Awaken the Hands

Hi, everyone. So happy that you're here. Today, we're going to engage in a class that will be so great for you if you work on devices a lot or use your hands a lot. So we'll give attention to our fingers, our wrists, our forearms elbow shoulders up into our neck. And I'm gonna invite you to start in a seat with me. You might grab a block to sit on or a blanket if you like, and have a strap or something at home that you can use as a strap. And let's begin. So we'll start with using our hands to give to ourselves. So you can start with giving yourself a face massage.

Maybe you're working into your jaw a little bit. There's perhaps some tender places where your ear meets your jaw underneath your jaw, even you could smooth out your eyebrows and the furrow in between your brow. You might close your eyes and take a couple breaths to arrive here. Smoothing out your forehead. And with both hands, you could take your index fingers and place them on the inside of your nose.

I'm just doing it on one side because of my mic. And then pull gently the skin across your cheek bones to your temples, then drag down towards your heart down through your neck. So you could do that on both sides drawing back and then pulling down. And finally, you could drag all that lymph tissue by brushing with your fingers across your neck towards your heart. Nice. Anytime you need to move your legs, do that. And we'll start with some somatic wrist work.

So you can take your right arm up and then plug your right shoulder back into the socket. And with your hand open at neutral, lower your hand right at the wrist and then bring it back up. So this is a flexion of your wrist joint. Lower down and bring back up. Notice if your elbow wants to bend And if you want a little more stretch, you can take your thumb into the center point of your palm, curl your fingers around, and curl your knuckles towards the floor.

Maybe some satisfaction there. And draw back. If your shoulder gets tired, feel free to bend your elbow. As well and keep it by your side. And then we'll rest rest that and take that magic moment in semantics where you take a pause. Notice any differences between both sides.

And then you can take your right arm back up. Pull log your shoulder in, and then we'll start to go let's make that fist first and start to go up into extension of the wrist. Okay? So from neutral, we're going up trying to make a ninety degree between our wrist and our forearm are in that direction. Right? If you want a little bit more, you can open your hand, and then it's like a stop sign. And I'm giving some attention to straightening out my arm here. Stop sign.

Big no. Yeah. And then you can let that go. And this time, we'll take our elbow right by our side, palm down, and start to move your hand. I'll show you this way. In this lateral movement, in this lateral deviation of the wrist.

And it's it's a micro movement. Right? So just be aware of how much movement you get. Maybe you're torquing or twisting through the wrist. And It's like you're wiping a table. You're flat on the table and and just working from your wrist side to side.

Nice. And then with your left hand, giving to your right hand, you can squeeze your wrist. And then maybe even rotate it and give a nice torque to the skin and the fascia there. And if you were ever did the snake bite thing as a kid, you can work that torque and turn all the way towards your elbow. And massage your forearm tissue all the way back to your wrist. Yeah. And then let's lean left into a side bend.

Take a side bend over there. You might free form your top arm. Let it circle or reach or bend, and you can come up into the middle and walk forwards towards a bit of a forward fold in the amount and let your head hang. And, again, you might come back to that magic moment of noticing the differences between your two sides. Alright. We'll roll on up. Might be appropriate to switch the cross of your legs other leg in front, and let's do that on the other side.

So left arm up. Or bent, plug it in, and we'll start with moving down through our hand that wrist flexion and back to neutral with a fairly straight elbow going down. And back up. And if you want a bit more, sensation, you can take your thumb into the center point of your palm and curl your knuckles down. So get into the top of your wrist. Maybe one more potentially with your breathing.

And then you can let it go. Notice what you notice. Shoulder rolls, if you like. And then come back up, and this time, we'll start with that soft fist, plug our shoulder in, and go up. And you can notice which one is harder for you to go down, inflection, or up in extension.

If you want a bit more, you can make that stop sign and see where you get. Go up towards that stop sign and project out through your arm. Open out through every finger. Nice. You can let that go. And then we'll take our arm by our side, and we'll start to do that wiping the table so that deviation of the wrist side to side and get curious side to side what you notice if there's a torque or a twist through your hand.

If your fingers wanna curl, What's this micro movement like for you? Getting so much space into your wrist. Okay. And then you can give to your own hand, squeeze your wrist joint, almost like you wanna pop off your hand from your your lower arm bones, traction. And then you can if you like, do this little rolling movement and snake bite through your forearm tissue, And let's side bend to our right this time. So go over to the side, lengthen that you can rotate your top arm if you want. You can bend your arm, and then we'll come on back up and come into your forward fold.

So walk it forwards, maybe walk your hips back. And you could take a couple breaths here. You can walk on back up from here, and I'm gonna invite you to switch the position of your legs. So you might have a block or a blanket And I'm gonna sit on this block in a hero's form. So I'm just giving my legs a different position. Maybe you're sitting right on the floor sitting on your heels as well, and this is where you can grab a hold of your strap. So we're going to begin with holding the strap in our right arm and taking that over our head so that the strap falls down your back.

And then with your left arm, turn your thumb down. And grab a hold of the strap as high up as you can get. So let's just show you that here. You've got this kind of shape with your arms. It's the Gomu Kossner cow face shape. Right? So your right elbow goes up, your bottom elbow goes down.

Pull a bit of tension between the strap. Now here's the part where we'll activate a little bit. So with your breath, try to take your strap away from your back I'll just show you that here on the side. So with your breath in, take it away from your back. As much as you can, you can move your chest bones forwards and then exhale and curl in like that.

And then we'll do that again. Come up, take it away from your back, project out through your elbows, widen through your collar bones, and then curling. Let's go again. Take it away from your back. Take a breath, and then curl in your breath. Right. And then let's take a bit more space in between your hands.

So as wide as you can on this strap. And this time, we're gonna go for straightening our arms. So any amount straighten out through your arms, your top arm goes up, your bottom arm goes down, and you're sort of pulling tension in this strap, little backbend through your chest, and then exhale and curl in. And let's do that again. Open up. And curl.

And maybe one more. You can give it a little bit more juice and bring your elbows into the midline and then curl in. Okay. We'll let that go. And you could take a couple of shoulder rolls there. You might lift your shoulders up and around your ears and exhale let them drop.

And let's switch sides. So this time we have our strap in the left hand, and it's going up our back, right on goes out to the side, thumb down, and we reach up, get a bit of a tighter grip here. And then project out through your elbows. And with an inhale as much as you can, you can try to take the strap away from your back and then exhale and curl in. Elbows can soften.

Yeah. So try that again. Pull away from your back, and then let your exhale tumble out of your mouth if you need. Then we can do one more like that. Pull back project out, notice the difference on both sides, and then draw in. So nice. Okay. You can come up, take a break if you need to, or widen the distance of space in between your hands, and then we'll go for sort of straightening our arms.

You can take your chest bones forward. You can wrap your elbows in and then draw it in. And again, you can open it up with your in breath and then draw it in. You can go for one more. Open it up, maybe stay a little. Drag your elbows to center.

You might even look up. Yeah. And then draw it in. Okay. As we come up here, you already have your strap on your left trapezius. So you can actually pull down on that tissue. So this meaty tissue at the base of your neck. And then as you pull down bottom and back hand and and front hand, you can take your ear over to your right shoulder. And you might explore a little bit of movement with your head, maybe some yes or no movements.

Maybe a circular movement with your chin or a figure 8. And then we'll try the other side. So we'll take that suspender over the other trap. Pull down and pull away from that pressure. Circle your chin, and you could think about any load that you have right now for yourself.

Can you release it into the ground, into the earth? Take a load off. Okay. And you can take that off and place your prop to the side as well as your block. We'll meet you in a tabletop facing the front of your mat. Knees under the hips, wrists, and shoulders line up. Press into your finger pads and start to circle around your wrists.

And then you can switch directions. Circle there. Yeah. And then coming to a tabletop and instead of circling your wrist, circle your shoulder blades. So bring your shoulder blades together on your back, drag them down your back, and then widen them into that protraction and then lift them up towards your ears. So some of us might wanna really get our spine into this. You could do that.

And then you can also really isolate your shoulders and do those shoulder rolls in this closed chain position. I find this feels really good and kind of gets into some of those crunchy places. So you can switch directions if you like. Okay. Let's try this with our forums down so you can lower down through your forums and then find that circling, which might feel a little more challenging to get your shoulder blades to move with your forearms on the ground. Notice if your spine is doing the work or if you can really isolate your shoulder blades coming together, dragging them down your back, widening them and then lifting up towards your ears.

And don't worry about it if it feels a little shaky at first, or it's hard to get the shoulder blades to move. All of your effort towards this is waking this area up. One more breath. And then we'll settle our hips towards our heels any amount and take our left arm through for little upper back twist. You can peek under your right.

Shoulder. Take a breath. And switch sides there as you're ready. K. Let's come on up and tuck toes. Walk your hands back in. Will load our fingertips a little.

So with your fingertips on the ground, can you push weight into them, shift forwards, push it some weight into them, and maybe you lighten your knees a little off the floor. Or you could even really weight your fingers and then come down. And then let's try that with our base of our finger knuckles on the floor, and you might explore if your wrist can come over your finger knuckles. Is there and get a good stretch to the fascia of your hands. And, potentially, that might be enough as you load your knuckles where you could tuck your toes and lift lighten your knees or even lift a little up. And lower down. And then it's the full hand.

And if you're feeling tight in there, turn your fingertips a little out to the sides, and then you can load, maybe lighten your knees, maybe lift a little, loading, pressing into your fingertips for a breath, and coming back down. Nice. Let's walk our fingers' hands forward, and coming to a downward facing form, puddle out through your feet. Couple of breaths. Okay. You can come back towards your knees. This is one of my favorite things to do.

Let's take our left forearm down palm facing up. And with your right forearm bones there, the ulnar bone, the pinky side, can you massage through the tissue of your forearm. So you're giving your forearm a good smash, and you can work from the elbow to the center of the forearm to the wrist. And maybe you feel like you're getting a little hand curl. When you pressurize, squeeze out the fluid, and then let it rush back in.

Giving yourself a good flush. That might be interesting enough. For some of you, you could crawl four words and place your knee on your forearm. And, obviously, that's a little bit more weight. So you might take a breath maybe needing through your for arm if you work on a device or you text a lot, this might feel kinda welcome, like, a sweet pain.

And finally, walk on back and you can take your right elbow into the center point of your palm and give it a little massage. You can work towards those tender areas, maybe the meat of your thumb in between the bones of your fingers, the base of your fingers, the metacarpals. Yeah. And then let that out. And you can come into your child's form, perhaps, Stock your hands, let your forehead come down, and take that magic moment.

Notice any differences side to side. And let's switch it up. So we'll do our other side. Right forearm down palm up. Left lower arm bones give a good massage.

Needing from the elbow crease down. Towards the wrist. A little involuntary hand curl might be happening. If you want, stay with that, or you can crawl up to take your knee there into the meaty part of your forearm. If it can reach and you might explore needing there and just monitoring how much weight you wanna apply down. I'm getting a good hand curl there.

And then, finally, if you like, your elbow can come in to the center point of your palm and explore some pressure work there. One more breath. K. You can take that magic moment rest into your child's form, or maybe you're fully lying on your abdomen. And notice the two sides. Land and locate. Okay.

Finally will come on up And I'm gonna ask you to come right up onto your knees here. Take your right hand to the side of your body, to your ribs, and flip your fingers behind you. And then you can work it as high as you like towards your armpit. And you could take a side bend here with your hand, sort of chicken winged into your side. Come out of that and then roll out your wrist if you need to.

Use your hand and then cup your waist and work your hand. Maybe your fingers even go up towards your armpit breast tissue if you have it. In there. So you're cupping, and then you can side bend there. And here I'm almost pushing my whole rib basket up, so I'm encouraging a little more lateral bend in the top side. See if it feels good.

Go for those pleasure sensations. Left hand go in. Chicken wing. See where you get. And then side bend.

Yeah. And then you can cup your side waist, work it up. You might even work your fingers up towards your armpit, and you can side bend it that way. And almost push your chest up to really lift your spine and come on out. Let's take that into a flow. So you can find your downward facing dog and huddle out your feet, shift your awareness into your feet and your hips as you press your arms down and forwards. Let's take our right leg up into a three legged dog. And then our right knee across to our left elbow, you could tap it or bring it close and then back into a three legged dog.

Two more times like that. Come across. Little twist shoulders over the wrists and back into a downward facing dog. One more like that come across. Back you go and bring your right foot into a low lunge.

Come up onto your fingertips, squeeze through your inner legs, and come all the way up into your high crescent. Take a couple breaths there. Here really inhabit your legs and press doctor your back heel sink into your front toes. One more breath. You might even frame your four arms, grab your forearms, your elbows, and frame your face here. Release your arms, and we'll open into a warrior too.

So we'll take our back foot to the back edge of the mat, hips open to the left, and sink in. Now here, we can try the same wrist flips we just did. First of all, fingers back with that chicken wing, And then reverse your warrior. Take a breath. Come on back, and then your fingers up or cupping your side ribs or up towards your armpit.

And a reverse warrior, and you might even press your chest towards the ceiling, sink into your front thigh. Feel it wherever you wanna feel it. Yeah. And then circle your hands to frame your front foot turn into the shape of a low lunge step back into a downward facing dog. Puddle out your feet. Other sides. We'll go left leg high.

And then left knee, shoulders over the wrist come across to tap or come close to your right elbow. Two more times like that. Left leg high. And twisted shape. One more. This time we'll go three legged dog and bring that leg all the way through to a low lunge, come up onto your fingertips, squeeze through your inner legs, and come all the way up into your high lunge.

Get into your legs. As you let your legs get heavy, can you feel your upper body get light? Stretch through your hand bones if you want. In a couple more breaths, you might frame your face. Name character energy.

K. We'll reach into our warrior 2, this time, opening to your right, back foot wide, sink in. Let's do those reverse warriors with our wrist flip. So first, chicken wing with your fingers behind you. And reach back.

Come on forwards, and you can turn your hands to cup your side waist or work your fingers up into your armpits. Take a breath. Sing and really feel it there. Push your chest up toward the ceiling and then windmill your hands to frame your front foot. Low lunge step back into your downward facing dog.

3 breaths. 1 2. And 3. Alright. Let's come down onto our knees, and we'll take our forms down to the floor in this first one, interlock your hands. Keep your elbows no wider than shoulder distance and let your head hang.

Walk your knees back, lift the space in between your shoulder blades, tuck your toes, and we'll come into a forearm dog. So maybe big knee bend, maybe straightening out your legs, maybe even walking your feet in. And sinking your heels down. And then big forearm press to decompress your shoulders. Press your wrist down. Your outer elbow Can you take one more full breath across the back of your ribs, spreading your shoulder blades away from your spine?

And then come on down so you can come to your child's form if you like those twists that we did in the upper back, you might take a beat for a twist on both sides. Nice. Let's come back into that. We'll do it three times. This time, if you want, your hands can come flat, pressing through your inner wrists, elbows no wider than shoulder distance, let your head hang. Lift the space in between your shoulder blades, tuck toes, and come into your bent knee forearm dog, or you can walk in and load your arms a bit more and push away push away so much that it feels like you're decompressing your shoulder joint.

You're spreading your shoulder blades? Can you slow down your breath here? Just getting curious a little in the staying. Alright. Well, come on down. You can take that child's form or maybe there's that twist and maybe your top arm spirals around on both sides.

You get a little more movement into your upper back. So nice. Okay. This last one, you get to choose your hands clasped or your hands down. Walk your knees back. Let your head hang. Lift the space in between your shoulder blades.

Talk toes. And we've got up to 5 breaths. I'm gonna count them. You get to explore them. 1.

2. 3. You could walk in. You could bend your knees. 4. And 5. Yeah. You can come down again.

Let yourself feel the afterglow of that. And there could be some more twisty things for you after that. Okay. Let's slide forwards onto our abdomen, and we can start by taking our legs up and swimming our arms back behind. And you might lean forward, bend your elbows, and interlock, and then reach back through your arms, reach back through your inner legs, your big toes, Can you feel some space around the back of your pelvis here? And come on down and you can take one temple to the floor. And take a breath.

So you might do that again, or you can widen your knees a little. Bend your legs. And you might reach back for one hand and the other and then kick your shins back and aim your shoulders forwards. Like, you're bringing your shins and your shoulders further apart from each other. Rock into it.

And you can take your other temple down and take a breath. He might sort of roll out your thighs, your legs, your hips. Okay. Let's come up and back, and we'll flip onto our back. So you can churn yourself so that you're in lying down position.

And if you need a big hug, bring your knees in, wobble, squeeze your thighs towards your body. And really let the earth take any of that weight that you might carry in your shoulders and your neck. Yeah. So you can take your feet back down to the floor. And let's begin with our right arm up. We'll come back to those somatic wrist movements.

Plug your right shoulder to the floor, and then remember how we went down into wrist flexion, try to keep your elbow straight, and then back to neutral. Let gravity help your shoulder really sink go down and back to neutral. If you want more a thumb into the center point of the palm and curl your knuckles down. Yeah. Couple of times. See how this is different.

And then you can keep your fist, right, and then come into that extension of your wrist and see what you get. Don't worry about the range of movement. Get more curious instead. And stop sign. Like you're holding up the sky there for a moment and then letting it go.

Straight arm and then those wagging left to right movements in your wrist. So you're wiping the table right from your wrist. See what you get. And then they'll squeeze. And if you want massage the fascia of your arm, Yeah. And then take your arms wherever.

It could be overhead. Could be down by your sides on your belly and drop into that magic moment. Other side. Left arm up, plug it in, and first we're going down. Hard to keep your elbow straight, right, but put some effort into it because you've got gravity working with your shoulder now.

You can curl into a fist. And these micro movements might not be big sensations. They might, but bring some keen awareness to the after effect of them. Right? So then you can keep the fist and go for the extension, see what you get. And stop sign.

Get curious. And then the wagging side to side. Does it feel easier on your back or different straight arm if you can? Yeah. And then give to your forearm by giving yourself a good squeeze. Yeah. You can roll on down through your forearm. Rotate spin unstick. Unglue.

Arms wherever. Take that moment to land and locate. Okay. Last thing. Take your hands in a downward pointing v and place them underneath your buttocks. It's like your your wrists are kind of on your si joint area. That downward pointing v is ending at your tailbone.

And then you can do a little baby windshield wiper side to side and wait one side and then the other. This is just another way to squash your wrists and get some flushing and blood flow in this area. If you want a little bit more, I like this is to let your legs come up. They could be straight or they could be a little bit bent and then add a little more weight like that side to side. Perfect.

K. Well, come on down. Any little movements you desire go for it, I'm gonna invite you to Give to yourself with your hands again and take your hands to your face. You might massage your temples. You might smooth out your brow. For the furrow in between your brow.

You could smooth out your forehead around your hairline. You could get into your jaw. Maybe even opening your jaw and hinging it. Your eyes might be closed. With your index finger, you could pull from your inner nose towards your temple and drag down through your neck.

Any puffiness in your face, you can imagine that you're drawing down your neck and in towards your torso area, your heart space, and you could comb your fingers through your neck space, dragging lymph down towards your heart. And then hands can be wherever is comfortable. You might out stretch your legs. And I'm gonna invite you to follow 5 breath in silence. 5 counts in.

5 counts out. Okay, my friends. You might wanna stay a little longer if you have the time. You could make your way towards the seat with me if you'd like. Roll to one side.

Roll on up. And in your seat, you could put your hands on your body. In front of your heart if you like and take a moment to acknowledge that you took time to make choices that support you. Peace. Shanti.