Hi, I'm Lakey Evans.
Having a flexible body doesn't mean that you have to roll yourself into a ball or bring
your legs into a split.
Good flexibility means having muscles that are not tight and joints that are not stiff.
This program is divided into three segments.
The first segment features simple movements that get the entire body warmed up and moving
towards flexibility.
The second segment concentrates on the muscles and joints of the upper body.
The third segment concentrates on the lower body.
The greatest thing about stretching exercises is that you can do them at any time of the
day or put them with any workout.
Let's begin.
Let's start in a parallel second position.
Our feet are, legs are hip width apart, feet and toes are pointing forward.
As we go through these exercises, I may ask you to bend or soften your knees and you always
want to be aware that your knees are going in the same direction as your toes.
Let's take a nice long inhale.
Abdominals are lifting.
We're reaching up towards the ceiling and press it down.
Head and neck are long on the spine.
And again, inhale up.
And reach and pressing all the way down.
And we're going to start with lengthening the neck and the shoulders, looking towards
the side.
Here we go.
Looking aside.
Now, center and the other side and center.
Again, side and center.
Feeling the spine very long.
Now we're going to tilt the ear towards the shoulder and center the head and shoulder
and center and shoulder and center.
Last time, tilting.
We'll do the entire series from the beginning.
Looking to the side and center.
Side and center.
Side, center, side.
Taking the ear towards the shoulder and up.
Keeping the shoulders very still.
Up and tilt.
Up, tilt.
Adding on, we're taking the ear towards the shoulder, dropping the chin towards the chest
and rolling the head up from the back of the neck all the way to the top of the head.
Other side, tilting, letting the chin drop and up from the back of the head to the top.
Feeling very long.
Once again, tilting it, letting the neck just roll forward gently and inhaling up.
And last time, letting the chin drop and rolling up.
Let's take a nice inhale.
Flank those arms out and up, reaching towards the ceiling.
Being careful not to let your rib cage open up.
We're still very long in the abdominals.
We're going to interlace the fingers, flip the palms up towards the ceiling and reach,
letting your shoulders come up, feeling a stretch in that waist.
Good.
Exhale, let your shoulders drop back down and just gently place your hands behind your
head.
You don't want to pull on your neck.
You're going to drop your chin towards your chest.
Once again, let the elbows fall in and bend forward from your waist, keeping your pelvis
upright.
And now take a soft knee bend, just like we were talking about earlier, making sure those
knees are going towards the toes.
Inhale and exhale.
Let the hands drop towards the sides.
And now we're going to roll up, uncurl from the base of the spine, the lower back, one
vertebrae at a time as if you were coming up a wall and the top of your head is the
last thing that comes up.
Great.
Let's do that again.
Reaching out, inhaling.
All the way up.
Interlace those fingers and stretch the palms up towards the sky.
And dropping those shoulders, looking forward at me.
Place those hands behind the neck and chin drops, elbows drop, and we curve on down,
bending from the waist, softening the knees.
And relax, feeling gravity.
Just take over, nice stretch in the lower back.
We inhale.
We exhale.
And just let those hands drop towards the side.
And we uncurl again, one vertebrae at a time from the base of the spine, feeling taller
and longer air in those in the back.
One last time.
Here we go.
Reaching out and up.
Interlace the fingers.
Reaching up with the palms.
Dropping the shoulders, looking front, placing the hands.
Chin to chest, elbows drop.
We curve.
This curve in the back, feeling the pelvis is still upright.
Inhale, exhale.
Drop the hands and roll all the way up.
Here we go.
Reaching the arms out to the side, flexing the palms so the fingertips are trying to
come back to you.
And you may want to bring your arms a little bit forward because we don't want to bring
them back and open up the rib cage.
The abdominals are lifting, lifting back towards the spine and up.
We're bringing the shoulders up in an isolation.
We bring them up and let them relax down.
And again, up, keeping the arms very still and relax down.
Last time.
Up and relax down.
Now taking the shoulders front, keeping the arms still and center.
And front and center.
Good.
And front and center.
Bending at the elbows, placing the hands behind the head once again.
And we're going to work the back of our shoulders and our shoulder blades, keeping the elbows
very still and open.
We reach the shoulder blades back towards each other and release them.
Again, not opening the rib cage.
Bring them together and down on the back.
It's a very small movement.
And release last time.
Opening them, bringing them together and release.
We're going to do this once more.
Bring those shoulder blades together and down.
Now take a small opening in the elbows towards the back.
There you go.
Feel an expansion in your chest right here.
Now release that.
Exhaling.
Once more, bring the shoulder blades together.
Now small opening with the elbows reaching towards the back.
Ever so slightly and release.
And just bring the arms down to the sides.
Wonderful.
Okay, now we're going to take a softening in the knee.
Slight bend.
Check yourself out.
Make sure that your knees are going towards your toes.
With the torso, we're bending to the right.
Yes, my pelvis is remaining upright and center.
I'm not shifting off to one side.
Reach the arm up towards the ceiling.
Palm away from you.
Now with the rib cage, stretch all the way up in a yawn, yawn feeling.
Drop the shoulder and drop the arm.
Again, softening the knees.
Reaching over.
Arm comes up and we reach up with the rib cage.
And yes, dropping the shoulder and arm comes down.
Once more, each side.
Torso over.
Arm up.
Really reach, reach as far as you can, letting the rib cage really lift you up and then you
center yourself.
Dropping the shoulder and arm coming down.
Last time.
Bending the knees.
Reaching up.
Palm away.
Rib cage brings you all the way up, all the way up.
Release the shoulder and drop the arm.
We're going to add on similar movement in the legs and the pelvis.
We're going to bring our torso over.
We're going to reach out and curve our arm around.
Now it's going to come right towards our ear.
We're going to take this entire shape, curving forward.
Nice, round back.
Wonderful.
And release this.
The pelvis is upright and we uncurl.
Roll all the way up.
Top of the head is very long, lifting, lifting.
Other side.
Torso comes over.
We reach out, drawing a nice big circle in the air.
Bicep towards the ear.
Take this entire shape forward, rounding.
Nice long feeling in the lower back and we uncurl.
Once more, just a little bit faster.
Here we go.
Bending.
Curving over with the torso.
Reaching out and up.
Curving forward and rolling up.
And bending to the side.
Reaching out and over.
Curving forward and rolling up.
We're adding on.
We're going to do an entire circle.
Torso over.
Reaching out and over.
Curving.
Now we're going to reach out to that left side.
Shoulders both coming forward and bursting up.
Reverse.
Reach out and over.
Torso side.
Reaching front.
Reach to the other side.
Nice reach, long back and inhale and come up.
Once more.
Draw big circles in the air.
Really feel the sides of your body stretching out there.
Really reaching right here and up last time.
You should feel really good to your back.
And curve.
Reaching to the side and coming up and just let that arm come on down to the side.
Beautiful.
The next thing we're going to do is we're going to be rolling down.
So again in the same stance, I'm just turning sides so you can really get a good view of
what's going on.
The chin is going to drop towards the chest.
The shoulders are going to curve in.
The knees are going to soften.
And we're going to curve all the way down.
Now you can watch Lisa and David for the modified version if you feel like you don't want to
necessarily go fingertips to the ground.
From here we're going to feel our sit bones reaching on a diagonal and then up towards
the ceiling.
Nice stretch in the hamstrings still with the soft knees.
Now uncurl your body just as we did before.
Have that pelvis come upright.
We roll up through the back one vertebrae at a time.
Very tall, very long and lengthened at the top.
And once again here we go.
Breathing out.
Chin to chest.
The shoulders come in and we curl ourselves all the way down.
Soften those knees and just let gravity let you just take you down.
There you go.
And sit bones are reaching up towards the ceiling.
Wonderful.
And we uncurl.
Putting that pelvis upright.
Then the lower back.
Again as if you were walking up a wall with your spine.
Tall, tall, tall, tall.
Beautiful.
Now we're going to close our legs in.
We're going to do the same exact thing in a parallel first position.
So your toes are touching.
You're feeling your inner thighs reach together.
Your knees reach together.
Long all the way through the center of your body and the top of your head.
We're extending energy up there.
Here we go.
Same thing.
Really use these abdominals to support yourself as you curve over.
Chin comes down.
Shoulders round.
We soften the knees and we keep curving.
Now at this about this point your pelvis is going to slowly reach up towards the ceiling
and you're supported by those abdominals.
Beautiful.
Here we go.
Uncurl.
Breathing up.
Spine right on top of itself.
Top of the head.
The last thing.
Long.
Don't let those rib cage open.
Yeah.
And last time.
Rolling down.
Curving.
You feel your entire spine articulating itself.
Curving.
Uh I'm feeling really.
Are you feeling it?
Building up your spine.
Yes.
Angerless spina capsule.
Villag...
Corey, what is going on.
Cешеyes behind you.
vuetra.
I can feel it.
You feel it?
Vi particular.
Where where?
The biceps are reproducing.
The pelvic of your spine areFred, body.
얘기를 ah.
Brilliant.
Nervous.
Uncurl safe.
Ni.
Down there.
Yes.
On your knees, 위에.
Down here we want to go.
Hip blades are engaged.
Really responsive.
I'm going to continue to face this way so you can see the flat back.
And your palms are going to face front.
You're going to take the top of your head and your sit bones over in one piece, bending
at a right angle, really trying to keep this lower back long and not curved.
We reach up and over, keeping the rib cage in, the abdominals.
Again, watch Lisa and David for a modified version.
Beautiful.
See this length?
We have two different oppositional pulls happening from the sit bones and the top of the head.
From here, we bend our knees, curve our back, and just let those arms drop towards the floor,
feeling like the torso wants to lay on the top of the thighs.
Beautiful.
From here, inhale, reach those fingertips back out.
Reach back out to the flat back.
Make sure your abdominals are engaged up towards the spine and the rib cage is released, dropped
in, and we reach up to the top.
Once more.
Here we go.
And over in this nice, flat, lengthened, long lower back.
And bend your knees, curve, and release down to the floor, letting that torso get even
closer to those thighs.
Really nice bend in that knee.
And now reach out with the fingertips.
Bring your torso up to a right angle, flat back.
And reaching out even further with your head abdominals engaged, we come all the way up.
And press the arms down.
Okay, let's close our legs back into that parallel first position.
This is the last exercise we're going to do.
We're going to reach out and up.
Palms are going to touch at the top.
We're going to reach our arms down by our sides as we go over through that flat back
position.
Once again.
Hands are going to come behind the calves.
We're softening the knees.
And we'll bring our torso as much as possible with just the right amount of tension, yes?
Towards your knees.
We put our shins, place your hands on top of your shins and look up.
And breathe out.
Exhale.
And again, hands on the calves.
From here our arms reach outside.
We come up through that flat back.
Diving up, up, up, up.
Palms to touch at the top.
And press the arms down.
And bring the palms together in front of the rib cage.
Here we go three more times.
This is called the sun breath.
We reach out and up.
Palms are touching.
Opening the arms side, flat back.
We're going through all the way down.
Hands come on the calves, soften the knees.
Bring that torso towards your knees.
Palms on your shins and look up.
Stomach is supporting, yes?
We release.
And arms come out.
We dive upward, upward, through that flat back all the way up.
Palms are touching.
And arms press down.
And palms come together.
Let's do this one last time, reaching out.
All the way up.
Nice long length on both sides of the body.
Diving out.
And forward.
Torso to the knees.
Palms on the shins.
We look up.
And release back down.
And bring the palms together.
And again, breathe out.
Okay, we're going to open to a wider parallel second position, legs on a slight angle from
the hip sockets.
And we're going to lift the toes up and rotate ever so slightly so the toes are pointing
on a diagonal.
Hands on the hips in the crease and we're going to plie down four counts, bending the
knees taking care to keep them in the same line as the toes.
Here we go.
Down one and up slowly and down feeling this nice crease and up twice more and descend
and coming up last time and rise.
Wonderful.
Take this left arm up and we're going to reach on the up diagonal curving.
Your other arm is on the hip.
Here we go.
Reaching up and to the diagonal and now reaching up and center.
Switching arms, reaching up to the diagonal and up and center twice more.
One arm comes over to long size lengthen.
Your abdominals are lifting, engaged and helping support your back and up.
Now your other arm joins and you go over and coming back up.
Notice that everything is facing front.
I haven't curved over to the side and reach out and up.
Last time we go over to the side, long diagonals and up so there's no tension.
This is still one long line.
I haven't bent or crunched over to the side and up.
Pressing the arms down, inhale and exhale.
Good.
Taking this arm up once more, we're going to reach over to the side in the same fashion
bending this leg making sure it's going towards the direction of the toes but not over.
We're going to lift up in the pelvis and pivot to the side changing the entire direction
of our body.
This leg that's in the back is lengthening down towards the floor and the knee is dropped
pointing towards the floor.
Here hands are on the hips and we're going to feel this back heel just lengthen towards
the floor gently.
Inhale and exhale.
Again stomach is lifted, long neck, long head and exhale.
We're going to gently bend this back knee at a right diagonal.
We're going to take a nice stretch in the quad.
From here we're going to curve the pelvis underneath and now release it to a straight
position.
Don't arch in the back.
Again curve.
You can feel this long line right here and release.
Twice more.
Here we go.
Curving.
Feel this nice roundness and release.
Last time curving and release.
And rise and straighten on both legs and now descend and let that front knee bend slightly.
So again we don't want to go past the toes.
We're not shifting forward.
We're going to walk our hands down our legs supported by the abdominals rounding forward.
Now again please notice Lisa and Dave they're doing the modified version.
At first you want to keep your hands on the shins.
Please do so.
I'm going to put my fingertips on the ground.
I'm going to let my head go and I'm going to relax over here.
Inhaling and exhaling.
And inhale and exhale.
Now we're going to gradually straighten this front leg.
Not quite all the way.
Still a soft knee.
Feeling a nice stretch, long lengthen in this front hamstring.
And we breathe here.
Dropping the head.
Inhale and exhale.
Last time inhale and exhale.
Bending this front knee once again.
We roll up, scooping the abdominals up towards the spine.
Rolling all the way up.
Your arms are going to reach out towards the side.
We're going to lift up and pivot to the front.
Here we go.
Other side.
Hand on the hip.
Reaching this arm up and bending this leg.
Up and the entire side turns.
So our pelvis is pointing to the side.
Leg is long.
Knee is pointing again towards the floor.
Hands are on the hips.
We elongate that heel towards the floor in the back.
Don't press it down.
Just let it release into the floor.
Nice.
Inhale and exhale.
Great.
Bending this back knee once again.
We're going to do our quad stretch four times.
Here we go.
Curving the pelvis front and releasing it to a straight upright position.
And again, curve and release.
Twice more.
We go curve.
Abdominals are lifted and release.
Torso, upper torso is elongated.
Curve.
We have a nice long spine.
And release.
Good.
And we're going to do our thighs on both those legs.
Inhale.
Now bend the front knee once again.
Again, taking care not to go over the toes.
We walk our hands down.
You decide where you'd like to place your hands.
And we breathe here.
Inhale.
And exhale, dropping the head.
And once again, inhale.
And exhale.
Slowly lengthen that front leg out.
Not quite all the way to straighten.
We still have a soft knee.
And we breathe here twice.
Inhale.
And exhale.
Again, always listen to your body.
It'll tell you where it wants to stop and where it needs to go.
Stretch happens gradually.
And on this inhale, we roll up using the abdominals towards the ceiling, towards the spine, reaching
those arms out to the side to help support us.
Lift and pivot.
Beautiful.
Now, let's just gently walk the feet in together.
And they come to a parallel first position.
We have this center line.
We're going to do a sun salutation, sun breath.
We're going to breathe in.
Palms are going to touch.
And breathing out, coming to our flat position, through our flat position.
Palms are coming to the calves.
And torso comes towards the knees, still with soft knees.
We put our palms on our shins.
Look up.
Inhale.
And exhale.
Now, we're going to take more, even more of a bend in the knees.
We're going to place our fingertips to palms on the floor.
We're going to reach back with that right leg.
We're going to reach back into a nice lunge position.
Now, take a check and make sure that this knee is not going past the toes.
And again, if you feel this is a little bit too much tension, bend your knee ever so slightly.
You can still get a wonderful stretch right here.
Great.
Now, scoop the leg.
We're going to scoop it in to join the other leg.
We're going to reach out, airplane all the way up.
Palms are going to touch.
And we're going to press down to the side.
Here we go, other side.
Reaching up and out.
And flat back forward up.
Breathing out.
Exhaling.
Bring that torso towards the shins.
There we go.
Palms on the front of the legs.
Look up.
And lift.
And now, exhale once again.
Take a deeper bend in the knees.
Place those fingertips or palms on the floor and step back with that left leg and a nice
lunge.
And inhale here.
And exhale.
Again check.
Inhale.
And exhale.
And really rotate those shoulders down so they're in.
We do one last inhale.
And exhale.
And we're going to scoop that leg up using the abdominals.
And we go.
Scoop.
Those legs are together.
We reach out towards the sides.
Back all the way up.
Palms are going to touch, reaching up, long sides of the body.
And press down.
Here we go.
One last time.
We reach out and up.
Inhaling and exhaling.
Bringing the torso towards the shins.
And here we go to look up.
Inhale, long in the back.
Beautiful.
And exhale.
Take a deeper bend.
Palms are going to come to the floor.
We step back with that left right leg.
Now this time our left leg is going to join.
Here we go.
So we're in much like a push up position.
We're going to call this the plank position.
Yeah?
You're going to slowly drop your knees towards the floor.
Your head is going to duck and you're going to scoop.
And chest is going to come to the floor.
We're going to adjust and bring your fingertips slightly forward and we're going to reach
out with the top of our head to a cobra.
Pointing our toes.
We have opposition between our head reaching this way and our toes reaching towards the
back wall.
And relax.
Now putting the weight in your hands, you're going to press yourself up, back onto your
knees.
This is the cat pose.
So from here just gently shift back and bring your pelvic bones towards your heel.
Let your head hang forward and rest.
And we'll stay here on an inhale and an exhale.
And exhale.
And once again, inhale and exhale.
Beautiful.
Now walking your hands in, come up and just shift off to one hip and we're going to take
a hold of our elastic band.
Remember if you don't have one, you can use a towel.
This is a wonderful tool.
So sitting with our feet straight in front of us.
Yep, we're going to be up on our sit bones here.
Take a hold of our band on either side.
Now you get to decide how much tension and resistance you would like to have.
Bend your knees slightly and hook this around on your instep.
You don't want to put it on the ball of your foot because you don't want it to slide up.
So here we go.
We're elongating our legs ever so slightly and we're reaching to sit up high on the sit
bones.
Beautiful.
Now we're going to curve our lower back and now using the band, straighten it, keeping
those shoulders down so all the work is happening in the lower back.
And once again, we curve and now we straighten.
Now when you come straight, check your posture.
Make sure that you haven't opened up your chest.
Yep, so very elongated.
The abdominals are lifting.
Once again, here we go, curving.
Pelvis is tucking under and you're releasing away from your body.
Now pelvis is coming upright, trying to sit on top of those sit bones, really using this
to bring yourself forward.
One last time.
Here we go, curving and release and bring yourself upright.
Everything is coming up together.
You feel very long, very tall.
Beautiful.
Now bring your torso forward and release the band, placing it on the side for later.
We're going to bend this right leg in.
The outside hand is going to wrap around the ankle.
The other leg is going to wrap around the shin.
We're going to do the same thing in this position, using your leg as a base.
We come up and we release.
Really feeling like someone is taking a long line and painting up the back of your spine,
really articulating so your pelvis shifts forward and release.
And one last time.
Pals are engaged and we come up and release.
Okay let's come up on those sit bones one more time.
And from this nice long posture, let your leg gently fall open.
Beautiful.
Let's take a hold of our band.
We're going to reach up towards the ceiling.
Again, we want to make sure that this doesn't happen, yes?
One long line.
We have an arched into our back.
We reach up, we're going to reach forward, up and forward, past our foot and the band
comes to our instep.
And we stay here and breathe.
In and out.
And now reach out and inhale and come all the way up.
Beautiful.
Here we go, twice more.
Reaching up, really reaching, going beyond yourself.
And forward and the band is in your instep.
You can bend your elbows and feel the resistance here.
Long back of the leg.
Great.
And reaching out and inhale up.
And last time, here we go.
Reaching up towards the sky, coming forward.
All the work is happening in your pelvis and the back of your leg, yes?
And we inhale and exhale.
And last time.
Inhale, reach out.
Reach up, long and tall.
Let go, one side of the band and bring it to the side.
There we go.
This leg comes forward and we're going to bring the other knee in.
Now you want to place it somewhere between your calf muscle and your knee.
The outside arm is the one that comes around your ankle.
This inside is on the top of your shin, not on your kneecap.
And we come up, straightening long in the back and we release and curve.
And again, we come up, using this leg, pulling it towards you and release.
The elbows are up high, yeah?
We're not slumping.
We're curving in the back.
And one last time.
Coming up and release.
Again, come up, long length in back and let this leg fall open, taking our band.
We reach up towards the ceiling.
And coming forward, long back, as straight, flat as you can for as long as you can.
We have it on the instep and we breathe here, resisting, resisting.
Make sure those shoulders are down, yes?
Inhale and exhale.
And inhale, reach out to come up.
Up, up, up, up, up, up, up.
Your pelvic bones are into the floor, grounded.
Reach up to go over, long.
Beautiful.
And inhale here.
And exhale.
And inhale, reach out to come up.
All the way further.
Beautiful.
Last time.
Up and forward.
And inhale.
And exhale.
Inhale to come up.
And let go one side and place the band down next to you.
Gorgeous.
Now, we're going to bring the soles of the feet together.
Now, you can again, just where you would like to place it.
Yes, if this feels like it's too close, please just let it come out a little bit further.
We're going to do a similar movement, elongating the lower back.
Coming up tall, back and forth, and take a moment to find those sit bones we keep talking
to you about.
Good.
Now, up long in the body.
We're going to take a curve in the lower back, feeling like someone kind of tapped you here
and you're going to curve.
So, we're not going to drop down.
We're going to keep this same height, curving back.
Here we go.
Now, we're going to take this entire curve and just tip it forward towards your feet.
Beautiful.
Now, from here, long elongation, again, someone's drawing.
You're going to feel your sit bone reach out on the diagonal all the way up your lower
back, up through your upper torso, and your head is long and you're using these arms as
resistance and now you sit up straight and long.
I bet you felt that was even longer.
Nice long back.
Here we go.
Curve again.
And coming forward.
Now releasing from the bottom of the spine, from those sit bones, all the way out, all
the way out.
Nice long back, flat back as we have done already several times.
Now, take that and sit up even further, even taller.
One last time.
Here we go.
Curving over, dropping the chin and we take it all the way over.
Beautiful.
Now, elongate that back from the bottom of the sit bone and coming up to a nice long,
tall, high diagonal and sit up to finish.
Wonderful.
Stretch this right leg in front of you and you're going to open it up to the side.
You're going to flex those toes back towards you.
Now, we're going to place our fingertips slightly off our shoulder towards the back and you're
going to bend your elbow.
Now, you want to make sure you can rotate your shoulder up for a second and then really
rotate it back down in the back as we have done in the first segment.
Yeah?
And we're going to hold on to this position.
So, we're not going to lean against it.
We're going to keep our shoulder down.
We're going to reach out to the side, come all the way around, reaching, scanning the
entire horizon and then we're going to reach past our toes.
Now, if you feel that you want to go ahead and this is comfortable to you, to clasp around
your foot, please do so but don't pull on your toes.
Yes?
And we'll breathe here.
Inhale and exhale.
And again, inhale and exhale.
Now, reach out, reach all the way back around the horizon, seeing everything past your fingertips
and once again, we're going to reach out and come around, come around, come around and
over the fingertips we breathe.
Inhale and exhale.
Now, take a moment to check and see that both of your sit bones are on the floor.
Yeah?
Inhale.
So, we're not tipping forward.
We're still very grounded here in the pelvis.
Exhale and reach out to open up and we'll do this one more time.
Here we go and reaching out, coming all the way around, nice long, tall spine.
We reach towards the toes and over and inhale and exhale and last time inhale and exhale
to open up in front all the way around and place the arm down to the side.
Our transition, we bring our leg front, bend this leg in and extend the other leg and open
it on the slight diagonal.
Find those sit bones.
Here we go, other side, placing the fingertips down, elbow bent and shoulder down, nice and
long and tall spine.
Here we go, reaching out, coming all the way around, look at everything over those fingertips
and reach past those toes and we inhale and we exhale and once again, inhale and exhale.
And exhale, reaching out, coming all the way around, one long continuous movement and here
we go, out and around and around.
Feel how long and graceful you feel, yeah?
And to the toes, inhale and exhale and one more, inhale and exhale.
And reaching out and across, across, across, last time, here we go and out, come over and
over and your back is spiraling along itself and we reach, really reach past those toes
and inhale and exhale and inhale and exhale and arm comes out and reaches around and we
place it down by our side.
Bring this leg front, this other leg is going to join it.
We're going to bring them over, coming onto one hip, tucking the legs under, we're going
to come to our cat pose, yeah?
So we have our weight on our hands, we're not leaning on our knees.
From here, stretch back into that nice long plank position and scooping under with the
pelvis, we're going to scoop the right leg in first, here we go.
In, reaching it towards the middle in between those hands and we scoop the other leg in
and here we're going to breathe out, we're covering our sun breath out and up in the
flat back and breathing all the way up, all the way up, palms to touch and reach.
We're going to begin with two sun breaths.
Here we go, reaching the arms out and up, long palms to touch and out with the top of
the head and that flat back that we've been working on, soft knees, torso comes to the
shins, palms on top of the shins looking up, inhaling and exhale.
Bring the torso down once again, reaching the arms out to the side, we come up in the
long shape again all the way to the top, palms to touch and arms down, two palms in front
of you in front of the rib cage and again one last time, reaching out and up, long sides
of the body, palms touch, head and torso coming forward, long flat position, really feel that
and bring the torso towards your knees and your shins.
Palms on the shins, we look up, inhale and exhale back to the legs and reaching out to
come up, forward, forward, you can feel your weight shifting slightly, that's fine, palms
together, pressing down and again, palms together in front of the rib cage.
Moving on to sun salutations, we reach out and up, same sequence here, exhaling forward
and to the legs, soft knees, palms on the shins looking up and coming back down towards
the torso, take a slightly bigger bend in the knees, place the palms down, we're gonna
step back with your right leg, then we're gonna step back with your left leg to the
plank position, coming down with the knees, the chest comes down and scoops forward, letting
the hands slide forward a bit to a cobra, nice and long, top of the head is out, toes
are extending towards the back, we come down, placing our weight back on our hands, we're
shifting up making a V, feel that our sit bones are reaching up on a back diagonal,
long in the legs and long, we feel flat back and you go ahead and take a look at your fingertips,
beautiful, we're gonna scoop our pelvis under and bring that right leg back in and bring
that left leg back in, soft knees and we reach out through that flat back all the way up,
palms reaching, reaching to the sky together, exhale and come together, one last time, other
leg, reaching out and up, nice long exhale coming all the way front, palms on the shins
looking up and coming back down, slightly bigger bend in the knees, palms flat on the
floor, step back with the left leg, step back with the right leg, plank position, having
the knees come down, our weight is in our hands, we scoop and chest comes on the floor,
let those hands slide forward a bit and elongating two oppositional forces, the top of the head
and the toes reaching back, cobra, beautiful, coming back down we're gonna press up to our
downward dog, tucking the toes, we make a V position with our body, sit bones reaching
up towards the ceiling and we're looking at our hands, great, scooping up underneath the
pelvis we step in, the left leg, we step in, the right leg, soft knees, reaching out with
the arms, front with the top of the head all the way up and press the arms down to the
rib cage and last time, here we go and arms out, come down, exhaling, bring that torso
towards the legs and we look up and coming back down, bending those knees, placing the
palms on the floor, right leg goes back, left leg goes back, plank position, knees come
down and we duck the chin and scoop under like you're going under a fence and we reach
out, shifting those hands to long cobra, nice circular position, yes and coming back down,
now this time we're gonna press up and instead of going to a downward dog, we're gonna come
taking the weight on the hands to the cat pose, so shifting to the cat pose, here we
go, nice curve all the way in the spine as much as you possibly can, now coming through
that neutral, flat, long position in the spine, we're gonna let everything go, we're feeling
the lower back arch and we breathe out, head comes up in a long position, again you don't
wanna crunch in the head, it's nice and elongated in the back of the neck, we come back to this
neutral position again and once again here we go, curving all the way up, scooping your
abdominals up towards the ceiling as much as you can and lengthening out long and now
we let the pelvis release, coming forward, dipping towards the floor, really let it tip,
the back is arching and we're looking up long, we come back to this neutral position and
we'll just shift back into the child's pose and relax and take a nice deep breath in
and let it out and walk your hands in, we're gonna shift to our side, we're gonna bring
our right leg forward, we're gonna invert our left knee, so I'm making a diamond shape
or square shape with my legs, my toe is touching my knee, you're gonna place your hands slightly
behind your shoulders, again in the same position so we don't engage our shoulders, it's really
from underneath here and we're gonna work on lengthening the hip here, nice long stretch,
we just gently roll the hip forward, feeling this elongate, nice long line and we exhale
and just let it come back to a neutral position, you don't have to press it into the floor,
twice more, roll it forward, roll it forward, roll it forward, wonderful and now let it
relax and last time, here we go, rolling it all the way forward and let it release, great,
bring the knees together and we'll switch to the other side, again placing the arms
just behind the shoulder blades, so you're leaning ever so slightly back, pelvis comes
up, rolling forward and coming down, twice more and rolling up, make sure that you aren't
engaging your shoulders, yeah, really press them down, so you're holding from underneath
your shoulder blades, good, last time and rolling up and coming down, beautiful, now
we're gonna come on to our sides, so just extend your body out, front palm is gonna
come down onto the floor, the other arm is just gonna gently reach out, so we're all
the way on our sides and take a moment to look and make sure that your pelvis isn't
shifted either front or back, we want both the bones to be right on top of each other,
from here using this nice long muscle in the back, we're gonna reach up, pressing ourselves,
pressing our weight into this front hand, here we go and reaching up, head is curving,
we're making a nice long curve, it's not a pinching or crunching motion and we release
down sliding that hand back out and once again reaching up, reaching up and up and release
on down, so the third time we come up, top of the head is reaching towards the ceiling
and this time as you bend your knees, reach all the way up, let this hand come in to sitting,
great, other side, here we go, switching, just swing your legs around and slide on out,
again check your position, make sure that your pelvis is on top of itself so we're not
rocking back and really use this as a support, base, here we go, other side, coming up, coming
up, nice curve, nice curve in the body, beautiful and down, twice more, we reach up, we reach
up so we're always reaching, it's never stopping and exhale, sliding out, last time is gonna
come all the way up, here we go, reaching up and up, all the way up, sliding that hand
in, fabulous, okay, turn, put the soles of your feet on the mat, your hip width apart,
we're gonna just lay, roll yourself down, just gently into a nice comfortable position,
you're gonna bring your right knee in towards your chest, just let it float up, you clasp
your hands around your shin, you don't wanna go on top of your knee cap, definitely around
your shin and just feel this crease in the front of your hip, now, we don't wanna let
our coccyx bone come off the floor so we're not trying to curve and take our lower back
off the floor, we're still very connected, our pelvis and our sit bone is very connected
to the floor, we'll flex that foot that's on the floor and we slide this leg all the
way down and out, holding on to this knee in opposition and feeling a nice elongation
in the front of the hip and breathe here and exhale and once again pointing through the
foot we inhale and exhale, release that leg, bend it in, let that knee come down and we'll
switch legs, first we let the knee float up, placing the hands on top of the shins, we'll
flex that foot that's on the floor and slide it all the way down, so you feel the energy
coming all the way out through your heel and we breathe here, nice inhale and exhale and
point through the foot and inhale and exhale, great, let this leg bend in, the long leg,
place the other knee down and now go ahead and pick up your band, we're gonna use it
for the next exercise, you're gonna let your right knee float towards your body, your torso
once again and this time we have two different versions, we have the basic version which
Lisa and Dave will do and then we have the advanced version, so the first time try the
basic version and as you build up please go on ahead with the advanced, you're gonna flex
your foot and just roll your body up gently, place your band either on the instep or behind
your thigh and we're gonna push out against it towards the up diagonal, here we go, resisting,
we have the arms and again we're still engaged underneath the shoulders, we push away with
the foot and let the foot come in and every time our thigh is gonna come ever so slightly
closer to our torso, once again we press away, press away, press away and letting the thigh
come in towards the torso, the knee is always bent and last time pressing away, pressing
away and this time we let the knee bend in, now from here we're gonna slowly elongate
this leg up towards the ceiling, still resisting ever so slightly with our band and you're
not gonna go to quite straight, just have a soft knee, just feel a nice long stretch
here and breathe, inhale and exhale, one more inhale and on the exhale let the knee
bend all the way down, slide the band out and we'll go to the other leg, place the foot
on the floor, let the other knee float on up towards your torso, roll yourself up and
place the band around your foot or your thigh, here we go, ready to press, pressing out and
thigh comes towards the chest, once again pressing out, make sure those sit bones and
that coccyx bone is on the floor so we haven't rolled up, let it bend in, yeah we're still
very connected all the way through the length of our spine, pressing out and letting it
come in and just feel that crease happen in the front of the hip, great, now slowly extend
gradually towards the ceiling, we're stretching our calf muscle, our hamstring and our hip,
still soft knee, inhale, exhale and let that knee bend all the way in, slip the band out,
you can just put it on the side and let that knee come down, now again Lisa and Dave will
be doing the modification, bring one knee towards your chest and for those of us doing
the advanced version please bring the other knee up and we're gonna elongate our legs
towards the ceiling and flex the foot, again we have very soft knees, from here hip width
apart, we're gonna rotate our legs bringing our heels together, knees are in line with
the toes, we're gonna reach up towards the ceiling keeping this whole back connected
to the floor, you can see I'm at a perpendicular angle, a right angle, we're gonna point through
the feet, we rotate parallel, great and bend the knees and flex the feet, we're hip width
apart, we rotate, bring those heels together, you can feel the back of your legs working
right here, as we stretch try to keep those heels together for as long as you can and
point through the feet and rotate, flex and bend twice more, we bring the heels together,
stretch all the way up keeping that connected, we have two again, two points, we point through
the feet and rotate parallel, last time, flex and bend, breathing, exhale and rotate, reach
those heels up, flex all the way towards the ceiling, point, point, point those toes and
rotate parallel, bend the knees both into your chest and just wrap your hands around
your knees and just breathe here, nice long inhale in and exhale out and inhale in, excellent
work, exhale out, gently place your feet on the floor one at a time, one knee and one
knee and again we're hip width apart so our knees are not touching, feet are parallel,
I'm gonna just take a nice gentle roll in the pelvis, we tuck the pelvis under, still
tailbone is on the floor and we release, once more, tucking the pelvis under and we release,
now we're gonna tuck the pelvis and press it up towards the ceiling, here we go, curling
the pelvis under, pressing it all the way up to the ceiling, now rolling through the
back from the top of the torso down to the coccyx bone, so reverse curl and we release,
one more time, we curl the pelvis under, we press it up, up, up, now from the top of the
torso we uncurl slowly all the way down through the coccyx bone one vertebrae at a time downwards,
wonderful, let the knees fall to one side and your chest falls to that side and with
your arms just sit yourself, come to a sitting upright position, beautiful, we can shift
back, we're gonna straighten our legs forward and just lightly flex our feet and we're gonna
open to a straddle position, so we're making a V with our legs, you don't have to open
it to a very wide position and take a hold of our band, bending our right leg, we reach
over and place it again on our instep and from here we're gonna extend slowly, again
not locking, just placing our leg out, lengthening it out, both of my sit bones are still on
the floor so we don't wanna release to one side, so from here we're gonna elongate our
neck and head and the top of our head is gonna reach towards this foot as we breathe, using
the band as resistance and we breathe in, so it's an active stretch, we're not collapsing
into our leg, we're really stretching, lengthening the head and the back and exhale and last
time, inhale and exhale and inhale and reach up and just place this band to one side and
walk the hands in and we'll go to the other side, here we go, bending the leg, placing
the band on the instep and slowly lengthening the leg as far as it feels comfortable for
you to go and we inhale, top of the head reaching towards the toes, exhale and again inhale,
both sit bones are on the floor, exhale and inhale and exhale and lift the band off,
just placing it in the back hand and walk your hands in slowly, wonderful.
Let's cross our legs just gently, great, now we're gonna take the band in hand again and
a very wide, so almost towards the ends, you just wanna have a bit of the band out, we're
gonna reach up, very solid in the stomach and also very solid, we don't wanna release
in the rib cage as we do this, we're in one line sitting on top of our sit bones, we reach
out and we're gonna open, pull on the band and reach on a diagonal towards the back,
ever so slightly right here, we're opening the front of our chest and now we reverse
and come to the front, releasing the tension and coming down, once more, here we go, reaching
up and forward, we open the band, stretching, pulling against it, coming down to a diagonal
in the back and up and forward, okay, changing the placement of our hands, palms are gonna
be up, we're gonna bring in just a little bit more so it's not quite as wide as what
we just did, elbows are in towards the torso and we're gonna reach our hands to the side,
opening up and coming together, twice more, opening up and coming together and open up,
last time, great and come together, place the band onto the back and just gently we're
gonna walk forward two breaths, on each exhale just take your torso a little bit forward
keeping those towards the sit bones on the floor, inhale and exhale and walk forward
and inhale and exhale and walk forward and stay here for one inhale and one exhale, now
with the stomach going towards the spine, roll the whole body up slowly, vertebrae each
on top of each other to the longest length your spine has had and we finish here, great
work!
The
the