Quick Magic Circle Mat

Hi there. Sarah Berticelli here. We're gonna do a short and powerful workout with the magic circle. Let's go ahead and get started. Have your feet right underneath your hips for me and feel your heels as well as all five metatarsals.

Think about maybe hovering your toes a little bit. I don't need it to be super active, but try not to grip the earth with the toes. Hold the circle between your hands, press just a little bit the circle into your body while also pressing into the circle. K? And just feel a little intention there. Lifting your heart, lengthening through the crown of the head, Now hold the circle with your hands.

And same idea, push a little into your body, but also pull outward on the circle. This is what we're gonna play with when we hold the circle today. This idea of pulling outward with straight arms. So when you push, you're engaging a little bit the front of the body. When you hug with your hands or hold with your hands and pull outward, I want you to try to feel that spreading of the collar bones and the spreading of the shoulder blades. Keep that feeling, lift your arms up and take your arms down.

Let's try that again. So the ribs stay contained as we lift up and breathing when it makes sense and down a slight pull. So only give it as much intention as you need. And, this time, take your arms straight out in front of you with that pulling sensation. We're gonna rotate around to one side.

Back to center, rotate around to the other side. For now, we'll keep the pelvis stable rotating, focusing on rotating the rib cage eyes, head, neck, all that, rather than the lower body. Last one here, please. Pulling outward a little bit, and then go ahead and rest that. Let's turn around and get ready to go to the floor.

So I'm going to, stand off the back edge of my mat. Take that slight pull outward and roll my body down. Bend your knees as needed. Keep your legs straight if it suits you. Allow the circle to touch the mat.

Hollow the belly inward and round and roll up that slight outward pull. Through the hands. Good. Roll yourself down again and roll yourself up. And gently roll down one last time. Place the circle down on the mat and walk out to a quadruped position.

Just have the circle stay underneath you. Hands underneath your shoulders, knees, underneath your hips. Let's round through the low back and extend through the spine. So if you choose to accept the mission, try tucking those toes under and really pressing into the toes as you round. And as you extend.

So you're getting a nice little toe stretch there. And if you were really wanting to work hard here, you could actually hover the knees. I'm not gonna choose to do that just yet, but you certainly could do that, rounding and extending. Just warming up the spine there. Now let's place that circle.

Lift up the circle and you're gonna place it just on the belly. Not on the pubic bone and not on the hip bones, but between the hip bones. Then we're gonna try to settle in a position that you can keep that circle perfectly still. Now if you have really long legs, you might need to modify this. But this works well for me and for most people.

So here, I'm gonna keep my quadruped, keep the circle perfectly stable, slide one leg back, place the ball of the foot down, slide that leg in. Slide the other leg back, slide it in. So what I'm interested in is changing the legs here, but also really being mindful of not moving the circle at all. So slide the first leg back. Stay there. Flex or point the foot. Lift the leg up a couple times.

So can you lift the leg up without changing the circle without changing your pelvis? Keep the leg lifted, come out to the side three times, keeping the circle where it is. So a lot of times, we're not quite sure where our body and where our pelvis is, and this is a nice way to measure that. Put the leg down other side, send the leg back. Lift it up, three, and two, feel your pelvis, feel your circle. Come out to the side, and you may find that one side just doesn't work quite the same.

This side, I am definitely a little bit lacking in my range, but this is a great way to feel what that looks like. So put the foot down. Come on in. Okay. So let's come out of that position and around to our seats preparing for a roll up. So take your arms out in front of you sitting up nice and tall.

Pull outward on that circle and let's roll back. Try to feel that you can get equal weight on both sides of your pelvis and roll yourself up. Good. Keep that outward pull and roll yourself back. Nice straight legs if you're able to. Certainly modify this position as needed.

Anyone who knows me knows that a roll up is quite tricky for me sometimes, but this actually creating this outward pull really helps me use my back, use my body a little better. Just one more here. Feel that beautiful. Stretch a little bit through the back, a little bit of work, all the things. So we're gonna go down and stay down this time, lift your two legs up, and place them between the circle.

So the circle is just above the knee. Settle into your body. We're doing a bridge here. So legs need to be wider than usual in order to create tension on the circle. So my feet are wider.

Take a breath and curl up, find your high bridge, but try to feel like your feet are a little wider than your knees, and then curl down. And I don't really need them to be wider, curl up again. I just don't want you in external rotation today. We're looking to target a little more of that outside glute and curl down. So this time, let's curve up and stay. So you're in that nice big bridge position.

The glutes hamstrings are all working. Can you keep this? Use your arms, use your abs. Take one leg and extend it out to the side, flex the foot reach, pull on the circle. Put it down. Other leg extended in your mind out to the side, squeeze the circle or reach out on the circle, press out. Change again. So we're doing like a marching, push out through the heel, And, ideally, you're trying to keep your pelvis up the whole time. I have a hard time with that.

So it's okay if it drips down. Just keep trying to lift it up. One more on each side here. And nice lateral glute work there. Two feet down, lift your pelvis up if it fell and roll down one lovely vertebra at a time.

Keeping the feet like this, just push into one leg and take your legs to one side, push into the other leg and take your legs to the other side. So play with that little spine sway, or it's actually more of a hip sway because I am not moving my pelvis very much. And just feel how that feels. Go ahead and release that. Lift your legs to tabletop position. Adjust the circle as needed.

Just a gentle push on the circle. Take your arms wide to the side first. Palms facing up. Push with one leg so you're gonna push over rather than pull. Think about that. So whatever direction I'm going to, I'm pushing with that outside leg to create a little bit more tension, if you will, in the glute muscles there.

So we can try that one more time. And then lift your hands up and clasp your fingers together creating like a circle with your arms, and we'll move a little faster in opposition. Legs go one way arms the opposite and we change and we change at whatever pace suits you and whatever range works for you. So just breathe and feel that push through the legs. Boy, My lateral glutes are definitely speaking to me, and this feels really quite nice in my core as well. One more time each side, breathing, and then gently hug those knees into your chest. Beautiful. Let's keep that circle on the outside of your legs. Reach around and hold on to the backs of your legs, lift your head and chest.

Push outward a little bit and just rock and roll. Rock and roll on your spine, rock and roll. Until you're up in a sitting position. We're gonna come back to that a little bit later, remove the circle from between your legs, stretch your legs straight out in front of you, pull outward and roll yourself back. Nice little articulation through the back. Here, lift your right leg up and place the foot in the on the handle area.

Use your hands to help you stretch through that foot, bend the knee, and keep the foot flexed with the the pull of your hands one more time, bend the knee and straighten. Now TikTok leg goes across the body, leg goes open, come back to center. Push through the straight leg. Your arms move to straight. Lift your head and chest, push into the leg, roll up to a sitting position rounded.

Pull with your arms, sit tall through your back. Lift your leg up as high as you can keep your back straight. We look like a little t rex here. And then you're gonna begin rolling back. Your arms will begin to straighten and then roll your body down. It's kinda like a climb a tree, and we come in. The foot is flexed. Ben and stretch three times. One, and two.

And three TikTok across and open center, push through the foot, the arms straighten, lift the head and chest, roll up, sit tall, create your little t rex shape. I didn't mean to call it that, but I kinda like it. Roll yourself back. Good. One more time, been in the stretch. Beautiful.

Try to get a nice little flex foot there. So you're really reaching up through the heel across the body, open, tick tock, push down through the foot, lift the head and chest, roll yourself up. Sit tall, lift the leg up. Last time we roll down, try to keep the leg there, and then the leg comes with you. Beautiful will change legs.

So other foot is gonna go right in the same spot. And we bend and stretch, push through the heel, and two, and three across the body, and open, and then push through the leg, lift the head and chest, round and roll yourself up. Sit tall through the body, lift the leg up, and there's our little t rex shape and round and roll back. Coming in, bent and stretch. Nice little stretch through the back of the leg and the foot.

Keep the leg straight, go across, open, back to center, push the straight leg into the circle nod your chin in, roll yourself up lots of hamstring work there. Sit tall. The elbows are bent. Lift the leg and roll yourself back. It's our last one here. Good. Bring the leg in.

We'll bend and straighten. Just make sure you find a breath that suits you. Straighten one more time, bending straighten, leg goes across, leg goes open, come back to center, push through the leg round and roll yourself up. Sit tall. Lift the leg up.

This is our last one. We roll ourselves down. And draw the leg in. Lift two legs up this time and slide your legs back through the circle outside of the knees. We're gonna rock and roll again.

So you can hold the backs of your legs, lift your head and chest and begin the rock and roll. So you're pushing outward on the circle, creating just a little bit of 10 security there. And then find yourself in an upright position. That will be your option one. We're gonna do open leg rockers.

So option two is up near the ankles. So you'll put the circle near the ankles. You'll lift your legs up. You'll keep that outward push. You'll find the place where you can hold on.

And here we go. We inhale to roll back. And we exhale straightening everything out. And inhale to roll back, perhaps. And straightening, find those back extensors at the top. Find your breath.

I'll take two more. Remember, we are rolling on the spine, but you do wanna avoid going all the way to the neck. So I stop right at the upper back. Let's hold this. Hold it. Hold it to straight legs.

Can you release your hands? Can you lower your legs a little? Oh, don't lose it. Don't lose it. And lift. And lift and lift. And last one. Put your feet down, remove the circle from your ankles.

You can cross those sweet legs, and we're gonna come around into our quadruped position again that we worked on earlier. So the circle is just underneath your belly. Between your two hip bones. I'm gonna move forward just a bit. Your hands are right underneath your shoulders. Beautiful.

Slide one leg back. Slide the other leg back. You're in a plank. And hopefully, you can feel where that circle is. You'll keep it there.

Take your right leg, lift it up three times. One, two, three. It's the same leg. Pull the knee in. One, press back. Two. Hold it here three.

So the knee is bent. Kick the elbow, the knee is straight and come on in. So the knees toward the elbow, you're kicking it to straight. I don't think I could kick my elbow here. Send my leg back, other side. We lift up three times. One, keep the circle still, two.

And three. The knee comes in. One, press back to straight. It's out to the side, two. And then we're gonna hold it here. We're gonna try to keep the height of the leg and kick out straight three times. Two, and three.

Take the leg back to where it came from, gently take your knees down. And you'll hold your circle now in your hands. So let's work on the mermaid. So you'll have a seat and create a mermaid shape. One leg out in front, the other leg behind you.

Place the circle down so that you can feel you feel like you're sitting upright as best as possible, and your arm is straight when you're on the circle here. So the other hand can just be by your side. We're gonna reach out a little bit and find a little bit of lateral flexion. The arm comes up. You're gonna reach around, put both hands on that circle.

Now check it out. Bend the elbows so that you can get your your circle square bring your forehead to your hands. Hold that belly more active. Press to straight. So check it out.

You're gonna bend your elbows. Bring your forehead to your hands. Pushing it down a little bit. And I'm not really pushing with my forehead. I'm just feeling the shape and press back up and one more time.

Feel those abs and press back up. And we'll go ahead and unwind there. Let's do it one more time. So I'm laterally flexing. I'm reaching over beyond, so my circle is not straight up and down. As I rotate around, I'm gonna pull back so my circle is straight, two hands on the handle or wherever they need to be. My elbows are gonna bend.

My forehead will touch the handle maybe, and I'm using my core, my abs to do this. It feels like quite a lot of work. Push up. I'm using my abs to do this. Press up one more time, and press up one arm, rotate around, and let's come on out of it and do the other side. So hook the legs to the other side.

Start with your hand on the handle. The magic circle is stacked and you feel pretty upright. That's a good general place to be. We're gonna lean into it a little bit, so you're on the diagonal. Rotate around. Get both hands on that. Oh, little tighter on this side.

Both hands on that circle. Bend your elbows. Try to bring your forehead to the circle. Again, notice if it feels different on one side for you. And then I'm pushing with my arms away looking forward. Now my forehead comes to the circle. I'm rounding my back, my elbows are bending, and I'm pushing away.

And one more time, my forehead comes to the circle. And I'm pushing away. I have one straight arm. I'm coming back to that lateral flexion, and I sit tall. I'm gonna do that again. Inhale, big breath.

Use your breath. Straighten out the circle. So you gotta do what you gotta do with your arms. You're gonna bend your elbows. The forehead will just touch.

And we're gonna push up, look the forehead touches. And press the arms to straight look one more time. And look and unwind, sit tall, Alright. Let's go ahead and move into some side planking and additional leg work. So this is a little tricky.

Sometimes you'll you'll put your bottom foot inside the handle, and you wanna be on your elbow. And your top foot on top. Okay? So set yourself up so you feel straight, energy through that forearm, energy through that side body. I'm looking for a lot of engagement there. Let's just go ahead and push down a few times engaging that inner thigh.

The other hand can be on the floor if you'd if you'd like or behind your head if you prefer. Now hold here. Lift the leg up and make sure you clear the circle as you kick forward, little pulse, and back point the foot. I like using the circle so I can feel the challenge for me keeping my one leg up above the circle. I find it a nice little hurdle to get over. Hold back here. Feel that glute.

Look forward and not take a little extra stretch. And then rest the foot or the leg rather on top of the circle. Here, if you choose to accept the mission, we're gonna push down through both legs. Engage that core, use your hand if you need to and lift up to a side plank. If you can do it with no hand, do it with no hand down, and up two, and up three, and up four, And one more time, please. Five, lower yourself all the way down here, and let's just flip ourselves to the other side. So slip your bottom foot on top of the handle there, the top foot, on the outside. So one is on the inside, one is on the outside, elbow plank position, although the hips are resting for now.

Let's push down a few times with that top leg and just kinda get our bearings here. I feel like the wobbliness of the circle pushing down helps me find the engagement in my core in this position. So now hold, lift the leg up, flex the ankle. We kick forward with a little pulse, and we go back with a little pulse. If you choose to flex the foot forward, and point the foot back. That's nice. And again, you're trying to keep your leg level if you can.

So most of us will have a harder time keeping the leg lifted as you go back. That's your focus. Last time, stay back here. Reach, reach, reach, reach, extend a little bit through the upper spine and look forward, and then rest the leg on top of the circle here. Here we go. Are you ready? Are you sure? Use your core, lift your hips up. Choose to lift the arm if you can, and we lower down.

And we lift up two and down. Oh, I'm quivering like a leaf with you guys. Three, working my balance a little bit. And four, and one more time. Five. And we'll gently lower down. So, grab manager circle here.

We're gonna place the circle out in front of us and come down to our bellies. I like to always take an opportunity to go down via push up position. Which you can get there however you'd like. So the circle needs to be a little bit on the diagonal away from you for this. We'll just find a placement for the hands. Oops.

I'm gonna have to move back a little bit. So I would like for you to have your hands a little bit. Again, the circles on the diagonal and your hands are a little forward. Find what works for you. You can keep your feet relaxed or you can tuck your toes under, which is something I like to do.

Press down through your whole pelvis, lift your back into extension, push a little through your arms and create a little more height there, and then lower yourself down with control. You'll lift your back into extension without really using the arms and then use the arms to create a little bit more height there and lower all the way down. And again, inhale to extension perhaps, If you can, keep those elbows nice and straight, press a little deeper. And we'll lower down. Just one more time, please.

That feels so nice. Just let your magic circle rest. Bring your hands underneath your shoulders with toes tucked, push yourselves to your hands and knees, sit in a child's pose, and let's take a few breaths. Child's pose or rest pose. Here in this position, my friends, can you really think about tucking your low ribs in and sending your breath to the back of your lungs?

Till your rear ribs, lateral and posterior hands could be by your side, by your feet. They could be arms could be bent that might help you. Arms can be overhead, whatever suits you with your hand arm position. Breathing in and breathing out. And one last breath together.

Bring yourselves upright. And I thank you so much for playing. I'll see you soon.