Class #2590

Suppleness and Strength

55 min - Class
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Find the suppleness within the strength in this Mat workout with Kristi Cooper. She invites you to move and flow with her and Meredith so you can release unwanted tension in your body. She also adds elements she learned from Judith Aston in Aston Kinetics so you can feel more balanced and grounded.
What You'll Need: Mat

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Apr 24, 2016
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You look too serious. It's girl time. We're going to move. We're going to just see how it feels. And so come along. Stand at the anywhere on your mat. Feet just a little bit apart, trying to feel yourself grounded. You may decide, do you want to step off the mat cause you want to feel good from the start. Okay, maybe not good, but some sense of at least you know where your feet are so you could build the rest of the foundation on top of it. I'm going to go onto the mat because that felt good and I'm in that space again where I want to feel good. So finding the bottom of your feet.

Take an inhale just for that, just to see if you can bring up some of that energy from the bottom of your feet through the crown of your head. And exhale, I'm going to do it again and I kind of have to just bounce it out a little bit just to let go. Whatever you need to do, if you need to swirl or twist or anything to let unnecessary tension that you know is there. Go and then stack yourself back up on the foundation. Maybe lean forward a little and then if that feels too far, just find a place that's upright and good. Inhale [inaudible] and exhale. And as you do, maybe the bones become heavier, but somehow somewhere in the center you're a little taller through the column. If there were one, which the Connie is from here, we'll do a roll down. Just inhale when you exhale and it feels the right to do so. Let your head become a little heavier. But it's not cause it falls.

It kind of reaches up and over, taking all the air out with it as it gets all the way to the ground. Let your hands come down, bend your knees if you need to for sure. But now especially, we'll all do it and then you can wiggle out your toes were bent knee still, you feel the flatness of your feet or what might be the flatness of your feet minor. Quite high in the arch. So I'm going to try and get them all down when it's time straight and the legs as much as you can, but keep your head down, bend them again. It's as if the knees are attached to your tailbone.

Polling you into around position and straighten breathing. Somehow bend again straight and hopefully getting a little more, but maybe not yet. That would be fine. You can keep them bent here if you want to slightly and inhale so we're back together. Imagine drawing the legs together, but we're not there slightly apart. Exhale, enroll yourself back up. Just sort of tapping in to where you are in your own body. When you get to the top, rotate the arms out.

Push some energy up or tension away however you want to look at. It's your hour or less. Probably exhale, turn the arms, push away, get taller, get lighter on your [inaudible] self and roll down. We'll go a little quicker. Now. Again, bend your knees as you need to so it feels good. Everybody bend your knees. Exhale, straighten them. Do two more of those. Inhale, bend. Pull the whole body though. It's not just a knee bend right and straight and you're bringing the whole spine with you. Bend, straighten as much as you can.

Be Gentle with yourself and roll up. Arms are heavy. Get to the top. Inhale, I will turn the arms out, pushing the air up or something out. Exhale. We're going to stay up at this time as you get down to about shoulder height, start to rise up on the toes. I've got to look forward or I will fall. Turn the palms out and inhale low or the heels.

I'm just going to shoulder height like cue and push down. Use the air. Use that ground force reaction as working with you all the time. Same thing. I'm just rotating arms as I go down. Using that ground force reaction. Feel how gravity isn't just pushing on you but the earth and then it has its effect that comes back up and supports you and you can work with that. You don't have to fight it. You can work with it. Oh, at least that.

The thigh and down. I'm going to give you one more time. It's hard on the mat or carpet and Dan you and just leave the arms down this time when they get there and feel like there's something under your feet, sort of resisting you to the ground and you want to push down. You want to go with gravity this time, but that ground force reaction is so strong. You have to actually push, move forward and have a seat. It's a good thought. I just couldn't finish. Just let it be. Take it into the world. It's still a thought. It's still done.

This is my thought diamond position. Oh yeah. Apparently I'm here. So stretching the diamond. I just took Diane Severino's class, so she's in my head to this. This extent. Best you can get the soles of the feet together, but also the fun part is holding on and being upright in a pretty easy place to be. Inhale, not going far. Does exhale. Tilt the pelvis back and then use your arms. Actually find your whole body right now. Inhale, stack yourself so you start to find where your sitz bones are and you stack above them. Xcel somewhere in there. Inhale. Exhale, roll backwards off the sits bones, the shoulders, not really leaning back a lot.

They might go with you a little, blow out all the air, prove it to yourself, and then inhale, come back up, lengthening through the spine. Exhale, let's go again. Now, speaking of that ground force where at least support, keep the breath and come forward, you can use the outside edges of your feet to push down, right? So that'll give you this sense of ease to go backwards so you're not just working one piece, you're working everything. Why not use the help we can get that we can't with and set up this time we're going back a little further. You might continue to hold on, but you'd probably have to move your arms. I'm going to press up against my thighs and my thighs down against my hands just to get to about mid back or waist. Hold it there. Check your shoulders.

If not around your ears. Start exhaling. See the belly drop back. Come forward. And I know you want to stretch forward, but I'm not going to yet. Grab on somewhere and sit up straight. We will. You know it's coming and exhale. It's so starting where we were when we roll back. Don't let the knees come up. If you can help it, press them down. Keep that out. Orange Energy. Inhale and exhale forward. Jess, so shoulders are over. Hips. Find the knees or someplace to hold on to to stack your spine.

[inaudible] and [inaudible]. Yeah, back, back, back, an email and I'm almost to the shoulder blades, but probably not quite XL. Forward this time. Go all the way forward. Stay curved. Find some place, comfy to hole and gently pressing the outer leg. Still knee, everything toward the floor as you stretch your spine forward. It is curved, but you're stretching it forward. The anchor being from the sitz bones or tailbone or pelvis. From there, let's slide the elbows back toward the knees and Elongate the spine. Just a little, nothing too harsh and round again. Forward.

We'll do three of those. Three, that's various thing. Inhale, stretch and lengthen. I like, I know you're like, sorry, I just took your class too and I'm gonna probably copy that one more time in here. We're in that nice long spine or along as we can muster so far. Exhale round forward, stay curved, and it says if someone pulled you from the front side of your hip bones, you start to roll back. We're going to go back a little further. How a little further all the way to the shoulder blades. May a touch for the, take the arms up, keep your eyes forward, the arms are coming back down and we'll come up [inaudible] go ahead and round all the way forward to hold those hip bones back a touch. Inhale. There's not a real starting and stopping point here, so go ahead and roll back breathing naturally. Inhale, arms up, maybe exhale forward. Oh the way, start rolling back on the inhale. Otherwise I think we run out of time and you know, just sort of testing the waters.

Where are you today with flexibility? There's fine arms. Your shoulders back. Next one will stay up. Take a little stretch forward briefly and then sit up. He looks, Christie, can I take your pants off? Yeah, you roll my pants right off. Show the yellow Meredith show the yellow doesn't. Okay.

Take the arms out and just very easily come toward the window. Come towards us. We're just gonna rotate. Press the front foot, the foot closest to the window into the back foot. A little, just a little. Don't stress out about it. The hand closest to the front too also goes to the ground and just use it for an assist to twist further further and take that up. Their arm up. Just something that feels good. Just getting an assist through that stretch.

Then keep reaching the arm that's in the air higher. Let the other, I'm come up. Try not to unwind and then come back to center. They both come to a tee. Yeah, that was fun. Thank you. I'm surprised it myself. We rotate backhand. It's going to go down, right?

You're gonna use it to assist you up, twist you further, and then allow the arm just to float up. Now here's the tricky part. I can already tell I'm leaning back, so don't do that. We're going to let the arm come off without unwinding and back to centers are supposed to be a tee and right close at the knees. If we're going down, we're going to do the spine to a supine, so all the way down, arms come back out to that tee. When you get there, bring the knees up and I'm going to say probably at the beginning. Let's take the knees a little closer to 90 sorry, inward from 90 so not perfect, 90 but closer to your chest. Just a little. Stretch the arms out.

Keep the shoulders on the ground towards the window or to the front. Inhale or rotate. Stretch long knees are lined up. Exhale, center. Start to feel that sweat and keep going. Inhale over that swaying of the body, the opposition and exhale center ways you can kind of tell if you're doing that Kinda is if the knees stay lined up and exhale. If you've done this 100,000 times like Meredith has, you can play with your body. You can look for different things. You might push the bottom leg into the top.

You might see if you can pretend your legs aren't even there and see if you can really focus on the waist. What could you do to make your own movement special? And again, I think you don't play with it even if you haven't done it 100,000 well you can. Of course you can. But if you haven't done 100,000 times and you haven't played with it, the direction would be keep your knees lined up, your shoulders down 90 90 right, left, right, left, right.

So that's what I was trying to avoid. But yes, do that and play. All right, come back to the center. Put your feet down in the center, laced the fingers behind your head. I have my feet slightly apart and I'm comfortable. Distance away. Elbows just off the mat and feel the space between your shoulders and ears.

Not because you forced anything. I don't care if they're down, they're just not up from there. We're not lifting yet for us. The back of your head into your hands. Hopefully that's not hard on your knuckles, but I'm literally pressing backwards and thank goodness the elbows are up cause it's not a great chin. Look for most of us, but do it anyway. From there. You keep that gentle intention of a backwards motion of the head. And then we breathe. We inhale as we exhale, as if the arms were our hammock.

We let the breaths bring the body, the spine forward, and the head is still gently fallen backwards. It's already, if you talk a little, but avoid a huge one. Inhale, hold, exhale, take it back down. Can use that traction that your arms are providing or your hands as a nice little stretch. Exhale. When it's time to come up, getting a little more, I dunno, stuff on listen the spine. Inhale. Exhale. Take yourself down and I'm not feeling that supple, so I'm gonna add something. Exhale, Corolla. [inaudible] we just stay here. Inhale, your head is still gently pressing backwards. It's a tuck of the pelvis, so we blow out the air and allow the spine to round the tailbone to come up, but come closer to it with your upper body to keep your upper body there. As you inhale, pelvis releases a little and exhale down [inaudible] if you need more of that dude, so you can add that little bit of a re Tuck.

But I'm going to, I'm going to avoid it now, but you can just so you know, so shouldn't be uncomfortable. Curl up, stay up and just for now, just for fun, reached both arms forward, one on top of the other, doesn't matter which pushed the bottom one into the top one though, and keep the collarbones wide so you're not hunching from there. You're almost beyond your, your knees with your fingertips come toward the front, not a rotation just yet. Just slide to your fingers. Go just outside the knee. That was an exhale. Maybe inhale, come across the middle. Don't lower down. Exhale just outside the knee.

Imagine you're holding something between the knees. Inhale says, wait, are you rotating? I'm slightly rotating, but it's not as severe as about me. How's that? Okay, I'm going just outside. I'm sort of just skimming the legs just so we know where we're headed, so I'll add to it now. So we've come across to the front. From there, take the top hair, the front hand hand, closest, the one behind your head, and now you're going to put that elbow on the ground, use it, push into it again, use the support, push into it to go forward further into that knee and then rotate even more. But you've got to wait the other side. You've got to keep both hips down and then return the arms and see how much further you are.

Come across free to everyone and then the hand closest to the back is going behind your head first. You're putting it on the ground. Use it to push you forward as much as you can, but keep the opposite hip down. So all that stayed the same. Reach, reach, reach, and then both hands go forward again, come back to the center, separate the hands and let yourself go down. Hmm. Yeah, sorta. All right. That's that. That's that. Anyway, both legs are down. Stretch them out.

Yeah, I'm from here. The arms are straight up. Just reach them up to the ceiling once and then let them drop heavy and leave the back of the shoulders on the ground. Yes, they're gently down, away from the ears, but let's not work hard on that today. From here as if you're pushing against the solid with your upper arms, you exhale and curl forward. Head, neck, and shoulders. Leave your legs down, down, down, down. Push your left leg into the ground. Push your right leg into the ground. I'm alternating so I lighten up on one. Push the left leg into the ground. Push the right leg into the ground, even it out.

So theoretically are pushing down and everything comes down to this time. Take the arms overhead without flaring the ribs. Inhale, the arms come up above the chest. Exhale, curl forward. Really reaching for your feet. Curling, curling, curling. Press the right leg down enough that the left leg lifts. It just floats. It didn't do anything for it. Let it go to the ground. The other side comes up.

Push down with the lower leg. That's your help and down again, alternate push. Keep the arms reaching, deepening your curl. Last one and both down and take it back. Yeah, sort of. Yeah, that's hard. It's okay. I like it though. Okay, good. Heart is okay. Curl up again. [inaudible] let's say, I'll just say right, like push it down so that it's almost easy to flip the left leg up, but floated up, push, push, push, push and down and take it all the way back. So I didn't say it, but I meant to.

The upper body came with me a little that time, just a little curl up again, just the are upper body, left legs going down to the point where it becomes almost easy to lift and then you kind of run out of room. Don't show it without straining and down. That's where your a hundred is approximately going to be alphabet. This time you leave the legs down, curl up. Think you're going to pick up both legs. Just think it. But instead, push both of them down. Inhale for five, two, three, four, five. Exhale, two, three, four or five. Keep pushing those legs down.

Make it easy for the arms to float. Long in front of the hips, up [inaudible] and down. Last one for four and up. Keep pushing. Keep pushing or think it and down. Lighten up a little and just go all the way back. Stretch it out. All right, probably no surprise. Exhale, curl up. Reaching forward. You could do one leg, both legs, other legs, alternate, whatever, but I'm lifting them both up after thinking about it. That's it. Let's go. Inhale two, three, four, five and exhale. Two, three, four, five.

Glue those legs together and now pump the arms. Inhale two, three, four, five and exhale. Two, three, four, five. One more and exhale to keep them glued together. Push your arms down this time. Let your legs come up, roll over from there. Your horizontal, parallel, whatever. Flex your feet, push them apart. Remember that that air like a solid.

Let the feet go down and roll down. It's not that everything has to be resisted or hard. If anything, I'm trying to make it easier on you. Crow around. Let's go up and over. Use your arms though. Why not flex? Push apart, lower the legs from your throat. Start Rolling down. Find the suppleness within the strength coming around and going a tiny, tiny bit faster. Marry up and over. This'll be it until we reverse it. So you get to the bottom and reverse.

So we come apart with the feet up and yeah, over still using the strengthen the arms, zipped the legs up, touch the feet if you can and melt it down. Keep pushing away with the bottoms of the feet and two to go up over, zip and close, not just at the legs. By the way, carry that sensation all the way up the front of your body. Last one over, zip and close. And this time we're going to slowly roll down to the point where you want to pick your head up to sit up straight and just do beautiful. Sit back. So you're comfy on your map.

And this is something I've been playing with from Judas Aston, and it's has to do with my, well I don't, she'll tell you if what it has to do with watch your class, but sometimes even, you know when you roll back and you don't feel everything equally, if you feather your way back, if you very subtly just feather your way back, it ends up feeling straight. So let's do one regular roll up. This is how she sorta does it with me in a tutorial. So we're just reaching forward, we're holding strong and we'll roll back. We have our feet together, we're just doing normal for now all the way back and we touch and you just taking inventory and it may or may not be different, but it's still fun to try. Exhale.

[inaudible] let's do one more without all my words. [inaudible] so the next thing is pretty much identical but as subtle feathering on the way down. So it's just down the sides of your spine. You probably won't see it. Here we go. Just to subtle like I'm exaggerating. Even myself right now. Just like spine, spine, spine, spine, spine, spine, spine, back. You can even do it coming up. It's not quite as easy to find in my opinion, but you can, it's just sort of like little feathering on the way up. Let's try it again. Stretch.

And she had us doing this even on the foot bar with foot and leg work and it just really made a difference in how balanced it felt by the hand. So I'm playing with it still in thought I'd include you. Thank you. It's interesting. Yeah. And up. Yeah, just and it's, I can't even tell which side needs it honestly, but I don't have to think about it and I try another one and if it feels different, great. And if it doesn't, that's okay too. Don. We go normal now. Right? Okay.

Inhaling, lift, reach, exhale. Let's do one more and then we'll go into the rolling. Yeah. Reading with it. Keep the sensation, the contraction. Scoot yourself forward. Have been on your mat.

You just behind the table and pick up the feet up your pants, pick up your pants, please. Keep your clothes on. For this all. Hey, super close. Just like exaggerate your closeness. Yeah, these together. Sorry. And here we go. Inhale back. Exhale up. See if you can land in. Hope I put my feet down cause there are that close and I didn't have any place to put 'em. Try it again. Pick them up. Go back, come back up if you can. Get your feet down. Do hold now.

Can you pick up in this spot? Do whatever you need to. Except for raise your shoulders without using the strength of your arms. Can you pick up your little left foot a little bit? Just straight up without moving your back either and put it down. Step on it. Pick up the other foot, put it down, step on it.

I know you can't put a lot of pressure, but try. So it's not really from the front of your body so much. Well it is, but really then if you have to lean back to pickup balls, do [inaudible]. It's minimize it. Dropping the shoulders, elbows wide, knees together and roll back. We're gonna roll. Hold, pause, feet. Stay off. Go again. Push back. Finding the easy rhythm and back reminding ourselves that we're letting go of unnecessary attention.

Where possible. Can we do one more time? Okay. She says and then just get yourself back a little bit. Pick up the right. Neat. I'll tell you now we are coming back up so we're not laying down. Okay. I always hate when I'm at home and I'm like, oh, come on. So we've drawn in, we're pushing the Shin into the hands. We've got help. I'm going to slowly roll down to about the shoulder blades.

Eventually the leg will come up if not sooner and then we're using that to come back up as if someone were pulling the straight leg up, put it down, use the support and look for a streets behind. Then you allow the hips to roll back. Keep some resistance. Elbows wide. Now press the foot that's in the air. They're both in the air. Press the foot of the bent knee into the other knee. Didn't change. Yeah, just use that and help yourself up. All that you can.

Okay. And straighten your spine. Just one more. We slide back. Keep the foot in contact with the inner seam of the knee. It's as if someone was pulling that straight leg down. [inaudible] and then up. Use what you have.

Yeah. And in this case is probably not the brain that's going to help switch. So do you need to pull up your pants? No, but I did get stuck. I couldn't do the exercise and my pants are still on a 50 50 thing. Okay. Sitting tall. You can pin the foot already if you want. I'm going to wait just for finding it cause it's there. It's different, right?

We roll back and I'm stretching the street like oh yeah. And I fall. Try not to hyperextend and then I help myself back up. Oh, it's so much easier when you do put the foot into the knee, I think. And it's not just that way. It's both ways. That inner seam works too. Here we go slowly down, keeping almost the same shape wide collarbones and okay, oh, where's that breath one? I need it. Oh sorry. S foot down straight and your spine details and we go again.

Okay. And I'm trying not to swing the leg unless you have to at that point. Oh my gosh. Foot down, fine. The street's fine. We're going back to the first side this time. Have some fun with it. I'm gonna once we're gonna roll three times and then come back up.

So you just Kinda keep an airborne. Once the light comes up, you don't have to lift it from square one and we go back and, and back up and back and up all the way. [inaudible] change legs and roll back and up. Oh, that's different. And back. And one more time. This one will land it and keep the leg you have. Roll down all the way. Stretch it up. Arms down by your side. Let the leg in the air. Uh, turn out just a little. Lift the hip up the Lego, straight up to the ceiling just for a second, and then drop it back down like we did the shoulders earlier. Leg circles, crossing the midline. Come around or, and inhale and exhale.

Here's the breath. Head, arm, doing full. Inhale around and now exhale. Okay. One more cycle, which will put us at about five and a half and then I'll be fine. Go the other way. Inhaler around upstairs, XLR or around upstairs. Inhale up and exhale. One more cycle and [inaudible] hug that knee in. Stretching that bottom leg out.

Just switch legs. Hug the other knee in first and then as you want to extend the leg into the air, the lower legs hitting the ground slightly. Turn it out, reach it up a little if you need to, just to kind of drop it back down. And now cross the midline. We inhale and [inaudible] and inhale to exhale and inhale. You can flex the foot if you're used to that x here. I think one more. And exhale, reverse directions. Take it outside. Inhale up. It can be smaller, it might be able to be bigger, but try for stability in and out and in.

And can I stop with this one? Yeah, I think so. I think Benjamin and hug it in. Bring the other knee up to those to join it. And it's like you're sliding the skin of the shins forward. So the front of your thighs can relax.

We're going into double leg stretch here in a second. From here, grow your head, neck and shoulders up, knees. Together we go. Inhale, hold. Exhale, sweep brown and grab and pull. Inhale. You can. Sometimes we stop at 90 degrees. That's fine, but what I'm wanting to do is really get the air out, so I'm using the physicality of the body, my body to try and push air out. Even if the tailbone comes up today. Yay. Freedom. Kim. I go for more faster. Here we go. One, two, three and four. Hold your right leg up. Stretch it. Pulse, pulse and pulse. Pull.

Getting now the bottom line to the floor. If it wasn't already, use it. It almost forces you higher. Not that we need to, but that's the idea. Let's go pull, pull hands. Mind your head for a formal one or two. I guess that's one for Mary. Two, two and three.

Head back three. Here's four. Now rotate. Same thing. Press one. Remember what you did with the elbow earlier. You can kind of do that here. You don't have to, but you could. If you wanted to slow it down a little, press press, press, press, press. Last one. Both legs up, hold. Bend your knees. Separate them of little arm. Stretch out overhead.

Yeah. Inhale, getting ready for a shoulder ish bridge or a bridge. Exhale, peel the hips up. Arms go down in front. [inaudible] standing on your feet, standing on your triceps. Find the long line of your hips. When it's time even healed, you'll exhale and soften your way down. It doesn't mean you're not working. The arms go to a, no, sorry, I left them down.

Rather use them as like a kicks down the four points and PLF [inaudible] and then from here, remember we did the feathering thing. Let's do it here too. So as we go down again, it's pretty subtle. It's not a typewriter, it's just a subtle like shimmy almost down the spine. Arms are just solid, so you're not putting more or less weight on the feet. Maybe on the fetal little up again, you can go do the same thing going up. Yeah, and we'll stay here. Stand a little more firmly on the arms.

Check that you definitely feel the backside of your body and I don't really mean the back. I do mean the back of your legs and probably your glutes. If you're not sure, Tuck your pelvis more. Meaning pubic bone disturbed. Stand on your feet even more. Pick your right leg up and we'll point down. Flex up. We go down. One, flex up, down two and up. Three here's six, four, five down, up. Again, stay up and lower the hips. No articulation. Go down. Push up one down. Push up to standing on that ground. Leg Three. Use it.

Keeping the hips as level as possible. Two more. Get up there. Stay up there. Point the toe. Return the leg shimmy or feather you way down the spine. Hm. And inhale. Exhale. Come back up.

Standing on that opposite leg. When you get there, make sure you know you're there. Pick up the opposite leg and point down we go. One, flex kick, one, two. Can you be any longer without strain? This four, five down enough. Again, stay up and just lower hips. Touchdown or you even an up one down. Up to touch. Lift three, four, watch the ribs somehow. I don't get so high on the side. Stay up. Point to tell.

Bend the knee, put the foot down, get the hips back up there and roll it down town. Dan, stretch your legs out. Put them together, reach your arms up, shoulders on the ground, Corolla [inaudible] all the way and take a stretch forward when you get there. Okay. Sitting up tall. Separate your feet for the spine stretch. So I'm going ever so slightly wider than the mat. Arms forward, externally rotated, and then like hug something, right, lift the chest. Use that resistance. Not to round you, but to lift you. Inhale, exhale, round forward. Go forward. Flex those feet, not just the toes.

Go as far forward as you can as if somebody were pulling you backwards. And for now, just come right back up in here. Use the shape of the body in this exercise to get the air out. So rather than thinking forward, try to get the top of your head down in between your knees. Just try, exhale and it doesn't mean you go backwards either. It's never going to happen. Christy, it could in my body a lot of really not.

You got that long torso though. I do not feel bad for you and lift up [inaudible] nowhere close to the four things. Flexibility of the spine, not the legs. One more with that side. It's just like how can I lift in and up from the front to get stretched through the back. Now that were there, put the hand somewhere on the ankles, maybe the shins, and then stick your bottom out and start to lengthen your spine on the diagonal using your arms for assistance. It's not again forward. It's it is four, but it's a little bit of a lift. Both arms come up by your ears. Peter's still flexed. You look for the long line. Now we exhale, release it all to roll back up. So we'll add that in. In here. Backs are long legs or active. Exhale forward and down.

Go right into or you can put your hands down if you wanted to. Stay there. Inhale into the long spine of the body. Feel how the neck is part of that spine. Exhale round and roll back up. [inaudible] and in how almost almost machine, like in terms of pumping the air, exhale out. As soon as you feel like you're, we're going to strain.

You just allow the length of the body before the strain you exhale and you come back up and it feels natural and you have room to inhale and exhale. I'm not saying there's not work there, but it's the breath kind of can come a little more naturally. Finding that length. Yeah, and even here. So working one more. Adding in. Exhale down. Inhale to the back, extension, strong legs. From there, gently press the upper arms back. Just a little Shinzen. A whole lot of movement to less your rural, flexible in the shoulders.

30 but get longer for keeping the ribs in a little five. Find the mid to upper back. Six of ten seven Oh, I still love this one. Eight nine hold 10 raise the shoulders up. Get longer. Keep the body long, but let the shoulders just fall back into place. Round forward. Oh my goodness. And Roll Up.

Bend the knees in when it feels right. You can kind of close to you. We're going into open like rocker in a moment. So you're just behind the tailbone. I'm in a bit of a diamond shape just to prepare for it from here. Can you think of picking up the legs again? Not from the hip flexor but higher up, closer to the chest.

So just pick up one leg and down and notice that you're not having to lean back or throw your head and down. Maybe you could even do both. You got to wait. You have to be able to do that to do the next part. So if you can't do that, that's where you are, but you can, so we'll pick them up both just straighten one and then the other pick one. Doesn't matter. I'm not doing anything fancy there. And then to initiate, we from the same high spot. We roll back, we come up, we hold, we find those back muscles. We worked, we lift the hips up to get us to go back. Exhaling the breath helps find a spot if you need to try and to avoid a lot of wobble. It's not a toss. You pick the hips up.

If that image doesn't work for you, sometimes I even think of pulling my legs up so I'm not just holding on. I'm picking them up to tilt me back and I push them back down into the socket. Tick. Whoa. Almost went too far. [inaudible] pick them up, pull them out of the socket to roll you back. Push them back in and find a place. Don't look at the back at the end. You're definitely still rounded, but you can find those muscles.

We just worked as helpful. Assists. Now make it easy for tomorrow to two. Close up the feet. We'll just slowly roll it down all the way. Arms. I go down in your head, go down, legs will come up.

And then just the easy tilt to the front, both legs together. Easy corkscrew around. I'm not going over and center other way. [inaudible] and center stay there. We'll roll over. Actually, I'm gonna move down because we are going to go into bicycle and scissors. So that's what really, what am I really? I'm terrible at that. Oh, well then be sure to watch married bicycles.

So in your last class you said you'd like to be challenged. So we've rolled over. If you don't know that you should watch it cause it's a little hard to get into position if you had, don't know it. We're going to, I like to bend my knees first. Just some kind of chill on up there, but my, but the idea is that I'm lifted through my trunk. Then I wa I personally have to walk my arms in, elbows in, and then the hands can either go sideways around the hips or straight up and down. But you want to just be mindful that you're about to drop your hips into your hands, which is the part that comes now.

So you're literally supporting yourself, not so much that your head can come up. So you gotta keep the hips high enough and the low back and a little bit of an arch. Okay. Enough talking, straighten the legs up and we'll just split the legs. Instead of bringing that front like way forward, you're going to instead hold it high and take the other leg further. Almost like you're trying to reach the ground when you've gone almost where all the weights in your arms, you bring that forward like into it. Both legs totally straightened. Now we slowly switched for the first one, get that far leg, the like furthest from your face inaction.

Then you can deal with the top lick now ago and it's pulse. Pulse. Oh my cat. Where is my calf cramping. What a weird spot. Keep going. Don't do what I'm doing. Just reach. Reach. Oh that's so weird. I have what we do at flex foot. It's not innovative. Just kidding. Keep it pointed. Oh, much better now then.

Now that we've had so much fun, the far leg, whichever it is, is going to bend. In order to not put all the weight into your wrist and hands, you got to lift your hips. As you try to touch that foot to the ground, cycle through to the other side. Try and touch. Ben Reached your hatch. There's this brief moment where they're almost both straight or maybe they are. Depends on how you do it.

Reverse it down and digging for it. And you could also do this with legs high and just kinda quick. And it's still good to have your feet up in the air. Sometimes both legs will go up and over, release the hands and then just roll up to seat it right up. It's not giving me nice look at all your so pretty backup feed together. We're, their palms are up, rotate to the front, press one to inhale and two to reach and reach. So what's the big deal, right? Well the spine.

So put your hands behind your head and point your elbows forward and don't let them move away from each other and do it directly from the spy just so you can feel the rotation, whether it's there or not. Truly go wide with the elbows or wider and then add the arms back in and to the twist. Twist legs aren't moving. Twist, twist, twist, twist. And finally last one, does the back center reach up round forward and we're going to go onto [inaudible]. Sidekick. Okay, so face that way I think really got, what can I say? See so I can see you can face me so you can see. Yeah, that's the way they are. That way everyone has a front view and a back view. It's perfect, right? Thank you.

What would I do without you? Um, let's go right here. It's good feet, slightly forward. Top leg is lifted. Stretch it long so you're kind of out of your hips and you're lifted out of the waist. Kicking forward and back. Honey. Easy for now. I'm going to keep my hand down. You can put behind your head and back. How about exhale to and sweep. Really reaching to the back line of the leg. So you fight, you start, you get stopped by the stretchability there.

That's cool. That's fine. In this version, just two more. Stretch back and stretch. Hold it to the back from there. Make sure the top shoulder, hip bone is slightly forward. Press the leg further back if you can. And lift ten nine, eight. I shouldn't have been turning my shoulders quite so much sick. They just, the pop is not the shoulder. Pelvis is when I met. Yup. Three more ish.

[inaudible] ten two more. Makes 10 great. I think from there Ben knee, so you're almost trying to kick yourself in the bum without the knee turning up. Bring the knee as close to the shoulder as possible. Even if it rounds your back, stretch the leg and sweep it back. Flexing the foot so it's a point. Bend it just now. Cycle it. Make it big.

Don't overthink this one. Just finding some motion lubrication. One more full cycle. I'm going to start it from the back. Kick forward. Pull it in, keep it bent until you get back there. Stretch, kick, bend, stretch, kick and one more and just bring it in and hold. It might be easier to do this all the way down on the upper arm. So go ahead. I'm okay here.

[inaudible] and then from there that leg goes in front. I'm going to have to help me remember that piece because it's slightly different than I had planned. From there, we lift up, I'm pushing into the bottom leg. Remember that ground force? Check your hips out. You're not rotating the bottom one under or the other way around. You're just holding.

Can you pick up the top leg and one touch down to a five, three, four, and five. Just set it down in front and we come up and switch sides all together. Don't get too carried away their legs ever so slightly in front. You're lifted, your supported top leg is up again. You get to use it. I don't care which version of sidekick you do. You get to use that bottom leg. Push down to help the rest be easy. Kicking forward. We go pulse, pulse, sweep.

Exhale. Exhale. Back. Three more. Finding a nice long line. One more. Hold it to the back. I'm checking my hip. This is where I messed up my shoulders before meaning rotated. Keep the upper body pretty straight ahead and lift ten one, two, three as if something was supporting you from below six, seven, seven, nine and 10. From there we bent the knee.

You bring in as close as you can and then pull it forward. Stretch it out. I was flexing somewhere in there to pull it back where it feels good. Yeah. Now, tiny bit easier and just go for it for Sherry. Okay, one more full one. Go once more all the way around here and I started from the back to reverse it.

Bring it forward. Point and back. I like the flexing when I'm kicking forward I think or back for that matter when it's in front of me. Three to go. [inaudible] oh one more time and then take it to the back and hold it for that stretch again. You can lie down on the upper arm if you want. Even here, I like to use a bottom like a little. Actually can't use it much just for reasons I'll spare you, but if you can, why not?

Yeah. Okay. Top leg and from there you did all by yourself. I did. Huh? I remember Jay. Ah, phew. Here we go. We're all stable. Ready to go. We're just going to lift ourselves up and hold and breathe. Checking our alignment, using that bottom leg legs are zipped together.

Then the top like lift five one push down with the bottom like two 30 here's four and five. Put it down probably in front. Come on up, bend the knees and just turn over. You're looking at me like I forgot something. No, no, he didn't. I didn't forget anything. I was just waiting for my direction. Where I'm going. Where am I going? We're going face down. Okay.

Single leg kick lower than, well, it's actually pretty much how I normally do it, but lower than it's normally tie. Elbows are in front. They can be right underneath you. Pulling yourself forward and then just list the legs. They're parallel. That's the hard part. Sometimes pull the abs in a bit and right left. Here we go. Kick, kick, kick, kick in. Exhale for four or that length of time. And exhale.

Looking forward, letting the chest kind of almost draw a little bit. Or maybe it's a ribs. Wreathing pulsing, breathing, pulsing. And last one, bring both knees and come all the way down. Turn your face to one side or the other for the single, I'm sorry. Devil lay kick hands as high as you can.

Mine are going to be lower than probably Mary's. Yep. And that's because I take care of myself sometimes. Hopefully will to hover the knees, kick the legs, bend them. Three, one, two, three. Stretching, reach long. I love this. I did this, this right now, this switch one, two, three and stretch again. [inaudible] Stuart ritual long, make it feel good on your low back.

What do you have to do so you're a little back, feels good and you get that stretch opening two more or one each side. [inaudible] up. Hold it, hold it, hold it. Put your feet on the ground. Tufts, the feet. Push down a little to see if you can lift your upper body higher, not the whole body. Just your upper curve. Raise the arms if it's available, let go of the arms. Bring him around. So sh hands by shoulders. Push yourself up and round back.

[inaudible] from there, curl the chosen there. We're getting there for all the toes and really get that stretch through. Pushing almost the the mat or the ground away so that you can really stretch out the bottoms of your feet and then keep using your feet as you round your body forward into a down stretch like position. Still got the toes curled under. [inaudible]. Okay.

And then it's your head is going to lead it this time so you still up out of your arms, your head, then your chest, then your ribs, everything. You still have connection to both sides of your body. Just when you almost sit down, come forward again. It's a full inhale all the way forward. Use the bottoms of your feet. Even now, exhale your head. You're still using the bottoms of the feet and inhale forward.

[inaudible] exhale, stay back this time. Lift the hips up so the legs will just straightened from those feet that were already working. Start to walk the feet forward a bit. A lot actually. Sorry, quite a bit. So they're right underneath you. I didn't move my hands. If he did, that's okay. But you mostly, you still, you want to be able to still lift your toes for what I'm about to do. Then try to draw up on the belly so the hands can float up a little bit.

And if that was super easy, walk your hands forward a little bit cause I want to find that edge where your head is still down. You're pushing the heels into the ground or the middle of your foot and then you exhale and you get a little curve to the spine that lightens the way to the hands and you put them back down and up and down. If on one foot really wants to grip, I'm trying to keep my toes up the whole time. And then the last one, it's as if the seem on the back of the leg. If there were one, pulling it down. Walk your hands forward. You can walk your feet backwards to coming into the front support. Okay. Nice. Long and strong. Feeling the strength of both sides of your body.

What's working more? Hm? How about what can we do less of? All around so it still feels like it's unified but not stressful. Point one foot lift at five times. It's up. One touchdown. Lift two down, three, four switch legs and one, two to three.

Just that leg work in four and five and down. Bend the knees, stretch back, release the toes [inaudible] and then come all the way down on to belly. We're ready for this now, this reach back and grab one foot or ankle and then the other [inaudible] I'm not, I haven't, I don't know if I will or not. For now, push your thighs downward and your feet into your hands at a lot of magically start to lift you if you haven't worn already there. Try not to splay your knees. So yeah, I'm already up with head. Then if you want to, if you can from the butt, start to lift your legs from your hands or your feet, but nothing else really changes. Then if you want to do some motion, that's where you're going to start really kicking into your hands a bit more. Still using the back extensors and then the hamstrings and really they're not ever turning off and on. Knees up, knees up, knees down to one, find a middle ground somewhere. Let the legs come down, release the hands, push yourself back into a rounded back or rest position. And then from there, just step your right foot forward between your hands.

And then if you, if it's too far to reach, you might need something from the side. But the general idea I'm going for here is to feel the stretch through the front of the opposite hip. So it's an I an attempt to not just press the hips forward but almost tuck and it might even be easier to come up first. If so, and you're not sure, I'd back up. Tuck the pelvis, you feel the stretch and then lean into it. That's an option. They're different. They're different. Yeah, that's fine. I couldn't feel it at first and it came up. Now I can. Yeah, I think that I get stuck in this.

Yeah. So play, I mean not play, but yeah, we'll figure it out. That's all we can do is explore I think. Um, so let's just do something like that on the other side, stepping the opposite foot forward. If you know your how, what you're looking for easily in the front of that hip, you can just go right into it. Maybe sometimes you've got to come up and create the sort of length through the trunk first to then send it forward. So it's not just dropping into it, but there's some sense of Koch contraction.

And then look for it. You might have to twist a little to find what you need. Only you really know at the end of the day. Okay. Or can find out, I should say. We don't always know. Maybe totally luck. Good.

Okay. So I just want to roll us up out of this. So let's bring our feet somewhere close to each other. They don't have to be fully together, but remembering that we are grounded cause we're making ourselves sewn, we're recognizing the truth and from there we just roll ourselves up growing up from the ground, from our feet, bones just stacking as they naturally do. Turn the arms out when it feels right to do that. Filling up. [inaudible] exhale. I want to go forward one more time so you just let the head go forward.

But it is, it isn't just dropping. It's looking for something. It's all part of the same chain. Bend the knees just once this time, straighten them. If it feels right to keep them straight, do and roll them. I'm not raising your arms this time. I am going to turn them inward, not the shoulders, just the hay farms to press back against an imaginary wall to rise up on the toes, not super high. Just feel good. Feel connection to both sides of your body. Easy down. I'll do two more of those and that'll be it.

And press connecting to the back. Be With that imaginary wall, the long body and down. [inaudible] and last one. Feel the distance between the ears and the shoulders and the space in your body. Setting yourself down now. Just bend the knees. Let the arms go forward. Easy.

And [inaudible] and Ben and app. And this is it for real this time. [inaudible] [inaudible] thank you. Thank you.

Comments

3 people like this.
Love ya Girls! Great workout!
2 people like this.
You girls are great!!! Thanks!
1 person likes this.
LOVE this class! Thank you Kristi & Meri! It was a great way to unwind on a Sunday afternoon & I think this may be my new favorite class. Everything felt really good in my body. You both inspire me to be the best student I can be!!
Thank you Monika, Ira and Summer!
1 person likes this.
Great class Kristi!
1 person likes this.
Thanks so much Kristi and Meredith! Loved all the playing with each movement and stretch. These classes are so much fun I barely notice how hard I'm working!
1 person likes this.
Just enjoyed a little girl time again and it was even better the second time!
Thank you Summer! Thank you everyone!
2 people like this.
This is what I love about Girl Time! So fun you two! Keeping it real with Kristi! Thank you for including Judith Aston's work. Loved it!!
Thank you ALL for your wonderful feedback.
Hope to see you on the mat soon, Miss Kristi!
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