Loosey Goosey Shoulders

(waves crashing) Hi. Thanks for joining in. For this practice, you'll need two blocks and a bolster. So, let's start just, very easily, and just kind of move your legs so we're not doing yoga, yet. (laughter) Maybe.

And so, this little arm motion here, kind of back the hands forward, opening the palms, just sort of swinging the arms, maybe it's kind of like a figure eight movement, it doesn't really matter, but you just want to find the looseness of your arms, kind of like, ape like, you know, like, maybe some of this. How do your arms just, like, if you were just feeling really tense, what would you do, like, some of that, right? And then just, how does it make your chest feel and you know, why would you do something like this? Kind of moving your arms around, all right? And then, just step your left foot forward and your right foot back and just shift your weight forward and back.

All right. Be nice if you had some really good music going. For this practice today. All right, moving back and forth. And then we're going to, just concentrate on your right arm.

Right, so the arm goes back and forward. And no form. Actually formlessness, movement, breath, shifting of weight, that's what we're playing with, right? So, forward and back. And make sure you breathe.

And actually, the movement helps you breathe. All right, so forward and back. OK. And then we'll start rolling just the shoulder. I like to make those noises, helps to define the motion.

All right, and then start actually thinking of the hands circling around, so making a big circle. And making it as smooth and easy as possible. And you can close your eyes, but actually, I wouldn't suggest that, you could fall over, you don't want to fall over while you're swinging your arm, and then you could start swinging a little faster. (breathes out) And it's really nice to make that breath pattern, like every time you feel the momentum and the weight of the arm, you breathe out. (breathes out) And then switch directions.

And slowing it down. And back to this kind of like, like you're gambling, like you're in the game, you know, this kind of moving around because we're transitioning to the other side, so that you have your right leg forward. All right? And then we just go to the easy swing, so take it down. Very loose.

I like to switch back and forth, so I feel the weight moving into one arm and then the other arm. I mean leg. All right. And then just the shoulder. Circling.

And then the hand circling. Right. Just find the motion. And then you either add some speed, but you want to find that drop and the drop and the drop, so there's momentum, and you're not controlling it with your jaw your mouth or your face. (breathes out) And then change directions.

So, you go back, back, back, back. (breathes out) Slow it down. And exhale. All right. Sort of stepping side to side and then let's do this a little bit, so it's like a figure eight.

You cross the arms in front and you swing 'em back. And as soft as you can be, in your upper spine and your chest and your shoulders and your neck and your jaw, all that just really soft. Uh huh, and the next time you might want to slow it down. Right arm in front and you might recognize this as the approach into a yoga arm pose, right? Called garudasana.

Really not gonna hit it, we're just gonna move through it. To the other side. Slowing it down, and then the left arm comes in front and whoop, your arms get kind of tied up, twined up, little movement side to side. And then release. Come into tadasana.

Stand on your mat, but a little bit further back from the front, and then let's enter, let's hook the thumbs and bring the arms up overhead, and spread your fingers wide, and find this kind of up and down feeling in the body, so you're letting the heels drop, your tail drop, I would suggest that you don't bring in your belly at all, but really try to let the gut fall. So you feel this length and hollowness inside. You can kind of reach up on one side, reach up on the other side, until you can fall into center. On an exhalation. And then inhale, look up beyond your hands, separate the hands and swan dive out over your legs.

Let the head fall. Take a breath in and lift your face and just bring your legs absolutely together and bend your knees. And so that the knees come forward, and come to this little hovering place where you're on the balls of your feet, and you can use your hands to support, if you have the flexibility, to come back on your heels, don't do that, because we're actually looking at the fold of the ankle, the fold of the knee, and the fold of the hips, and you can play back and forth here, just to open the back body. Really round in and surrender the weight of your body into your legs. Breathing in, lift your face, hug the knees together, and bring your knees to the floor, and then lift them up again, and then, this time, you try to bring your knees as close to your toes as you can.

Sit upright, scooping the toes towards the knees, and the knees towards the toes, and then squeeze the legs together, and just sit upright for a moment. If this is impossible, you just come to the tops of your feet, right? Or you sit on a block that you have handy. Bring your fingers to the floor, lift your knees. Let's do it one more time, hug the knees in.

Pull the toes forward, you might want to bring your own little toe forward and then sit upright. And then hands to the floor, the heels fall back. You drop the head and now you stand on your feet. And again, the play is folding the ankles. So, in order to fold the ankles, the shin bones have to kind of roll back and the shin bone releases into this angle, deepening the heel onto the floor.

Lift your upper body, squeeze your legs together, and start to swing the arms. All the way up to stand, perhaps, and down. Like you're a skier. And you can let the head go or not. Find that swing and then catch up.

Interlace the fingers, extend the body high up, and low down, and then release the arms. Come to tree, standing on your left leg, so bring your right foot knee up into your hands, turn the leg out, and find your vrikshasana. Hands to prayer, nice and steady. Inhale, the arms go up. And exhale, let them come out wide.

Turn the knee forward, interlace your hands underneath your thigh, and drop your thigh into your hands, and bend your standing leg, as well, and just swing that right knee, inhaling. Exhaling, extend the leg forward. Inhale, arms wide, and exhale. Bring your legs together, tadasana. Other side, left knee into your hands, turn the leg out, come to tree.

Hands to prayer. Fall down, take your arms up when you're ready. Breathing in and out, open the arms wide. Turn the knee forward, interlace your hands underneath, and let the weight of the legs fall. Find the swing of your left knee.

Let the swing of that leg extend forward. Swing the arms wide. And take the legs together. Come again, so, you're on your mat, pulled back a little bit from the front. Hook your thumbs, rehook with the other thumb on top, and go into this diving into the space above you, and plummeting down into the space below you.

So, looking to be as long as possible. And then inhale. Lift the face. Part the clouds. And swan dive into open space.

Inhaling, extend forward, bend the knees. Find this fold. Take the hands to the floor, and bring your knees to the floor, and this time, just relax the tops of the feet onto the floor. This is where, I like to use a block. So, grab one of your blocks.

And lean forward, and place your block on your heels. And this is a really interesting feeling in the ankle. So, if it's killing you, don't do it. Otherwise, you use the flat broadness of the block to open the front of the ankle and to kind of release through the shin bones, so you can take your hands to the floor, walk your knees forward, to make this line as long as possible. And then sit.

And then take the block away. Curl your toes under. Come back into your tiny squat. Hovering on the balls of your feet. Bring your knees down onto the floor.

Sit upright. Bring your hands to the floor. Lengthen the tops of the feet, and this time, without the block, you're gonna sit back. But the real game is to try to hug your heels together. Woo.

Uh huh. So what does that take, right? It takes a lot of lower leg attention. Shin bones in and inner heels hugging, so that when you do sit up, your sit bones are draped around your heels. Your heels are sequestered inside your sit bones.

Breathing, with quite a bit of activity in those lower legs. Exhaling, hands to the floor. Curl the toes under, come into your baby squat. Don't need the block at this point. Just relax over your legs, breathe in.

As you breathe out, the heels roll down. The chest comes up. It's like a preparation to swing. (breathes out) Catching up. And bring your hands to prayer.

Now, you can step forward. And find a moment of stillness. At the very center of your being, hook your thumbs, inhale, take the arms up, lift the face, exhale, come out over the legs, you can bend the knees, and then interlace your hands behind your back. (breathes out) Inhale. Gaze comes forward, fingers to the floor.

Exhale, right leg back, and release the right knee to the floor, relax the top of the foot down. Hook the thumbs and inhale, take the arms up, and the gaze up. Exhale, hands to the floor, and come to plank. Reach the crown of the head forward and the heels back. Inhale here, exhale the knees.

The chest, and the chin to the floor. Come through to cobra, and exhale, come down. Lengthen the legs, you can step the right leg back. Place the foot on the floor, left leg back. Place the foot on the floor.

Inhale, cobra. Head and chest forward. Exhale, roll the front body down. And bend the knees, as you exhale. Inhale, head and chest forward, exhale, rolling, bend the knees.

Inhale, forward, and exhale, reach those knees back. So the thighs stay long. Last time, inhale forward, and exhale down. Inhaling back into cobra, and this time, come into upward facing dog. So, get up on your feet, straighten those legs, and enjoy the posture.

One more breath in, exhale. Downward facing dog. Hips high, belly wide and empty. Inhale, lift your face, look forward. Exhale, right leg, all the way between your hands, and release the left knee to the floor.

Hook your thumbs. Go up, go up more than back. Fill into the back body here. And exhale. Bring your hands to the floor, and step your left leg next to the right.

You might want to interlace your hands behind your back here. Take a big breath in, bend the knees, swing the arms up. And exhale. Hands to prayer. Other side.

Hooking the thumbs, inhale, gaze up, exhale, bend the knees, release the arms, interlace. Inhale, look forward, lengthen. Left leg back to a lunge. Hook the thumbs, inhale. Go up.

And then exhale to plank. Inhale, full light breath and plank. Exhale, knees, chest, chin. Inhale, cobra. Exhale, fold the legs.

Inhale, cobra. Exhale, fold. Inhale, take the head forward. Like the head pulls the spine into length. And exhale, fold.

Last one like this, inhale. And exhale. Now, inhaling, come through Cobra, to exhale into upward facing dog. Inhale, complete the posture. Which leads you into downward facing dog.

Inhaling. And exhaling. Inhale, lift the face. Exhale, left leg forward, release the right knee. Hook the thumbs.

Pull the torso off the legs. And exhale, standing forward bend. Interlace the hands behind the back. Release the arms, swing them. (breathes out) The next time you catch the arms up, release the arms wide.

And come into tadasana. So, because of the arm swinging, you might really feel all this kind of movement and vibration in your body, look to the very center. Where there might be more quiet. You don't want to ignore all the great vibration that you're raising and creating, but you want to have a reference for it. Into your center.

OK, bend your knees, grab one of your blocks. Take your block, and wedge it between your shin bones. This is just to have like a grounding, right? So, you're going to have your feet parallel to each other, your feet will be just about block width apart, and there's just a gentle containment of the block. Release your pubis, soft groins, release the tail.

A nice broad, open belly area. Solar plexus, breath space, OK. We're gonna roll the right shoulder, find the circularity of that. And then the next time you roll the shoulder, take the hand, so the palm faces forward, bring the arm straight out in front of you, leading with the pinky edge of the finger, right? So, that pinky edge stays right along the inner border of your personal space.

When you bring the arm up as high as it's gonna go, and it might not go as high as mine, so just be mindful of your own practice, you're gonna reach the arm up, flip the palm back, and then look back and reach the arm out and down. So, we'll do it again, one little roll here. Sweep the hand, as if the hand's going under your floorboards, out into the space in front of you, up toward the ceiling, any amount, here's where it gets sticky, exhale, soften the neck, but reach that pinky side of the hand up, and let the whole body open, take the arm out of the socket, turn the palm back, and reach it back and down. Roll the shoulder. This is all good if you've never dislocated your shoulder.

If you have dislocated your shoulder, you don't want to reach it out of the socket. So, for the people who have dislocated their shoulder, you just want to look for the easeful range of motion. It might not look like anyone else's, but find how your arm moves, it's the most important thing. Otherwise, we circle on more time, you can bend the legs, and hug that block, reaching the right arm forward, bring it right along, side your head, and then right there, it's an inhalation. You reach it as high up as you can.

You turn the palm, and you take it all the way back. And release. Roll shoulders easy, hug the block. Let's change the block now, so it's up in between the thighs. Just a different way to work the legs.

Again, it's a gentle hugging, it's not a crushing. You can think of taking that, I like to take my thumbs onto the block, and draw the block down, it helps me release through the lower pelvis, the pelvic floor area. So, I really feel the ground. OK, left arm, roll the shoulder once, palm faces forward. It sweeps forward, lead with the pinky.

Uh huh, it might not go that high, wherever it goes, you stop there, let the neck soften. Inhale, reach it up, straight up. Flip the hand. Look, follow your hand. Goes way out behind you.

And then circles once and again. Down, out. Up. Wherever it gets sticky or cranky, stop, soften. It goes straight up from there.

Up, flip. Back. And rolls. Just to clear it out, and one more time. Bend your knees a little bit, so you're not stiff in the legs, inhaling and exhaling up.

Reach it high, turn it. Go back. And roll, roll, and again, it's like loosey goosey, like double whipping or, oh yeah, what is that called? Double Dutch, right? You want to sort of be that loose, that loose.

OK, put your block away, you don't need it right now, turn again to the side to your mat, and step forward. Tadasana. So, we've just gone from this sort of big exploration to the quiet centeredness of tadasana. Arms down by your sides. Inhaling, take the palms out, and raise the arms up overhead, and exhale, swan dive, out over the legs.

Inhale, lengthen the chest forward, exhale, release over the legs, come through a little utkatasana. So go as deeply, as folded in those ankles as you can. To a slightly higher utkatasana, swing the arms. Catch 'em up. And release into tadasana.

And then just press down into the balls of the feet, lift the heels, and bring the heels down. A couple more times. Go down to go up. You want to find through that point of the heel, going down that, oops, you can rise up. Down to go up.

OK, bend your knees, grab your blocks again, if you need them, I'm not gonna use them. Turn so that you're in the middle of your mat facing side, bring your fingers to your chest, right into the center, inhale. And exhale, bend the knees, and jump the feet wide. Heel toe them wider if you need. Turn your left foot in 15 degrees, you right foot out 90 degrees.

Inhale and exhale. We'll move into triangle pose. Inhale, sweep the right arm up, a grand gesture, all the way up, open this flank of the body, swing the hips to the left, and take your body out along the line of the right leg. Broad chest. Inhale, look at your top hand, breathe in, breathe out.

Come up. And just bend your right knee. And now we'll do it another way. Same posture with a different sensibility. So, the arms are wide.

Turn, your left palm to face up. Gaze at your hand. And then inhale, and exhale. Lift the hand up. The gaze is up towards your left hand, that's going higher and higher and higher, you start shifting your hips, but it's like your body's going into triangle pose, but you're going into outer space.

(laughter) All the way open. Enjoy the posture, see what it is, see what it's offered you, and then inhale, come up. Bend your right leg, transition to the other side. Turn your right foot in, turn your left foot out. Release your arms and swing 'em.

Get kind of soft. Right, because we want this feeling of swing and weight in the arms to help us breathe, all right? Eyes on your left hand. And then it's this grand gesture. Opening up, opening up, like opening the whale's mouth.

The sit bones, the tail bones swing to the right, as you extend and open and lay the body out and find the pose, find the breath. And looking up at the top hand, you inhale, reach up. Exhale, bend your front leg. Be steady and easy on your legs. Now, the gaze is to the back hand.

Turn the palm up, you can just actually release your left arm. You're gonna breathe in, and this view, you're presenting your own heart, right? You let it go up, like peace doves flying out of your heart, flying out of your heart, the gaze is up. No fear. You're going somewhere, but you have no fear about where you're going.

(breathes out) Feel the breath. And then inhaling. Come up. Bend your left leg, turn the feet parallel. Release and swing.

'Cause you have good music going, right? All right, one more pose here. Turn your left foot in, turn your right foot out. Inhaling, exhaling, triangle pose. We'll move into Ardha Chandrasana.

Bend your right leg. Step your right hand forward, use a block or not. Come onto that hand and lift your left leg. Now, this leg, that knee has to stay directly over the foot for stability. Open into the posture.

Gaze up if you feel secure. Find the airiness of the lungs. Bend your right leg. Reach the left leg way back. Move back into triangle pose.

Exhale, look around, open up. And come to stand. Let's go to the other side. Turn your right foot in, turn your left foot out. Swing it out.

(breathes out) Triangle pose. Transitioning to ardha chandrasana. Soften your mouth, turn your gaze if you got it. Bend your left knee. Take that right leg way back.

(breathes out) Triangle pose. Even, open, flying, lightly come up. Bend your left leg, turn your feet parallel to each other. Bring the legs together. Swing the legs out, I mean the arms.

Legs are a good idea, too. OK. So, facing the front of your mat, come into tadasana. Inhale, turn the arms out, gaze up. Exhale, swan dive into the space above you, and out.

Inhale, lengthen chest forward, exhale, step or jump, chaturanga dandasana, knees, chest, chin, whatever connective sequence you're going to do, do it now. And you'll step the right leg forward, and turn your left heel down. Stay here for a moment, feel the Earth, release the chest, go down in the legs more, to come up to warrior one. And then straighten your legs. And then take the arms up, right?

And then go up on your tippy toes. Breathe in here. Stay as high as you are, but your heels get pulled down. And you bend your front leg, and you come back into warrior one, but your legs are pulling down, and your upper body, from the legs up, are yearning for the space above you. Inhale here.

Exhale. Any connective sequence that you want to do. I mean, meet in downward facing dog. Inhale here, exhale, left leg forward. Turn the back heel down and wait.

So, already, here, take your hands off the floor. A little movement with the arms. So that your legs have you. And then. Warrior one.

Straighten the legs. Exhale. The legs are going down. But magically, the heels somehow come off the floor. Inhale, up here on tippy toe, exhale.

Let those legs pull you down. But your body gets more space. Re-enter the magic of virabhadrasana one, but you let go, you let it go out of you. You let the pose move through you. Catch yourself on your arms, any connective sequence.

(breathes out) Downward facing dog. OK, let's take the right leg backened up. Lift the foot as high as you like. Bend the knee. Inhale, step the right leg forward.

Turn the back heel down. Sweep your left arm forward and up. To vira two, warrior two. All right, heel toe your right foot to the right, just once. To make some space here.

And then you're gonna move from warrior two to warrior one, and just think about the feet, the legs, the hips here, for a moment. Right, what is this cha cha cha, what is the movement, and how do the feet shift and connect to the Earth, and how do your hips move from an open hipped position to a more closed hip position? Move your feet however you need to so they're supportive, now let's go back to the arms, open the arms. And let them move like streamers. All right, and finally, opening, so that you're into warrior one.

Widen the pelvis. Quietly riding the breath. And then give the posture away. And transition through your connective sequence. Where we will meet in downward facing dog.

Let's do the other side, left side. Left leg lifts, lift it high, bend the knee. Inhaling and exhaling, pull it forward, and spin the back heel down. Find the legs, right arm goes forward, and up. To warrior two.

Uh huh, straighten the legs, heel toe. Your left foot to the left just a little bit, that'll bring, that'll give you space to wrap your right hip around on this side. So, you can drop the arms. It might help to take your right hand to your right hip and bring the hip forward, so the right hip point is facing your left foot, it's more of a warrior one stance, and then open the hips warrior two. Spinning it around.

So, now you might understand why we need to open the ankle so much, because man, that back ankle is folded. You want the heel to be just dropped. And open. Let's start adding the arms. Turning.

And opening. Turning. And opening. And this time, we'll come around, and we'll find warrior one. Let all the beauty of the posture move through you.

Getting caught nowhere. Release it. Connective sequence of your choice. And we meet in downward facing dog. Bring your knees to the floor.

And just gather your block. You only need one block. And place it toward the front of your mat. And then return to downward facing dog. Inhaling, right leg back and up.

Lift the foot high, bend the knee. Inhale and exhale. Bring the foot forward, and plant the back heel. Sweep the left arm forward and up to warrior two. Heel toe your right foot to the right.

Transition into warrior one. Mm hmm. Feel that back foot. Inhaling now, extend both legs, two straight legs, lift the gaze, open the arms into a twist, left hand comes down, onto the floor, or onto your block. Adjust the space between the legs if you need to.

And we play into pavitra trikonasana. So, all the action of the feet and the hips, how do they help you here? To find the freedom of the spine. And most importantly, the freedom of the breath. Sometimes our lives are like chaotic hurricanes, right?

Or twisters. Maybe the more chaos we find, the easier it is to find center. Coming out of the pose, bend the front leg, hands on the floor, downward facing dog. How do you find your yoga? Left leg back and up.

Lift the foot high. Bend the knee, inhale, and exhale. Comes through. The back heel plants. And the right arm swings forward and up to warrior two.

And you give yourself a little space there between your feet and you wrap your right hip around. Uh huh, and then you come into warrior one. Charting the experience. You're inside. It's like, you're in your center, and the whole world is revolving around you.

(laughter) I don't know where the lesson is in that. And then inhale, come up, open your arms, into the twist, and then bring that right hand down. On the block, if you're using it. I'm placing my block to the inside of my foot. 'Cause I need the space.

To work into the pose. Which is elusive to me. On the side. (breathes out) Take your time. Find your breath.

How does it work for you? What are you forgetting? Call it all in. Gaze down. Hands to the floor.

And to downward facing dog. Stay in dog. And lengthen the place between, so your hands go forward and your feet go as far back as you can. Super long dog. Lift your heels, release the groin, send the pubic bone, the tail bone, the sit bones up.

Let the spine release like a hammock. But you want to find the broadness of the shoulders to really support this posture. Inhaling, exhaling, tail bone leads the way into warrior, or upward facing dog. And then lay your legs. Lay the belly down.

And rest here for a moment. (breathes out) And just bring your hands alongside your body. Push back. And sit on your feet for a moment. This is where you'll want to bring your bolster to your mat.

And now that you have your bolster. You're going to lay your belly over the bolster. It's, initially, it's not so comfortable, because you want to place the bolster, or place your body on the bolster, so that your solar plexus is gonna compress, so you lay on your bolster. You want to have your breasts in front of the bolster, and then walk your feet back until you can feel as much of your front thighs on the mat as you can. Just take a moment to hang the head, because this is such a beautiful reminder of how open we want our back body to be, and back bending.

So, breathe here and know that it's very different. Your breath is being pressed into the deep back lungs. And that's a good thing. All right, and then you lift your head. And fold your knees.

And try not to lift your hips up, but let the tail really drop, let your hips be heavy, down towards the floor. And then reach back, and find your ankles with your fingers. And move into dhanurasana. But you're really already in it, probably. So fronts of thighs on the floor, and then you feel this bolster in front of your rib cage supporting you.

So that's the beauty of props, right? They help us stay in postures a little longer without the stress of hanging on. Wrap your fingers further around your ankles, and press your thighs into the floor. And keep the hip dropped until you really feel that your breath is opening into the back of the lungs. And then you can just lift your head and look forward.

Release. Let the feet go. We'll do it again. I feel like I need to creep a little further forward on the bolster, right? And then bending the knees.

Try to lengthen the thighs back as you bend the knees. Find your ankles. Reach the knees away from you. Think of lifting the sides of the armpits. Let your spine be kind of passive here because the bolster's holding you up.

And it's nice, every once and a while, to push the thighs into the floor. But then, release that action, let the buttocks be wide, and the groin really soft. Okey dokey. Coming out of that. Take your arms in front, bow your head.

And then hands to the floor, pick yourself up. And take the bolster away. OK. Come up onto your knees. Depending upon your back, and we don't want to crunch the back, or overuse it, you will either curl your toes under, and we're gonna do a pose called ustrasana, right, so, if you can easily touch your heels with the toes curled under, then you won't need extra props.

You could either gather your blocks and take your hands onto your blocks, into the pose, or don't even worry about it, you take your hands onto your hips, and you just think about finding an arc through the upper regions of your body. OK, curling the toes under, stand into the knees, stand into your toes, reach the heels back, hips are just in line with your thighs. Roll the right shoulder, roll the left shoulder. Roll the right, roll the left. Roll the right, roll the left.

Nice and loosey, so back to that loosey goosey thing we were doing in the beginning of class. And then concentrating on your right arm, you roll the shoulder once, you reach the hand down, pinky leads forward, and up. Here, exhale, and then inhale, reach the arm as high as you can, turn the palm, look at it, look at it, look at it, oh, maybe you have your heel. Exhale, turn the head forward. Roll the left shoulder, reach the left arm up, up, up, up, up, up, turn the palm and right to the other heel, all right, now.

Soften the groin, scoot the toes toward the knees. And imagine that you had the bolster to lay over, right, to use in danerasana, you can see that it's the same shape. We're just turned differently. Widen the groin. Open the chest.

Press down through your toes and your knees and come up. Relax the feet and sit. So, I dropped my head back, but you don't have to, right? You go into the pose, you fill it with breath and love, and no crunch, no jam. We'll do it again.

Coming up, you can choose, this time, to either keep the toes curled under, or lay the tops of the feet down onto the floor. Right, if you've got this pose, where the shins are long, you really want to feel that the whole length of the shin, especially right here, the bottom of the shine bone, is really planted. Ustrasana means camel pose, so you can think about how camels kneel, and then push down into their forelegs to get up off the floor. All right? We're gonna lead with the left arm.

Inhaling and exhaling, roll just the shoulder. Scoop the hand forward. And up. Right there. You breathe in, you go up, turn the palms, sweep it way back, and find the heel.

Other side, even though you're cock eyed, like this, right, you're hanging out, it's fine, kind of in a twist, roll the right shoulder, sweep the arm out, and up, go as high as you can, turn the palm over, find your heels. Do look forward. Release the groin. Imagine that you have the support of the bolster. Under your solar plexus that's widening.

And you're breathing into the back lungs. As long as you need to, there's no need to drop the head back if the chest isn't lifted high enough. Inhaling, exhaling, feet down. Chest lifts, head is the last thing to come up. And then come to all fours.

Cross your right shin over the left. And lay down on your back. (breathes out) Feel the weight of the body. As if, you know, the space above you had weight. It was meeting you.

Helping you remember your breath. Helping you remember your heart. All right. Lock your feet close in to your hips, and a little wider, and maybe you'll be able to reach down and hold onto your ankles. Try to wrap your fingers around your ankles.

If you can't do that, then you can just lay the hands on the floor, OK. Breathing in and breathing out, heels down. Reach the knees away from you. It's the same shin shape as utkatasana. Right?

The knees pull away and the heels drive down. And as the hips rise, you want to unstick the skin, and you just come into this easy place. Make it easy. Maybe your hips aren't this high, maybe your hips are much, much higher. Wideness in the diaphragm.

Wideness in the back body. Let the spine come into its arc. And then come down, you can lift the heels, release the hands, and lay back. (breathes out) Go again. Holding those ankles, you can't, the knees way out over the toes, reach your knees towards and beyond the front of your mat, walking up, way up onto your upper arm bones, as the knees reach, the reach of the knees and the drop of the heels tags the tailbone long.

Now stay up this time, release your hands, and bring your hands for urdhva dhanurasana and then press into your hands and go to the top of your head. Set your hands clear, breathe in, and as you breathe out, heels down, hands down, go up onto tippy toes. And play in the posture, feel the weight of the breath, descend the heels as you're able. (breathes out) Soft breath. And then bending the elbows, coming down, look to the ceiling and release.

(breathes out) Feel that incredible vibration, right? Resounding into the space around you. That is such a beautiful moment, let it go. Go again. Leading again, the same way.

So, holding on, heels nice and close, holding onto those ankles. Breathing in, breathing out. Drop the heels down, reach the knees across the tops of the feet. Hips come up. You can stay here.

Or you transfer the arms. Around your head. Breathing in. Breathe out, heels dig down, and maybe you go all the way up without stopping on the top of the head. I like to lift my heels.

Soft groins. Heels pulling down. A folded ankle. A dropped heel. Wide pelvic belly.

Look up to the ceiling to just emphasize the release of the spine up through your rib cage. Bending the arms, coming down. (breathes out) Boom, boom, boom, right? Such a sign of life to feel that pumping of the heart. One more time.

Pulling the heels in close. Because we only ever do it three times, right? It's such a yoga teacher thing to do it three times, but if you'd like to do it 10 times, I applaud your efforts, and I'm right there with you. Right, you can do them much faster than I'm teaching them, heels down. Knees reach.

Go ahead, release your arms. Open that chest. I like to take my hands along the sides of the chest, like really give me some support and let the butt go. And then heels drive down, hands, and up you go. And then find as much freedom as you can here.

Uh huh. The arms are pouring out of your heart, and the heels drop out of the belly. And your spine is loving you for your efforts. (breathes out) Bending your elbows, gently down, sorry, I got to go. OK.

Lying down. Let's just do this, so close your eyes, bring your hands, like hover them over the crown of your head. And slide them across your forehead. Down your face, like not touching your body, but just hovering. Across the throat area.

Right along your central axis, just slide your hands. Sense what you sense, notice what you notice, even if it's nothing. All the way down between your legs so it's in front of your pubis and then back up. Don't look for anything, just do it. Sometimes you want to stay somewhere, but don't right now.

And release the arms wide. Heel toe your feet as wide as your mat. Drop both knees to the right. Let them just fall. You can swing that left arm somewhat overhead.

And then knees up and over to the other side. Right arm up. And then come onto your back, see if you can find your bolster again. You don't even have to pick up your head. Just bring the bolster so that you can have the bolster under your knees for shavasana.

And then lay the body down. And lay your mind down. Your job is done. Drop into the breath and through the breath. Into the Earth, and through the Earth.

Don't hold back. Let yourself drop. You can stay as long as you like. If you're ready to come out of shavasana, take your feet up onto the bolster. And then bring your knees to your chest.

Do not pick up your head, you just roll to your side. Use your hands to guide the body upright. And come to a comfortable seat. And bring your hands to your upper chest and instead of prayer, touch your hands to your body, stack your hands in front of your chest. It's not a concept of honoring your efforts, it's a heartfelt sense of presence.

Namaste.