knee or your leg out to the side. Your arm can be a counterbalance. Then let's hover the knee there. See if you can lift it a little bit higher. Draw it in, curl in, take ahold of the top of your ankle. I'm just going to show you this way so you can see a little better. And then kick that ankle back behind you as you take your left hand forwards and any variation of dancer's form you like. Try. If you want a bit more challenge, see if you can let go your hand and maintain the position. Come on up. Ground. Beautiful. So right leg stays grounded. Left leg comes back for warrior one. So instead of aggressively squaring your hips, ground your back foot, lift your back ribs, and maybe take your hands together to look up. Hands to the heart. Beautiful. Shift onto a pivot. Weight your right foot, shift onto a point and lift your back leg up. Choose an arm position, level your hips.

Draw your abdomen slightly back and long and lift your back leg a little bit more, maintaining length in your lower spine. Come on up. Clear the floor and back into those hip circles. So hands can come to the waist. Squeeze the hips in. Knee comes out to the side. Hacky sack. Knees together. Extend the hip. And just find that controlled rotation without too much movement in your right hip. Squeezing your right hip in. If you'd like a little more challenge, get a longer lever. Internally rotate so the inner thigh points down. Extend the hip without moving the low back too much. When you come up, bend through your knee. Either hold your knee or take a hold of your foot and find your uttita hasta. Standing big toe where you have your knee, hips back a bit. And then you can take your leg out to the side. Maybe use a counterbalance here or your knee. If your leg is out to the side, you could try hovering it or bending there. Lifting the leg wherever you have it a little higher. And then exhale. Curl into a little ball here. Curl forwards. Take the top of your ankle. Kick it back. And maybe reach your right arm forwards. Now if you'd like that real big challenge, see if you can let go and sort of keep the shape. Don't worry if you fall out. Just find your feet. Come back in. And then you can slowly come on up. And through your feet. Beautiful. Inhale your arms up. Exhale, fold in. Inhale, elongate. Exhale, find your downward facing dog. You might step or hop. Take a breath there. Then you can come down to your knees or hop through however you do. And I'm going to turn to you to show you this next sequence we'll be doing. You might want a blanket. I'm going to take one and put it underneath your hips as your legs come into a V position out front and your toes are up. So you can do this with your hands behind you to support or to make it more challenging. Don't use your hands. So either way, we'll rock our knees to the left. And then inhale into the center. You could have your hands back and rock them to the right. And you might butt walk a little bit forward here. You might just need to scooch your buttocks back a bit. Let's go sideways. And when you come over to the side, it's okay if your top hip comes off. Let it do that. Okay, let's let our legs fall to the left.

Okay, so your left leg is out in front in a 90 degree. And then let's lean down over that leg. So you can use your hands here and make it more passive if that's what you need today. Or you can do this without your hands and lean in. Let's take a breath there. It's almost like your left hip is curling underneath you for a little added strength work. Okay, let's inhale, come up. Come on to the other side. So using your hands or not. So you fall into the right outer shin and use your hands or not. So come over that. It's kind of like you're letting your sternum bisect the center of your shin. Okay, let's come on up over to the other side. So we're going back to the left side now. And we're going to come back forwards. If you want this to be sweet and soft, use your hands. If you want a little more fire, don't use your hands. Come on forwards and then start to stretch your back leg back out behind you. And you're on the inner part of the leg to start. And you don't you can do that a little or a lot. Breathe in there. Then if you like, you can some of you will want to turn on to the tippy toes and start to turn your knee towards the ground any amount. I know you're in more of a classic supine one legged pigeon variation. And if you really want to challenge you could do this without the use of your hands or use your hands. Maybe let the top of the back foot go. Okay, let's retract to the back leg. So it's back to where it was on the inner knee. Come on up and flop over to the other side. Okay, so now we'll come on in, use your hands or not and maybe start to open up that back leg a little or a lot. And if you've had enough hip strength work, let your hands come down. Now some of you might tuck the back toes under and turn so that the center of the kneecap touches the ground a little bit more and that might be more intense sensation if you're seeking that. And if you really want to challenge you could do this without the use of your hands and really pull that bottom hip towards your back foot or not. Maybe let the back knee in the top of the foot release. One more breath. Okay, we'll come on up, retract that back leg, come up and over. So one more time if you come off your support, scoot back on sweat over to the left. Now this time you can use your hands or not. And let's try to lift up. I know this is hard, but it's supportive for your outer hips. Lift up your right foot and see if you can do that without overly crunching your right side. Just for a breath. Exhale release and really soften into that hip. And then let's go over to the other side. Last thing here before we come on to our backs. And without overly crunching your left side, see if you can lift your left foot off the floor and you might feel some good stability, the good kind of tension around your outer hip, which might even support you in your flexibility journey. Okay, let's exhale, let that go. Come into the center, draw the legs right in towards each other and round forwards. Okay, we'll turn. We're going to lie down on our backs with your blanket if you have it nearby. Roll on down, maybe you do some segmental rolling, something nice for the spine there. And let's close with a spinal twist. So draw the knees in. Let's pop the hips a little to the left, not the shoulders, just the hips, and let the knees fall to the right. So you might want a little more hip release. And if you want to, you can cross your left leg over your right and catch the weight of your legs with flexed feet. So now you might get a little more tug on the outer hip. You don't have to do that, but it might feel it might feel like welcome at this point. Let's take a breath. Connecting to yourself here, your thoughts, your breath, spaciousness and any restrictions that might be there with gentleness. Let's unhook our legs if you have them hooked, come into the center. And now we'll take our hips slightly to the right to let them drop over to the left. And when you do that, you might cross your right leg over top of your left. And with flexed feet, catch your descent there. I just have a mic in the way. So I'm just going to go a little over. And I'm noticing that it feels great just to go a little bit over. Let's take one more breath there connecting to yourself.

Okay, let's untwizzle the legs come back into the center, center out your hips, and any lying down shape that you would like to take, go for that. I want to show you something that might be useful for some of you. If you take a blanket roll, and you take it right about at your tailbone, and then you press into your head and drag your ribs away from the blanket away from your pelvis, you might feel this slight dropping of your abdomen, a slight posterior tip of your pelvis. And with your feet planted, just notice if there's any relief, any relief from that. Take your hands anywhere that's comfortable and let's take a few breaths here together. Invitation is to inhale through the nose for three counts. Inhale for six through the nose. You're welcome to exhale out of your mouth. One more breath like that. Three counts in, six out. Notice how you feel. And if I were you, I'd stay here for a little longer. But if you're ready to get on with your day, then stretch your arms over your head, maybe arch your spine, little counter pose to that, dry your knees and however you do, come on up. Take a moment, see if you feel any more grounded. Such a pleasure to practice with you today. Namaste.