Lower Body Wunda Chair

I have Haley and Jennifer joining me today for this workout. And we're going to be using the one, two chairs. We have, uh, one to chairs by two different manufacturers. So you see gonna see some changes and I'm more accustomed to one of them. So, um, there may be some adjustments made along the way, but I wanted to speak about this idea of kind of be holding your sort of hourglass shape as I get older. Um, I'm realizing it's more and more difficult to hold your stomach in. And um, I had a, uh, a woman who bays up my kids when they were really young, who's said that her mother taught her that one day it just pops out and it never goes again. And I was always like, no, that's not true, but I'm starting to understand the wisdom of the mother more.

Um, but I'm fighting that battle and that's what Romana taught us to do is fight gravity and fight that good fight. And for me, I'm also finding out that it's, um, a matter of pushing against gravity somewhat. And you know, just as physics works, the more that we push down on the floor, the floor is going to press up on us and support us. So we have to use that as we get older and not let ourselves sorta like slump into the ground. So that is what is going to be the focus for our, um, chair workouts. So it's going to be a kind of lower body intensive workout.

Um, with that said, let's have a seat and we're gonna start with the foot work. And uh, Hailey has one spring low and one spring on the third setting using the black springs over here. And Jennifer has one low and medium. So for these two ladies, let me see, what am I gonna think about? Um, let's have you guys both start with your arms sort of genie style and let's start with your heels together. Toes apart. Good. And I'm going to have you guys lip high and then Kinda wrap the toes around the edge of the pedal as best you can. Okay. And then from there 10 times, we're going to start to press the pedal down. And up.

And we're gonna lift it one and two and 10 times. Good. And Hailey, I'm gonna pause a sec. You're going to move back. Keep going, Jennifer. Good. And that's it. Just there. And then try to lift those heels a little bit, right? That's it. And then you use your little grubby toes to help you use your belly to pull the panel up and up. And don't worry about going all the way to the bottom, but lift up and up. That's it. Now keep pushing into that spring and lift the belly and four and three and two and pause. And then let's go on the arch of the foot guys. And once again, let's use those grippy toes to move your feet back a little more for me, Hailey.

Let's squeeze the knees and feet together, right? So you have like one leg working and then 10 times, once again, we'll crass and lift up and up. And you can see this little Archie part of Haley. So I would tell her not to push your pedal down so far and to more think about stabilizing up in her tummy. And with this whole idea again of the power that we push down is going to help us lift up in our spine. That's a better idea. Three, two and stay. And you guys can tell I'm not such a good counter.

So if you get to like 10 or 15 that's plenty. Let's go on your heels. Flexing your toes. So now you chose, don't have anything to grip, but now you're going to keep that same connection. You just felt the spring 10 more times and pressing and lifting up and up and good. And Jennifer could keep trying to lift up into my hand. She grows and the lifts, right? So it's never so important to press the pedal all the way down cause you kind of lose the connection of the spring. But the idea is to lift, lift, lift the pedal to the top each time. And good.

Let's separate the feet guys and go onto the balls of the foot. So now there'll be right underneath your hips and raise the heels high. And again, you could use your grippy little toes here and go 10 more times pressing and two, three and four. Don't worry about going so far down and better. That's it. Eight and nine and good. Now, one little trick I do sometimes when I'm teaching is I say, okay, go ahead and press the pedal all the way to the floor and push down firmly. Feel big. Toe, second toe, third toe, fourth or fifth toe, right? All those toes across, right? And draw your stomach in.

Now could you guys stand from here? What would it take for you to stand and then have a seat? Good. So you saw how much they had to lunge forward. Okay, so what I want you to try to do is like gather up your insides and go up to stand. So lift that belly. Push down to lift up, push down and lift up. Push down to lift up. Better, better, better, better, better, better. I was going to grab you and I didn't quite get there. And then push down to lift up as you sit to, so now lift those heels, lift that tummy. Bring your Tishi back to me.

That's it. Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh boy. So that's sometimes just like a little tricky trick to just feel what it takes like, oh, gather yourself and be ready. Yeah. So now let's raise the pedal one more time. Good. And think about what it just took. Get ready to stand. But now extend one leg in front of you. Good.

And be ready to stand and we'll go five, four. Keep getting ready to stand. If you were to stand on that left foot, what would it take Haley to and try the other leg. Good. And here we go again. And six, five, four little slippery on the pedal and three and two and one. Good. So that's plenty of weight for you, right? Good. You guys. Let's step off and face the chair and we'll just do the tendon stretch. So again, going into this idea of the fact that we want to connect to our spines and our legs, you're going to hold the hands over the front edge of the chair and your feet are going to stand on the pedal.

Good. So we're going to raise the heels to begin with. Good. You're going to draw your tummy muscles in and up, and go ahead and stretch those legs like, like ice picks down through the floorboards. And then keep that distance, that length. And let's lower the heels down to three and raise the heels up, up, up, and again, down, down, down, and up. Up, up. Good.

Now we're going to keep lifting up as the heels go down. So there's a stretch to be gained through the spine, right? And then lift up. Beautiful, Hailey. Gorgeous. Good. And not taking too much tension right in the neck or the shoulders. And then lift, lift, lift. Good, good. Keep even weights.

Squeeze those heels tight and lift. Lift, lift. Good. And again, Jennifer, lower. Lower, lower. So again, I'm going to have Jennifer also try to keep her weight forward a little bit more. So there an opposition. As those heels are reaching down, she's fighting the good fight to lift her waist up, away from the heels, stretching down. Good. And feel those stomach muscles and they're not beautiful to lift. Lift, lift. It's a very tricky exercise, actually. Last one. And let's stay at the tippy top. And from there guys, let's just step one foot forward on top of the chair. So we're still in that same spring setting.

We're going to have the big toe come to the edge and you guys can have a choice. You can have cross your hands in front of your chest, you can put them behind the head. Okay, with the left leg, you guys both have your left leg down on the pedal. I want you to just raise that left heel high and once again, push down into the toes of the left foot and feel your stomach muscles. Ah, gorgeous, right? So you feel that opposition that energy down and then almost as if you pushed more energy down into the spring, that's going to help you float all the way to the top.

And we can pause for a moment once we're up here. Good. And you guys just find your balance. Yes. Good. So find that opposition. Once again, as you push energy down through the left foot, that's it. Lift up in your belly and rise up again. One good. And again, that dagger that ice pick reaching down and very nice.

And let's do five total on this leg. And while I'll let you guys finish on the floor today. Good. It's a lot of work, right? Keep finding that connection down, but oh good. You can place the hands and let's change sides. Good. So, so frequently we're thinking about that leg on top, doing so much work, but you can kind of share the responsibility between the two legs, Yam. And so once again, wherever you placing your hands, good. And let's go ahead and rise to the top.

[inaudible] good. And Jennifer, you're gonna stretch through that right leg, right? And that's how it should feel. Also. Like you should feel that connection to that stretch in the front of the right hip and then like the back of the right leg, really doing good, strong work. Exactly right. That's sort of like checks you, you know, gives your mind a little mental check. Am I using enough energy? Good. Good. Last two. Haley, if you just trust yourself, then your shoulders won't work. So hard. Right?

And you can just let that lower half do the work. Beautiful. Ah, that got bad or that got bed are very, very nice. Could you guys, you can place your hands and take a little break. Good. We'll bring the pedals up with control. Let's come to the back of the chair guys. And you guys get to add a little more spring for the going up to the side. Okay, good. And for you guys at home, you can either keep the same spring setting or give yourself a little bit of extra spring. Um, the ones to the sides are just tougher, you know, be safe.

Don't fall off if you've got a high chair, you ha you have some extra, you know, help. But the put the low chairs, you know, breaking teeth doesn't make your body look better. So don't do that. So let's put the right foot on top of the chair to begin with. Okay. So your left foot will press the pedal down. Sorry. Good. And then you can turn to the side. Good. And the right leg is on top. Alright, good, good. So once again, and you get a choice, your hands can go behind the head, they can stretch. And it was another traditional way was to hold one arm out. One arm in. Yeah.

So once again, we're going to push down through that standing legs and now that left leg is strong. The tummy muscles are drawn in and up. Now careful. Wait a minute. Good. That's what everyone wants to do, right? And now granted this manufacturer, this, this distance is a lot higher than that distance. So it probably is necessary to get going at first. But you don't want to keep your weight shifted over there.

You want to stand down through this left side. Okay, Haley. So I'll give it to you to rise up. So let's rise up to begin with. Yeah, good. Good. Now once again, whew. So that right leg has to tip under. Maybe we'll do this one at a time. Yeah, that left leg is going to press down with strength. Good.

And he's telling me muscles are drawn in and not good. Now I would tell Hailey, maybe don't go as far down, but push into that left leg and get that right leg up and under. We'll do five last too. Haley, can you get that right hip to tip under more? One more. Okey-Dokey. And come down. Turn and face the chair so you're safe and pause. Good. Now just like you saw the girls when they were standing up, they went to lunge forward.

That's also sort of a tendency when we go to the side, we tend to lunge forward. So we want to try to be stacked up on top of that leg better so that we're getting this power because part of all this lift that we need for, you know, keeping our bodies up away from the ground also starts from the inner thighs and right up underneath the touch. Right? So we don't, well this is just gonna build our, our, the front of our legs. We got to get the back of those legs. Nice and strong. Good. Haley hangout. Oh, you did the first side. Brilliant. Let's do the second side. Good. Everyone good? So once again, rising to the top. Good.

It was always a trickier side. Right. So now trying to press through both legs and find that pelvis under you. Good. And then think about our, our hourglass shape. So if we're pushing energy down through both legs, yes. And then up into the waist.

Good. And then take it to the floor. Yes. Good. Good. Facing the chair and carefully stepping off. Nice. You guys. Good? Good, good, good, good, good people all the time. Make comments to me about that little funny picture of Joe PyLadies in his tidy whities doing these exercises, but he's like 86, right? And up here it's like, you know, who cares what he looks like. He was up there doing it.

All right, so let's keep the same spring setting and we're going to go into tendon stretch. Okay. So let's have a seat on the chair. Toes on the pedal. Good. Now this goes back into that first, uh, or the, um, into the footwork. The last exercise we did tendon stretch, right? We're kind of in the same position, right? So we're gonna use that idea again of pressing down through the legs of, you know, with our dagger legs and lifting up into the tummy.

So let's go ahead and push the pedal to the floor. You're going to drop the heads, lift the waist. Good. And now find that opposition. You guys just push into the spring, right? And now you've got more springs, you've got more help, lift up into your tummy and let's start to pick up that Spring and lift that pedal as high as you can. You can lift it and again, push the spring down and lift your waste one and push the spring down and lift the waist too.

And push the spring down and lift the waist three and have a seat and take a little break. Not Bad, not bad. Now what I want you guys to know the differences, the difference between lifting your hips and lifting your waist. Okay? So that's what I want you to focus on is you want to lift the waist up without your shoulders lifting. Um, but, but that, that's where your strength is coming from. So it's not, we're not twerking. Yeah, let's try it one more time. Drop the down. Lift the waist. Good. So find that difference. Find that opposition. If you send those daggers down, right. And you want to lift her waist. Nice. Jennifer. That's it. Good Hayley. Stick with it. Stick with it. That's it.

Now find that opposition down to go up. Oh, don't lose it. Nearly one more time and good. Jennifer and I slowly done take a little break. Good, good. So now you guys are starting to feel yes. What we're talking about in that connection. Let's walk to the others side of the chair. Good.

They're getting a break, but we're not going to do one leg. Good. Let's place your knees on top of the chair facing the pedal. Good. And now they have the same spring setting. Know that as these exercises become more easy, you can take the spring setting down, right to challenge yourself. Okay. But that spring opposition and gives you some nice feedback, you know, to feel how to work your body more effectively.

So let's go ahead and start with the arms up. Good. I want you guys to just feel, again, a nice long line. You're going to press energy sort of down through your kneecaps and in and up through your bellies. And using that, I want you to start to round forward. And ideally we keep the hips right over the knees and love the waist to hold good. And without pressing the pedal down for a moment. Just pause. So once again, just check yourself that your hips are forward over your knees.

Take a moment to feel that as you push into the pedal, maybe a half an inch down, press down into the kneecaps and feel that waist really lift up. Beautiful. And then find that opposition to take the pedal down and to raise your waist up one and down and a two. And let's go down and stay down guys, and keeping it down. Feel that opposition again. You're pressing down into the knees, down into the waist. Good or sorry, up into the waist, down to the hands. And then let's bend the elbows and pump the pedal and lift the belly higher.

One higher, two, highest three and hold the pedal down. And then roll the way, step to come all the way on top of the hips to lift, to lift, to lift, to lift, to lift, and take a little breath. How was that? Excellent. Good. Good. One more time. Let's take the arms up and once again, let's begin to roll down. So find those needs right away and find that lift in the belly. So we're fighting the opposition. Good. Very good, Haley. Very Good Jennifer. That's it. And hold that pedal. And again, just kinda check your line and feel your strength. Find your opposition, find your power. And then let's press the pedal down and roll the way.

Step one and press the pedal down. And I'm going to give you a little nudge Haley too. And then feel that. Tell me love to three and now let's hold it down. And even as you press down, Haley, can the shoulders relax? Can you tell me lift. That's it. Put all that pump up. Pedal one and two and three.

Can you pump a deeper Haley and lift? Press Look, press. That's the way. And hold and then lift that tummy. Good. Cause Hailey's not at the age yet where she has to worry about any of this. So we're giving her a headstart. Good. Let's have you guys step off and let's have a seat on the chair once again for the tabletop. Good. How are you guys feeling?

So let's go ahead and have your toes go on. The pedal heals together and the hands to the back of the chair. Good. So one thing idea that we're trying to get to is we feel a lot with the chairs. The fact that that spring gives us resistance and feedback and we really want to be like one with the spring. Okay. So earlier we were gripping the toes around the pedal.

I'm going to let you guys go ahead and use that technique again. Let's have the hands stay where they are, keep the pedal where it is and go ahead and raise your hips up as high as you can. Lift them. Good, good, good. And let's pump that pedal six times. And those grippy little toes again can help you lift. That's it. And it's so magical because it connects you right into your tummy.

It's wonderful. And then stay at the top to have a seat and take a breath. Not Bad. Not Bad. Good for me. I'm going to have you guys. Haley, that was good. Keep your eyes just focused straight ahead of you. Yeah. Good. And let's now try it on one leg. So again, using that same connection, right? So the pedal is going to stay where it is.

We're going to go ahead and raise the hips up in the air. Good. Let's send the right leg forward first and you're going to reach for the camera. Jennifer. That's it. And then pump that left leg. Five, four, three, two. Hold it and can place both feet. Have a seat, take a little break. Ooh. La, la, la, la, la, la. And then let's rise up again and we'll try the second side and the other leg will reach and good and use that right leg and lift with your belly.

One and two. That's it. And three, just five times. Good. Try to keep the hips even and stretching. That's the way. And hold the pedal up and have the seat down. Good, good, good. You guys saw how gorgeous Jennifer had her leg up high for me.

Stretching it out across the room might actually make you work harder. Okay. So lifting it up high is kind of your easy way. So sometimes you know, define what, what really makes your body challenge you. Yeah, trying it to the side now guys. So hands go back. Now this time, once again we'll raise the hips up in the air and that first leg that was lifting is now gonna stretch to the side. And again, we're going to work that peddle five, four, three, two. That's it. One place both feet and have a seat. Good, good, good. Take a little breath. Good. And sometimes you guys can work out using your ears, right? Cause you can hear the [inaudible] pick up the Buddha. The spring. Yeah.

So even just hearing, you know, just using your ears sometimes to also tell you what your body's, what your muscles are doing. Yeah. And now, once again, the second side, let's rise up and the other lego stretch and good keeping that hip up good. Even that work yet. It, that raising leg has to keep the hip lifted too good and hold it at the top. Jennifer, can you lift that left tip a little bit more? That's where it could be. And then place both feet and have a seat and take a break.

Good. You guys good? You guys good? You guys did fiery. Very nice. Good. Let's step off the chair. Good. Let's turn to face it. Good. And actually I'm going to change the spring setting. Let's have you guys go to one spring in the middle is what I would know to do with you Jennifer. Yeah, good, good.

So you're going to start one foot length away from the edge of the chair. Heels together. Good. And I just feel like they've worked so hard. We're just gonna do something to kind of like try to combine it all. Okay. So just feeling both legs connecting down. Um, let's go ahead and rise up on your tippy toes, guys. We're going to bend the knees and keep lifting up in the tummies to sit close to the chair and those hands can go on the pedal. Good. Good.

So you might need to move closer. Yeah. Good, good, good. You can be a little bit of the push. All right, good. So once you get your bottom is close to the heels as you can try to lift the heels just or the hips, one inch off the heels. Good. Now make sure, once again you've got energy down into this toes. That's it into the size and lifting up into the tummy. That's the way.

And using that we're going to go ahead and press the pedal and bring it up and press the pedal and bring it up and lift your belly as the battle goes down. Two more press and last one. And now really press into those toes to rise straight up and have s or lower the heels. Nicely done. Let's step onto the pedal yet and your hands can go to the edge of the chair in the front. So once again, a good, I'm challenging you guys quite a bit. Okay. Hands are going to stay close to the edge here.

You guys are going to, once again, have your toes turned apart, heels together. And let's go ahead and have a nice deep bend. He hips all the way to your heels. Good. Good. Now from this position, hands to the other side. Good. Could you bring your body and the pedal all the way up?

I know I didn't give you a lot. That's the way he liked. Good. Good. So heels together and let's try to lower the body down and burring the hips and the heels up one and lower the body down and bring the heels in the hips up too. And lower the body down and bring it all up. Three and go to the floor and rise up and step off. Ooh, good. One more time.

I'm going to add just one little bit of this spring at the bottom for them. And you guys will try that once again. So tricky, right? Like good, good, good. Sometimes just to also like just make [inaudible] make your body do it. Just do it, you know? So once again, same exercise. You have more spring now. More help. Yeah. Good.

So back to our idea. If we can push down into the spring and lift up into our tummies, then everything should be able to work in unison. So now guys, let's go for it. Let's rise up one good and feel that pressure down and lift you and feel that down in press three now. Both you guys hold it at the top. Stay at the top. Can you bring your heels higher to your hips? Get your hips lower to the heels. Hips. Lower that the way. Lift your chest now. Now we're working. Here we go.

Haley. Now we're going to go down and pick it up one good. And use your stomach to lift it up to one more heels together and stay at the top three. Yes. And you can bring the pedal to the ground. Right? Good. You guys. Very, very nice. Well we and good. Bring the pedal out.

Nicely done. Good, good. Now do you guys, could you feel from just challenging yourselves to do it in that ridiculously hard setting that it's just kind of like it made your body aware of what it would take, you know, to do it in that other setting? So sometimes, you know, it's like, just tease the body a little bit, just give it a little bit of a challenge and then boom, you don't have to use this so much. It's like, then the body will just kick in and do it. Okay. Can we just reverse those two real quick? Alright, last exercises to now your back begins to the chair. So you'll be standing up actually to start with. Let's good. So we did the one from the floor first, right? We are standing on the floor and just use our hands. So we'll begin with that.

So feet on the floor, Hailey. Good heels together. Toes apart. That's it. And let's begin by rolling up on the tippy toes. Good. Now squeeze those heels guys and pushed down into the toes. As soon as you push down into the toes, what happens? Ah, good, good. And your booties a little bit too, right? Yeah. So now keep those heels. Keep those toes pressing down.

You're gonna start to bend the knees deeply. Your hands now reach behind you just to grab the pedal of the chair. That's it. Good. You okay with that wrist. And now we're going to try to go as deep as we can to the heels and then just lift one inch off the heels and then we will pump the pedal. Press down, lift up one a little slower, press down and lift up to use that opposition.

As you press down into the toes and up into the tummy. We are connecting those legs into our bellies and we feel the arms on the back as a bonus. And then let's hold it. Press down into the toes and rise straight. Ah, and take a little breath. Lower the heels. Last exercise I promised. Good.

You're going to sit on the chair to begin with and you can press the pedal to the floor. So when you hear those words, the last exercise, you have to know that every little last bit of energy you have goes into this last exercise, right? All right, good. So let's begin by sliding the bottoms forward to take them close to the heels. And then let's low where the body by bending the elbows and picking it up. One good. And at the same time, Hailey, you're bringing those heels back to connecting them up into the belly too. Good. And two more you guys up, and then let's stay at the top.

Hold this position and just pump that pedal. Let's press it down and pick it up with the tummy up. And one more. Stay at the top and have a seat. Excellent. For a stretch, let's push the pedal to the ground. Let's round your head down and just touch your fingertips to the floor in front of you. Take a little breath. Good. Let your legs just hang on that pedal.

Let your arms hang over. Let your spines relax, and then keep everything raggedy in doll as you roll your spine up to sit tall. Okay.