Class #1401

Resilience & Suppleness Mat

45 min - Class
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Description

Jennifer Golden Zumann joins Pilates Anytime with a Mat workout based on the concept of finding resilience and suppleness in the body. She adds movements that are more primal so you can have fun while you are working out. Jennifer also encourages you to declutter the cues that are already in your head so you can focus on moving the body and feeling good.
What You'll Need: Mat

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Jan 09, 2014
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Hi, I'm Jennifer Golden Zuman and today we're going to be doing a mat class based on the concepts of finding resilience and suppleness in the body. We're going to look for a primal animal like way of moving. A number of the things we're going to start with right now are inspired by some of the video footage of Joe's standing exercises. I like to stand and begin with that. So let's go ahead and just begin finding your standing position.

So I like to find these two hip bones and try to line up the center of the knee and just about that first and second toe space and have your feet about five degrees off the mid line. If there are straight in and then your thigh bones are tend to turn inwards. So we want to make sure that they are open just enough that you feel there's a springiness through your ankles and your knees and your hips feel nice and supple. So we're going to begin now with thinking about having wings. Okay. So I want you to imagine a webbing really.

You can think about your whole arm through the sleeves and that it wraps around your back, tucking into your sacrum and continuing out through your legs. We're going to begin with both arms just a couple of times. Let's inhale and bring it up. Oh, your collarbones to pivot upwards a bit and then exhale, bring it back down. I like to turn my palms on the way down. I like to feel that sense of twisting. Now what's kind of fun is it's one thing to think about the tissue on the outside of the skeleton, but what if we think about the tissue on the inside of the skeleton?

So imagine that that sleeve of the arm wraps the inside surface of the rib cage and just to explore what it feels like. The way I'm going to teach today is it's a way I'm into teaching now and the more I learn and when I learned different things from different people, it changes. It adapts. Part of what we need to do is declutter the pile of cues we have in our head and return to a sense of feeling the body move. After this one, we're going to start doing one arm at a time. As we lift the right arm, I want you to imagine that it lifts the left side of your sacrum and then exhale, okay, back down, and then the other side. Feel it. Lift the side of your sacred. Allow your body to feel kind of like a slinky, so sometimes you can feel your bones move underneath the skin and tissue a little bit.

Now we're going to bring both arms up, make some muscle happen in the arms, turn the palms, pull the elbows in towards your body. Reach back out and press back down. Now we're getting a little more active. Inhale, exhale, inhale and exhale. And I do this. I do so much. I feel like I want to rise up. So just kind of imagine that it's like you're in water and you're trying to swim to the top of the pool back out, and one more time up and pull it in. Reach out and down. Good. Now bring it up again.

We're going to make a fist. Lift the arms higher. Use your arm muscles now clasp bend and pull and then straighten. Open and down. Lift up. I know it's a little funny. Make your muscles clasp straight and keep pulling and down. Again, lift, clasp, pull and switch hands each time. I didn't mention that, but hopefully you thought of that. Pull. Stretch, open and down. Good.

Now bring the arms up again and we're going to start with a little bit of a forward fold or curl. I don't want your hips to go back at all. I want you to imagine that you're in this blanket in this web and you curl. Maybe just a little bit at first for me, but I just start the morning. It's kind of like this and then I use the resilient tissue in the back to lift me back up and bring the arms back down again. Bring it up. Don't fear the shoulder movement either. Coil forward, Yay, free the shoulders, bring it back up and back down two more times.

Open and lifts, lift and then bring it back up. Good and down. Now maybe it'll go further. What do you think? Play with it a little bit. Can it go adjust a little more maybe and then back up. If you feel a tug in your low back, do not go that far. It can't go that far. Good. Nice.

Lift up and then open and okay. Now we're going to go all the way down so you can bend your knees a little bit if you need to. Up. We're going to roll down what we're going to come out. We're going to sweep to the right, so sweep out and you should look like a candy cane when you get there, like you're against the wall. So come all the way up like that. Like you're against the wall still. All this is working. And then bring it back down and then out to the other side, over and up and back down.

Give a kind of a little tin quality, but keep it feeling supple in spree and down. Other side up. We don't want the hips to wander around. Keep the hips right in the middle. [inaudible] good. We're going to go all the way around now. So we go to the right, we go up. Ah, all the way around. This is standing, corkscrew. Go the other way. Now up, lift up all the way around. Good. One more time to each side.

Try to keep those hips right in the middle so they don't wander right. It'll limit the range a little bit, but it'll help you find your resilient range. Good. And then roll all the way back up. Take the feet a little wider. Bring your hands to your hips. If you get your fingers right in this little crease between these front hip bones, then you can really feel if those muscles are engaging.

Now this is a funny one and I've seen it in the videos and I just love it. So you're gonna exhale, bend your knee, bring nose towards the knees, squeeze out your air, and then spring right back up. Other side. Exhale and inhale. Strongly. Press that foot into the floor. Good over [inaudible].

Yeah, when you compress it all, it springs back open one more time. To each side. [inaudible] let the spine get kind of round as you do it. Great. Now bring the arms out to the side. Strong fists. We're going to do the discus thrower. So you're gonna twist. The legs going to bend and the arms are going to abandon.

You're gonna Punch three times and then open back up. So if you think about rotating your lungs as you go, rotate your lungs and you ring them out. Then the resilience of the lungs brings you back open. Yes. So three of those. It's like doing this fall and twist one to three. Let the torque come from the waist and the legs.

The torque power comes from the legs. Good. Let's do two more to each side. Let that power come from the legs and open last one, two, three, and open. Good. Okay. Now we're going to do what I call the crouch and pounce, which is currently my favorite thing in the world. So come down to your knees, hands and knees. And there's a couple of components to this. There's the crouch face, and then there's the paths and the landing phase. So our first one is going to be on the in the hovering cat kind of position. When we say line up the wrists, I want the crease of the risks to be in a straight line.

That might mean the hands might be different from each other slightly, which is fine as long as the bone structure of the arm is properly stacked. So the first thing we're going to do is take a full breath in and then as you exhale, you're just gonna put weight into your feet and float the knees up. I want to make sure you get a good sense of this position because when it's in the right place, everything is nice and spring and then lower it back down. [inaudible] let's do it again. Lift up just a little good. Open your sit bones a little bit. Yeah, so you feel a zip through that low back and bring it down.

It's tempting to put almost all your weight in your hands, but make sure you feel four legged now back up. Okay, now we're going to crouch back. To prepare to pounds. You have to keep your eyes on your prey as you go back. So look at your prey. Yeah, get ready and then we're going to pounce just to that floating cap position. It's like your head hits the wall and you end up stopping right there. Feel the spring stretch and coil it forward. And again, back and forward. One more time, back and forward. Great. Bring your knees down for a moment.

Phase two of crouch and lbs is from a plank position. So let's step out to our plank. Go ahead again, find that there's equal work and weight in the hands and feet. Get your eyes on the prey, which might be a little further out. Now that we're ready to jump a little further and come back. Now really prepare the backs of those legs.

If you can imagine that your heels against a wall you're going to push forward. So there's just as much activity through the backs of the legs as there is arms and forward. Good. Yeah. Come back there and find your, find a Yo-yo moment. Like when the Yoyo goes down, it's going to work to come forward. So kicking back here, think about going slow motion so it's not too fast. Yeah, so you can keep a sense of support the whole time and open. One more time. You can bounce or not bounce. I like to bounce cause it feels good, but I'm there, but it should feel like a slingshot. You draw back the slingshot and then it whew goes forward. Good. Okay.

Now we're going to do an upstretched version of that. So we're going to make a ripple through the spine. We're going to crouch again, and then our pounds is going to go like this through that upper back until it opens back up again. Let's just do about three of those. Ready, crouched back, wind up, and then coil forward and open it to the very end and then zip straight, strong. And again, let's make sure that plank doesn't collapse, right? Lift in here as you come forward. Curl and then straight and strong right there. One more time. Looks good. Okay, very nice. Okay, now my favorite of these is Spiderman. So it's going to go like this.

We're going to get our crouch and then you're going to open it aside and rich and then bounce right back. I still want it to be like an India. Really? It? Okay. Why don't you open towards me first. Okay, so ready. Get ready for your windup. Up we go. Great. We're being that proud. Yeah. Crouch back. Get your crouch and then you're getting your left arm. No, the forearm start. Yes.

Open up and reach. Press your feet actively into the floor and then wind back. Get bouncy and open out to the other side again. Yes. And wind up good and open and wind up good and open. Keep this like bent and push it into the ground. Yes, Ben. This one, and push it into the ground. The one that you're supporting you.

You want to keep it bent. It's almost like doing a bridge and precedent of the floor. Reach back. Last one. Good. Reach back and back to center. Whew. Good job. Now Cross your ankles and sit forward.

You should be so supple right now that our roll ops are going to be fabulous. Ready. Let's go up for a minute, get your blanket again and then just wind yourself up so you stretch that tissue and then let it lift up again like we did in the beginning and again winded up and then lift now winded up again. If we don't allow ourselves to lift the potential we're creating right here, we can use to roll back. So the back body and I was working to open the front body all the way back and then the arms come up and the front body is working to open the back body all the way forward. Beautiful. And again, good. And you know what? I'm not concerned about where your arms are exactly, but what I do want you to do is tune in to the elastic nature and move from there. Let's do two more. Reach your legs.

Go ahead and try to let go of some of the cues you may have heard in the past. Think about pulling your sitting bones, embed the sitting bones into the hamstring tissue to continue to get length on the way down. [inaudible] then roll back up. Now this time as we roll down, we're just gonna roll to the kidneys. So roll back, fall into the kidneys, slide your legs in, and then choose where if you like your hundreds here, if you like them here, if you like them here, I'm good with that and begin pumping in and out. But what I definitely want is the backs of those legs working.

Just like when we were crouching and pouncing, I want them to give the thrust through the upper body so they're active and you're drawing the belly in in a way. Imagine wheels, the head, the neck, the shoulder girdle, the rib cage, they're like wheels rolling forward. What do we have? Maybe two more. Let your arms kind of wrap with you a little bit so you can feel the harness of musculature around the body. Go ahead. Let's do one more breath cycle. I think that's nice and bring it back down. Good.

Restin for just a moment, but then press your arms into the floor actively. I want you to really, really press your arms. I want you to create a very solid base for your rollover. Press your palms, your forearms, your upper arms. I want the triceps fired up even before we begin now ever so slowly stretch the legs up as the belly deepens back. Good, and then use the spring of your arms to take you back. Open legs. Flex the feet and roll back down.

Now there's something interesting that Joseph Paul had his rights in return to life, which is open the legs as wide as possible. See what that feels like. Roll back, open the legs as wide as possible as possible means without losing the rest of your form. Of course, and then bring it together one more time, but there's a definite difference between just a little bit open end. What happens in the hip sockets when you really open up. Good. Now begin with the legs open. Press those risks down. It's tempting for those rips to pop up, but I promise you you will like the effect through the triceps if you press those risks down. Yeah, it'll make those arms work much more helps to keep the chest open as well.

Good. Last one here and then let's go ahead and keep the legs up for a moment, but reach your left leg down to the floor, reach it down. Let's go ahead and bend the right knee for a moment just so we can get there. I want you to press the meaty part of your heel into the floor. Not Be Achilles, not the back of the ankle, but just press into the floor so you fire up the whole back side of the body there. I really want to have an activity through the back of that leg. Now we're going to inhale and take the leg across the body. Let the pelvis roll a little bit. Exhale, unwind.

So the knee is going to stay bent. We come back to the center, then go the other way and really actively press that heel into the floor and exhale. Let it unwind right back to the center again. Let's take it across. Another thing in return to life is that he says that the opposite hip should come up and it's a specific thing. It says, note the right hip is raised, you know he, so this becomes a lumbo pelvic rotation exercise. I'm referring to the legs circles. So let's straighten the leg up and let's give that a goal that see what it feels like. Take it across, around and up. Now that support leg on the floor, that is what propels this movement. The sturdier, your solid side is the freer. The moving side will be good. One more and then we'll go the other way.

Let's take it open around sweep and up and to good. Don't worry about bringing it up towards your head too much. I don't want it to cause your pelvis to curl or you'll no longer feel that left leg. No, let's keep it up here and let's go ahead and climb the tree. So we're going to climb up, up, up to the top of the tree and then back down and again, roll yourself up. Wow.

Good. And then back down. I think I could see a little bit more attentiveness to these two front hipbones pulling towards each other. Yeah, let's see what we can do there. Good. Now. Let's stay here for a moment, holding this leg up. Now let's bring it down and place that foot on the floor. Bring your behind you to the mat. Want you to push through your arms, pull your belly back and bring your head towards that knee and then bring it back again and press and open.

[inaudible] so we come down, here's the coil, and then the recoil. Want you to feel that opposition one more time. We're playing with, we're playing with the tissues, we're having fun with the way our body is resilient. Good. And come back down. All right, let's do rolling back now so you can lift the leg back up, roll back down, bring it up to the ceiling, stretch it to the floor, and then anchor that side. The other side will come in and stay bent to begin with. Inhale across.

Exhale, unwind, and then inhale, open. Good. Remember that the power of this really comes from the support leg. That's where this really comes from. If you press the calf or the Achilles down, it just doesn't work as well. So you need to make sure if this is totally not a correct anatomical term, but I call it ankle or Josias. So I guess it kind of is. It's a con. It's a concave curve. So yeah, versus this, this really flexed position, right? Because when you do that, you kick in that whole back side.

Let's bring the leg up now and go into the leg circle. Let's take it across a round and up and give so much more attention to the leg that's not circling. So we get this beautiful glide in the socket one more time. And again, our arms are strong, everything's working other way around and up. Good. Three and two, that looks great. If you really tune in and then you can tell how far to go. Now climb the tree up. We go think about slough, like really climb up that tree and then back down.

We want to use our arms as much as we use our legs and back up. Climb up that tree. It's tempting to think this is going to be about my abs and yes it is, you know? But really I want you to get a sense of climbing. One more time. Come up, use the arms and come on up there. Now bend the leg down, place the foot down, hands behind you. And I like to sometimes find my, find my springing this a little bit, you know, just it feels good. And then push forward and then back and up.

And again when you come up, there's this telescoping quality where the thigh telescopes, there's tissues, layers of tissue that telescope open. And then one more time. Yeah, you got that going at the end there. That was great. And back up. Good. And I'll bring that back down. Okay, we're going to switch forward just to bed and we're going to do rolling like a ball. So wrap your arms around your legs, lift your feet up off the floor. Now you can hold the legs apart like this if you want.

I kind of like to see how tight of a ball I can get and see if I can really roll there. So give it a go, but try to feel first before we move. The pelvis is rotated, that rib cage is rotated and allow the weight of the organs to drop into the lumbar spine a little bit. Use gravity to help you into this curve and then inhale back and exhale forward. Now, once you've found that ball, your breadth motivates your movement. [inaudible] great. Two more times.

We're going to go right into single leg stretch, so pull the right leg in. When you go back, I want you to feel this slingshot like quality. Go ahead and roll into it. Roll into it, roll into it, roll into it. When you get there, hold and open the space between your pubic bone and tailbone just a little more, and then switch legs and switch. Now this is a breathing exercise.

Each time I want you to feel this quality of this pumping kind of plunging plunger motion. Good. Last one. Okay. Now we'll do my current favorite version of double leg stretch. If you need your restaurant back for a second, that's fine, but what we're gonna do is bring the arms and legs out and then stretch the arms back around and in. Reach towards your toes. Turn the arms open around and in, and this is a great hammock quality. When you go back, I want you to be supported by your hammock and then wrap it around you. Really imagine there's like a net. One more time, field and net and around and in, right leg, up, left leg down. Inhale and exhale again. Feel the net.

Now I want your net to come up this way more. Yes. And let your vertebra rest into it. [inaudible] one more time with each. Okay. Now let's see here. Bring your hands behind your head. Feel your net now only as far as we can.

We reach away and then we roll the hips back into the socket. Beautiful. Keep that net up up here even more. And Coil back into it. Yes, one more is good cause we got more common. And Inhale, bend your knees in. Exhale, twist to your right and get your first position. But hold in this I like three breaths to really make sure that this counts to roll up higher. On the third breath, I want you to inhale and bring it back in.

I want you to see. And the other side, if you can balance on the bottom most ribs on that left side. Can you get up on that bottom roast most ribs good. And come back down cause this is a phenomenal breathing exercise. Phenomenal organ exercise. Come up towards me just a little more. Yeah, make that secondary good and back down other side. I do like two rounds of the slow of three breaths.

Like accordion breath. Now we'll go fast for eight, seven, six, five up, up, up a little more. Come on. Open the bottom a little more. Last one and a rock yourself right up. Open the legs out to the sides. Arms are going to, let's do the hands in front of you. If you need to. Prop yourself up on something that's quite alright, nice and tall. And then slide forward. Roll from the top of your head. Slide your arms.

Feel your head coil, your neck, your upper sternum, your lower sternum, and then let it spring you back up. Okay, now let's make this a breath cleanse. So as we come forward, you go forward. Roll the diaphragm's going up, up against the bottom of the lungs, and as you coil every drop of air on those lungs, the lungs will lift you back up again. One more time. [inaudible] good and back up. Beautiful. Let's scoot forward a little bit. Grab our ankles and open into our open like rocker. Open up we go. [inaudible] again. There's one interesting thing that that is in return to life, which is keep chest, well rounded. Chin talked in.

So I want you to imagine again that you're laying in this hammock and you don't have to do it that way, but we're exploring it. See what it feels like. Let's inhale, roll back and exhale roll up. There's something really invigorating about lifting the chest at the end, which is perfectly fine to do, but let's see what it feels like to stay in this rocking shape. One more time. Good. All right. Now let's go ahead and bend the knees and bring the feet down to the floor.

We're going to roll back into a bridge right now. So you're going to lay on your back. Knees Bent, feet flat. So let's make this a, I'm a physics experiment. Instead of thinking about rolling the spine out, let's try something different. Let's imagine what happens if we simply try to upright the shinbones on top of the ankle and it pulls the spine along with it.

So without squeezing your booty at all, it'll kick in. But that's the happy byproduct, not the, not the primary force of the exercise and roll back down. Let's take your feet a fraction wider. Feel the whole lateral edge of the foot, the fourth and fifth toes all the way to the heel. Really strong. Do not pinch, you're behind. Simply bring your shins forward and then press those feet actively into the floor. And lets stay up now actively press the whole foot into the ground and feel as though the of the pelvis can unfold.

Can you relax your touch just a little bit more and then yes, and then there we go. Gorgeous. Now fold the right leg in. Reach it up towards the ceiling. Imagine that you're going to make footprints on the ceiling that are going to be propelled by this left leg. So we're going to go up and a little bit down up. Again, if we're looking at the resilience, we're just looking for resilience, not for, not for grip, not for contraction. Hold. Now reach the leg down, page the other side of the room with your toes and then bring it back up and again, paint the other side of the room and back up. Good.

Wrap around my yes, and back up. Good. Then the knee then and placed the foot on the floor. Let's come down before we do the other side. Good. So we want to avoid feeling like we're narrowing the bottom of the pelvis because we want health in that lowest part of the back. So let's press those feet again.

Send the shins forward so you feel the layers of tissue telescoping open and the thighs. Let your tissue go. [inaudible] press up into my hands right here. Good. Now the other leg is going to come up and reach up to the ceiling. Flex the foot. Let's make footprints on the ceiling for three good. Two beautiful holds.

Reach through your toes a little bit and then reach the leg out and up and again, reach and up. One more time as good. Use the whole foot on the ground. This is just like the leg. Circle that support leg. Bend the knee and bring it back to the floor and lower that spine back down into the mat. Rock up to a seated position. Now for the saw, open the legs out to the sides. Bring the arms straight out. Let's make this an Oregon exercise. I want you to imagine first just to twist to the right.

Feel both lungs roll with you as you twist to the right, and then bring it back to the center. Now imagine that the turning of the lungs is what leads you. So we're not necessarily focused on the tissues on the outside of the skeleton right now, we're focused on the inside of the skeleton. One more of just the twisting. Now we're going to go into the sauce. So inhale, twist. You feel those lungs rotate, then coil them up to three and bring it up. I kind of like those three, three saws. You know one, because it gives that nice resilience and then it opens one more time to each side. One, two. Let's not give up on that back arm. So turn the back palm up and press into my hand. You all the way.

Turn it like that more. Keep going. Yes. Press my hand. There it is. That's what I want to see. Do. One more. Did you decide to get that back of that arm working? Press my hands. Yes. Good. Very nice. Alright, now come up to come to your belly. Let's just come right to the belly now.

Begin by letting your forehead rest on your hands. Okay. We're gonna focus on how to get thrust through the upper spine, so I don't want the legs all the way together or particularly wide apart. I want them to be nice and feeling like they're extending out of the pelvis. I want the front of the pelvis to feel really comfortably anchored into the floor. I'd like you to for now, avoid pushing your pubic bone down for stability. We're going to try to find stability through other means.

I'd like you to feel the triangle, the pubic bone and the two front hipbones like a cookie cutter on the floor. Now take a deep breath in and as you exhale, feel your belly rise but your spine come to meet it just at the top of that sacrum, that flat door at the back of your pelvis and then again inhale and then exhale. Feel as though that tissue in the low back slides up to create some structural support back there. Good. Now we're going to do a two count exhalation. First exhalation is going to be belly to sacrum. That same thing we just did. Take that sacred forward second pieces, the legs are going to try to lift.

Now this is a wonderful bit of exercises from Irene Dowd and then bring that down. Inhale deeply. First count. Exhale is going to be the belly and sacrum. Bring this forward more and then the legs. It's almost like the sacrum here is like suspenders, pulling the legs up, up off the floor, lifting those legs up off the floor, you k and your low back and then back down. One more time. Try to keep the front of that pelvis down a long, low back doesn't mean a round low back. Keep that in mind.

It means following the shape of the bones. Good. Now we're going to do this and we're going to add the next piece. So the first part of the exhalation is that support. Second part is the hamstrings. Third part is you as the hamstrings, as a lever for the upper body to extend forward. Take the hands with you on your forehead and it's going to lift only as much as your legs feel like they're counter balancing them and then back down.

Good again. Inhale, exhale, belly to spine, legs, upper body. Think of sending it forward. I want you guys, I want your breast bones to shine towards each other, so more forward than upwards and back down. And one more time. Belly and spine legs and I want to see it come forward more than upward. Good. Now hold this position and bend your knees. Open your hands.

We're going to do a breaststroke here so your hands are going to come by your sides. We're going to reach forward through the arms and legs. Keep the belly lifting up. We're going to swim through space, opening the chest just a little bit more dynamically and then bend it back in again. Reach forward. Inhale, open, exhale, bend two more times. Reach forward. Inhale, open. Really feel this support and exhale bend. Remember your legs, provide the thrust. Good and bend. Beautiful guys, curl your toes under.

Place your hands if you can. You're going to float light as a feather, stiff as a board, right up into a plank position. Otherwise you can come to your knees and come up and back out again. All right, let's lift the right leg up and reach back and then bring it back down. Left leg reach and back down. Just for now, let's stay even instead of lowering back through the other foot cause I want you to feel like the leg is reaching out of your trunk. One more time to each side. Good. Last one. Okay. Let's lay on your side.

We're going to begin our side leg series with another Irene Dowd inspired exercise. So you're going to lay all the way on your side with your front body in a straight line. First thing we have to do is get that support of front to back. Then we're going to bend the knees back, keeping the top knee up a little bit so you don't strain the knee. So we want to make sure that we are front body solid and we're not curling the tail at all here. Now we're going to press through that bottom shin and we're actively gonna press and perhaps the hips will float up its heels together.

Yeah, and then down. Exhale, count one is the support count two is the press and perhaps the hips will lift. I don't want you to flex your hip or just try to lift your hips though. Let's think of the lift being the happy byproduct. The activation of the side and the side of the waist. This lateral triangle and the side hip muscles is really the goal of this exercise.

Let's do one more of these exhale and see if we can lift right up under there. Good, and then bring it down. So now that we've kicked those guys in, we can do our sidekicks. The legs will come slightly forward. Let's see. I really like to not use the hand on the floor because I think if you're losing your balance, you may need to zipper up a little bit. So press that bottom leg again and try to get that same sensation in your lower side. And let's inhale as the leg goes forward. Exhale as it goes back and only go so far as you can.

Still feel the support through the other side of the body. You can keep going. Inhale and exhale. Let's not worry about a double kick. I want to get a nice pendulum swing three more and two and one. Hold it back there. Now I call this a heart swirl because I want you to imagine that the line is so clear that you can feel the leg all the way up to the heart and then we're going to circle that leg and I want you to visualize, you're kind of getting a whirlpool going internally.

Three, two, one, switch directions. If it's not connecting you maybe squeezing something too much. We only need to work as much as we need to. Not, you know, not as much as we can. Three, two, one. Good. Bring your knees forward. Let your head drop down. Again, lift your feet up. We're going to do a clam here, so let's open and close that top knee.

Let's do five, four, three, two, and one. Hold for moment. Remember that bottom leg guys, let's use it and then bring it back down. Good. Okay, let's do the other side. So we're going to start with this side stability exercise. You went on, make the whole front body into a nice straight line. We're in hip extension, we're open here and then we're going to bend. Keep the bottom of the pelvis open. If we do this, then we're kind of jamming the femur head, thigh, bone head where it doesn't belong. So I want you to feel a nice openness. Yeah. And take a deep breath in here. The front knee will, top knee will be up a little bit and then press the shit and see if those hips can lift. And then back down. I like to press kinda right about here. If you press your knee, you end up using your rotators. If you press down lower, you end up using your side of the leg more. [inaudible].

Let's do about four more. This is a magnificent therapeutic exercise. I'll do this sometimes just before I go take a walk or take a jog or something because this kind of sets me up and gets me ready to ready to use my legs and rises it ready to transmit the load through my whole body. One more time. MMM. Take the time to get that first exhalation. First moment of excalation happening. Good. Now once you've got it, let's straighten those legs again. He'll be slightly in front of you.

You can turn that bottom foot and really anchor it into the ground. Get that side working again. It's this lateral triangle and side of the hip on that bottom side is really providing like there's a tot hammock on the underside, lift the top leg up, make it crease right in the hip joint here. Yeah, and then go forward and back. I think sometimes we reach that leg too long in an effort to not shrink up that side. But remember we want to stay in the socket, so you want to make sure that you're connected through the side of your pelvis here and you're not over. You're not overreaching through that side of the body. Three more, two and one.

Let's hold it back and let's see if we can give our heart a little a little swirl. So start swirling the leg and just make it so clear that it feels like it just moves the liquid through all the inner spaces. Switched direction everywhere that there's not a bone or an organ or something is fluid. There's tons of fluid in there. So this is not just like imagine water. This is like for real. There's water. We want to make everything move and get it to all the tissues. Good.

And bring it down. Bring your knees forward. Now let your head come down, lift your feet up. Good. And now let's open and close. Let's explore that hip socket, that bottom leg. Remember that provides the sense of [inaudible]. It's still animal. I don't want you to get rigid here. Two more times and one great, and bring that back down. Beautiful.

Okay, now let's go ahead and come up to a seated position. Now we're going to do a little back support teaser Combo. So we're gonna do a table. We're gonna do a modified version first or a level one version first, and then we'll move it into a little bit more of an advanced version if it seems feasible. So we're going to start with the feet open in line with the sitting bones, hands behind you.

So the first thing I want to do is I just want to kind of explore your arms and shoulders a little bit. We're finding the webbing so we don't go beyond our range. I want you to find where it feels resilient. That's the important here and excluding the back. Find the resilient range. Okay. Now we're going to press through the feet.

Press through the arms and the taught Hammock of the back body is going to lift you up, okay, and then you're going to come down. I want you to come down with your pelvis in a bit of a curl so you land and you can go either here or here. Either one is fine, but don't go straight yet. Save it, save it. We've got some fun later and then bring it down. If you really want to go straight, if your body just can't resist, you can go ahead. But I want to see about playing with the hip joint, just lifting the legs without activating the quads yet. Let's do one more of these. Now, if this is like clearly for these ladies to easy, then we can go on to going to a straight teaser and then we come down and the fingers will go to the sides here, up, back, down.

And again, we're playing with this is the interplay between the front and the back body. This time we'll stay up here and hold and let's see if we can lift the right leg up and down. Now we're revisiting this idea of the opposite leg, providing the liberty for freedom of the moving leg. One more time with each side. Good. And we're going to take it right back to our teaser, right back into that teaser. Good. Now let's roll just a couple of inches back perhaps, and then climb back up the mountain and again, a couple of inches back and climb back up that mountain. Reach those arms, reach those arms one more time.

Imagine that you're going to hand make your clothes in that hammock around you. Good. And then you guys come on down from here. We're going to do a little mermaid. It's another Special Coil Related Mermaid. So you're going to sit with your legs to the side like this. Your hands going to come to the floor and here's the windup.

This is the windup. We're stretching this tissue out and then it's going to spring us up. And then here's another windup and it opens us back out again so we could think about the bones, we can think about the muscles or we can kind of play with this sense of elasticity a little bit. Good. We're going to do one more and then we're going to have some fun. So we're going to go to the windup here to this side. No, really winded up, winded up so much that you can't even contain the energy when you bring your hand to the floor and it lifts you up and back down and over and it lifts you up. One more time.

Okay. Let it lift you up and we'll finish with the stretch. Clasping the wrist twist towards your legs and squeeze the air out of your belly. Good. Come up. Let's do the other side so you can just swing those legs on around. Okay, so let's play with this. We're going to go away from the legs first and I just kind of let my elbow come down. I think of my arms being as spring too and over and up. Good.

Let your hand when it hits the floor. Let it feel like a cat so it just bounces back up. Okay. Now, this time lined up so much, so much windup. We're really coiling it up here. It doesn't mean we're stretching deeper. It means that we're really getting it ready to spring open and lift you. And again, take it over, spring it open.

Good, and just go where you go. You know you can just go where it feels good right now. Read your body, read your resilient range, and now lift the arm, clasp, twist and stretch. Okay guys, we're going to come into a close right now. So we're going to do our seal can come back in. Bring the soles of your feet together and reach under and grab your feet again. Find yourself into a nice round state. Clap for three.

Let's roll back and then roll back up. And you can clap overhead if you like on the fourth one. So we have two more left. I want you to come right up to standing. Good. You know what? That was fun, but let's do a little more Ninja thing. Let's get a little more Ninja. So we're going to go like this.

I want you to put your hands behind your legs. I want you to come to here and go right back to like a little crouchy thing again and right back again. And try to do the opposite leg each ready. And you don't have to do seal legs again. You can just hold. Yeah. Ready and or even behind. Yeah, roll back. Whatever's going to get you there.

Good and right back into Ninja. Yeah. I want you to ask step step, because most of these animals, like four legged animals, we'll step step. Yeah. And you know what you can practice. If you can't roll up and down all the way, then just come to this position again and practice this kind of leap back with opposite legs. We're just gonna do two more ready. But I want you to feel like an anima ready yet. It's just fun. It's just fun. You can't take it too seriously. Any of it ever. Okay, good.

Now come back to standing position. Alright, we're going to do first, just little, little rebound style pushup. Okay. So you're gonna roll down from the top of your head, lift your belly and walk forward. We're going to first do it on the knees just to make sure everybody can do this. All I'd like you to do here is feel a little bouncy.

So we're gonna go one little bounce, two little bounce, three little bounds. And on four we're going to go down and up. Yep. One Hand Up, two little bouts, three little bounce and four and up. Good. Curl your toes under. Walk your hands back and roll up. One more set, either on the knees or you can go forward on the hands. Roll down, walk it forward. Good. Take your pick on your position and we want to feel one bounce, two, three and use the same resilience again. One, two, three and say, resilience. Curl your toes under.

Lift your hips up, walk back, feel the spring is of your body. Bring you back up again. And three times we inhale and we exhale just like we started. And again, feel the weight of the feet comfortably into the floor. Imagine big our wings. Last one.

Fingers interlace, stretch up. Imagine your arms are holding a net and that your sacrum is resting into that net. Let the arms open and good workout. Thank you very much. Yeah.

Comments

6 people like this.
There is so much in this class that I had to stop and just watch and listen.
I love how you reference from Return to Life.
You are an inspiration.
Hi Michaela! I'm so glad to hear you were inspired! You know, no matter how many different ways I explore the work, I can't help but love checking back in with Return to Life :)
5 people like this.
Extend the shins forward over the ankle :)))
4 people like this.
Thank you Jennifer for this wonderful, challenging and feel great class! I appreciate your energy and teaching style. Your cues were spot on magical, helping me go deeper into each exercise! Not to mention, I can breathe easier now after taking your class. A big boost for my sinus cold! Thanks again!
2 people like this.
Excellent class - nice and vigorous - great stretches - loved the plank to teaser series. Thank you.
Hi Sunni and Rena, thanks for letting me know you found some effective cues! It's always nice to know that my movement musings make sense to someone other than me!
Plank->Teaser->Plank, one of my fave's, Stacy. I'm glad you had fun!
3 people like this.
Just lovely! I so appreciate the richness of your approach, nuanced, incorporating multiple systems in our bodies. Beautifully fleshed out! And love the references to Irene Dowd. She intrigues me! :)
Hi Miriam, thanks so much for your encouraging comment :)
Follow your intrigue with Irene Dowd, too. She is full of gems and genius!
1 person likes this.
Excellent!
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