Fletcher Towel Work®

So welcome everyone. I'm curious. Saban and I'm, I'll be introducing a beginning to intermediate telework class today. Um, any shoulder issues in the room? No, there's shoulder issues. No slightly forward shoulders is the rest of the world. All right. So the telework is quite wonderful at not only opening up the chest, establishing shoulder and balance and range of motion, but also bringing a lift and, and, and posture to the entire body. So this is developed by Mr Ron Fletcher. Very much based on applies principles and um, anything that feels like too much. Just sit it down and come, come join us for the next exercise. All right, so let's start with the legs together.

And I'd like for you to line up your first miniature souls, line up your ankle bones, your medial Malleoli line, and then think of pressing the floor away. So really feel your weight into the floor and try to feel the oppositional lift up through the body. Feel the opening through the front of the hips, feel the length through the waist, and then feel the opening through the front of the chance to. What I want you to do is get a sense of where your body is now and hopefully you'll be in a slightly different place at the end of class. Let's start just with a very simple toe lift, feeling those foot centers into the floor. And then exhale, lower the toes down. Show it is an audible breath and a Fletcher class. Just breathe along with us.

Inhale, lift, ah, and exhale lower down. And as you breathe in and try to feel the arms reflect that movement. Inhale open and exhale cloud still moving the feet. And again, inhale o open and Exhale, Clo shoe more big breaths. Focus on breathing into your back. And exhale, shh. Last one. Deep breath in and exhale close.

And then let's press to the ball of the right foot. Ball up the left, sorry, and place the heel and then follow up the right and play and press and then reach the heel into the floor. Two more times, press and place. Last one, and press and lice, a small play, folding at the hips, reaching the arms forward, lengthening up out of the hips. And again, reaching forward and grow. Taller palms are facing one another. And again, feel the connection of the arms into the bash. Last one, reaching forward and pressing up. And from here, just draw those shoulders up and place them down. And again, lifting arm and play.

She's warming up the shoulder girdle. Before we park it and play Shen, I'm really trying to get your left shoulder down a little bit more and place one more time. Lifting up and placed down and play. Reaching the arms forward from here I can tract rounding forward and had reached for the center of your towel. So the hands are right in the center and roll up right through the center of the body, opening up the hips and place the spine. So from here what I'd like for you to do is fold the towel in half and place the folded end of the tail at the right shoulders.

So the outside of your right shoulder and then place the loose sense of the tail at the end of the other shoulder girls. So what we're trying to do is measure double the width of the shoulder girdle. So if you release the folded end of the towel and then hold both hands at the, does that make sense? Some more complex to describe than it is to do. All right, so the arms are down by your sides. So when we hold the tail, we want to think of the Talus, a continuation of the arms. So it's not a separate piece of equipment. It becomes an extension of the body.

So let's just feel that. So as we breathe in, I want you to feel how the towel and the arms work together. Inhale, expand and exhale down. So it's like you're breathing life into the towel and exhale flow. Feel that breath into your bag. Two more. Last one and this time, full breath to pull the tail open and then pull the tail taut.

So in this position we want the knuckles facing the floor. Feel the width across the chestnuts. A little too wide. Yeah, you'll feel it. There's a sweet spot, knuckles facing the floor. And let's lift the tail just up to chest height. And as you press the tail down, grow taller through the spine, lifting up. And again, inhale, lift and exhale, press and keeping the tail tots. Keep that engagement from the back. Let's do that one more time. Lift. Ah, press down and lift the tail up to chest height.

And as if you were setting the tail down on a shelf, press the shoulders down. So in this position, I'd like for you to hold the tail just with your thumb and forefinger and pull the tail from there. Notice how the work goes up into the neck and the shoulders. Not so good. Wrap your full hand around the towel. And then we can engage what Kathy grant called the piano muscle.

So going from the pinky finger up through the triceps into the back. And that's really where we're trying to pull from. So as soon as you feel the tension coming up into the neck and shoulders, um, consider where you're pulling the towel and try to re-engage it from the back. So in this position, the elbows are reaching wide, the shoulders are down, and let's just lift the shoulders up. And as you press the shoulders down, pull the tail, Todd Church elbows are blind. So it's a reaching elbow. Exactly. Notice how that changes the organization. Inhale, lift the shoulders up and pull the tail tot. Nice.

And again, two more times. Finding the connection into the bash. Last one. Inhale, lift and exhale. Find that connection. So just working the top tail. Pull from here. Inhale, pull it taut and it's a slight release. Feeling the work from the back and release and just this is fatiguing to find and to release. Let's do this two more times. Pull and trulys last time.

Pulled Taut and to release and then pull the tail top. Lift the tail up over the crown of your head. Take a deep breath in and exhale. Press all the way down. Keeping the towel taught. Take a deep breath in and without losing that posture, release the towel. It's a lot of work. Yeah, it is just, just learning how to work the upper body from the back. Um, especially for women, it's challenging. So let's circle the arms up and around and exaggerate that movement.

Placing the shoulders on the back two more times, up and around last time, up and around. And then from here, pull the tail. Tod again, chest is open, elbows are reaching wide. So a little tendency to hyper extend the elbows. I have that tendency too, so I really have to think of reaching the elbows out to the sides. Lifting up through the center of the body. Inhale the towel to the chest, exhale the towel over her head. So from here, let's bend the elbows and make sure that we're right over the crown of the head. And then press the tail up from there. And again, pull down, keeping the shoulders down, length in the arms from your back. Beautiful. And again, pull and press up from the back. One more time.

Keep that pinky finger engaged and press up. Keeping the tail over the crown of the head. Let's pull the tail taught from here. Inhale, pull and release and pull and release. And think of the breath moving the tail. So as you inhale, you expand laterally and release two more times. Pull and release last time, pull and release. And then engage the towel, pulling and press the tail all the way down.

Keeping the chest open. Release the challenge. How do you all feel a little more often hitting up. I'm hitting him to draw the shoulders up and place them. Let's do that two more times. Lift and place last time.

Lift up and place down and then just pressed to the ball of the left foot and lower ball of the right and Lauer and again, press and Lauer last time. Prince up and lower. And again, pull the tail. Todd, you're going to hear that a lot during this class and wrap the towel around the hips, expanding the chest and open to the side. Chest expansion [inaudible] and to the side and then hold that position. Opening the chest and a little pulse here. Pulsing into the back. So double breath in. Hail and hail, two more sets and hale last set and exhale and keep that chest expansion.

That's a beautiful, and turn the head to the right and exhale centers. At least there's something good to see here and Saturn and again, look at the ocean and Saturn and turn and center and then expand the chest and lower down and again, circling the shoulders. And now two more times all up and around and up and two around. Good. And just lift the toes up and let's come to a turned out position. So it's a little wider than the Nepalis fee. And from here those pull the tail.

Todd, this next one I think is one of Christie's favorites. The lateral hipster. Yeah, this is a signature piece. And lift the tail up and said lifting the shoulders that place the shoulders on your back. Wrap the hands around the towel. Let's do that one more time. Lift up and place the shoulders on your back. And from here breech the hips to the right as we bend the spine over to the left Ami and pull the hip center. Place the shoulders down, lift up and hips to the left. So try to lead with the hips, not the shoulders.

And then pull the hips center and place the shoulders. Lengthen and reach the hip. [inaudible] and hip center and Lauer. Couple more times and oh over to the side and come center. Let's do that one more time.

Moving from the hips in the spine and then hold this position. Try to keep the towel still and pulse the hips. Pulse two, three, four. Open the chest, six, seven and hips and over to the other side. And a pulse. Pulse, two, three, four, five, six, seven and lift up and lower down. How'd that feel? Nice on the side to the body. Let's open the legs out to more of a second position. All right, so let's bring the tail forward right in front of the body. Elbows her wide.

She has to stay open. And then from here is if your arms were on a shelf, I want you to pull the elbows back. Think of hiding the elbows behind you so we don't want to do this. And then press the tail forward on that Shell. And again, pull. So this is called pulse to w. And I said we want to think of reaching the elbows wide, feeling that even engagement and or word.

Let's do that two more times. Pull and press forward. Last one and pull and press forward. Let's pull back one more time holding this position and then just work the rotator, rotate the elbows down and inhale back and rotate down. Try to keep the tail evenly taught throughout. And again, rotate down and back and hold this rotation.

Do you feel the imbalances you want me to? And again, rotate down. Hold this position, take a deep breath in and think of pressing the towel up from your body. And let's pull the tail down to the upper back. And as you do so, stretch the back of the neck and then press from the back and then pull to the chest, opening the throat and press, uh, and again, pull and Pressu, stretching the throw and press up two more times and lengthen up. Last time, pull. And, uh, and then from here, pull and extend the arms behind shoe shoe and let's work a little post Steria range of motion. So just inhale, lift the tail up, stretching and exhale down and again, lift. Sure.

Two more times. Last one. Sure. And then hold that lift of the towel up behind. She said it's right at about the top of the pelvis and little pulses up from here.

For sure. The elbows aren't hyper, hyper extended. Last one and lift up a little bit higher. Exhale down, bending the elbows, push the tail up from your back, keeping the tail over the crown of the head. Let's take a full breath to rotate the body to the right and com centered and rotate and center. Keeping it taut over the crown of the head and again to the right, keeping the hips stale and to the left and center. This time full breath to the right.

Full breath all the way around to the left. Tell over the crown of the head war three, one comm. Center and lower all the way down. Good. How did that feel? Shoulders doing. Okay, good. Anything. Anyone want to give up? All right.

So let's stay in the second position and from here come down into a play and place the hands right at the knees. And what I'd like for you to do is come forward into a contraction. So the back is rounded and it's as if we're trying to hover or round her body's over something. I think Mama Bird over a nest except for David. All right. So as you extend the legs, open the body to the right and contract and come back to center and again open the body to the left and centers. So feel how the movement all comes together at the end and open back to center.

Ron felt that there wasn't enough rotation and lateral flection in the classic work and a lot of that comes in to the tail work and open to the side. Now from here, take a full breath, open your chest to the ceiling and kind of back to the side then and again stretched to the ceiling. [inaudible] back to the Sidebench last time, rotating and, and come back to center. How did that feel? Okay. And sit the knees, full breath to open the body to the side and then rotate the chest and extend the arm. You may have to bend the elbow back to the side bench and again, open keeping the hip still. One more time. Open back to the side. Bend and contract and come forward.

So we're going to take that movement. One more step. That's okay. Full breath to open show. Full breath to rotate to the ceiling. And then from here what I want you to do is wrap the towel around your body as you deeply bend into that left flag that sort of focuses to the floor. The belly is contracted. And then just reverse your steps.

Full breath to open the body to the ceiling, breath to the side bend and then contract and come back to the beginning position. Nice and open to the sides. Rotate to the ceiling, bending the right leg, wrap the towel around the body. Deep contraction. Open to the back to the sideburn. Shh. And contract and come forward. So let's make it a little bit more of a flowing motion. Full breath to open.

Yeah, sent to the side Ben and then back to the contractions. Full breath for everything opening to this side, she lets it rotate to the ceiling, bending deeply. And then from here, roll up through the spine and draw the chosen. Draw the heel. Sin Towson. He all sin and Towson. Okay. Through the shoulders. Okay, good. All right, so let's pull the tail Todd again and we'll do a simple exercise called the windmill and this involves moving the scapula laterally so we're not thinking up and down but it's an outward rotation.

So pull the tail top right at the chest and then from here, rotate right arm up, left arm down so you form a vertical line and then come back to horizontal and again, vertical line and horizontal. I'll go, I'll follow you. And again, rotate and center, trying to keep those shoulders down. Rotate and center to more slowly and center. Try to keep the collarbones level and rotate and center. Full breath to rotate. Had another side.

Four more, three more. Last two, last one as center, bring the towel up and then just bring it around the neck. The hands for a second. So I just want you to flex the wrist and down. Okay. And I can live [inaudible] and down and lift and down.

So something Ron really worked a lot as articulating the risks in the hands and pressed down, and then bring the hands out in front and then just bring one finger in at a time. So starting with the pinky finger, pinky ring, middle index, and then from here, rotate the wrists and open. And again, one, two, three, four, rotate and open. Then let's take the tail again and we'll work anterior and posterior range of motion. So I think the shoulder girdle needs to be warmed up for that. Pull the tail tod at the hips. Again, feel the lift up to the body. Elbows are wide, and let's divide the movement from the hips to overhead. And two breaths. That'll be inhale. Inhale up, exhale, exhale down.

Then we'll go into four breaths. Then we'll go into six breaths and up to eight. Clear. Okay. All right, so the chest is open, starting with two, ready and, and for, and six [inaudible] six again. Hey. Okay. [inaudible] one more time.

[inaudible] five, six, seven, eight and pull the towel on top. Anica and roll the shoulders and around. So when we, when we started the mat, work with a five counts and five counts out with the hundreds. Most of our clients can do that. Like when you to warm up the breath up and around last time. Oh and her round.

So now we'll work post interior range of motion. So Post Steria range of motion is anything behind the center of the head, back to the hips. And for most of us there's a point where the shoulders don't want to, don't want to go. If you get to that point and it's really tight, simply think of pulling the tail a little wider, a little toddler to create more space in the shoulder joint and see if you can ease into that, into that place. We never want to force the shoulders. The other thing we don't want to do is collapse the shoulder blades to find range of motion. So I have clients who are very proud of themselves for doing this and that just does the shoulders. It just service.

So what we're thinking of doing is keeping the sh both the chest and the upper back wide and trying to create the range of motion just in the shoulder joint. Okay. All right. So let's pull the tail tod and lift the tail up overhead and then just, I think of easing the tail back behind the crown of the head and then to the overhead position [inaudible] and again [inaudible] pulling fully use your breath and then hold that position behind the head. Take a breath to widen the towel, widen the bat, and then think of tapping down with a double breath. Sure.

Lift up and press all the way down. Let's do this one more time. Going a little further. Inhale, lift. Ah, and it back. Holding that position. Take a breath to widen the tail. Widen the back little taps down, holding the tail, pulling it Taut. Yeah.

Two more sets. Wow. Seven and press all the way down. How did that feel too much? Did any of you feel that you were thrusting your ribs forward as you did that meat? You let me Tia. So let's not do that. Um, the next piece is thoracic rotation. So if, if we can get the towel.

So it's um, basically the equivalent of the tail right in front of the chance that tells right behind the scapula. What we'll do is we'll take the towel and we'll rotate one side of the towel to the, to the side, rotating the thoracic spine without moving the hips and then rotate back and place the towel on a shelf set. Does that make sense? So we're basically right pivoting around one arm and one shoulder. Let's open the legs back out to two. A second position to do this piece. Pulling the child shot, lift the child up to the chest.

Elbows are wide, shoulders are down. Telecoms up over hand and reach back. Civil start by pivoting around the right arm. Lift up and rotate the chest without moving the hips. And again, lift, ah, and reach back.

And again, lift and rotate to this side. It's getting warm in here and lift and rotate that good. Feel the breath. Move the spine. And uh, and then last time, lift and rotate to the side. Lift up and back. Beautiful.

Lift up and press all the way down. How did that feel? Was One side harder than the other or more challenging just to stabilize? So this next piece is called the Hallelujah circle. And um, again, we'll, we'll develop it. So we're in a second position. Be able to lift up and out of the hips and trying to get a little more lift through. This part of the body. Shoulders are down, your shoulders look different. Do you feel?

Yeah. All right. So our goal is to hold on to that and pull the towel on top. So this piece starts and a great thing. X position, lift the shoulders up and place them down. So let's start by placing the right hand at the right hip and wrapping the towel around the body. So we open the chest and then come back to that exposition. Shh. Left hand to the left hip, open and back.

Uh, she's just like, we're winding up the movement open and um, and again, I'll open and come up and from here, open the chest to the left and then come out to the side. Ben. Shh. And then from here, come back to the exposition over to the other side come center. So it's a high contraction and come back up. So we placed the right hand on the right head last time. So it's left hand to left hip. I'll open and to the side.

Inhale, center. Exhale. Inhale to your contraction and come up. Right hand to right hip in half. Shh. Left hand. Sure. Right hand.

Shh. Left hand. Sure. And 12 the towel taught and release. Pull it Taut and release. One more time. Pull the towel, Taut and release. Pull the towel tot, bring it down and wrap it around. Go ahead and bring the theat in. Bring the healed sin. Towson. He all sin. Tosin good. So we're all the way together.

Lifting up out of the hips at the demi play. I reaching forward and pressing up and again Marie and press up two more times. Ri and lengthen up last time. Reaching forward and lined up and just draw the shoulders up. Place them on your back and just notice if your body feels any different than it did at the beginning of class goes. Thank you all very much.