Class #4447

Powerhouse Magic

55 min - Class
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Grab your Magic Circle for the third class in Wall-to-Wall with Alexandra. You’ll connect your legs to your center and your arms to your back muscles to fire up your body and move your limbs with purpose. By the end of this class you’ll tap into the potential of the Mat and realize the magic in each Pilates exercise.
What You'll Need: Mat

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Hi guys. Welcome. (laughs) Welcome to the Magic Circle Powerhouse Powerhouse Magic Circle. We are going to have a lot of fun using this thing. I love this magic circle.

It reminds me of the woman, the chair. Yeah, It's what we can get from the pedal. So we'll be talking about that. Welcome to the wall-to-wall with me. We will finish against the wall again like I have been doing in every class.

So make sure you have a nice space available for you after you work out with me on mat. So grab your magic circle. And I love sharing that, we want to keep the magic circle nice and light. We don't wanna work with tension. We wanna work with length energy, but we don't want to ...

(groans) squeeze the life out of the magic circle. So keep that energy of the fire inside the circle and not let it come out. So that would be letting the energy spill out of the magic circle so keep it inside. Yep, So go ahead and have a seat lying your back and just take a moment here. Bend your knees into your chest is always nice to start the class just by hugging your knees and stretching a lower back from standing and gravity.

From now, for here, we gonna bend your knees 90 degrees and we gotta hold the circle nicely. And on top in front of your chest, keep your fingers long. They'll help you not to squeeze the circle too hard. So you're gonna hold with the heels of your hands nice and strong. That's the strongest part of your hand, wrist long, elbows straight, soften the elbows, but they are straight.

Your neck is long on the mat and we're going to tap one foot at a time. So we call the pre politesse. I like to always start with the prep two. So you find your center and now your hip flexors in your hips. So keep the hip nice and relax.

Zip the center and tie that belt around your waist and then with your right foot you're going to touch the mat and pick it up and then touch your left foot on the mat and pick it up. Always asking yourself, is my center really nice and tight? Is this movement coming from my center? And I'm just tapping. I'm pretending the mat is nice and hot and I'm just touching and picking it up again.

For maybe for some of you, you may just want to go halfway, which is completely fine. And now we just gonna tap a little faster. So you're gonna go right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot. So no matter how fast I do things my center is working really hard. My hip is relaxed.

My hip flexors are relaxed. They're working to an extent but not definitely not a hundred percent maybe 15%. And one more in each leg and last time. And now let's pop your circle in between your ankles, these ankle bones here. You're going to go on top of those ankle bones called the malleoli if you curious about it.

I think it's a funny name. Keep it above that. So it's nice one. And it's not into that mat into that bone. Close the legs a little bit.

Have a little bit attention, but not too much. Just feel that the circle is in between your knees. And now from here, we're gonna have both legs going down to the mat and maybe for you could be maybe a quarter of the way or half the way, and you bring it back each time or maybe you can go all the way down to the mat and then come back up again and I could be standing in your tummy and you have nice everything into your center. You tightened our waist, just tie that belt around your waist. You putting that jacket on with a zipper going from those bones under heat all the way in between your chest and you moving the legs with control and intention.

You know what they're moving from? Let's do two more, down to the floor and up. You squeezing the circle a little bit without tension and rest. Very nice. Now let's do the hundred.

So you can start with your knees bent. You're going to... Remember what we learned from the tower. We can pick up the head, nice and long. So your abdominal muscles are the ones lifting the head and then bring it back down again.

Again, so if I was there, I would be pulling and lengthening your head to help you to come up. So it's not just the head moving it's the whole unit of the body. Last time. Come up nice and long and maybe that will be lower than you think. And stay there and then from there, pick up your arms and pump your arms up and down.

Breathe in two, three, four, five and out two, three, four, five breathe in two, three, four or five and out two, three, four, five. Keep breathing in for five counts and exhale for five counts. So that's 30. If you want to, you can straighten your legs and you can go as much as you want to 40 and let's do one more. Breathe in two, three, four, five and exhale two, three, four, five.

Now we need 50 more. So take your circle in your hands, get your heels together, and pump with your circle. Breathe in two, three, four, five, and exhale two, three, four, ten. Breathe in with the air, (inhales) Out with the air. You take your legs where you can hold them from your center.

And two more. Breathe in two, three, four, five. And exhale two, three, four, five. Last time. In two, three, four, five.

Exhale, two, three, four and five. Lower the legs on the mat. Give yourself a nice stretch, bringing the arms over the head. Now take your circle up, pick up the head as a unit with the rest of your body and roll up and go lift the waist to reach the arms forward. Squeeze the circle and come down, lengthening your waist, drawing the legs together.

Bring the arms over the head. Bring the arms up, head up in with the air, go under the bridge, out with the air. Lift your waist and in with the air. Draw those legs together out with the air. And again feel free to bend your knees, hold on to your thighs, place your feet under heavy furniture and roll down just squeezing your circle a little bit as you go down and then you relax.

You bring your arms up, last time. Head up, inhale, lengthen the waist, exhale Lift the waist and keep the arms nice and active. Squeeze the struggle from the hips. So Joseph says your arms starts all the way by your hips. And rest.

Nice. Let's place your circle, right between your ankles above that little funny bone there. And let's start from here. Yes, If you really at first, you can start from the bottom. Otherwise from up here or the first one, the second one bring the arms long and keep a little bit of life in your circle.

Take your hips over the head, squeeze your circle and then come back down squeezing your circle a little bit more. And again, let's do one more from here. And over the head, keep the leg live the arms pushing, squeeze your circle into an oval shape and come back down with control. Nice. Now, if you want, if you wish you can take your legs lower to the mat or just stay where we were and pick it up to the ceiling, over the head, notice that I'm trying not to use momentum, squeezes and return and lower to the mat bring it up and over.

So I stop intentionally, so I don't just swing my legs over. Squeeze the circle and down. Similar to what we did last week with the tower, right? Nice and honest movement. Lift the legs.

Last one. And over assets, all pure strength that's taking you there. Squeeze into an oval shape and come down nice and smooth. You decide when you wanna come down and rest. Beautiful.

Now go ahead and give yourself a little stretch there with the circle, why not? Nice, just a little stretch and move the leg a little bit more and go ahead and swap foot, so just a little mini stretch. You still getting warmed up. And you going to take your circle and roll up because we're gonna place you circle today right underneath you heel. So you have an option of doing underneath the heel, or underneath your ankle.

The heel is nice because the more you press your circle down the more you feel your thigh in your seat. So you have a very unstable surface, which is great. And the idea here is that you're gonna be paying attention on this leg today. Now, lift the other leg up turn out just a little bit, keep this leg from moving. So you may do a smaller circle today and we go cross the leg around and up to the nose.

Keep the other leg quiet a round and two. Another thing, keep that bottom knee there soft. And two more. Four, one more... Let's do one more, so we're gonna do six.

Hope the poor politesse police will know and reverse A way across and up, as you bring it up, can you squeeze your circle more with the back of your thighs and lift. Arms are active, neck is long, quiet circle and all round and up and last time down, all round and up. Beautiful. Now go ahead and swap. If you need your hands to help you, please use your hands.

So what I was saying is that, keep that back knee nice and soft to the rise you can hyperextend the knee or straight too much and then you miss the muscle. And we go across around and up, around across and up. And it's really challenge to talk, to move and keep that leg nice and straight pushing the circle down. through we and two, one more and reverse. Go away and around and up.

And every time you coming up can you press this circle down and up So you feel that your center is helping you to press the circle down. And the back of the thighs and the bum on the seat. And two more, up last time and rest. Very nice. Now let's bring your circle there and we're gonna do three roll-ups from here.

So it's gonna be hard but you can do it. Hold onto the back of knee too or reach your arms forward and roll up. You won't come too much, too high and reach forward. It's almost like a teaser. And then you go back down again and you can add breath.

inhale, come up, exhale. So now you're a bit more warm and roll down with control. And last time press you circle down, soften your knees and come up, up, up and see how far you can do. Beautiful. And then take your circle.

Nice homework. You can practice there. Now, we're gonna do your rolling, like a ball. And today I want you to reach. Yeah, there are different variations and press your knees against your elbows.

So the energy's reaching almost like you're doing the stomach massage and the reformer. Knees and heels are down. So try not to lift them up too high. Inhale, go back and then exhale. Come up and reach the energy through the ceiling and through the wall.

Inhale, push your knees into your biceps into the arms there. And again, inhale and exhale. Now we're going to add to the craziness. We're gonna go back and we're going to stand up after rolling back up. So you're gonna roll back, roll up in, stand up, reach and go back down and go into your rolling like a ball and come up and reach.

So hopefully that feels just as difficult for you to come up, go back energy forward and up. And again, down inhale, go back. It's real. The struggle is real. The challenge is real.

Polite is hard and humbling. Last one, inhale, exhale, come up and reach. Nice. From here, you gonna reach your arms forward. You're gonna bend that right knee and you're going to do a little mini squat here.

And down two and up three and up. And you're just holding your circle. You're not squeezing just there to help you last time for five and switch leg. Nice and strong. Scoop deeper, go down, push with your heels.

And two, if it's too hard, just do another set. Do a set with your both legs. Last time. Very nice. Place your feet down and burrow back down.

Good. Beautiful. Now let's do a single leg stretch. So you're going to keep reaching your arms forward. Remember what we did with the tower? You know, when you had to go too far up you want it to come up long.

So if you wanna keep your circle there, you can. Keeping the leg reaching, keeping the neck long, nice and honest coming from your center, Or you can reach and squeeze and squeeze and squeeze and squeeze. Think of squeezing a circle with your waist with your back muscles, by your hips. Two more. Nine, nine, ten, ten.

Let's pop your circle in between your ankles. Inhale, reach out, hold. Can you come up any higher with your body then circle your arms to pull in. Inhale reach out, you're just holding your circle and pulling in. And if you want to squeeze your circle a little bit find your seat, wrap open your hips and exhale, inhale, reach, exhale.

So think of your backstroke on the reform. You wanna reach the arms and the legs and then circle the arms. Inhale, reach, lengthen arms or legs, energy away from each other. Exhale. That's a two more inhale, reach, exhale.

This time inhale, reach, exhale. Pick up your circle and we go pull, pull and swap. And you're just holding your circle. If you want a little bit of support for your neck pop the frame of the circle behind your head and then you can rest the head and challenge your center by coming up with your center. If you want a little bit more stretch with your foot behind the thighs and the curve you can flex your ankles a little bit Breath.

Otherwise, keep your arms up there. Point your toes and two, two and one, one, one, one, and rest. Let's pop the circle in between your ankles again. Take a break if you need. Hands behind your head, linked in your neck, elbows wide, inhale, go down.

Exhale. Make your circle into a oval shape and come up. Inhale, go down and oval shape to come back up too. In with the air, out with the air. So you are all using your inner thighs inevitably but I want your attention to come from your seat from your center, reaching your legs, lengthening before you come up. Reach those legs through the wall and pulling.

Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. Last time, inhale, exhale. Good. Now, criss-cross. You're going to reach the legs out.

When you bend your knees, you're gonna come say hi to your opposite knee, with your elbow. Reach out, come say hi to the opposite knee with your elbow. Reach and two, it feels like 20 but this is just the second one. (laughs) out and three and out and four and out and four and out and five, twist, twist reach, last one and take a moment. So that was five.

We going to do another five with a different variation. So you're gonna bring your circle on your thigh there, below the knee, elbows. You can keep your foot down if you want to and then come up, but come up with your whole waist helping you nod the hat or the elbows, your knees coming towards the elbow. And the elbow is going to say hi to the knee but you really focusing on the waist and two more, four. nice and five and swap other side. So this side you can keep your foot down or you can take it out.

It's up to you. Squeeze five and come up four. The knee and the elbow is coming half and half through three. We can pop it back down two, one more and one and rest. Hopefully you crampy.

You should, and here we go, take your circle up. Legs are together and roll up, long neck, long waist and just take them on ankle. Fully stretch your body and sit up top. So now you're going to open your legs a little wider than your hips and your circle is going to go in between you. So you're going to do her spine stretch forward.

Very similar to the on-the-chair. So I want you to, instead of thinking down, I want you to grow taller to then scoop and press the circle down, up, up, up, up, up and then resist coming back up. So that's what I was saying, Keep the energy inside the circle. Again, lift to press down, down, scoop deeper, touch the ceiling with the crown of your head. And if you touch the bottom gushing you gave yourself a piece of chocolate after the class.

And again, so this gushing and touching that bottom cushion, lift up. So always think lengthened to go down. The back, the arms, this chain, here aside and back is working really hard. Your waste is going in, in, in, in, and then you keep it as long as you want. And then you keep it down, down, down, down, down.

Don't let it come up. Don't let it come up. Same thing with pedal, right. with the on-the-chair. Last one, lift energy through the legs and press those heels into the floor like you did into the circle, when you were doing your single-like circle.

Press, press, grow taller, press, press grow, taller touch. I get a piece of chocolate and come back up. Dark chocolate's good for you, but you deserve it. Great. Let's do one hand at a time. Get to start with this one so you can see.

The other one is gonna either go behind your head, So your head can press into it or you can bring it to the side that we wanna wake up. So Joseph Brant is Roman. She just slept with love, to wake up the muscles we want to connect with. So you can have your hand there to wake up and press down with his energy coming from the side. And then you come back up when you want or your hand can be behind your hat lengthening you, lifting to press down active legs flexing the toes to the ceiling and I come up.

And last time. So we're doing three repetitions. Lift to press down. Feel your waist on that side, feel your back on that side Feel your belly button on that side. And you come back on when you decide to. Get to swap hands, same thing.

Lift to press down, press your hand into your hands. Energy through the ceiling and control coming up. And again, out, out, down, down, down, down, down, up, up up, up, down, down, down, down, down. Your scoop, scoop scoop keeping the resistance going. Keep the Springs alive, right.

It's the same thing. So you keep your circle alive. Keep the tension. Don't stop the attention there and keep it down as you're coming back up and you'll feel that one side is different than the other. You walk a little bit more on the weaker side, on your home time.

Beautiful. Right, so now you're going to come forward. You're going to take the circle in between your ankles. Hold the circle, once its turning out, keep your elbows from moving. If you're bending your elbows, that means that you're using about too much momentum.

And we go, we're gonna do three with the circle in between the legs. So go back and then three with the circle being outside the ankles. One. And again, chin in, inhale. Exhale. One more.

Keep your circle oval shape if you can. Keep it center and come up. Nice. And let's pop your circle to the outside. See how that feels. So that means you're gonna bring it a bit more of a tension on the outside muscles.

We go inhale out, come up center, elbows straight. Don't let the elbows help you, feel your back muscles helping you and come up, two last time, inhale, go back. Nice and smooth pushing to your circle out, out and three. Very nice. Let's pop the circle inside again and walk down nice and slow.

Bring your arms long by your side and we're gonna go up now. So you can squeeze your circle, go up and then squeeze even more to come down. So when I say squeeze it's without tension. You go up and then keep squeezing the circle to come down, as you press your arms down like chest expansion. And again up, now can you stay there and come down nice and slow.

How much can you make your circle into a oval shape coming in? And last time, up and squeeze come down with control. Take your time, take your time, take your time take your time and take your circle and come up. Nice. The so variation.

I want you to twist and place your circle, so with this hand on the outside of your ankle. So when you twist, you placing the circle on the outside of your thigh there or your leg. Yeah. So let's do it this way. So you're gonna inhale, twist to the right, exhale, press, keep your fingers long, active back arm and use that whole side that you did for your spine. Stretch forward to press the circle lifting the waist.

And come up, pick up your circle, twist, place it right along your calf muscles and press down. So this chain of energy on the side, down, down, down, down, down and come up. And again, inhale, twist, place, press and lift your waist up, up, up, up, up, up, up and pick it up again. Twist, reach, energy, lift that waste, nothing collapse, everything's lifting and lengthening and pick it up again. One more.

Inhale twist reach, live, reach, up and control. Last one, twist, place, long fingers you don't need fingers, You have strong back, you have strong waist, lift the waist, anchor the hips and come back up. Nice. Good. Now, so go ahead and turn around. And you're gonna face down this time.

Bring the circle right in between your hands just for some resistance. And you're going to do your neck pull. So belly button off the floor, long neck, and we look to the right, down, around the left and forward to the left down around to the right and forward. Beautiful. Now from here, you're going to reach your circle in front of you for swamp variation.

So you're gonna bring your arms forward. So once again, think won the chair, long neck, the muscles are moving from your waist all the way down here like swimmers. So you're gonna press the circle with your back and your waist. And then you come out of the water and you look forward. My fingers are long, the heels of my hands are pressing down and I'm coming up, coming up, up, up, up, up.

And then I bring my head down and I decide when I want to release my circle peer polities, and again. Press, lift belly button, look forward, up solid movement hand down and come back down. My legs are drawing together, my heels are together. And again, energy coming from my waist. From my back, down we go, reach, feel nice and strong, open the chest, long neck.

Remember we wanna come up with the back of the hats not just the skull moving and rest. Now stick with this variation we're gonna try one arm at a time. Crazy. So, left-hand is gonna come back more into the center. Right arm is gonna reach out and I'm just going to try to wake up that side a bit more.

So this side is hard for me. Press down, press down, press down, press down and release. And again, press down. So even if you just holding, even if you're not pressing it I know it's hard and down. Last time. Just so the brain can talk to that.

The muscle group there that you haven't activated as much as we want to. I needed as well and rest. Swap, reach the other arm, press down, solid up. And yeah. So is it easier on that side, for me its too challenging.

Always a welcome challenge up, up, up, up, up, up, up and down. One more, reached with the other arm to press down with your back with your triceps, everything back there. No shoulders, no neck. And rest. (sighs) Rest your circle and just sit back on your heels a little bit and round your body.

Make your body a little tiny ball. Like the rolling likable Roman has thought or really likes when we hold the back of the heels and try to beat tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny bow. Good, so we're not done yet with extension more here. We're gonna go back forward, stay nice and tall and kick, kick kick. So keep those hips pressing into the mat so you can stretch the front of the thigh and make the back of the thighs work hard.

Kick kick, two two, one more and rest. Nice. Let's bring your arms. Every exercise is a victory. Every repetition's a victory.

So you're gonna bring your elbows bend with your circle. And you're gonna kick with both legs. Kick, kick, kick, kick. Now come up. This is part of the arm series with magic circle and then good luck. Squeeze that circle back there which is not going to move very much.

And then rest your head to the other side. Kick, kick, kick, come up, squeeze back there, nice and long arms and rest. And kick, kick, kick, come up press the legs down together lengthen the back of the neck and squeeze the circle. One more. You can do it. And kick, kick, kick, come up, stay up there.

It's like eating your vegetables. Good for you. Hold, bounce back there, pump it. One, two, three, four, five, and rest. Sit back on your heels and go back into that little tiny ball again. So you wanna round round, round, round, round wrap your heels if you want to, round a bit more belly button into the spine and come up.

Nice, nice work there. Let's do the neck pull over with a circle in between your ankles. So you're going to just place the circle so far away from you. So you can feel that you won top of this circle with the heels. So just not hiding your bones there.

Then the knees, if you want to, hold thighs, roll down. Think of the push through belly on the Cadillac. Yeah, so you're pressing out and pressing in hands. It can either be behind your head or behind your thigh. And we go, in with the air, squeeze your circle, head to the knees as you lift the waist.

Stack one bone at a time against the imaginary wall. Remember we did that against the wall, go back flat like the flat back and around squeezing more and more your circle and all the way down. And again, come up, inhale, exhale, stretch and stack the vertebrate. Smile and go back back, back back. Now you lengthening the waist, you rounding it.

The more you run, the more you squeeze squeeze round, round, squeeze, squeeze, round and go down. Last time. Come up. Exhale, to the knee, lift the waist round, stack one bone at a time. Try not to miss any of them. Push against the, wall one at a time.

Sit up nice and tall, flat, flat, flat, and round. Beautiful. Take your circle in your hands. Nice. Let's bring your structure in between your knees and lift the hips into a little bridge, squeeze the circle for five, four, three, two, one. Keep it up there with the thighs.

And you're just going to lower the hips a little bit and pick it up and come up again. One, keep the circle oval as much as like the shape of a nug or even smaller too. And again, come up three. So hopefully you feeling this heat as much as the inner thigh or even more not just the inner thighs. Up and two more, two last time and hold, squeeze.

Another set. Last time. Eight, seven, six, five, four, three long arms, long neck shoulders open and want round and come up. Good. Now you're gonna do the mermaid here and it's nice to do with two circles. If you have two circles, you can do that. Otherwise just imagine that you have the other circle there.

So arms long, once again, fire that waste fire that side. You can even have your hand there if you helps you. And you're gonna press the circle down as you lift and up. So this side is coming up. As you press down, think of you're pulling straps.

Those are the muscles you want a few back here. You want to crack the Walnut, go through the ceiling, up, up, up, up, up press those knees down, to get the seat to help you and come up. And again, press down, lift the waist. So it's lifting is not down, up, up, up, up, up, up and come up on your own time. Nice to go ahead and switch side.

Always checking my tummy, pulling it in. Cause we would talk fingers long. Another thing the circle is slightly in front of your shoulders is not behind. Otherwise, there's two joints not gonna like that. Keep the fingers long and we go, Lift to press, lift to press.

Touch the ceiling and come back. I'm gonna show you a back view and again. so I want you to crack the Walnut. Crack pulling the straps, pull the straps and release. Last one, lift up, up, soften the elbows if you need to, to fire the back of the arms and the back of the muscles and release.

I'm gonna face you again. And we go two more. Lift, energy, feel like you have another magic circle on this side as well. And release. Nice.

The ears have been pulling up to the ceiling. Last one, press down, head touching the ceiling, up, up, press lift, lift and release. (sighs) Nice. So actually this would come the sidekicks. So we're going to do them standing today.

So go ahead and stand up. 'Cause the end of this year is we're gonna do everything standing against the wall. So I'm giving you more and more things standing little by little, so you can feel the Pilates standing. Yeah, it's beautiful to work on the map, but then we take it with us and then the politesse is in your body. So you have your little Politis V there.

Once again, my knees are soft, my arms are out with the energy that I created with the magic circle. I'm gonna lean to the right but I don't wanna lean too far. I still want my energy up and I'm gonna pull that leg in from my center. And then I'm going to release with control. Again press to lift, lift to press and resist.

Soften both these a tiny bass. It's not the joint helping you. And out. I always think Romana control, control, control strength with stretch control, scoop. And in, in, in, in, in, out, out, out, out, out in, in, in I this side, I keep the fire inside the circle.

So I'm gonna show you one without I just kind of release and I get not allowed in, in, in, out, out in, in, in, out, out, out, out good. Now from now, let's pop there. Same walking leg forward. If you need to adjust please do. I need to adjust to look back and now you're just gonna pull that leg into the body.

So I'm gonna face this way, so you can see. There's my hamstrings my thigh here pressing in to my body and then out. So there's a very fine line to feel the back of the knee versus the thigh. So this is extension. We taking the leg behind like when we're taking walks, right.

When we taking, when you walk, so this is going back behind you, the bum, the back of the thighs and release. And again, in, in, in, in, in, out, out, out, out, out stay nice and tall lifting energy. The supporting leg is working just as much. And out, out, out out in, in, in, out, out, out out. So one two, three, one, two, three, three, three, two.

Two more to go, two to one more and one, one. And now step forward with that working foot. Yeah, and then the back of the thighs are gonna come in and then you release. And now I'm just turning out a little bit with this. Like, but you don't need to, you can do a facing.

This way your toes are facing out through that window in, in, in, in out, out, out. So there's always energy, both ways, keep moving. It's like moving like the river flowing. Stay nice and tall. Hands can be on your hips, hands can be out, hands can be in your back.

Pick your variation. Hips are nice and square and three and two more, in, in, in, out, out, out and last time in, in, in, out, out, out and now magically you on the other leg that we haven't done any yet. So we started that way. Now we're gonna face, we leaning this way. So reach out and we pull and we release and we pull and we release.

Fixed my circle a little back 'cause it's going to the bone that doesn't feel very nice. Nice. And again, so energy through the ceiling, softened both knees a little bit make the thighs work on the outside. You will feel on the inside but fires. And that message to the back of the wrapping and out, out in, in, in.

The waste is getting smaller, every time you draw those legs in. Reach the arms long, think of your back muscles, helping you stay tall, breed. Naturally, this is not a brief exercise on this one. So just breathing into your nose, out through the nose, keep the heat in your body. Try to fight the urge to lean too far to the side.

So you thinking up like a puppet and in, in, in, out, out, out, in, in, in, out, out, out last time in, in, in, out, out, out. Now pop the leg forward in front of you. If you need to adjust, please do. And we go inside the body and out. so we're gonna face this way once again.

So you can see making an oval shape and then I'm coming out of that shape. And I go back in again. So I don't really release a hundred percent so pull in and out. By the way if you're doing on a mat, good for you. Cause it's a lot harder than doing on the floor.

It's a lot more in stable then unstable than if I did it on the mat. Oh well. And in good free prep, receptive muscles and joints. So every time you walking on balance, it's very good for brain, joint connection, preventing people from falling and hurting themselves. So it's nice to keep that balance, but yes you can do it on the floor.

Please do on the floor. Hand against the wall if you need to. It can still do a beautiful job holding it against the wall back knee soft, thighs burning, bum burning, knees happy. in, in, in, out, out, out. Last time in, in, in, out, out, out.

Step forward with that foot and that will be the last one for us. So adjust if you need to and we go pull in there. So you're thinking, Oh, she's gonna fall any time. It feels a bit wobbly for me. I don't only have to be honest.

I don't normally do on top of the mat. But Oh, well, challenging. It's good for you pushing yourself once again. So hands can be here out behind your head. If it's behind your head, think of lifting the neck to press down.

So there's always energy going various different ways. And again, scoop I have a dear friend that sketched the teaser and he was describing the teaser to someone that can hear his cues. So he drove the teaser energy and he was like up and down that way and that way. So it's the same thing here. The energy is going up, the legs are working pushing in, the other legs pushing down to the floor to give me strength to push up and always, and that's what makes it so efficient about Pilates and art and rest.

Beautiful. Now go ahead and shake your legs and in place yourself. And one more, you can go into a little squat here and then down, we go. Beautiful. So now we're gonna do the teaser.

So let's show on your hands, get to the position, reach the legs, bring the arms. You keep it forward if you want to and go down keep the legs nice and quiet and come back up and reach and down. And it's amazing. I can still hear Romana saying Ariba right in front of me. And down when you were like suffering she would give you the biggest Meyer and say Samire was another hard, have fun with it and down.

And one more, which is very true... (laughs) Now hold it there, lower the legs and bring it up. One, lower the legs, bring it up two, lower the legs. Bring it up three. Now see if you can keep your arms and give you a little halo, like an angel, I go down everything together, everything come up with a halo.

Please feel free to bring your arms down to bend your knees, you know your body and come up. Now hold, have some fun now. Bring your legs through the circle, under the circle, above the circle. Inside the circle, under the circle, above the circle. One more set, inside and under, smile and rest.

Let's place your circle down and go into your seat you very deserve it. See you. It's a reward. Stretch the inner thighs and go back and clap back there if you feel like you can. Keep your chin tuck then so you want to chin to chest your head.

One to touch the floor, there's a knee to touch the floor. Energy through the legs. One, two, three back. One, two, three forward. One, two, three back.

Last one and you're going to come up. If you have healthy knees, go ahead and cross the legs reach forward and come down with energy and let's go to your, to the wow. So let's bring the circle to the wall with us. And so there is a leg series that we just did today. And now we're going to do a little bit of the arms.

So you're going to step forward a little bit. Make sure you're back. No ponytail is stopping your head from touching the wall. And you're going to bring the arms forward. Find your back against the wall, pull everything in.

And you're going to squeeze for one and release. Remember energy inside the circle too, and release but you have a little bit attention. You never release a hundred percent, three. Beautiful. Now bring it down to the belly button, showing the ribs and sternum everything into the wall. Even if you need to walk forward and we go, One and release, two and release and three and release.

Bring it in front of your eyes. Belly button into the wall without tucking the hips. So keep the hips nice and relax. And we go, three and release two and release one more, three and release. Bring it down and let's do our little eight pumps.

You're gonna do eight down here. Six, five, four wasting to the wall to one waist on the wall ribs on the wall and travel to come up. So you taking eight counts to go up. You stay up there for eight, five, four, three, two, one come down. How are those legs?

Are they still with the magic circle in between the ankles idea? Hold on there for eight, can your waist grow on the wall, lengthen on the wall and travel, eight, seven six, five, four, three, two, one stay up. There is a wonderful feeling to do against the wall. You can really feel the wall as a feedback and come down. So you push the abdominal muscles into the wall to give energy to your arms and back and rest.

Oh nice. You're going to walk up. You don't need the circle anymore. You're going to face the wall. You're going to do...

Remember how we have been doing, building into a pushup. So a press up, we say here in England. So you decide, how far are you gonna go. And today we're going to push, clap, pushing, clap pushing claps. So that's three, four...

One day you're gonna do it on the floor. Five. Let's do eight, six, seven, and eight. Beautiful work. Now because you work the pack muscles and all this, we're gonna turn around into a beautiful extension. So that's another thing.

We worked on the chest expansion and we look to the sides. Then last class we opened up and really enjoy open the chest here today. We're going to walk forward a little bit but make sure your shoulders are with you. So you have your shoulders, your hands by your shoulder. As you walk forward remember, this is a chest opening not a crunchy over your lower back, open the chest, look up and indulge yourself into this little.

Someone's like a bridge, Isn't it? Bring your head to the wall and push. So it should feel really yummy. Open your chest to the ceiling and end. Two more. This is like walking to make a successful bridge.

One more or reverse pushups. It looks like to... it feels like to push, push, push, push, push come back into the wall. So your hands are very close to your shoulders again and walk your feet a little bit further away from your wall. So you don't want it to have it too close.

So your feet about away from the wall here reach the arms up and how do a roll up here. So you gonna roll, pull everything into the wall and Itsy Bitsy spider down the wall and then stretch and then roll back up with control. Now take your time, here soften the knees, bend them. And if you need the amount more press the lower back, the middle back, the floating ribs the sternum and the ribs and the collarbone. Ah, bring your heels against the wall.

And now you want to push the wall all the way from you with your long length and waist pull everything in and then you live the wall nice and tall. Keeping the plight, his body polite, his energy everything you took from the feedback from the mat from the wall and just keep it with you throughout your day. So thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed. Hope you fell in love with the magic circle a bit more today.

Thank you for joining me today. Thank you for taking the time to move your body here with us pilates anytime.

Comments

2 people like this.
Thank you for this excellent class!
2 people like this.
Very interesting MC variations! Thank  you very much!!!👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
Tatiana
2 people like this.
Great  Class!
Selene S
2 people like this.
loved it!
Alexandra H
This was such a fun way to add zest to a mat class! I don't think I've ever been so grateful for seal!
6 people like this.
While I am not flexible enough for this class, I like Alexandra and her teaching style. Additionally,  I don't mind the challenge of trying to adapt an exercise  to my capabilities. I loved the standing/balancing work with the circle.  Fortunately balance is not one of my shortcomings.  I got a good workout, had fun, and feel much better. Note for people who do not roll up to standing very well... cross your feet as you start to come up to standing. It's about 50% easier that way. Thanks Again Alexandra:) 
Laura Maria
Enjoyed the creative variations, especially the standing series with the circel :) 
2 people like this.
👏👏👏excellent session. Loved using the circle ⭕️
Deanne
2 people like this.
Loved it! Terrific!
Lisa D
2 people like this.
great magic circle class. It's in my Favorites now!
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