Class #2783

Light and Buoyant Mat

50 min - Class
106 likes

Description

You will feel light and buoyant after taking this Mat workout with Amy Havens. She uses the Theraband to give you feedback about your body positions and breathing. She also works on finding new ways to make connections to the band so you can stretch and strengthen your body.
What You'll Need: Mat, Theraband

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Hi Everyone, I'm here to do a mat class for us. Uh, what you'll need is just a theraband today. Uh, resistance isn't, is a necessary as length. You want a fairly long theraband for this class. Okay? So we're gonna Start, want you to put it on your mat, um, horizontally. We're gonna lie back on that more. You're going to lie down is putting the base of your ribs. Here we go, kind of your floating ribs right on the Bam. So find your, the base of your rib cage and mark yourself and go ahead and lie down. So why I'm using the band today is just to give us a little bit of feedback that, that resistance and actually using it to press into, in certain exercises, reaching into in certain exercises and just maintaining a sense of, um, connection of your basically ribs on your back. You're to start with.

And of course you'll be doing feed in there and reaching. So think, think, link and extension. Okay. And feedback. So let's just take about three deep breaths. Just placing your feet naturally, comfortably on your mat. Just let your body and your bed, your back and your pelvis just settle into the floor. You can already think about the, the resistant quality of that theraband, that Alaska city of it, and putting that image or that sensation, that feeling into your body, into your muscles, ligaments, tendons, and possibly even the spaces in your, in your joints, or between your joints throughout this class. Okay, so go ahead and grab the band. I'm going to do a little soft, um, hold on it and put it between my thumb and my index finger on both sides.

And then just feel your elbows resting on the mat and the band will start fairly loose at this point. Okay. So as we take a nice reach up, uh, with your arms to the ceiling, just hold that. It's not a push, it's just to think of a sense of length and take three or four breaths here. And on the inhale, let's reach our rib cage back against the mat or back into the band. So your effort of inhaling will probably give you a little sense of stretch on the band. The exhale. You'll feel a little release on us. Let's do three together. [inaudible] shoulders are even focus on allowing your ribs to travel back against the mat. One more time.

Inhaling back and then exhale. Just soften the band and then soften your elbows. We're going to do that one more time just to get you connected. Feel free to adjust the band if you need to. More on your ribs. Arms will straighten up. Shoulder blades are just easy on the mat.

You're not yanking them down. The a nice wide chest, three cycles. Inhale and exhale. [inaudible] looking straight up to the ceiling. Inhale your ribs back in the in the band and feel how that inhale effort is stretching the band and exhale it should be releasing it a little bit. And one more time.

So you hear us say breathe into your back often in math classes or into plays or maybe even into yoga. And that's, this is a way to kind of get into that part of your body. Okay, so keeping it here or let yourself rest of you need to, we're going to take it easy. Chest lift. So keeping the connection of ribs against the mats or against the band. So let's take a breath to get ready. Exhale. And as you lift your head, neck, and chest, I'm just going to take my arms in easy, reach forward. I'm focusing on keeping my ribs back against the band.

And then roll back down. Let's just do five altogether and he'll prepare and exhale some changing the breath in just a second to give you a little compare and contrast, but right now, inhaling here an exhaling, fold forward and two more. Inhale ribs to the band and exhaling, reach forward. And one more time. Inhale into the band and exhale, fold forward accrual for her. [inaudible] okay, so come on back and let your arms rest for just a moment. Stretch them back up. Now let's round forward. As we inhale, we'll do five more and same, same breathing into the band. Inhale forward ribs back. It's a little harder, I think.

Exhale as you come down, the band gets a little softer. Inhale ribs back and exhale, your body goes down. The band goes down three more times. Inhale. Some of you might know. What I'm trying to focus on is the post here, your aspect of the diaphragm to let the ribs read back. It's going to be a little more apparent in a minute here.

Let's just do one more. Inhale, curling forward, reaching those arms. Feel like you're trying to stretch them forward and exhaling down. And then just relax your elbows. Okay? Take your arms out to the side. If you need a little less resistance, just walk your hands further forward. Now I want you to, as you're lying flat, breathe back into your ribs against the band.

So if you tugged on this or somebody came around, you wouldn't be able to tug the band away from you. Okay? So your, your lawn it, you're lying on it. So inhaling, arms straight up can actually touch your palms together. Your ribs are wide, exhaling out just five times. Inhale, it's kind of getting a little more circulation in your upper body. Inhale, reach, exhale, and open. We've stretched the band inside. Decide out through the fingertips, ups to the ceiling and out the walls. One more time. Inhaling and exhale. Okay, let's take the legs out straight for a second. Arms by your side. It's going to be a nice loose band. Take a nice breath into your back, see the chest lift, and I want you to just keep your legs down and feel this. You're going to reach the arms long, stretch them forward.

Now my band is still fairly loose at this point, which is fine. I want to make more of an effort of stretching the band, reading the ribs back to curl higher. Okay? And then roll back down. We'll do five. Inhale as we rise. Crural ribs are back, arms are forward, legs are long. We're setting up for the 100 so after this set of preps, we're going to lift the legs. And so inhale, start to get that sense.

Your arms will be reaching towards your toes even more when you pump them. Okay? If you need to walk your hands backwards just a little more. If you want more feedback, that's fine. Stretch and back. Last one. Let's stay up here this time. Inhale.

Now I want you to turn your hands face down. Exhale, float your legs. Now start the pumping and yes, my arms are higher than normal. I'm going to tighten up that band a little bit and sense that you're trying to keep the band taught and reach. Okay? Do what you need to, um, make an adjustments, but focus on every inhale that you are reaching your ribs back so that you do not arch your back. Keep going. Exhale. Three, four, five. Stretch the band deep in the abdominal contraction.

Widen that chest should feel the tips of your scapula on your mat. One more. Inhale, three, four, exhale for five and lay flat. Yeah. Okay. Now let's just keep the band where it is. You're going to unwind it there with your hands. And once again, just reached the arms up. Let's try to get into a little roll up now. Okay, so reach up to the ceiling with arms but not shoulder blades.

So I want you to keep those back for just a minute. Go through that chest lift position. Now, right about here, I'm going to, I'm making a decision. I want more resistance or tension to assist me getting up. So I'm going to make a choice. I'm going to move my hands down. Okay? Yeah, that's gonna be a lot more from which I am going to like and need. So here we go. Inhale. It's almost like I want to stretch the band, stretching me forward, but now it's the ribs back in opposition to this reaching forward.

Putting that principle of oppositions a really pull the abdominals back into the low back. Adjust your shoulders. Now let's roll back. Do whatever you need to do with your feet. Try to keep them fairly stationary on your mat and left. Here we go. Reach the band, but the stomach goes back and opposition. You can let your head come down toward your arms. If that feels good.

Inhale again, keep your focus on the breath. Exhale back. Three more. Inhale, exhale. Low ribs back into the band. Inhale, you're reaching to it, giving you guidance. Last two, ah, and back. So this is nice. Elasticity of the band, that coil and recoil. Really giving that sensation, that movement quality, that principle of buoyancy into your movement. Okay, good. So let's just take that away. Let your arms rest for a minute. Lift your hips. We're going to go into some pelvic curl, adding a little bit of additional arm work into it.

So to unfold your band and just put it again, that same in between your thumb and index finger and just reach your arm as long and just let the band meet your thighs. Walk your heels. And so we'll take a nice breath in to prepare ribs back. And as we exhale, pelvic curl, you're gonna feel your thighs and your hips press upward against that band. You can pull your arms down against the mat for more arm work. That's what I was talking about, the shoulder extensors. Now let's take a full breath to roll down. Inhale, exhale.

You could just release the band a little bit near the bottom. Just so like so. Full breath to roll us up and XL. So the higher you press your hips, you are feeling that resistance into the band. Imagine your thighs rolling in a little toward one another. A full breath to roll down. [inaudible] three more. Keeping it moving. Yeah. Exhale.

Press the hips up. Pull the arms down, a full breath to roll down. It's getting that nice fluidity in your spine. Do you want more resistance? A little more arm work? You walk your hands and narrower, less. You want to walk your hands wider and rolling down.

Let's take one more. We'll stay up. All right, so there we go. We've got ourself pressed into the ballots. Take a like eight extra little hip presses, not rib presses. The ribs are stable. In fact, your ribs are back. Remember we breathed back so much. They're back there.

If the hips that come up and the hips up against that band. Three and four energy through your fingertips. Five inner thighs, pretty close together here, seven and eight, and then unroll your spine. We're going to go up and do one little extra thing with the hips and feet. Roll back up. Full breath.

Now before we do this next one, ticket inventory. Are Your arms stretching as long as they could be or your shoulders getting too close to your ears. Take an extra moment to stretch your arms. Okay. Lift your heels up off of the floor. Off the Mat. It's running a little tippy toe balls of feet position. Now I want you just to take one heel down, lifted back up, other heel down, lifted back up.

When you take one down the opposite hip almost, I want you to press more up into the band. Okay, so heel is down, hip is up. Your pelvis is not rotating. It's just like a physical feeling I want you to work with, okay? Bones are still level, heel and left. Heel and left heel, eh, left eight more down and up. Should be tapping into the glutes about now and lower arms are long down and for right around your sit bone. You should be pretty aware at this point.

Last time down. Lift both heels down. Now let's stretch those shoulders easy. Take your arms back overhead. Your hips are down. Level Mountain. Just take about three breath cycles. No pulling on the band. Just let yourself breathe. She should feel good to open that up. Okay, now let's extend the legs long again.

Can Walk your hands narrower. Why not? Let's do a roll up to get us up to the top. Oh, it's a little harder without the band behind my back. That's okay. Now we are going to put it behind the back so you have to probably open it up. Take a moment and get it down to low on the base of the ribs again, like so. Wrap yourself around. You don't have to cross the band. Just put that band right on your shins. Here we are again.

Breathing into the back. Six. Rolling like a ball. Your breath is what motivates the movement. Inhale back, exhaling up. That band is going to slap me in the face. If I don't watch out. You're rolling up. Breathe back. Hips up. Three more. Breathe back. Stay with that feedback. That band is nice to breathe against.

The last one. Wow. And lift. Did a place your feet, bring your knees together if you can and just hold your hands on your shins. I'm almost no pulling my hands up. My shinbones toward my knees. Visualize your collarbone bone rolling your shoulders rolling back and lift your chest a little bit.

Okay. To oppose all of that flection that we've just been doing. And then I want you just to find an easy sitting upright position. Release your band. Okay, let's go down for a little more of the work of the series of five after woops leg circles. I do want to use the band for circle, so put it on your foot. Okay. Ball of the foot. Have enough band on either side. It should be fairly even. Okay.

Now I've done this in a class recently where I want you to take your hands to the very end and you're on the floor opposed to where I'm out on a high table. Put your fist on the floor and really use your strong shoulders to hold the band down. Okay? If that starts to get a little too, um, upsetting in your neck, you just loosen it up and bring your arms in. Okay? Now here we've got this really big energetic pool side to side. Take a moment, reach your sitz bone toward your opposite heel. This heel wants this set bone, so I want you to angle that together. Here we go.

Big circles. Exhale round. Use this like the, the bigness, the size of the band to make a big circle of your leg. Range of motion today and four and five. Just let it stir five the other way. Open. Exhale, round, open, exhale around. So when I opened class, I said you're going to be using the abandoned lots of ways. Push into it, reach into it. I'm not even just thinking of my foot, I'm thinking my whole femur hold here. Okay. Lower the leg, so not even thing. Foot thing, Femur, head to heel, reaching that down into that band. Let's lift it up again and try it. One more time. Femur to heal on kids. A great place to transition. You're just going to step that other foot in.

Take a look, make sure you step on there evenly. Release, lift it up. Take a moment. This heel wants this set bone, so I want you to angle that down. Here we go. Cross midline, circle around, lift. Notice if the you lose some of the foot connection on the band or some of the reach. Try to keep a continuous reach against that theraband. Okay? Through the whole circle. That was your five other way.

Large range of motion. Stir that hip socket. Get. Keep that circulation going. Four and five. Okay. Just two times. Lower straight leg femur to heal and lift. Last one, Femur to heal and let's just take the band away for a few moments.

Talking to the sign. Tuck your head in. Let's just go on and go swiftly through the series of five ring, one of your in opposite leg stretches, elbows are lifted. Breathe into your back for two. Here we go. Inhale, inhale, exhale, exhale. So the band is gone, but to keep pretending or feeling like you're breathing back against each inhale. Let's go for three, two and double leg. Knees open today. Pull those heels in toward your high sit bones. They're your high inner thighs. Stretch out long and just hold. If you have the therapist in your fingers, you'd be reaching a back over your toes, out your feet, stretch wide like you had it a moment ago and leg circles and then circle around your shins. Pretend you have it.

Stretch and stretch and wrap. That would be where the theraband got easier, right? Less. Here's the tartness of it, the expansion of it, the release of it to more. See if you can find that feeling again within your own muscles and joints system. Last one, and out. Expand, expand and rap. Rap. RAP head goes down.

Let's do a little scissor. One leg up, one leg down. When I have you'd pull it in. Go for some flexibility today. Remember though, sit bone to heal. Here we go. Pull, pull, change, pull, pull, pull, pull, pull, pull. Ah, ah, ah, nice. And elastic. Eight more. Is there a place you can relax into this? Pretty intense. Um, flexibility. Exercise. Relax into it. Seven. There's your eight. Okay. Tuck your head down for a moment.

Interlace the hands behind your head. Let it feel meaningful. Holding your head. Lift your head in your chest. You should see your elbows out of the peripheral vision. Take your legs up. Pele's v now squeeze them in together. Reach again. If you have the theraband and you're pulling it down, pulling it down, you'd be pulling it up off of the floor.

Pretend if it's up here and you're pulling it down, you're pulling it down. Now, if it was hooked on the floor and from here you'd be pulling it up. Play with that for three more. Pull it down, pull it up from the floor, pull it down from the ceiling. That'd be fun to try and pull it up from the floor and pull down from the ceiling. And last one, we're going to take it up from the floor all the way up. Fold your knees is go into a little crisscross here. Do you choose, take one knee in. Now think about this shoulder and going back around the rib cage.

If you can look at that elbow you I'd like you to, but I don't want you to drop your head to get there. Thanks. Shoulder blade around your back, ribs, other shoulder blade around the back, ribs and shoulder blades. Again, if you have that theraband around you and you're trying to stretch it out your feet and maybe out your elbow and up your head, how many ways can you think of stretching that imaginary man? Let's go for use elasticity in you and rest. Okay, good. Let's roll all the way up. I think we'll do this for the spine. Stretch forward. Yeah, that's, go ahead and put it behind our back again. Alright, so find out the only thing working with the theraband.

Sometimes you have to keep adjusting and picking it up and things, but that's all right. Okay, so we've got a back on the low ribs. Here we go. I'm going to have my elbows hug forward against the band. I want to have my shoulders and external rotation. Take an icy breath and let's go ahead and round into spine stretch and reach your arms forward out a kind of outside frame of your legs. Here's that rib cage back thing again and roll back up.

Easy elbows. Let's do five. Inhale forward today and exhale recoil. Three more. Inhale, find your end points out your heels at your hands back, your rib cage. Exhaling, sitting a little taller. Two more inhale really should be connecting at a sense to have a wide back body. Last one, and the next sale is we roll up to sitting tall. Open your arms out. Let's take spine stretch or spine twist here. I'm going to come toward you first exhale. Now I want you to make sure you still feel both sides of the back rib cage on the band so this front arm hasn't taken your taking it too far, okay?

Your ribs are still against it. Inhale, center to the other side. Just one X. Relax your feet. To do this, you can stay focused on your torso and x for more x, stay against that band. It's tempting to come forward and let your ribs arch forward. You're a nice column, a cylinder that's rotating on its axis last time and center, okay, legs together. Let's take that away.

I do want you to put this over your feet. I didn't do rollover at the beginning. I usually need to warm up a little bit. Feeling kind of warm, so let's put it on the feet. Once again, kind of in the center of it. Roll back, put your legs up in the air and pull the band all the way down and we want some tension here. Pull. I want you to reach as high up there as you need to. I'm going to go full link. Make a vista fish. Pull it down. Okay, now, not just feed into band, not just femur heads band. That was like circles. How about sits bones up to the band? We'll see what happens if you connect that.

Here we go. Rolling over. Sit bones. Did the theraband keep your legs just as they are reading. Start unrolling. You can lift your legs if you'd like to stretch the band with your arms. Control the descent.

Let's lower down the legs a little bit again, sit bones to the feet. Do the band and rolled out. Just two more today. Sit bones, stretch and roll down. Can feel my hand is like doing gopher Paul here. Hold on a sec. I've got to get connected. Go for Paul was like that thing. Something weird. Keep a fist.

Keep it connected and all of that matters to reach your hips. There we go, and now, whew. It's hard for me corkscrew. I'm going to keep the band here. Take your legs to your right hip. Circle down. This is femurs into the band again and other way and around feel like. Yeah. I'm like you just wanted to twist a little more.

I'm going to go lower with my legs reaching. I want to explore that sense when I think of long inner thighs now toward the theraband I'm going to choke up. I want more to work with. Okay, so no rib arching as the legs reaching long. Once again each direction, ideally ankle bones are bolted, they're not sliding apart and pause. Okay, let's roll all the way up and lets come over prone with the theraband. Okay, so how about lying down? We'll start with a band right there, opening up again, poems on it.

Your forehead can actually be on it. That's fine. And just took your elbows in. Let's just do three swan. Okay. Not really using the band for anything at this point. We're just ready for it. For the next exercise. So hands are back by the ribs, elbows are lifted. Roll the collarbone, shoulder blades down and begin to move where we eyes looking out past the band. Guess you can use that band as a reference to keep reaching your chest too and coming down. So here's the great place. I know it's there.

I want to reach my chest to it and in my forehead too. Same thing going up. So it's the breast bone, it's the breastbone and forward and down. [inaudible] last one is such a great abdominal stretch, isn't it? This one. So nice to stretch the tummy. I feel your legs reaching back long. I'm going to look up a little, it always feels good to just complete that lift here and all the way down.

Okay, now I do want to use the band. Grab it in your palm. Elbows are down. Your approximately elbows. I want you to make a soft fist. Thumbs are pointed out for single leg kick. Pull on the band a little bit. Now I'm pulling on it with my hands, but you can also think of finding the pull of the band in your upper back so it's like upper back, a little narrow. Okay. However your legs, let's do point flex today. Point, flex lower point, flex a lower [inaudible] pulling a lot of coordination on their feet and point flex down.

Point flex down. Point eight more hair. Keep that upper back involved in the exercise and last one on the right. Last one on the left and release. Okay. Extend your arms along in front of you up overhead. I'm going to take my legs just slightly apart.

I want to feel my hip bones and pubic bone anchor into the mat. Nose is rested there. My forehead is no longer touching and I'm just going to take a quick scan and can I extend energy out the five points of me, my head. There really are six out your tail arm. Arm, leg, leg. Okay. Like a big star. Now legs will stay down on this exercise, but really heavy pelvis start to lift the head and the arms at the same time.

Now I'm going to pull the man behind my head and allow my shoulders to feel like they're getting opened up by the closing of the [inaudible] band. All right. Did they handle just land on the back of your hips? Now return the band. See if you can keep your body up, pull on the band, use the upper back to keep stretching it, and then you can come [inaudible] all the way down to your head. We'll do five total. If this is too much in your shoulders, you just lift a little bit like that. If you can't do that, if your shoulders are a little weak yet, that's fine. Do some more swan. Okay. Or some. A single leg kick.

I'm going to get to double leg kick in just a minute. Let the band help. Help you lift. Open up those chest muscles and return lift and down. Three more. Do you have to pull on it to help you is you've got a, you've got to, you know, pull that resistance. Engage your upper back.

Here we go. The back of the shoulders. Those are often very weak muscles, so it's a not surprising. This may be difficult. I couldn't do it for a really long time. I'm glad I can now man, open or in a stay here. Bring your legs together and I'm going to rotate my head to face you. But let's challenge ourselves today. Not to put the head all the way down.

Keep some sense that you're almost skimming above the water. Just a different way to look at this today. Kay. Take a breath. Both heels. Let's flex the feet and pull heels too. Band, pull, pull, pull. Now as you lower your legs, float the arms. Lift the arms up a little. Now if I had like a connection of my feet against the band there, that sense of reaching back. Okay, turn it and lower down heels. Come in for three, two, one and reach.

We're just going to do one more each side and three, two, one, one, two, three and reach other side and one, two, three and reached last little bit. Lift those legs. Paddle the legs. You're going to paddle those legs. Keep your buttons kind of from unwanted. Your hand on wind. Your hands and lift and lift and rest. Okay, let's come to a rest pose for a moment or a cat back.

Lot of lower back extensions to just wiggle out the hips. Okay, and we're going to go into some side. Lying. I'm going to face you and I want you to put both feet in the band like we did for corkscrew. Don't fall off the table. That's for me, okay? Lying down. Okay. Take a look down your legs and your, see your legs are straight together. They're on top of one another. Your arm is on top of the hip and then this arm is down long. If you need it here or you've certainly, you can bend it to lift your head here. Okay, I'm going to take my down.

Now let's focus on the length of the band again. We did it in leg circles. I want you to think about your femurs reaching down through your legs, out your feet at your heels. Okay? And just float. Let's float there and down. So the reach might become a lift. If you reach so long, your legs might just float up. They often do. You could technically just lift them, but I want you to connect, reaching to lift and [inaudible] inner thighs toward the arches of the feet and down two more long enough, your front ribs are in here.

Inhaling into your back ribs and lower. Okay. Sneak the bottom foot out. Just take it out of there. You can bend it if you'd like. I want you to take the top leg up. Let's just do five. So of course it has a lot more movement now and a lot more range to go focus on reaching though out. The higher you go, keep resisting, keep reaching in.

He wants attention on that band without bending your elbow. And last one. Okay, good. Now we're going to go front, back. I'm going to sneak up on my elbow this way and I want to choke up on the band so that I have more resistance so that I have to reach into it more. Okay? And as you bring your leg forward, stretch the sole of your foot should be facing me right there. If I could see you, I would. And as you take it back, reach, push your heel back, squeeze your buns.

Let's do four more so we can come front and front and back and back and belly is in and back and back and back and back. One more front and front. And back and back. Bring your legs kind of where it was. If we were in a diagonal here. In fact, we can keep the bottom like there. Turn the topic out and lift up and I just want you to hold for a second. I've got my elbow bent nicely right in kind of my hip crease and I wanna keep that there. Take a moment to reach the sit bone again to this opposite heel.

Okay. Now when we lower the leg, push out through the heel, the heel, stretch, the theraband, it'll probably create a long arm as well. Let's just do, do for more slow today so you can explore those. Stretch the reach, the stretch, the high inner thighs, reaching down the leg to the heel. Three more am Lang. Then if you're going to zip up the ABS balance on the side of your hip. Okay, one more time and down. Then you're going to bring the leg back up and I'm going to do legs. Circle up here. Little ones, one, two, three, and four more. Five, six, seven, eight.

The other way up, said bone is reaching up to the heel. Three and four and five and six and seven and eight and down. Okay. I'm going to put my head down. One more thing on the side. Go back to parallel. You can bend the bottom and if you'd like, bring your leg forward. Okay. Right now we're in paralleling. We did that already from back. We did turn out up down.

Now I want you to go internally rotated. This is gnarly. It is going to get your hip more, but let's go up down for 10 of them. I'm thinking my heel up, toes down, heel up, toes down. You should be feeling it my now up right in the hip and five count down for five if you need two, five, keep reaching the band mind started to get a little slack, so I'm going to keep reaching out. Three. You want the long hip, if that makes sense too.

Yeah, grumble last one and bend it in. Okay. Other side, just reach out and come on up. As you flip around, you're going to take both feet in first lie on your side. Okay, take a little inventory, see yourself straight ankle on the ankle, leg over leg. This arm began long and stretch. Oh, your friend ribs in. He should be breathe in and we lifted the legs we floated. And now let the band also kind of helped pull the shoulder down for you.

Isn't that kind of cool? The more you reach your legs, you might actually get a longer neck because of this and the feedback. So if you can feel that reaching inner thighs to ankles, shoulder, now you might be able to see that that is happening up here. It feels really nice. Okay, now we did five only in a sneaker bottom. Like out we went a lot bigger range because we can, we're not inhibited by the site bottom way, but keep that sense. Your inner thigh, reaching to the feet, keeping tension on that band.

Yeah, for and five women into front. Back up on the heel of the hand. Here we go. Bring it forward. Let me pause for that moment. There's solar foot forward, right? And then as you carry it back, squeeze your bum, reach your bump to your heel. We did five and when you came forward and four choke up if you need to or if you want to front, front and back. It can cue. You said bone to heal, right? Not sit bone to ribs.

He wants that bone underneath down the length of the leg to heal back. We have five. So here's your fifth one. Okay, now bring your legs together, turning the top leg out. Slowly bring your leg up. This is where we kind of held for a second elbow into the crease of your hip. You'll probably see that this is not as flexible on this leg is the other.

So stretch the band more up to the ceiling, the elbow into the crick of the hip can help. Best sit bone to heal. And then we reached out long and long again. So all the way up, you're on the side of your hip and hip to heel. Push, reach and reach. And notice I'm doing something a little different with this arm. I'm not really too concerned. I'm focusing on reaching him to heal.

The main aspect of the arm straightens. That's fine too. And two more on the side of the hip balancing reach. I got a little extra class time. Okay, and I've got to come back up. I'm going to put my head down. We did little circles up here for eight seven it was up six five sit bone is reaching up to the heel up and seven and eight reverse cit one and three.

Check your ribs. Are they back? Five and seven and eight stretch along. Now we, now we do internal rotation. Okay, so leg comes forward, head is down, can bend the bottom knee, still reach from hip to heel. Turn the toes down, heel up and we did 10 of them up and down and lift and think it's an exhale on this one. As we lift, keep pushing that band hot. Stretch the bed and four, three we're going to come up in a minute for some kind of specific arm work too. And last one and down we go. Okay, just roll over to your back. Everyone. Take the band off your feet, cross your ankles, hold your feet and just bring your body kind of closed.

Stretch shift. Feel good. On the back of the hips. Okay. And Change. Hmm. Okay. I'm going to bring us up to a seated position. We're going to sit on the band. Do you again? You have to open up the band pretty long all the way open.

Well, mine covers almost the length of the table. Cool. All right, so I'm going to try to kind of eyeball the center of it and sit right there, one side, either side and take it off the mat and then put the other hand holding it. Okay. Spider fingers on one fist on the other. I have my thumb facing me for a second. Arm's going to go out on the way out. I want you to turn your thumb face up. Just hold that for a second. Are you even in your sit bones?

We've got this arm in external rotation and then bring it back. You can think some to sternum. Okay. Out and up and out. Thumb into sternum. Three more. So I'm doing a little different pathway of my arm today. It's not quite draw sword going more horizontal than adding that external or lateral rotation of the arm. Okay. There's four might've been five.

So I'm going to go five in case. Okay, there it is. Alright, and now switch hands inside. Shave the ear and someone said recently ran. Go. I love it. Reach up. Just reach. So again, in opposition as the arm goes up, the shoulders supposed to stay down. You know it's supposed to. It's going to go up a little bit. The natural everyday movement. We do think of a long side of the neck committee rather than such a tug down shoulder. A long neck. Okay, one more.

Let's add a little side bend to this one. [inaudible] stay up there. I'm gonna hold it with a fist. Now this hands going to go out on fingers and inside. Then the ribs go into the band on an inhale and all the way up. Exhale. Just soften the Aldo. Make it a continuous movement.

Now focus on the breath ribs to the band. Last three. Inhale and to up and over and down in your last one. In. Inhale up and over and lower. Okay, just those on the other side. That one can go away. Pick this up for crossover. Your thumb is facing you first. Your spider fingers, your arm is level. Here we go. I'm bringing my aunt handout to you.

Then rotating some up and then coming back around some toward me, yourself, and out and open. So we're kind of feeding the upper arm mechanic of the shoulder here rotates and it rotates last too, and your shoulders are low. You've got a long neck. Okay, some nice upper arm work here. Switch arms, finger for spider fingers, and just reach up as high as you can without your neck scratching or getting a little scapula elevation. Upper trap engagement. If you want to think of that long neck, it's easier to focus on long both sides of the neck. Okay, two more. And reach and that'll come up into sidemen on the next one. Here we go, and let's let it merge into the bend and Exhale, returned soft in the elbow.

Feel that continuous inhalation and exhaling over the last three. Inhale, plant your seat, not your seeds, your seat, and point your it bones up and over and exhaling down. We've got one more here. Okay. All right, let's go ahead and come up onto our knees. We'll do one piece from kneeling, maybe two. Chest expansion, thigh stretch. They're really nice with the band, so I'll take that band right across the front of your thighs. It doesn't have to be completely open. I'll turn sideways, so right there and I'm going to have you take your toes this way. Today though, just for a change of pace, often we cue it this way. Press the feet down, change it up, bend the toes, heels together.

My knees are apart a little bit when they have a good sense for the not on the front of my knees. More that way than back this way. Okay, so you can really feel the engagement of your hamstrings up the back of your leg, up into your seat. Now the ban on the thighs, arms long like they were in the hundred. I remember they were reaching. Let's take the arms back and forward, but not all the way forward. Keep some resistance. Press and release a little bit. Three more. Inhale the ribs. Go back on the inhale and center last too long and reach endow. And last one reach. I didn't do the head turn, but that's fine.

Now I want you to take your arms forward. Thigh stretch, pelvic tilt a little bit. We will have to change the feet. Challenge yourself today. Bring your knees together, hindering back. I'm just going to have you look straight ahead. Keep your arms straight ahead. Pull yourself forward. All right, where could the elasticity be? I'm thinking of it. If I had a band kind of from my head down the back of my body to my feet, I'd be pressing the band down that way. From up here. Down.

Okay. Press and a blast to pull the band a little for a little extra fun and bring it up in once more and center. Okay. Take this down onto your hands. Stretch your feet back. Open up the toes and just hold for a couple of breaths here. Rock a little bit.

Okay. And rest. So I want you to just to come down, turn your hands, face up, Tuck your head down. Often Times a prop or a you say where you are, I'm going to talk to you for a second. Stay rounded down. Sometimes the props in the feedback of different elasticy are squeezing or releasing, can um, work you differently. Enough part of it to add some different strengthening, but it also can leave you a little bit, uh, wound up maybe in your neck or low back. So take a few moments. I'm coming down with you again just to take some easy breath. Okay, we're done working. We're done pulling on the band.

Does it feel some ease now you stay right there. I'm just gonna roll up so my head is just kind of above my, my chest here. He'll probably be a little bit of residual buoyancy in you once you get up and start moving right now, which is actually something I hope you feel and help you to actually connect to you. And like when you start walking around, you'll probably feel like you've got a little trampoline in you because of all of this energy that it fed you. And that's what we want to promote. We want to feel that kind of buoyancy and that resilience all the time. So let it try not to resist it and hunker down away from it.

Let that kind of move you, if you will. Okay. Let me know how you do. Let me know how that felt for you, and if it did leave you feeling, boy, and I want to here. That was my goal. All right. Bye.

Comments

1 person likes this.
Thank you Amy, l
1 person likes this.
Really enjoyable. ..especially the side lying work. ..using band to create length in legs did stay with me after. ...but also the seated arm work had a great effect on easing my shoulder tension. ..cueing neck length not shoulder down. ..always enjoy your style of teaching. Thank you
3 people like this.
I miss reformer work; because I'm rehabbing an ankle. This mat class was just what I needed, I swear we share a brain sometimes. I've been releasing the posterior diaphragm/thoracic spine (floating ribs) with my yoga students recently. It's so good to be LEAD (conscientiously) by a SUPERB teacher in a theme I am leading my students! I also use the thera for feed back, I'll be borrowing a couple moves once I get them committed to memory, THANKS!
Keep Mixin' it up;)
2 people like this.
Great class Amy. The feedback the band gives behind the ribs is awesome. I have been playing with the sling work with breathing and connecting to the back ribs as well but like how the theraband can be just as informative! Thank you!
1 person likes this.
Simply taking any class with you leaves me feeling buoyant! Lots of discovery in this class too. Thanks!
2 people like this.
Thank you. The instructions are beautifully clear and the feedback from the band was enlightening. Lovely class!
1 person likes this.
Wow ladies.....you've brought a huge smile to my face today! Thank you for ALL your comments, feedback and encouragement! We're all in this together.......Thank you!!
1 person likes this.
Thank you! Love the class! Love to fell the feedback from the band!! Great!!!
1 person likes this.
Love the band! Great cuing Amy!
1 person likes this.
Fabulous feeling class thank you Amy H!
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