Finding a Lift from Within

All right. Today we are going to do the number six of the beginner mat class series and it certainly should be done in consecutive order and don't feel like you need to do one and then the next and the next. Try to stay at one until you're proficient at that and you feel really good, really solid, then move on to number two. And then number three, if you're just jumping around, you might be doing yourself a disservice because there's a lot of nuts and bolts in each one. So today is number six of our mat series and it's the last time that we are going to be just focusing on our box and staying with our back on the mat. After this we'll be turning onto our side and then to onto our belly and challenging and other positions. So let's start off the way we always start off, which is Palati stance are standing super important and today we're really going to focus on being light and having a really great feeling.

That feeling that you want when you leave a pilates class, who I'm full of energy and I'm lighter and I feel longer and leaner. That's what we're focusing on today. You will want to do grab yourself too. I have some weights over here, some two pound weights. You can pause it later on cause we're gonna do Matt and then we'll finish up with the weights. Doing some wall exercises. If you don't have weights, he could have two soup cans or something in your pantry that's of equal weight works just as good. So alright, standing in [inaudible] stance, you want the weight on the ball of every toe on the side of your foot and on the heel. You never want a collapsed arch.

So just start checking yourself right now. And then you want to draw a straight line from one hip to the other. And when you do that, you want your belly to pull behind that line. No Little Hill going and you want from each hipbone image of a spiraling barbershop pole going all the way down to your feet so you can engage your outer thighs and your bottom automatically engages. So you've got your outer thighs, your bottom, your stomach, probably some inner thigh work too. And we're going to work our way up to have a straight line from one shoulder to the other, completing our [inaudible] frame and box.

So you don't want one higher than the other. Just nice and level. Very nice. So today I was saying we're going to work on feeling lighter. One of the things that's hardest to get is that we get a little compacted in our posture a lot, especially as in the new technology reading tax. Everything's down, whether you're sitting on your computer or whether you're just walking with your phone. It's a lot of compaction on your lower back and your posture. So I want you to think about the bottom of your rib cage and the top of your pelvis and we're going to try to create space between those, which on the back side creates space, which we've talked a lot about of not having a short lower back, but we're going to create space between each as well as space in the front. It's pretty hard to do without a pilates instructor having their eye on you because you might just dislocate your ribs to do it or do something funky without an eye to know exactly, but we're going to try to get that feeling.

So try to stay lifted in and up, almost like you're being pulled up by a string line marionette. And we're going to try to the Palati sit today, so we're going to put one arm over the other. Keep your weight lifted, your energy up, put one foot in front of the other and then try to sit down, keeping your weight up and a long lower back. Go ahead and trying to sit. Very nice. Keep pulling in and up and lower yourself.

I'm very impressed ladies that you guys made that look a little too easy. If you've fall down with a thump, that is really what is supposed to happen on the first time. So just go with it. Keep trying. If you have bad knees, probably not a good idea for you. All right, take the full length of your mat so that your heads on the mat too. You might need a towel into your head if you needed it in the previous classes. And Go ahead and bend your knees and have the feet flat on the Mat.

Sorry Brianna. There you go. So make sure you're have your shoulders square, not lifted up two ears. Make them a little longer away from your ears for me. There you go. Your hips are square. Good. And now I want you to pull your belly and behind the line of your hips and feel it really into the mat. So the reason we don't add sa being on your side or being on your tummy for a little while in PyLadies is because it's really hard to know exactly where your alignment is when you're on your back.

It's very clear if your back is on the mat or if fits big tunnel into your back. So right now, see if you can pull your belly into your lower back, stretching your lower back and getting the lower back vertebra on the mat. If you have to tilt your pelvis a little bit towards you, that's fine right now. As you get more flexible, we're going to try not to, so pulling deep into the mat while you're there with your belly, anchoring your lower back. I like to use that image of a tree trunk with its roots growing through the mat.

See if you can stay rooted in your lower back, but pull your spine long out the crown of your head as if you can have more distance between the bottom of your ribs and your pelvis. Okay. See if you can just feel that on the mat and I want you to go ahead and hug the right knee into your chest. We're going to start getting into the a hundred and the left knee into your chest. Great. I want you to reach your arms really long on the mat and lift him up five inches. So there are at your level of your hips. Good. And I want you to take a big breath into the mat and as you exhale, pull your belly into the mat and round, head and upper body up.

And let's start pumping. Inhale, two, three, four, five, exhaling. Good. Two more like this. Inhaling, as you exhale, pull your belly into the mat and pull it up in with the air. And as you exhale, pull into the mat and pull up and in with the air. And this time lengthen your legs as if you're pulling your pelvis away from those herbs in with the air for five. And exhale two, three, four, that 60 inhale, two, three, four, five and pulling that belly in to the men up. And two more. You've got barbershop, Poles, rapping and squeezing.

Let's do one more this time. Exhale, as long as you can. Exhale until you can't exhale anymore air and hug those knees into your chest. Nice job. Use those legs to sit up. We're going to do the roll back. Just a couple of them to warm up cause we've already started doing the roll up so your hands will be underneath your knees and round your back. Good. Very nice ladies.

So your shoulders still want to be directly over your hip bones, but we want to round spine a c curve. All right, let's pull our belly into our lower back and pull our waistband away from our thighs onto the mat until your arms are straight. And then roll out each vertebra until your head goes down. And then inhale, lift the head back up and exhale rolling up. So be very aware if you're coming up in one solid piece, let's roll down again. See if you can squeeze your bottom and send your sit bones towards your heels in the opposite direction that you're pulling your ribs and your head goes down.

Inhale, lift the head to start. Exhale, rolling up. But your pelvis isn't pushing forward to help you in the beginning. Staying here. Let's straighten our legs on the mat and reach for your ankles and stretch. Good. And we're gonna start rolling back.

So we want to see if we can keep our heels where they are. That's going to be a goal, so you're going to send your hip, send your hips, sit bone, send those barbershop, pull muscles towards your feet as you roll down and then hold the arms right here. Actually ladies, beautiful. Let's check those backs. Are they on the mat or is there a big tunnel under specifically the bottom of your shoulder blades? I need for it to be nice and anchor. If that's anchored. Now we can take our arms back as far as we can. Keep that anchor. I don't want to tunnel right behind your ribs.

Bring your arms up to the ceiling. Anchor that area even more as you bring your head up between your arms and roll up one vertebra at a time. Reaching for those feet. I love the precision ain't rolling back. Let's send those hips to your feet. Let's not have those feet. Slide back 10 inches with us. Rolling, rolling.

Anchor the shoulder girdle muscles as you reach back and now we're going to go five more at a tempo. It's arms head. Roll it up, reach for those feet. Roll back, sending your legs one way, your upper body the other way and stretch back and arms head up. Good. Try to keep your arms, uh, their head between your arms, I should say. So right here we have arms, head, and then coming forward. Good. And reaching and rolling back. Lower back, middle and two more and arms head and rolling up. Let's remember to try to keep our hips reaching away from us.

Stretching that lower back and one more arms. Head and scooping in and stretch. Good and rolling back. Stretching those legs one way. An upper body to the other and arms by your side. Very nice job ladies. If you slid a little back, readjust, it's going to take off. It takes a long time, but that is a good goal because if your hips keep coming with you, your lower back keeps staying short. And we want to lengthen that. All right, we're going to hug the right knee into your chest for single leg circles. Straighten that leg up to the ceiling and make sure it's a little turned out.

And we're going to put your hands behind your thigh for a stretch. If this is super easy, then you can slide your hands up behind your calf. If it's super hard, then bend the left leg on the mat. God Mine, I'm showing great. So that you would do this modification if you needed to, but go ahead and do it with your leg down. Good. And now we're going to press your arms down by your side. I want to start off not with the circle, but reaching that leg straight down the middle of your body. Reach it, anchoring in your lower back and pull it up from your powerhouse. One more time.

See if you engage those spiraling muscles, lengthening that hip, and pull it up from your belly all the way up to your nose. And now let's start the circle. Cross around, up, cross around, up, cross around either way, and three, two around, up. One more. Reach with that hip. Good. Reverse down around, up, good. Down in green, the belly. Really feeling that pelvis reach and three around, up and two around, up last one. And Hug in that knee.

Good and we're going to put the right leg down and bring in the left. Now, even though this is a beginner series, we don't detail every aspect of this extra so you can look at in a different part of the website. We break down each part of this exercise. Straighten the left leg up. We do want to keep moving though, so we're going to make sure the legs a little turned out. Again, if it's easy, go up behind your calf. Good. And if it's hard, bend the right leg. Okay, arms by your side. We're going to start again by reaching that leg down the middle of your body because I really want you to feel that length and then pull it up. Sorry Brianna. Just stretch down and let me see your belly. Pull in. Double that leg up. Excellent. Hold that leg up to your nose and now to tempo.

Cross around, up, cross in the belly in cross. We worked on breathing last time. You might want to exhale and one more exhale. Reverse down around, up, down, stomach, down. It pulls up. Don't forget to reach with that thighs. It goes down reach and pull it up. One more reach and pull it up and hug in that knee. Love it ladies.

Leg down on the mat. And we're going to do rolling like a ball. So you're gonna lift your head up and exhale as you roll up one vertebra at a time. Because our transitions are always an exercise and you're gonna lift your bottom forward to your heels. Good. And now we're going to put your hands [inaudible] underneath your knees. So if you have your hands underneath your knees, it's a little more, it's a little easier to do the exercise because you have more space.

But if this is, you can do this, stick like this and that's great cause the idea is to keep pulling in and supporting the lower back instead of balancing like this. So if you find yourself flat when you roll back or balancing like this, stick to rolling like a ball like this. But for this class we're going to challenge you a little bit more. If you're ready for it again and you're going to put your hands instead on your ankles and your fingers are all going to face each other. Okay? Nothing changed in the pelvis though.

You didn't start supporting yourself with your lower back. And then you're gonna use your upper stomach so your lower belly is holding in one position. Then use your upper belly to curl your upper body forward, forward, forward, so that your ears are almost between your knees. Notice where your heels are as well. They're pretty close to your seat. You want to keep them tight to your bottom. When you roll these all challenge the exercise a lot more. Okay, let's breathe.

Inhale to roll back. Exhale, hold that position in with the air. I love your lower back, Briana. Exhale, but try to get your head deeper between your knees. Yes, and in with the air. And exhale on Jia. I love your head, but I want this around more. So we're going to pull back and now dive your head forward. Forward, forward, forward us. That's excellent. And roll back from the lower belly and exhale up. Good. And inhale. Roll back and exhale up.

Nice. Two more in with the air and exhale up. Massage your back back as you roll and exhale up and hold. Rest your feet down. And we're going to transition into the series of five. So put your hands behind you, lift your bottom back. Good. And we're going to lie down onto your back. Good.

Excellent. We're going to bring the right knee into your and we have the right hand on your ankle and the left hand on your knee. Good. All right, so I want you to keep remembering that we're trying to anchor into the mat, but we're trying to create space between the bottom of your, the bottom of your ribs and the top of your pelvis as well as really lengthening that lower back. Okay. So think about really lengthening the lower back and I want you to bring your head up looking at your real tight pulled in belly, right. Just absolutely no belly at all. And then lengthen that left leg off. The Mat floated up a little bit higher for me. Jia? That's it.

Excellent. Good. So that it came from all those barbershop pull muscles and you can feel that and let switch drawing in the left and drawing in the right and pulling in left good. So your stomach scooping in and up. You're really reaching the pelvis in the opposite direction. You're doing it just one leg at a time, which is a little easier than the next exercise. So get that feeling here. You could do it with your quads all day long, but you really want your belly pulling in the knee and your hip reaching the leg and one more set a right and a left and grab both ankles.

And we're going to do the double leg stretch, but I want you to just rest your neck down for a second because I really detailed and worked you guys hard on that. Rolling like a ball about where your lower back should be and where your ears should be. This is rolling like a ball on your back. So let's get into that much of a position. Let's get your ears between your knees. Let's get your knees right there. Pull and up above knees. Separate a little bit. So, and you're gonna use your lower belly to get those thighs onto your chest, not just your arms. Okay. All right.

Now keep rooted into the mat and reach your arms and legs and pull and beautiful and reach and scoop it in. And belly is scooped out. Yes. And exhale and reach and scoop and belly is scooping in. Yes. And exhale. Two more ratios. Hips and scoop and little more energy in those arms to reach and scoop in.

And now extend the right leg up to the ceiling. The left leg goes forward both hands behind your right ankle. And we're going to switch legs, switch and switch and switch. So the belly is anchored, the pelvis is reaching each time the lectures fly. Let's really take this attempt by the lays.

It's right and left and right and left and right and left and right and left. One more set. Yes, both legs up. Let's support the head with your hands and reach those legs down, down, down, and pull them up so your belly is anchored. I think you want to come up just a little higher. Brianna with your upper body. Yeah.

And reach those hips and pull it up so you know where the top bottom of your ribs are. Reached the pelvis away. One more time, reaching all with the powerhouse and now bend the right knee and twist to it to three and switch twist. That right leg is reaching and switch tourist twist. Stay up with the shoulders as you do the last one. Really pulling back that left elbow and hug both knees in. Those were tough to do and that's how much of a sequence.

So good job. Let's go ahead and sit up and we're going to do spine stretch forward. Straight legs open a little wider than a yoga mat. If you have a grots mat, you really want to enjoy using those boxes. So spine stretch forward is an exercise that feels great on stretching the back, but there's so much more to it and a, you can do it against a wall and really get a lot more integrity out of it too. So imagine that you're sitting against a wall. When I sit, I often think I am sitting nice and tall, but I really have shifted my hipbones a little forward.

So you want to make sure that the bottom of your box is the hip bones are directly over those sit bones that you haven't stuck your tailbone out a little behind. You try to feel that and that's when a wall would become really helpful if you could feel that sacred and the lower back against the wall. Then you want to stack each vertebra one on top of the other above that arms up at shoulder height. I like to add two more feelings for adding that length. I like to you press down with my arms to feel my belly lift up a little bit so I engage. That also makes me lift off my seat.

And then finally I connect my neck and head as if I am a puppet and they're pulling me up by my head. So really getting that height and then you keep that height as you bring your head down and then the next bump and then the next. You don't give up any distance between the vertebrals, you don't collapse it all and then roll up one bone. It's, I'm still lifting each one up, up, up, and then rest. Press Down with your arms, pool, your powerhouse in and up, stacking, lifting up through the crown of your head and exhaling down, down, down, beautiful. Love the position of your hip bones over your sit bones and then roll right back up one vertebra at a time. Good rest a little bit, and then press down and pull up. You've got this tiny sway right through here.

This is where it gets hard to work on your own because we kind of don't know where we are in space and once somebody comes in helps you, then it's like, ah, yeah, that feels great. And then rolling back up and then you're going to be stacking right there. Awesome. And one more. You're going to push down, lifting up that seat, powerhouse, lifting in and up. Great. Reaching and rolling back up. Beautiful shoulders and head and nice rest for a second.

Last class we added open leg rocker, so it was here and we're going to bring your legs together and we're going to lift your bottom forward, separating your knees and keep your weight on your hands Kinda so that you're not going to try to support yourself with your lower back and then balanced with the fetal little up and you're going to bring your arms through and on top of your ankles. If that's just crazy talk, then put your hands behind your knees. If you find that you have a real tight hamstrings, but if you're very flexible, you can do it here. Okay, so I'll do the modification and we're going to extend the right leg and then we're going to bring it down and we're going to extend the left and it might look more like this instead of a straight leg I'm being, if you have tight hamstrings and we're going to do that again, remember that your box, your plot is frame. It doesn't move at all. You are just perfectly square and balance. That is what this is for and putting it down. Now we're going to do both legs. At the same time, your belly is scooped in and up and bring both flakes up.

I'm going to snail slide up. What I want you to understand here is you want to pull in your belly and lift the bottom of your ribs as far away from your pelvis as you can, growing taller, taller, and being bend those legs down. Kay Joe supplies used to have sit on top of his desk in that position for almost an hour. Just balancing and practicing. So we want to really work on that balance. So we're going to scoop in, bring those legs up and don't have your energy going down and said, pull your belly in and pull it up and pull it up almost against those hands. Stay here. Bring your legs together.

So our preview to our teaser open and bring them down. We'll do it one more time. So this preparation for open leg rocker, scoop your belly in. If this is unbelievably hard, stay here likes together and then open. If it's reasonable, then we're going to go for the rocking and you're going to rock back and roll right back up. Holding the balance good. Make sure that you're focused on something and you're going to roll back and you're going to regain that focus immediately. That's how you forget. Come right back up in with the air. Always breathing, always exhaling our air to come up. Three more in with the air.

Make a little more rhythmical. Exhale up in with the air roll back. Exhale rolling up and one more in with the air rolling back. Exhale up. Great. Squeeze your legs together and try to roll down your back. Leaving your legs there until your lower backs down, your middle back.

And then your heads on the mat and legs are straight up. As you get more advanced, you can go right into corkscrew from here. But bend your knees, hug a man, and give yourself a little break, cause others, your quads and everything else are going to start to try to work at this point. Okay, how are we doing? Good. So we're going to do cork screw, so your arms are down by your side. So really use these exercises legs up to feel the mat behind you.

Feel your belly rooted in spiraling muscles. You have a plotty stance and we're going to have the legs fall towards the ocean and then circle down or around and center and reverse and all right and center. And as your belly, your legs go, your belly stays down and reversed. Nice. Try to look at your feet. Are they shifting? Are you able to keep that Palati stance?

Cause remember you're reaching from your hips. Let's do a force set with that in mind. Rue Circle and scoop, scoop, scoop, power, those feet and go the other way. Your bellies rooted in and good. So something to work on. Let's go ahead and sit up and we're going to do sauce. So straight up. Good. So next time the transition for that, because we always want to go from point a to point B as seamlessly as we can.

See how I am a right angle. We're going to be a right angle again in a second. So we just sit up and we're ready to go for the next exercise. Okay. All right. So thank you. So we don't hit each other. That's great. Alright. So arms up at shoulder height. Show me all those muscles in your arms.

Thank you. And then I want to see them get longer, always longer, always reaching, reaching. I want to see your spine get taller. You did beautifully in spine stretch forward. So let me see that belly pull in behind the line of your hips, right over your sip bones and pull up taller through the crown of your head. Keep that height as you twist to the right and then exhale, reach past your baby toe. Good you hear even more. You're trying to lift the bottom of your ribs from the top of your pelvis.

Inhale up, twisting to the left. Exhale, scoop your belly in and look at your ribs right now. You should have a like a big tunnel space right there. Inhaling up and twist to the right. You do not lie down on your thigh. You don't collapse. You really work. And inhaling up, let's flex those feet to twist to the left.

And both heels are pushing away with energy as you reach, reach, reach, and in with the air. One more set twist to the right and scoop that sit. That's it reaching. It's a breathing exercise. Inhaling up both feet flexed and exhale as your belly pulls in. Really lifting between the bottom of your ribs and inhale up and arms down and legs together. Good. So tempted to have you guys flip over, but with that is going to be our next class or two classes actually.

So now we're going to do neck pull, come on back on the mat. Great. So neck pool is very challenging exercise and we're going to come forward a little more so that it's like the roll up, it's just more, oh, sorry, that wasn't a very, very good cue there. All right, so we're gonna lift your bottom forward a little bit and have your feet, knees bent, feet flat. Good. But this time we're going to start working parallel. So I know sometimes we think Ramana's Polis is all about wrapping and squeezing and Pilati stands. But this is the first introduction to one of our parallel exercises.

So your knees are going to be in line with your hip bones and so are your feet. Okay. All right. So we're going to sit up now as tall as you can remember, spine stretch forward. So we're going to try to pull the bottom of our ribs up as far away as we can. Like there's a lot of work in your stomach and lifting through this lower back. And now I want you to round your back using your powerhouse, not just collapsing and roll down one vertebrae at a time until your head goes down. Once the head touches, you're going to inhale, lift up your head and exhale, curl it up until your head kisses your knees.

And inhale, roll up to a tall back, creating all that space, little longer in the net cure. Excellent. And roll down head to your chest and roll down all the way. Good, nice job. Inhale, lift your head up. Exhale, scoop it in, kissing your knees and inhale. Sit up tall. And this time you might need to lift your bottom back, but we're going to have straight legs.

So we're going to come back and you're gonna push your heels away, like you're skidding on your heels to activate the back of your legs. And your seat. Okay, not to tighten this, that if they are, these are tightening than soften the knees. So you're going to from your hips, push away those heels sitting up tall, tall, tall. Now roll down again. And the hands are right here and you're trying to keep your heels in the same position. Inhale, lift your head up. Exhale, curl in and you're lengthening your hips this way while you're scooping in, until you kiss your knees, right. And then use your belly to stack your spine up.

Sitting up super tall and roll down. Hips go on one way. Bottom of the ribs. Go in, the other back is into the mat. One more like that. Inhale, sit up. Exhale, curling up, articulating, kissing your knees. Roll up through your spine. This time we're gonna stay tall for a little while as you go back.

So go ahead and hinge back from the hips. Yes. And now curl down scooping and push those heels away. Good. And again, inhale, head up. Exhale, curl it up. We're going to keep your legs in line with those hips. E and sit up tall him.

Make sure your pelvis comes with you. As you hinge back, you don't leave it. So keep pulling your belly belly belly, and now curl the rest down. Nice job. Good. Let's put one hand over the other behind your head. Good. If that first part was challenging enough to keep smooth, stay there because you don't want to lose control in this exercise. You want to stay smooth. So we're gonna let the elbows come together.

Almost kissing the elbows together to curl up. Inhale, lift your head up and see if you can roll up one vertebra at a time until you kiss your knees. And now sit up tall opening those elbows. Don't sway the back. When you do that though, make sure you're still spine. In fact, push your head into your hands right now. You'll feel a stretch in your back and hinge back tiny bit and roll the rest down. Push your heels away from you. Push, push, push, push. And as soon as your head touches, curl right back up.

Romanis is they don't take a nap down there. Za to sleep. You want to roll right back up. Inhale. Sit up tall and hinge, not take your pelvis with you a little more, and then curl the rest down. That's better. Good. One more. Right on up. That's it. All the way to kiss your knees. Inhale, roll up through the spine. Push your head into your hands and stretch your back a little bit as you hinge back and then roll all the rest. Yeah. Nice work ladies.

So that's where it starts to get the name neck pool is you push your head into your hands and you start to get that feeling of the next stretch. And it's so you don't pull on the neck to come up. It's that the neck is pulling you down. All right, so that's neck pool. And we're going to sit up with control, always elegant and beautifully, and we're going to lift your bottom forward a little bit. So you have bent knees and feet flat. Good. So we as you can tell, have been just do it and beaten it to death of rolling up and rolling down, articulating and being on your back. Nice and square.

So this is this a teaser. Little get a little bit back more good. And we've done it a few times. Same with Ugi would skip back just a squeeze your legs together. So we're going to start at, just like we always do, which is hands underneath your knees, like the roll back. And you're going to round your back using your power house. Good.

And hold right there, GM, maybe come forward a little bit. [inaudible] excellent. Good. Juliana. I like it. All right, great. Brianna. So we're gonna straighten your right leg, but the thighs will be at the same level, the knees at the same level. It's just from the knee down that legs up. All right. And we're gonna stay there.

As you roll down your pelvis is reaching with that leg while your belly is pulling in the other way and you're going to lift the head up to your chest and roll up. Easy as can be. And rule down, rolling away this legs, reaching with those spiraling muscles and head lifts and your belly is scooping and creating as much space in that lower back and hold it there. And switch legs. Easy as can be. Good and rolling down. So the tighter the angle of the legs, the harder it is. And rolling up. If you had both legs up, you would see that their both would be higher and that'd be a little more challenging.

And One more rolling down head touches an inhale if the hat and scoop and, and these are really hard exercise. Stay here. We're going to bring both legs up. So again, if this is way too challenging, do class number five again and keep doing it until you feel really good. I would have your legs just a little lower. Awesome. That's your challenging level. And we're going to roll down away from those legs that's at gea or she's working hard and head to your chest and curl it up. Scoop, Scoop Love, love it.

And one more and Rowland down and head to your chest and scooping in. And I want to say, yeah, that's more the position I wanted you in. Great. Hug those knees into your chest. Beautiful. So now we're going to do seal. So you're going to have your knees, you're pretty close to the front. So I don't think you guys ladies need a move that you want your knees to open and you're going to have your arms this time.

Hands go under the ankles instead of on top. Try to pull those feet towards you so that you can keep your lower back rather than you going towards those legs. Alright, so you're going to scoop in your belly and we're going to clap three times. One, two, three and roll back. One, two, three and roll up. Hold two, three. Good. And roll back to three and roll up to three. So now hold it there. GM. Such a late co cube. Sorry. What I would love to see is, um, maybe let's take it to the next level here.

So we're doing so well on clapping here, showing that we're balanced just like an open leg rocker, but we're going to see if we can hold ourselves back there with our six pack, with our powerhouse and our pelvis is stable while you clap to three. And part of that is this light feeling. So when you roll back, we kind of let everything just fall into us. But we really want to feel like we're lifting our bottom and that we have some control of lifting our bottom when we're clapping. So that's a goal to try to feel like you have control back there. And that's why we clap. You can keep your feet lose, but everything else is in control. So let's try to add that.

Try not to have the pelvis just mushed down on your ribs when you're back there. Okay, here we go. Inhale, roll back and hold two, three and roll up to three and roll back to three and roll up to three and roll back to three and roll up to and hold it here. Rest your feet down for a second. I won't be too mean. So we introduced the cit today, right? We're going to introduce the stand. Okay.

Sometimes it's easier to learn how to sit from a how to stand, but we're trying to learn how to have that great feeling of being light on your feet and how feeling really stretched and long and lean when you finish [inaudible]. So if a geo was to try to sit up right now like this with all her weight back, there's no way she could sit up. So she has to bring her weight forward and use all of the back of her thighs and her seat and she has to push into the earth to stand up. So everything here is going to be working and all of this is going to be working. I'm going to help a lot here, but um, if you again have bad knees, probably not the um, exercise for you. So we're going to do two more and then we're gonna try to stand up.

How about I've worked two more with you and then I'll work. So hand seal. Have you ever stood up before? I'm sure a ton. Okay, so we're gonna roll back because it's nice to get in a good rhythm and you can keep up. I love it. You guys are like, I'm just going to seal away and inhale, roll back. Now let go the feet cross numb and reach. That's it. So you want to reach your energy forward over achievers over here. I love it. So we just have that tried to get that real good feeling of up and there's nothing better. It makes me feel young and like accomplished. You know, you don't want to feel like, oh my gosh, I can't stand up anymore.

So it's a great goal to have and it feels really good to achieve it. And now we're going to grab our two pound weights and go over to the wall. Okay, so we're going to do some wall exercises. Now. Always a great ending to apply these Matt. So let's go ahead and take the wall. Walk right up to it. This is kind of my, so I want you to actually face the wall. This is kind of my favorite thing on the Tuck. Your little tag in here, Aha.

And get your toes right up against the, and what happens is two things I love naturally happen is you have to lift up your head because you don't want to knock yourself. And we don't actually hold our head up when we walk or when we stand. We look down a lot again with a technology. It's just what our posture does. So when you walk straight into the wall, it already reminds you how your neck and head should be in alignment. And also you don't want your tummy to be the first thing that touches the wall.

So everyone pulls in their stomach as much as they can. So it's two nice natural reactions to remind you. So keep your belly in, keep your head tall, your neck tall, and go ahead and turn around and put your back against the wall and you want your heels against the wall. And we're going to start just like we did in class, which is an applauded stance. I want the heals completely against the wall, even though we're our back is not going to be against the wall. So we have a Pilati stance, right? Then I have your left foot a little less turned out. Perfecto. Good looks. And maybe just an inch wider with your toes. Yup.

Good. And here you want to have weight on the ball of your foot, side of the foot and heels, right? No collapsed arches. But at the same time here you might feel your ankle bones collapsing and touching. That's something else that we have to work on. So don't let the bone in your ankle knock the other one. No collapsing. So then you start to feel, Ooh, I need to engage my outer thighs. So everything doesn't fold in and your inner thighs are a little bit in, in your bottom. Okay.

We have that line of your hips and ideally we are, when you get really advanced in Pele's, your stomach is so strong and your lower back is so flexible that you can get your lower back against the wall right now. But for until we get there, we're going to work on it. So we have some space always. We have a natural curve behind our lower backs. So that's to be expected. The only problem is is if our lower back only knows how to be stuck like that. Cause we're only as young as our spine is. As soon as our spine feels stiff and immobile, we feel a lot older than we are.

So you want to be able to round your back. You want to be able to arch your back. You want to be able to side bend, you want to have mobility in your spine. So that's why the wall is so important. And again, that tactile information for your body of a square by back. So pull your belly into your lower back. Try to get every bur vertebra on the wall, especially between the bottom of your shoulder blades and your waistband and your head against the wall. Okay?

And once you've tried all you can and you can't get your back against the wall, then take like five inches. Step out away from your feet. Walk away, not your body, just your feet. Good. And let's see again here. Geo, that looks really good. You're making contact. But I'd love for you to feel like you're really powerful and almost pushing the wall away with your powerhouse instead of like, I pretty much feel it. I'm not sure completely. Because when you do your arm circles, you might feel more strain than a great feeling.

So walk your feet out just a tiny bit more. Good. And if you have really tight back, you're going to walk your feet quite a bit. You're really good here too. Do you feel good? Do you feel the back of your ribs nice and snug there? Good. All right. And I like the neck and head and how here, let's relax the shoulder a little bit. Who they don't want the head and then we're, so we want the back of the ribs a little bit more. Pretty Nice. Good.

So that's a lot of work. Maybe soften the knees a little bit and just an inch forward with your feet because these are all just little modifications. Again, that's kind of nicer when you work with an instructor, but pull it in. Great. So again, you want to feel like you're really almost rounding your back through the wall instead of like, oh, I think it's Kinda there. Okay. If you, um, just one last note, go ahead and, uh, Geo walk your feet all the way forward. If you have a really stiff back, you can actually just go ahead and bend forward and do this exercise like this. And then as you get more flexible, you'll roll up just one vertebra, get them lower back, Aha and do the exercise like that.

And then work up to the shoulder blades and then the, maybe the shoulders, but not the head. And then the neck and head. So work and do it. And then your feet get to slowly start coming back and go. They can go where you were challenged before. Great. Okay. So enough of that, and again, you can, this is broken down in more detailed in other, another um, exercise. But let's do arm circles. So we're going to pull into the wall.

We're gonna pull the bottom of our ribs in the front and in the back away from our pelvis. As you reach your arms up, up, up, and then open them to the side. If that hurts your shoulders. Keep 'em only up to shoulder height and up, up, up, and open them to the side. Lovely ladies. One more. Pulling into the wall, growing taller, puppet and opening and reversing it. I'm impressed you guys aren't knocking each other out. And as you, I love to push down like spine, stretch forward and opening, reaching out. And as the arms come down, pull your belly in and up, sliding up that wall.

One more. Really feel like you're sliding up that wall and getting that one inch taller. And then hold here with that height. And let's do the peel down. Head to your chest. Keep lifting just like you did in spine. Stretch forward. And we're going to keep your waistband against the wall so the line of your hips will stay facing forward. Good.

And then make sure your knees aren't pressing back to hold you. Make sure your Belize in and now, now that you're aware of your pelvis, you can come down a little bit lower, never lower than your shoulders at the same level as your pelvis, but just come to where you have a good lower backstretch. That's what your goal is here. So you want to still just be just a tiny bit, right? You can come lower, but just keep that feeling good. And now three loose circles with those arms. Two, three and reverse it. Circling the shoulder almost two, three and we're going to roll up engaging your inner thighs and your lower belly and each vertebra articulating up when you're against the wall, slide up again and then bring your head to your chest. And then your shoulders really picking apart each part of your spine instead of coming off solid, getting a good lower back stretch and three delicious circles here.

One, always keeping that lift in your powerhouse. Reverse those three circles. Good. And now roll back onto the lifting with your powerhouse. Lower back goes middle back up or opening the shoulders and the head. And you're still really have that nice lift.

I want you to separate your feet so that they're parallel and hip width apart. And they're going to come out about two feet away from the wall, foot and a half to two feet, depending on your height. Maybe a little bit more. Brianna. Good. Same with you. Joint. Okay, good. And Juliana? Little wider so that they're right in line with their good, good. And maybe just a little bit forward.

Also good cause we're going to do a squat or a wall. Sit and you don't want the knee to go further than between the ankle and the toe to protect the knee. Okay? But let's say really tall. You can't grow any taller. Straighten those legs. Slide up the wall and keep that height as you sit down. Okay, so we're gonna keep tall. As you slide down, all your energy is staying up, up, up until your bottom is at the same level as your knees hold. Pull your belly into the wall, tighten the back of your thighs and use that to slide up. Up you go.

Good. Hold it there. I have to say, that was beautiful. One thing that's really common is you feel like, ah, my paint is not glossy enough or I get stuck, I have wrong clothes and I get stuck, but it's not pushing so much into the wall as it is feeling that energy of your body lifting. So try to find a happy balance of using the wall, but not pushing too much into it on let's do two more. And when we do it, I want your arms to lift up to shoulder height for the next one simultaneously as you sit. So here we go. Pull your belly in. Arms start coming up to shoulder height. Hold it there.

You're trying to engage the belly and the back of the thighs. Push down with the arms as you come up, up, up. Good. You use your left leg only to come up on that time. So we're gonna or, or your right. One more. I'm going to watch it, but your hips went this way. So make sure you stay over your right leg. And that's also really, really calming cause we're always stronger on one side on this last one.

Enjoy it and let your arms come up as high as you want while you sit here we go. Going down the arms can give you a good stretch. Pull on your belly, squeeze your seat and push down with those arms as you slide up, up, up, up. Keep that height. As you walk your feet back into the wall, you're in a Pilati stance and now you're gonna push your weights against the wall and we're going to lean forward like the leaning tower of Pisa, pushing your hips forward, push the weights back. Brianna's hold. Your upper body is great, but now squeeze your bottom forward. Three, two, one. Head Up. Excellent. Relax your arms by your side.

That was a transformation. I wanted to see. Nice work. Okay. Good job ladies. I hope you feel lighter and lifted and full of energy. Good.