Less is More

Hi, everyone. Welcome to Les Moore from the nervous system reset. This class is all about doing less and being more. You'll need two blocks, a blanket, and a bolster. And if you don't have those props, just improvise.

So we're gonna start on our blocks today. We're gonna set up the blocks so that you have one block that's gonna go underneath your head to support your head. And then the other block I'm gonna say you wanna have it about one block distance apart from the one that goes under your head so that it supports your shoulder blades. When you lie down on the first block for your shoulder blades, just notice if this is too high And if so, you can always take it down a notch, which is something that I'm gonna do myself today. So there are different ways to set this up.

This is a little more comfortable, but if you're looking for a bigger backbend, you might wanna take this one up higher. And then if you are going to the lowest notch, then the block that goes under your head will also lower. So there are different variations. You can go up higher with the one underneath your head, if you're going higher with the block underneath your shoulder blades, are lower or lower. Once you're settled and you feel that block supporting right in the mid back, you can bring the soles of your feet together.

That one option to set up. You can also bend the knees and place your feet on the mat. And if you're feeling like you want that extra hip opener today, but you need support for your hips, you can always make fist with your hands. And place your fists underneath your outer hips. So go ahead and settle onto your props.

Just take a moment to notice your space. And drop into your space. Just feeling the temperature of the room. Any sounds that you might identify? And then begin to bring awareness to your mat Your body on the mat.

Your props, and your breath. Take a cleansing breath together so you'll inhale through the nose. Filling up all the way to the very top of your lungs. Exhaling all the breath out. We'll do that one more time.

Inhaling slowly, filling your lower lungs, mid lungs, upper lungs, holding to the top when you're full. And at sailing all the breath out either through your mouth or your nose. And now you'll just take a deep inhale and a deep exhale. We're gonna do a 3 part breath. It's really simple.

As you inhale, we're gonna interrupt that inhalation with a pause I'm gonna guide you through it, and it's followed by a long deep exhale. So you're gonna inhale to fill your lower lungs and pause. Fill again into the mid lungs and pause. And fill all the way to the upper lungs and hold the breath. Exhale all the breath out.

We'll do that again. Email into your low lungs. Inhale into the mid lungs. Pause. Inhale into the upper lungs.

Pause. And exhale the breath out. Twice more in l into the low lungs. Pause. Inhale into the mid lungs.

Hold. Inhale, feel to the top of your lungs, hold the breath, and exhale all the breath out. One more, inhale a third of the way into the low lungs. Pause. Inhale another the third into the bin logs.

Pause. Inhale and fill all the way to the top of your lungs. Hold and exhale all the breath out. Take a regular breath in through the nose. And out through the nose.

Just notice your whole body receiving the breath. The invitation to release, to let go, to de stress, to just be. And from here, you'll bring your feet back onto the mat. So you can always place your hands on your thighs to help your knees come up and then place your elbows into the mat. Push down to lift up.

There really is no elegant way to do this. So just come off of your blocks, set them up to the side, and then lie down on your back again. Hugging your knees into your chest, giving yourself a big squeeze, and we're gonna take the legs into happy baby pose. So you're gonna grab Either the outer parts of your feet. And if that's not possible, you can always grab your ankles or your shins. You wanna feel your low back pressing down onto the mat.

Try your tailbone forward. Continue to drop into your breath. Perhaps even visualizing that you're filling your low lungs. Mid lungs and upper lungs. From here, you can lower your left foot Keep your right foot into happy baby pose.

Some of us might want to extend the left leg straight. And if you're choosing to extend your left leg rate, flex your left foot firm, your left thigh. I like to draw my right knee down a little bit more on the right side. Opening up the inner right thigh, the outer right hip, your right foot flexes, Rebend your left leg, placing your left foot on the mat. We're gonna cross the right ankle over the left thigh for thread and needle, you can stay here or bring your right arm through the gap between the legs, interlacing the fingers in front of the shin or behind the left hand ring. Again, visualizing that you're filling your lower lungs, mid lungs and upper lungs with a breath.

I'm taking those long deep breaths, exhaling fully. You'll lower your left foot. Cross your right thigh over your left. Shift your hips a little bit to the right and drop your knees to the left for a twist. Just countering our backbend as you're laying on the blocks.

It was a nice chest opener. So now we're just offering a counter pose to that as you twist. And then back to center, bring your legs back into happy baby pose, pressing your lower back down. Again, we wanna make sure that the low back is supported. From here, you can lower your right foot keep that right knee bent or extend that right leg straight so you get that additional stretch and your right hip flexor. Flex your right foot.

Try to do your best to align your right heel with the right hip point. Maybe tug on your left foot down a little bit just to stretch more deeply into the inner left thigh. You have one more breath. And then rebend your right knee, your left ankle over your right thigh for thread, the needle. Your shoulders are heavy and anchored.

Back of your head is heavy. And then lower your right foot, cross your left thigh over the right, send your left arm to the left, even shift your pelvis to the left, and drop your knees to the right. Deep inhale as you fill your lower lungs. Mid lungs and upper lungs, full exhale, And back to center, hug your knees into your chest, and rock yourself back and forth. We're gonna come on to all fours.

Tabletop position, setting up your hands beneath your shoulders, your knees, or hip width apart. And on the inhale, draw your chest forward as you exhale round your spine. Inhale as you draw your chest forward. So creating that arch in the upper back where the block was. So it's like the block is pressing into your spine. And on the exhale lifting the navel rounding your spine, like, you're pushing the block away from the upper back.

We'll do that one more time. In how arch. Excel round. And then come into downward facing dog, tucking your toes, lifting your hips, pressing your thighs back, any amount. So your legs are firm. You can always keep a slight bend in your knees.

And then inhale as you come up high on your tippy toes, bend the knees, and step up to the top of your mat. In hell, halfway up, hands to shins, shift a little more weight towards your toes. Like you're looking over a cliff and then exhale fold. Separate your feet so they're hip width apart. Just coming into uttanasana for a moment, grabbing a hold of your elbows, creating traction to stretch out your spine.

Bending the knees is super supportive to the lower back and takes the hamstrings out of the equation a little bit. It's really focusing in on a spinal stretch. I'm releasing your hands. Inhale halfway up. Arta, uttanasana, hands to your hips, and then slowly rise up.

Mountain pose, arms by your sides. We're gonna step in to Dawson with the feet hip width apart and just work on a little bit more breath work. So this breath is called, the breath of life. And just like we did earlier in the beginning of class on the blocks, we're gonna do this in three parts, but it's a little more swift. And you're really sniffing the breath in versus taking these deep inhale.

So I'm gonna demonstrate first things first. You wanna feel grounded. A slight bend in the knees. The arms are gonna be out in front of you to begin with. And the first breath is a sniff.

It goes and then the arms go out on the second breath and the arms go up. On the 3rd breath. The exhale, you're just gonna fold. We come up sniffing, arms out, sniff up, exhale. You'll get the hang of it. Just go with the flow.

You're gonna start to feel a little bit more heat. In your body. That's okay. You can exhale through your mouth. Couple more.

Last one? And then exhale pause. Fold holds. Just let your arms hang. Your knees are bent.

Slow down your breath. And then from here, you'll inhale halfway up. And make your way back into downward facing dog. Just pausing in your down dog. Dropping into that place of being doing a little less so that we feel more expansive, more spacious.

Great. And then from here, low air knees to the mat, We're gonna come into a seated pose. You can always sit on a blanket. So seated with the soles of your feet together and your knees parted wide. There are a couple of ways to set up your feet here.

You can take your feet further away, which just gives you a little bit more space or bring them in a little closer to your body. Once you're here, inhale, root your sit bones, lift up tall, lift your chest, And as you exhale forward fold, Instead of pressing your elbows into your thighs, allow your exhale to just relax the muscles of your body. Maybe giving you a little bit more depth in your stretch through your exhalation. As you breathe in, you fill your low lungs, midlungs, and upper lungs. Complete and full exhales.

2 more. At this point, you can gently nudge your elbows into your thighs or your shins as long as it's as it's not forced. Great. And then sit up from here, take your legs out wide. This is where you might wanna grab your bolster. And use your bolster.

I know I need to use mine for this particular pose. So you can set it up just the flat weight, in front of your body or a little bit higher. I'm gonna go for higher. So slide it all the way up towards your body. Your legs are out either at 45 degrees or wider.

This is as far as I'm gonna go. You could take your hands to the outside of your is just tat your fingers and inhale as you lift your chest, giving yourself a little bit more height and space. From here, you can stay here or exhale and lean into your bolster. So it's like you're about to rest in a hammock. Just allow yourself to make any adjustments so you can Certainly adjust your bolster, the height of your bolster.

I'm gonna stay right here because it's pretty perfect for me. And where you wanna feel your efforts, really, is as you exhale to just allow your body to lean into whatever prop you're using. If it's not a bolster, it could be something else, a pillow. You wanna just lean into your exhale to open up. You can continue to fill up your lower lungs, perhaps even targeting the back of the lungs.

The mid lungs filling into also the backside of the mid lungs. All the way into the upper lungs. Completing that with a full exhale. Take a full cycle of breath. And then you'll come up slowly grabbing your bolster and setting up for your final pose. Shavasana.

So sliding that bolster underneath your thighs now. Taking your blanket here to just cover your body if you wish. I'm gonna place the blanket over my hips. So what you wanna make sure is that your bolster is placed right up against your thighs. Your heels should be touching the mat still versus up.

So you wanna feel like they're supported, then your arms can rest alongside your body. You can also clasp your fingers. Your hands over your abdomen. So make yourself really comfortable if your head needs some added support. You could put a pillow there, a blanket's there underneath your head, and just know that you can also adjust as many times as you need to or even come out of the pose and do this seated, if you wish.

But just take a cleansing breath, filling up all the way to the top of your lungs. And exhaling the breath out through the mouth. And again, inhale as you fill up all the way to the top of your lungs. Pauseing your breath at full Exhale all the breath out. Just notice the different touch points of your body on the mat.

Imagine that as you exhale, those different touch points on the mat become heavier. Notice the rising and the falling of your navel as you breathe. And the rise and the fall of your chest as you breathe. Noticing the breath at your nostrils. Just feeling the air, traveling in through the nose, and out through the nose.

Has the breath travels in It fills the lungs from the bottom to the top. And on the exhale, the breath dissolves from the lungs back out through the nostrils. Bring your attention to the space between your eyebrows. Relaxing the skin on your forehead. Feel even your eyelids, softening, your facial expression soft, and peaceful.

Relax your throat in the center of your throat. Feel the center of your chest and your heart, softening, In the center of your navel. In the center of your pelvis. And each one of your thighs your right to the left, your shins, ankles and feet. Notice your whole body.

Effortlessly resting and at ease. You'll begin to deepen your breath again. I'm serving the navel rise and fall. Notice any sounds from outside or in your space and the temperature of the room. Just a reminder of where you are.

Let your toes move again. Your fingers. And you even reach your arms above your head stretching one more time on your mat. Making your way to a seated pose, you can bend your knees and roll over to one side. Coming into fetal position transitioning slowly.

When you're ready, come on up. Lifting yourself up to a seated pose. When you're seated, again, you can close your eyes. Or keep your eyes open. Just soften your gaze.

Just notice how you feel in this moment. Drawing the palms together in front of our hearts, spowing the chin towards your heart, and gratitude for Your willingness to show up to slow down, to do less so that you can just be be your most authentic self aligned. Perhaps just at peace and lifting the chin blinking open your eyes. Namaste.