Class #2296

Work on Breathing

45 min - Class
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Make the breath work for you in the third class in Alan Herdman's progressive Mat series. He adds on from the previous class focusing on establishing work in the muscles before doing the movements. He also adds in preps for exercises like Swan and Teaser as well as a challenge to test your balance.
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This is class three. A lot of the exercises are basically the same, but we're just adding onto them. But what I want you to think about all the way through is those basic positions of using the muscles, of establishing the work in the muscles before you do the movement. Okay? And with the breath is making the breath work for you rather than just putting a breath to the exercise. This time we're going to just do a pelvic tilt with a slight difference.

So in the same position, just watch me first your same position as we started all the positions, the pelvis, the feet, and the rib cage and your arms. You take a breath whom you breathe out and you curl up quite high this time, but keep the weight into the center of the foot. As you breathe in, you take your arms back onto the floor behind, and as you breathe out, you roll down from the front of the torso and stretch your arms away from you. So you get a, you can let the shoulders go up, really stretch a long stretch. Then draw the scapular down and bring your hands behind the head. Breathing in. Then breathe out, lift and curl into a chest lift.

Reach our arms out and then go down. Okay, so just it's just in your mind. Establish where your feet are, where your spine is. So take a deep breath in. Now as you breathe out, curl up as high as you can onto the shoulder blades, but not too high towards the neck. Okay? Keep all the way up. Bring your arms up and over your head. Breathing in onto the floor behind you.

Palm spacing the ceiling. And as you breathe out, roll the spine down, but stretch your arms using the curve from the front of the torso. As you go down, let your shoulders go into your ears. As you're stretching more, draw the scapular down and bring your hands behind your head. Breathing in, elbows up, just a little. Lift your sternum breathing out. Remember to keep the neck long. Chin open, richer, arms out and lift a little higher and then relax. Back Down. Breathing in and breathe out and curl. Well, wait, wait. Start again. Curl you.

Some of you are doing a bridge. I want to curl. Remember, we're rolling. So breathe out and curl up. Ran The back as you go up, arms up and over your head. Breathing in right back behind. Now stretch your arms away and reach. Now. Roll through the front of the torso as you go down. Slide the shoulder blades down and place their hands behind your head.

Breathing in, lift straight up and then into a car. Keep the chin away from the chest. Stretch your arms out and reach a little higher. Lift, lift, lift, lift, lift, and then relax. Back Down. Breathing in silent breath and breathe out and curl up all the way up. Tip the pelvis a little more. Curl the other way, Ratner, so it's more like this. Okay, that's it. Now bring your arms way back. Breathing in, stretch through your armpits.

Really reach, reach, reach, and sink down. Feel the curve of the front of the torso as you go down. Hands behind your head. Breathing in, breathe out, lift the sternum and curl board. Lift, lift, lift, lift, lift. Stretch your arms out and reach. Reach, reach, reach. Reach. Now. Hold that. Point your toes breathing in on the, keep your toes on the bed.

Now as you breathe out, lift your right knee up, keep the heel down, keep the heel down, and then down and left. Knee up and then down, and then relax back down. So when you lift your legs in this position, don't sort of kick the leg. The heel drops as you bring your knee up towards you and then down. Okay, one more time. And breathe out and curl.

Think of the spine. Rolling like a ball. Bring your arms up and over your head. Breathing in and reach your arms away. Stretch through your armpits. Now keep that reach as you roll down from the front of the torso. Hollowing out the stomach muscles as you go down. Hands Behind your head, drawing the shoulder blades down.

Lift curve. Reach your arms out and stretch. Stretch, stretch. Now point your toes breathing in, right knee and down. Left knee and down. Both knees. Lift, lift, lift, lift down and relax. Back down onto the floor. Good. Lift your knees up, arms up straight. Take a deep breath in.

As you breathe out, [inaudible] forward and stretch your legs out to about 45 degrees. Turned out legs, and then breathe in and go down and breathe out and reach. Lift the sternum and breathe in to go down and down and breathe out and stretch about, about there. Okay. And lift. Turn the legs out and then down. Better. Now Bend your knees and go back down again. Yes, and one more. And reach forward and, and just rest. When you take your legs out, if you, if you take them out into this position, the legs are too heavy.

Rotate them so you can use, remember the exercise we did earlier where we were bending the knees up to get the hamstrings working and the ones sliding across to get the inner thighs. We're going to do the same. We're going to use that. So as you could at you press the heels together and rotate. So you get the inside of your thighs and the back of the legs working and you'll find the legs are much lighter to hold into that position. Okay, so this time, okay, take a breath in. Now as you breathe out, stretch open the legs, breathing in, flex and close, lifting a little higher point and then go down. So arms down, legs out, turned out, open the legs. Open.

Wide Flex and close point. And then dad, the whole dog. [inaudible] about up to the ceiling. Bring gentle. Take your legs quite so low. Okay. Right. I'm changing it. Arms down, legs out. Whoops. Let's do [inaudible] together. Are we ready? Ladies?

Drop your views down, right. Arms down, legs out. Breathing out now open your arms and your legs. Breathing in. Flex now slowly come forward. Reaching a little higher as you come forward. Point and then go back down. Arms up straight. Did you get to add and arms done? Legs out, arms and legs opening. Breathing in, flex and squeezed together as you come up and then dat and arms down, legs out. Open.

Breathing in now lift your upper torso forward as you come forward. And then down at rest. That's instead of the hundreds. It just works. The I've, I'm not a fan of the hundreds. I have to say all this. But if you do something like this, it's the same position and you're using the same breath in the same stomach muscles. Oh, y'all right there. Okay.

I call this the windmill as take breath in first. As you breathe out, take one arm back and one arm forward. As you breathe in, you go to the t position, you rotate one palm up, the other palm down, breathe out, and then breathe in. And then the other back. So we'll take one obvious types of guests, startup straight, first palms facing. Let's take our right arm back, so take that right arm back, breathing out, and the left arm forward, left arm forward. Now breathe in and go into the t position. Rotate one palm down and the other palm up.

Continue the circle and lift up and the other arm. Dan says, stretch back. Now stretch the tee position now stay in the t position. Flip one arm over in the other arm up, and then continue the circle and up. Hang on a minute. Let's try that again. Okay. Just watch me. There's the, this palm goes down, this palm, the palm goes back. So it's the back of their hand going behind you.

The front of the hand that goes down to there. Now you go out to the t position. Now the right palm goes back, the left palm goes forward, new, continue the circle and then come up. So why that is. So you're getting the rotation and the move into the shoulder joint. So when you're in this position, it's a rich. As you rotate. Okay? So we'll take the right arm back first. So where we're, let's do it together.

So breathe in now. Breathe out right arm back, left arm forward. Now know where your position is. Take your arms out to the tee position. Hold it right arm turns up, left harm, turns down. Continue the circle and then lift other arm and back. Breathing out.

Breathe in and go to the t position or hold it there into the tee position as you change arms and continue and lift. One more and one more. Set and back. Right arm, back, left arm forward. Take your arms to the side, right. Palm goes down, left palm goes up. Continue the movement and lift better. Now, left arm, back, right arm. Forward tee position. Right arm up, left arm. Done.

Continue the circle and lift and rest. Good. What are it's really in this position is to rather than just flipping its rotation into the shoulders who are getting much more work into the shoulder joint. Okay. Roll-Ups, stretch your legs out. Arms back behind head. Yeah.

Okay. Um, I'm straight that. I'm going to change it slightly. So bring your arms up first. Breathing in, lift your upper torso forward and pause. Focus below the navel. And now breathe out and lift. Oh, point your feet and stretch over the legs. Stretch one, two, three. Breathe in.

Flex the feet and slowly roll back down. Breathing out. Feel the energy going through your heels as you go away, pulling back and stretch our arms back behind your head. So bring your arms up. Let's change the breath slightly. Go back down and take your arms. Bring your arms up without any breath. Point your feet. Bring your upper back and head forward. Breathing in, bringing your arms parallel to the floor. Pause there, focus on the area below your navel.

Now lift up into that curve and slowly stretch over [inaudible] and reach over with pointed feet. Stretch one, two, three. Breathe in and then slowly breathe out. Going down, keeping your arms parallel to the floor as you go down and stretch back. So we'll go down with flexed feet. Come up with pointed feet. Okay, so ums up, no breath, upper back and head forward. Breathing in now. Pause and breathe out and focus below the navel as you come up.

Point your toes and stretch. One, two, three. Breathe in and slowly breathe out. As you go down, flexing the feet as you go down. Pull down more and stretch. Let's do one more like that. Point your toes. Bring your arms up, upper back, and head forward. Breathing in pause now. Focus below the navel. Now lift into that curve. Lift, lift, lift, lift, lift, and then stretch over with pointed feet. One, two, three, four, and slowly go down with flexed feet.

Very good. Three, four. No, it's just one. Two. Yeah, it's not a pulse. This time, you're going to curl up. You coming up, you cut up to here and then sit up to a straight back. Bend one knee, flex the other foot and stretch over. One, two, three, four, lift. Stretch the other leg out. One, two, three, stretch.

Lift and out, and then slowly go back down. Okay, so it's one leg at a time. Once you're in the c curve, stretch your arms back. I remember too that I want that pause where you focus just below the navels who are lifting from the lower abdominals rather than lifting. Hiking yourself up. So arms up, slow it down, a little upper back and head forward. Breathing in pause now. Lift up until your shoulders are over the hips.

Sit Up very straight. Bend your right knee and stretch your arms up to the ceiling. Flex the foot. Sorry. Keep the foot pointed and stretch over and stretch over. One, two, three, four. And now sit up straight. Change legs and stretch over and one pointed foot.

Two, three, four. Sit Up, very straight. Stretch both legs out. Flex the feet and slowly roll down and stretch your arms back behind your head. Now bring your arms up, upper back and head forward. Breathing and pause. Breathe out and lift. Sit Up very straight.

Bend one knee and stretch and stretch over one foot, two, three, four, sitting up. Very straight. Change legs. Breathing in and breathe out. And stretch. Two, two, three, four. Sit Up straight. Breathing in. Stretch both legs, arms parallel to the floor and slowly rolled out. There we go and back.

Very nice. Sitting up. Spine twist. I want your palms down and your arms pulled back so they're slightly behind the shoulder so you are supporting between the shoulder blade so the arms don't swing so they're back behind you. Now we'll go to, let's all go to face the front first. Okay, so breathe in and turn, turn, turn, turn, turn, turn. But keep your arms in line and breathe out to come through center. Breathe in and turn. Lift up through the spine. Lift, lift, lift, lift and scent. Hang on for a second.

What I'm, what I tend to get is that, feel that you've got a large s polled through your shoulders, so you're keeping your arms back in the position. Okay. Elongate stretched up. Come on, up, up, up, up, up, up, up. Thank you. Breathe in and turn slowly, slowly. Still keep lifting. Keep lifting. Keep lifting. Better. Center and breathe in and go to the other side.

Center. Now I'm going to change it. Turn to your, to the front. Now hold it there. Lift your arms up to here. Now turn a little more. Turn, turn, turn, center. Open your arms down and go to the other side. Turn. Now bring your arms up and reach through the torso. Come on, lift, lift, lift, lift, center, and open the arms down and turn to the front.

Lift your arms up and let the whole torso up. Reach, reach, reach, reach, center. Open your arms, turn, lift up. Rich. Come on, rich, rich and turn. Smile Center and then dad and relaxed forward. Very nice, very nice. Lying on your back. Okay.

Same semi soup and position. Bend one leg up to the chest and slowly stretch it to the ceiling. Flex and take it down to the floor. Okay, then bet without touching the floor. Bend up and stretch, flex and take it down four times. Point. Breathe in and lift your leg up. Slowly stretch, flex and reach through the heel. And then Dan and Ben, wait, make sure the center is held and reach. Flex and really push through the heel as you go down and bend and stretch.

Flex and stretch through the hamstring and a nice other side. And then breathing it in and reach. Flex and point and bend and stretch and take the leg a little higher. So when you bend your knee, bring your knees close to the chest as possible. Then try and stretch it in the same place.

And it doesn't matter if it doesn't get that far and then just gets the hamstring working a little more. And then, and stretch. And Dad, I think that was for on that side was that four? Yeah. Now lift your right knee up to the as high as you can, but don't strain it. Open the left knee, ultra little rotate this leg in the hip joint and I want small circles inwards, four times and outfits, four times going across the body towards your bent knee so you feel it working through the hip joint. But keep the hip space square as you do it. Holding down on this hip. Good. So you're getting across your center line with the leg rotated. Do four inwards and four outwards and then we'll do the other leg keeping the other two the torso completely still and hold the hip. Still. Remember what we're doing here. There we go.

That's good. And then other leg, just draw your tummy down just a little more on that. That's it. Try and stay, but not probably not as open as that. No. Turn out and bring it right across. So you're aiming to get that cross position. Okay. Try and keep the hips as square as possible as you do this and control it through this feeling of narrowing the waistline in both directions and then bring the legs down and relax and slowly sit up.

Come to this side of your bed, onto your toes. Hold onto your ankles and elbows wide. And it's the same thing that we talked about earlier as having a circle this way and a circle this way. So keep the head dropped in. Take a breath in. Now as you breathe out, he said if I fall down, I fall off this thing and curl up and then back balance back and then up six times. Keep it, keep it going. It's all right. Uh, and just do as much as you can. Don't do it or you don't have to add curl.

Just relax and up. Try and a real, hang on a minute. Try and get a rhythm going. Sure, sure. Okay. Better. Are you breathing addressed? Just make sure you always keep this feeling of openness of the back because if you're too, like remember you gonna roll up onto your back so it has to be wide. Okay. So rather than closing, get as much as possible in that position. Try One more and you are in time and that, that's it. Yeah.

Dressed. Okay. Lying on your front. What we'll do is hit from this position, stretch the legs out. You can have the leg slightly turned out you, as you breathe in, you're going to slide your hands towards you bending your elbows and drawing the shoulder dates down. I didn't slide very well on this, so, so you're getting that feeling of the thoracic extension and this. Okay. And then back down. Okay, so just slow what you think of the scapular sliding down your back as you do it and then you bring your hands towards you into it. That's it. So you bring your Elvis as close to the shoulders as possible and then slowly slide back down again. Is that done?

And then pull up, that's it. And then draw the blades down first. Keep them apart and lift. That's it. And back down. Okay, sit up and let's bend the maths in half. So your hands are on the floor so you can slide a little more. Is this one what I want you to do here, same position.

You'll stretch out, but you're going to keep your arms straight. You hear this and you're going to slide up and lift to the, and then back. We're going to do it there twice. Then here, twice the same way. And then we're going to change our hands on the side of the hand. Yes, your little fingers on the floor and do the same thing in that and then back and that position and then back. Okay. Arms completely straight. You are to start from below the shoulder blades and breathe in.

As you slide up. I'm straight, I'm straight, I'm straight. Shoulders Dan, shoulders down. Good and read out and slide away and breathe in. And lift the sternum, drawing the shoulder blades down and slight guard and not turn the Ha. Move it up. Move it out. Put so palms down, palms dive a little wider and slide and dad. Well ignore the noise. Uh, slide drawing the shoulder blades on the come together a little more as you do this. And then dad, now bring your hands back and center with the palm spacing each other and a draw down the shoulder blades. Lift the sternum and feel a stretch from the pubic burn right up through the sternum and then back and breathe in and lift.

Nice and dad and wide. And with palms that and not too wide. It's just just there you go. And lift and low and lift. [inaudible] pull the shoulder blades down at this more and the undressed. Sit Up and stretch your back out.

Now you should feel the openness in the chest when you do that. So different positions you can do more than just two positions. But normally I would do it with a towel on the floor. So if you've got, makes life a lot easier. Okay. And do you know you can go that wide and why do you think it's going to help you with plus and polishing the floor?

Swan. Swan dive. Okay. Right. Lying on po, open out the maths, stretching out again. This the same as we did in the other class. You lift and stretch. Would you hold that lift and do scissors back and forward four times and then done. Okay.

Flow Count of Eight, the scissors. Okay, let's face the front [inaudible]. Okay. Now Really Elongate so that you've got your head away from your arm and you're balancing on your fingertips at the front. Okay. Stretch your hand out. Palms down. So I put the palm down. Really just gives you a little more support.

Now stretch the legs and lift the bottom leg up and bring the head up. Feel ahead and toes are going in the opposite direction and our top leg forward, bottom leg back and change to slow. Three, four, five, six, seven and then eight and then back and a lift again. We're going to go fast and reach out. And one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and change over to the other side. Okay, so the first one is very long stretches. If you're reaching away with the, with the feet. Second one is much faster. So really stretch out and reach away. Stretch and stretch.

One and two and three and four with me. Five, six, seven [inaudible] and ate and together and dad and lift and one and two and three and four and five and six and seven and eight and that good on your back. Try and think of the [inaudible] values as doing and one and two so you're not late so you get their on one, get their on two rather than halfway. Double x stretches on two counts. So you're going to start here, not, I want you to think on this one is your arms are completely straight so there's no sort of bits and pieces going back.

Sued and won two and two. So it's there and back. Okay, so you go from bent to straight mediafly. Okay, hold onto your ankles. Elbows wide. One and two. One and two. One and two. One, two, one, two and rest. And it's, I'm not saying it's wrong, it's just I, it's when it, when you do this or they just think of chop.

So it's back and forth. Let's try one more set. Keep your eyes forward so that you leave the head in the right alignment. Elbows wide. Now I'm going to give you the choice you can breathe in to go out or you can breathe out to God. I really don't mind. And one get there. Back. Two, three, four, five, six and rest.

Okay. Okay. Yeah, so right. Single straight leg stretch. Hold on. So it's one to three and stretch to three and stretch to, let's start altogether. Okay.

Have a right leg up, left leg dad, and pull. One, two, three, change. One, two, three, change. One, two, three, change. One, two, three, change. One, two, three, change. One, two, three. And rest. Remember it's called the single straight leg stretch. Okay, so both legs must be very straight. Teaser preparation. Just hold. Hold on. You can cross your Ang. Just hold onto your wrists like this at the back of your knees and you can be onto, let's do it just under the sit. Burns in this position.

Now pull her stomach muscles back. Feel that pulling together now just from there, just straighten one leg up very slowly and then done. And the other leg up slowly and then both. And I can't get my leg straight. Yes I can. And uh, and one leg stretch. Stretch both legs stretch.

Now try and hold that. Take your lay hands away and reach up to your feet. Bend your knees, take your hands back and then dad, very good. Do it again. Roll down. You can roll down. You can roll down or you, yeah. Brett, when you finish or I mean keep the, keep your knees bent and then you can roll down from there. Okay. Hmm.

Yeah, I don't mind. And then start again. Yes. I like a little, a personal, uh, addition to the exercise. It's okay if you want to row down at the end. By all means, cause it's a good preparation for the next class. So a good position, right leg stretch, left leg stretch both together, stretch and down, right leg stretch, left leg, stretch both legs stretch, stretch your arms up and now slowly roll down from that position and then relax your legs addressed. Okay. Onto your hands and knees. Remember the cat we did. That's do the cat again.

So round your back. So just that we show, remember you're in this position, thighs and go, Elvis slightly rotated out. So go run the back and now it's the pelvis that does the work and reaching through and then it's the [inaudible] starts and back. We'll do four of those. Then we're going to go back to a flat back or not completely flat. This is slight natural arch. And then as you breathe in, you're going to stretch your right arm and left leg out and slowly bring it back in without changing the pelt position and the other side stretch and then back.

Okay, we do forecasts, so no curl up from the pelvis, from the pelvis. Keep the shoulder blades down, show the blades down. Now hold that curve. Now start with the pelvis, the pelvis sticks out the thighs. Stay at right angles all the time. That's it. And get the thoracic spine working and then curl.

And let's talk with the pelvis. The pelvis uplift the sternum up a little more. Lift the sternum, have this slightly rotated outwards and that'll help and curl up and slowly go back to a flat back. Yeah, well remember what I said, still have a slight neutral natural curve. Now from that, as you breathe in, right arm and left leg, stretch away and slowly come back without changing the pelvis. As you come back, think of it sliding than the underneath and the other side. Breathe in and breathe to come back [inaudible] and stretch away. Breathing in and reach and then breathe out and stretch away and one more to each side and stretch away and back. Nice and stretch away and back and sit down towards your heels and stretch the back out. Sit down towards your heels and release.

Take a deep breath in and slowly breathe out and relax. Breathe in and relax. Now come up into his kneel, kneeling position and up straight. One leg out in front and place your hands on your knee and stand up. Good, right?

We're going to face that way. What you do is you standing up straight and you are going to shift weight. [inaudible] legs are very slightly rotated out. Just just watch me first. You shift weight and I really pull up on this side a concentrate on the elongation so you're, the weight is over your right leg in this point.

Now slowly lift your left knee up and bring your right arm up as you do it. You said rocking from side to side. Take your knee out to the side and pull one, two, three. Bring your arm up, bring your knee back to center, and then slowly down. So we're going to shift weight onto our right side. Really feel up right through your center.

Focus on pulling up and onto that leg. Now slowly lift your left knee up, concentrating on the balance, and bring your right arm up to the ceiling. Take hold of your left knee with your left hand and take it out to the side. And lift one, two, three, four, center with your knee, lifting the other arm up and taking it down. Now the other side, and stretch that right onto the leg. Now stretch that the up, that the knee up and take hold of it and pull to the side and stretch.

One, two, three, four, lift Joel knee to the center that your arm up and slowly go dad and stretch once more to each side. Do you know if you fall over or stag? It doesn't matter cause then you'll know where to work on your balance. I'll tell you what, we'll do. Come a little closer. Hold on. No, no, I so don't be too far away. So you've at least you're balancing. So just, just slightly closer. Now you're going to, you, you're going to lift your right, be balanced on your left side.

Okay. Now lift your right knee up and take her to bits. Holding onto your partner. Oh, the opposite. Yeah. Uh, sorry. The opposite sides. Sorry, but, and uh, go out to the side and pull up. One, two, three, four. Bring your knee in front. Lift your outside arm up. Balance and lower your leg and change places. Just switch.

Swing around ad. That's just our, although you're holding onto your partner, think that they're not there. They may just suddenly walk away. So be ready and lift your outside leg up. But where we'd start again, sorry. Focus on your inside leg and get the weight into the center.

The partners balance. Now lift the knee up. Take it out to the side. Now pull one, two, three, four. Lift this arm up and bring your knee to the center and then slowly take it down. Nice. One more time. Oh No, not yet. Oh, did we do it twice? That changeover. Lift your left knee up right arm up.

Take your leg out to the side and hold and pull a one, two, three, four. Bring your knee into the center. Stretch your other arm up. Now straighten your leg out in front, Ben. Did Dan and place it onto the floor and bring your arms down and balance. And if Joe knee up, take it out to the side and pull one, two, three, four, right arm up to the ceiling, right leg out to the front and low the leg, and then done. That was very good. Did you have help?

Okay. Standing straight up, face straight and just do a roll down and slowly roll down. Just really feel the stomach muscles working to take you down. If you need to bend your knees. Do so. Breathe in when you're done there and slowly unfilled. Just stack your spine on the Vertebra, on top of each other as you come up using the stylet muscles and reach up and then bring your arms up. Come up on your toes, leave your arms there and slowly lower your heels.

Go over to your left with both arms, stretch, gone, reach, reach, reach, reach. Now, hold there, keep that right hip in place and rotate and turn and look down towards the floor. Arms are parallel to the floor. Come through center, go over to the other side, rotate, and then come up. So from here you go, you go over, you turn to the front, to the left, rotate back, and then around. Thank you very much.

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Comments

1 person likes this.
Alan, I really like your class, especially your variation with hundred ;) . Thank you!
2 people like this.
Wealth of knowledge. thanks to you I was released quite early from pt for knee replacement.??????????
3 people like this.
Alan, I loved your class and the methodical pace. Love your cuing of breath with movement.
Great class. Looking forward to the 4th one!
1 person likes this.
I love Mr. Herdman's approach and his methodical delivery. Very challenging but also energizing. I loved executing this class. the body felt wonderful -lengthened-when done.
2 people like this.
Lovely to see "Real client" shaped participants and the challenges they have with the exercises . Many thanks to them for taking part in front of the camera :)
Good class, an icon but he should always wear socks! No one wants that foot touching them.
Anna M
I knowledge instructor and lovely man but I think he forgot he's meant to be teaching us at home not the 4 people in the studio. Felt like they disrupted the flow

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