Flexibility and Freedom

Hello, everyone. Thanks so much for joining me here today. For our practice today, you'll want a bolster, a blanket, two blocks, and a strap. And before we come to our recline position to start our flexibility class today, Please open up your strap and make a non sliding loop, and you want your loop to be about as wide as your shoulders. K. So once you have that set, you can set that to the side. We'll get to that soon.

We'll eventually put your bolster on your mat parallel to this long edge and then take your folded blanket. That's where your head's gonna go. We're gonna sit in front of this bolster. And grab ahold of your blocks to get a really nice front body stretch with blocks maybe turned in medium position for, an easy start to our hips stretch. If you feel where your bolster is, give a little room between your bolster and your back.

So this catches maybe the edge of your rib cage. And blanket catches the base of the skull. Alright. You might need to do a readjustment of where your blocks are now so that you feel beginning of a stretch. If you'd like a little bit more, flip your blocks flat. K. So check out which feels best for you.

Let's have your arms float out to your side. Maybe in line with your chest. If you can work with that angle, a little bend of your elbows towards the floor. And maybe now you can already start to feel that stretch across your chest into your inner arms, the bicep area, bring awareness again through that front spine opening here. And with this front body opened, maybe it's a little bit easier to breathe from your nose all the way down towards the navel, all the way down towards your hips.

And we're exhaling from the hips all the way back up towards the nose. K. As you run your awareness through that whole front of the body on inhale, Just noticing that stretching that's occurring from somewhere deep within your center up toward your muscles, up toward the skin. And maybe be feeling with your exhale a little bit more of your body in contact with the props, with the floor. As we ease into our flexibility practice, and I like to think of flexibility as one of the anchors in an empowered aging practice. To help us navigate life's changes and reminding us to be flexible like nature as we encounter changes.

Also nice to feel flexible in our physical body to do all the things we love to do. So one way that we might improve our flexibility and range of motion is to hang out and poses a little bit longer. So my hope for today's class is that we get to move slowly and really luxuriate and moving at more snail speeds, not feeling rushed, and enjoying time to really be in each shape. Take a few more moments as you are here. Just getting that stretch from the hips through the front spine.

If it's okay with your shoulders, let's slide your arms a little bit more back towards your ears, bend your elbows, and see if you might catch your opposite forearm or elbow, and let your arms for a few moments drop back a little bit more towards your ears here. Staying here with a comfortable breath in and out. Let the arms come back down to your sides. Slowly tip your knees in towards parallel. Let's set the blocks to the side for now and go ahead and find where your strap is, and we might keep your legs bent for the moment as you let your arms reach up, grab your strap loop, and let's slide your, hands into the loop.

And you might have your thumbs free. So you're kind of pushing out the back of your hand into this loop. So from here, let's have your arms start to reach back towards your ears as you push into your loop. So you're kind of stretching a little more through the shoulders and side body. Take your arms back up. Hopefully, that straps in a pretty good spot for you, if not adjust. And let's again, push out into your strap as you take your arms back.

And to see if that helps your shoulders feel a little more stable as you're moving into that deeper stretch. K. Arms back now take one leg and then the other leg down so you've got straight legs as your arms reach back and going back up. And if we can one more time, keep your legs down. Fingert your arms back towards your ears and hold, pushing the back of your hand into your loop. K. A little challenge in the shoulder area.

And we'll take the arms back up set this loop to the side for a moment. We're gonna use it again. You bend your knees. Let's catch the back of your legs and bring yourself up off your bolster. Now if you can move your bolster to the side, but we want to keep our blanket for where your head goes.

As we come back to the floor, and we'll want our strap in hand. Okay. So if you meet me back on the ground with your blanket under your head. So let's bring your right foot when you're ready into your loop and have your hands reach up and you might find that you like to hold, the strap a certain way with this loop, and you might try a few different positions to see what works best for you. K. So the hope is that when you're here, your right leg's straight, left leg bent, that you have the arm bones and shoulders moving towards the floor, and we'll find somewhat of a stretch, hopefully, in the hamstring area on your right sides. Little bend of the elbows.

K. If you wanted a deeper stretch, let your left leg be down on the floor, and we'll come to our classic hamstring stretch. Which again, we might notice today's hamstrings might feel different than yesterday's hamstrings and be kind and careful as we move deeper into that stretch here. Okay. Not overdoing that. K. So holding sometimes a little longer can be really helpful to get a little bit more actual leg through the muscles so they're not gripped or tense. And now let's add a little bit more for the shoulders again as you slide your hands along that tail of the strap and pull a little bit with your hands until you, find maybe a slightly new place in that right hamstring to rest your focus.

While also targeting the shoulders. Once it doesn't feel for good for your shoulders, you just go back up the strap and hold your arms straight above you. K? Some of you will be reaching back behind you. And take one more moment, letting more of your backside soften into the floor here. And then take your right hand up, maybe for that loop. Open your left arm out to the left.

And let your right leg gradually open up to the right sides and looking for that stretch for that inner right leg as your left arm and shoulder press into the floor. And just working at increasing that range of motion, having a slow, luxurious stretch here through the right leg. Can we bring awareness again to your breath? Again, moving from the nose down towards the hips. Exhaling from the hips up towards the nose.

You can come back up towards that center position, and then the left hand gets the strap, right arm up to your right side. And do a little bit of crossing over to your left sides, and letting that right side of your body lengthen a little bit here. K. Orient your gaze towards the ceiling, nose pointing towards the ceiling. And see how it feels to settle into maybe two more breath cycles here. Okay.

Gradually roll that right leg back up. And rebend your left leg for a moment. Let's move the strap off your right foot, set it to the sides. Okay. We're gonna keep that right leg open and maybe hold on to the pinky side of the foot. If you feel like it's difficult to reach your foot, you might even just hold your ankle or grab your strap again. Okay. Now take your left leg back to the floor straight.

So you're doing happy baby on your right side. Open your left arm out to your left. It's gonna feel for that different stretch through your right hip and through the front of your left hip. The shoulders, releasing towards the floor here. Hopefully, by the end of class, you'll feel a little more open through every corner of your hips and shoulders, spine.

It starts to slide your left heel back in under your knees, so your foot is knee is bent. Rest your right heel on top of your left leg. Now lift your left foot and as your legs swing towards you, catch either the front of the knee, the back of the hamstrings, or add the strap around the front of your leg, and we'll come into our figure four stretch to get into yet another part of your hip. Maybe rock yourself a little bit side to side as you give yourself time to let that right femur drop into a good spot. So more of your back body is willing to drop into the floor here.

Soft gaze, bringing your focus to that area where you're feeling the stretch and noticing what your flexibility and range of motion feels like right now at the start of the class. Okay. We'll let go of that front leg, if you're ready, and transfer your right foot to the floor. And now let's go ahead and grab your strap and send your left foot into the strap, left leg in the air. And you might have, a way that you like holding your loop here with your hands to keep your left leg up in the air straits. K. And just for ease of settling in, your right leg might be bent until you find a healthy stretch for your left hamstrings.

If you feel you want a little bit more sensation to work with, take your right leg down and see if that's a good place to be today or back up a step. Can we relax the shoulders a little bit more towards the floor here? And sometimes that means we have a little more bend in the elbows. Alright. So treating yourself to really nice stretch here, not feeling hurried or rushed, and encouraging a little more contact with the ground underneath you. It's open your right arm out to the right and then start to open your left leg out to the left.

A little gradual tipping. Until you meet that stretch for that inner left leg, shoulders pressing back firmly into the floor, nose pointing towards the ceiling. And then feeling again, when you meet that edge where you're really noticing that stretch for the left side, if it feels a little too much, you tip your leg a little bit back up toward vertical. You're noticing that change is here. Yeah. As you're ready swing that leg back up towards center and rebend your right leg for a moment, we might get rid of that strap.

And set it off to the side as we raise your left foot back up for the happy baby on your left sides or hold your ankle if that feels better. Right arm out to the right, left, right leg comes down in front of you. And that might intensify that stretch for the front of that hip area. It'd be deeper into the psoas muscle, as well as your left hip. Alright. So with your nose pointing to the ceiling, shoulders, pressing back, a little bit more towards the ground.

And take your time, luxurating, and that opening for the hips, appreciating the support underneath you. And a moment or two to give yourself time to open here. K. Then we'll rebend your right knee, if you're ready, and put your left heel on top of that right knee for a moment. Swing the legs towards you and catch the back of your right leg or the front of your knee and give that little hug in towards your torso. Now sometimes rocking a little bit side to side helps relax and massage those muscles of the lower back.

And when we're more relaxed there, we might notice that left hip settles into a better spot for you to actually enjoy the stretch here. Okay. So attention turned inward and just observe. Again, the change is happening in that left hip. And maybe over the years doing this, maybe you've noticed you have a little more range of motion with your consistent steady practice or knowing that is possible with steady, consistent practice that we can work on increasing our flexibility. Let's go ahead and release that front knee. If you're ready, and you just set right foot down, left foot down.

Let's send your feet to the edge of your yoga mat. Open your arms to the side, and let your knees tilt like windshield wipers to your left. So now we're going a little bit more down toward the quadricep and front hip. Stretch your right arm towards your ear. And so we have a a long stretch from your right fingertips down to your right knee.

And if your angles between the feet don't quite feel right, readjust until you feel that stretch going all the way down through the front of your hip to your knee. K. Give it one or two more moments here. Take your right arm back out to your right side, and we swing the knees parallel, and then let your legs drop a little bit over to your right side, like windshield wipers. Take your left arm towards your ear. And see if you can adjust your feet angle so that you've got a nice stretch from your left hand all the way down to your left knee.

And often, you know, you're kind of in the right zone when you feel a little bit more of your back body sinking towards the floor. He's hopefully not feeling rushed, but just enough time to really dive into this left side here. A more reach through your waist down towards the knee. Alright. If you're ready, we're gonna tip back towards neutral. And with your arms down towards your side, tip the knees towards your chest, now catch the back of your legs, and let's bring ourselves up towards sitting.

Okay. We're gonna spin around in our position and turn to face the floor. Finally leaving the ground here and we're gonna take our blanket and slide it now and open it so it's underneath your knees more or less about the center of the mat. So let's set the toes down and set your knees about hip distance apart. Walk the hands now at least a handprint forward of your shoulders. And let's start to swing your hips a little bit back as you come into your extended child's pose. Hey. In the beginning, you might even move your hands a little bit wider just to give you a better opening in your back body here.

And then as you come forward, tabletop, bring your chest through the arms and you're in your upward dog with knees down. And then going back to your extended child's pose. One more time with that forward movement, just a little bit opening through the front spine. Coming back into your extended child's pose. And now let's hang out here.

Whatever amount of hips going back feels good for you. See if you can dial into that wonderful stretch for the shoulders and back muscles as your hips are slightly stretching back. Also fair to feel a little bit of that stretch down towards the buttocks. Alright. Now bring yourself a little more forward, curl your toes under, walk your hands towards your knees. And let's lift the knees up and fold your blanket one more time for a little more padding as you're on the knees.

And bring your right foot forward into that low lunge position. You might point your left toes straight back, and let's work a little bit on flexibility for the hips and shoulders. As you look straight ahead and let your arms sweep up as your hips come forward, and then we'll move back and down with your arms. Arms come up as we do our low lunge. And then move back arms down.

Two more. Going through that lunge and move your arms down, body back. Last time, going through our lunge with our arms up. And moving back and down. Okay. Let's go ahead and switch and bring your right knee to your blanket and bring your left foot forward, pointing your right toes straight back.

Now, as we take our arms up, let's go into our low lunge. And arms down with your body back. Nice and slow, inhaling into your lungs with that maybe a moment of pause. Going back and down. Inhale going into your lunge and back and down.

Let's take your left knee to the blanket, and as you bring your hands forward, come into, tabletop, and then shift your knees off the blanket and come into downward facing dog with your feet airing on the maybe slightly wider side, maybe about as wide as your hips are a little wider. With a little bend of the knees, push your hips up and back. And then gradually let your heels settle a little more towards the floor. So intending to feel a little more stretch through your calves here. One more moment or two holding the stretch.

And that feeling of your heels gradually reaching towards the floor. Just walk your feet towards your blanket, walk your hands towards your blanket, and we'll set our blanket to the sides. As you get ready to come up toward standing forward bend, the top of your mat with bent knees. Let's go ahead and grab your opposite elbow. Give yourself a moment to go into a slightly deeper stretch here.

With a knee bent. So it's more about your back stretching, maybe than the hamstrings. One more exhale in your forward fold. Release your arms and maybe ragdoll roll your way up towards standing or whatever's best for your spine and then shake out your limbs, your arms, your body, and we're gonna find our strap again. And once you have your stop, we're gonna turn to face the long side of your mat. So if you open up your legs a little bit wider like you might do in your warrior two pose, turn your left foot out and bend your knees straighten your leg a little bit as you open up your strap loop.

And well, one more time, put your hands in, thumbs are out. Bend your knee, and we're gonna stay with that left leg bent and your warrior two shape. And let's stretch up towards the ceiling with your fingertips as you come into a slightly deeper hip stretch here. Okay. Pushing out into your loop wide through the upper mid back. Let's bend that knee a little bit more as you reach a little bit over to your left sides and feel like you're pushing into your loop.

He's still keeping your shoulders wide. Come back up toward neutral and straighten your front leg just for a moment and let your strap go behind you. Take your right hand back, walk up towards your left hand. Left elbow pointing to the ceiling. Let's come back into our warrior two legs with your left elbow up in the air.

K. A little more stretch for that left side of the shoulder and chest. One more moment, getting that longer stretch for the hips here. Now for the shoulder. Let's release the right hand, the left arm, and turn your left foot in. Bring your feet a little closer.

Hold the strap behind you with your palms facing away from your back. And then let your arms stretch back away from the buttocks. You can bend the knees. For those of you that like to tilt forward, come into your forward bend with bent knees. Arms reaching up and back. If bending forward isn't working for you, stay standing.

One more moment here. And bring yourself all the way back up. Take your strap in front of you and let your feet open again a little bit wider. This time with your right foot turned out, bend your knee kinda finds the loop of your strap here. And once you have your hands in, thumbs are out. Stay with your right leg bent and try to tune now into both legs and the hip stretch you're getting here.

Arms come up. Do a little bit of pushing out into your loop. And as we work with that stretch for the shoulders, we'll do a little deepening into your right knee as you reach out to the sides. You can feel that lengthening through your side body and deeper stretch for your hips. Gradually bring yourself back up to center straighten your front leg for a moment.

And from here, we'll go ahead and take your left hand behind you, holds the strap walk up towards your right hand and have your right elbow in the air. And let's re bend our right knee to come into that warrior two leg position. This time your right elbow up in the air. Okay. Take a moment looking straight ahead, opening up through that right shoulder. As you release your left arm from behind your back, right arm down, turn your right foot forward.

Let's heel, toe your legs and feet towards each other. And we'll set your strap down to the sides and take a moment and let's meet back up at the top of your mat. He take just a moment here aligning yourself in mountain pose with your palms facing forward and just tuning into your posture for a moment here. When you're ready, let's reach those arms up towards the ears, looking up towards the ceiling. XL, bend your knees, fold over and touch the grounds as you look back through the legs.

One leg and the other goes back into our plank position. As we've settled into our plank position, holding one more moment before we let the knees touch down. And let's swivel over onto your right hip. So you end up on the right side with your legs staggered like 90 degree angles. Take your left hand, reach over to the right, and we'll just do a little rotation towards the right side of the room.

If it's okay, take your elbows down under your shoulders and let's go a little bit deeper into that left side of your lower back and waist area as we stay with our elbows and wrist and palms pressing together or elbows pressing into the floor, more specifically, and feeling what range of motion you have here to do this rotation towards the right. I'm thinking another moment here. If you wanna go a little deeper, your elbows might slide wider, you might stack your hands and bring your forehead to your stacked hands. See if that adds more sense of stretch for you that you're enjoying or stay higher. Alright. So hopefully you enjoy some aspect of that stretch and maybe doing that more often.

Let's anchor your hands, lift yourself up. And let's have the legs just swivel right around to side two. So the legs are again staggered, more or less 90 degree angles. Reach your right hand over to this left side, and you might start in this tall position. We come down to the elbows. And enjoy that opening here now a little bit more through the right side of your body.

So flexibility through the spine, that waist area. Maybe notice again that warm ups through the hips makes it a little easier to turn this way towards the left. And if you liked on the other side, coming down lower, you might see if that's appropriate here. With your elbows wide hands stacked to settle into our right side body stretch here. And hopefully enjoying again what you discover here through this side of the body.

If you're ready, we're gonna start to bring your hands a little bit more under your shoulders, lift yourself up, and then swing your right leg out straight and bring your left leg out straight. Let's bring her bolster back just for a moment to have a little something neutral. To have your hands on your bolster, legs wide. Maybe slide your hands out towards the edge of your bolster. And if you need to, you bend your knees to get a little more reach forwards. K. So as we're working towards that forward bend, just to get a symmetrical stretch through the legs, after doing our asymmetrical side stretch, moment lifting the chest up away from the belly.

K. One more moment with that nice lift through the chest, grounding through the legs. Slide your hands back along the bolster. Start to bend your knees a little bit, and we can set that perhaps to the sides and cross your ankles and set yourself rock into a comfortable seat or sit up on your bolster. If you like a little bit more supports, and just keep enjoying again how that feels to support yourself with props to settle into the poses a little longer. Alright. And with your eyes to the horizon, eyes open or closed, a little gratitude for all that you are able to do today.

And in closing this part of our practice with the palms together, in front of the heart center, may others continue to benefit from our practice? Nava stay everyone. Thanks so much for being here. See you next time.