Control & Balance Challenge

So today we're going to do some challenging reformer work. So look after yourself and here we go. Christie is accompanying me today and I'm so thrilled. So we're just gonna stand to begin finding our weight over our features. Using this as a moment to center to bring your mind in your body at least closer together and then we'll bring our arms out to the side and we'll reach out.

Like you're going to touch the outsides of the room and then keep that energy as you reach overhead stretching as though you could perhaps reach up and touch the ceiling and then reach back out so we feel the size of the room in our periphery and then let the arms go light as they come down and then create out energy. We reach out and then they left. Now light and now heavy reach. Expanding through the chest, expanding our minds perhaps and bringing the arms down. We're inhaling here. Exhale, let the head fold into the chest. Rounding the spine down. I'm going to soften my knees. Christie, you can do that or keep your leg straight. Both are a good option.

Pause at the bottom. Stretch the legs towards straight. Bend the knees. Inhale and exhale to lift the spine. Back up, articulating through the spine, stacking one bone on top of the next, and then taking the arms out to the [inaudible] side. Anna, we reach out. We reach up and we're going to look up and create a little bit of extension. Take the arms back out to the side, reach the arms down. One more. Roll down, bringing the chin into the chest, curling, controlling that downward descent with the center of the body.

Legs bent or straight. If they're straight, bend them. Now if they're been straight in them, now everyone is straightening now and then let's all bend and feel the weight on both feet and roll up. So standing, let me, Christie and I are just going to put up our springs for footwork. Right now I'm choosing three reds in a blue. We're going to come onto our back all the way, feet on the bar, arms at our side, starting with a pelvic curl. Inhale and exhale. Feel the feet scraped down the bar as the pelvis starts curling up away from the Mat. Feel that the knees reach forward and the arms gently pressed backwards.

Inhale and exhale as you around. So no matter how challenging the movement that we're preparing to do is, it's always worthwhile. Here we go again. Exhaling to Lyft. Always worthwhile to start with some fundamental exercises to give yourself time to connect your body and down to think about where your movements are coming from. All movements have some sort of familial relationship to these fundamental movements. Let's do one more. Christy lifting up, reaching [inaudible], sending the knees forwards in here and an XL or you start with the breastbone. We feel the ribs, they soften, we feel the lower spine soften into the mat and we drop the pelvis down. Bring the hands back to the Sh, uh, the hooks, the pegs where the straps lift, lift the feet up off the bar for the spine. Twist will inhale towards me and we'll exhale to center and keeping the knees and feet lined up.

We'll inhale the opposite direction and exhale to pull and just rocking the pelvis, rocking that lower spine, opening it up and exhale to come back and inhale and exhale and inhale towards me. Now holding here, we take the top leg and reach out. We let gravity press down on that leg. Take a little bit more of a stretch. Fold the knee back in. Inhale and exhale to come back to center inhales. We rotate the opposite direction.

Xcel the top like stretches out and presses down on that bottom knee in. You know we fold the knee back in and exhale to center. The arms are still, the shoulders are brought. Inhale towards me. This time the bottom leg goes out straight and pulls us over and we bend and we pull back and in here and the bottom leg stretches out. But the knees stay connected and in here and say hello back to center. Let go of the pegs. Bring the hands up to the knees, bring the body up towards the knees, pressing the lower spine flat. Also feel that the tailbone is not curled away from the Mat.

We take the legs over the bar, arms reach back, touching the hands together, and then pressing through space in, he'll chew, reach, exhale, push through space. Create the same amount of energy that you were doing just a moment ago when were trying to touch the outsides of the room. So now we touch the front of the room in the back of the room and then we touch the outsides of the room, pressing the arms through space, inhale and exhale and we feel the full stretch, the length through the body and then the contraction. And we'll do two more and around and India and around taking both hands to the left neither, right? Like I want us actually to take that leg and push down on the bar and use it to help us curl and change, pushing down on the bar.

So feel the relationship between that hip extensor and the abdominals, the leg as straight and our arms are strong, strong as we press down on the knee and the trunk is still and the breath is focused. And one more hands behind the head. Now the leg floats over the bar as we rotate floats over the bar. As we rotate, keeping the elbows. Why? Feeling the rotation happen at the trunk rather than the neck rotating around the rib cage. And we do two to one.

One coming back to this side, placing that straight leg down on the bar. Take the underneath hand away from the head. Reach forward and lift five nice slow pulses. Three, two, one first float the leg hand behind the head, back to the center and over to the other side. The leg goes down, the underneath. Ian Comes over and we curl up. And two, just milking that lift.

Two and one. We lift the leg, the hand comes back. We bend the knees to the center and we lay the body down. Feed on the foot bar. I'm going to lift my head dress up. I like to be able to see my feet. Same little downward drag on the heels. Find your neutral pelvis. And here we go. We're seeing out an in reach.

So we feel that that backs of the legs are aware that a movement originates from and you want to find equal pressure on both of your legs. Well do for dragging the carriage back in or creating resistance. Doing a little check-in with the body. Where are the arms? We're gonna pump, so it's down to catching the way to the springs with their tension anywhere in the body. Five, four, three, two, one. We're going to take it out. We're going to bend in. We're going to come to the toes.

Going to press out and back. So when your legs are straight, your heels are lifted maximally. But then the heel stay still as the knees bent. So stabilizing through the ankle joint, finding the full extension of the knees each. We're going to add on here. So we take it out.

We take the heels under the bar, five and four and a feel that you could potentially lift all the way through the backside of the leg too and hold to bend the knees and reach out. And four lift three, two feeling the ribs. Settle into the reformer and bent and reach out. And here's three, two full articulation of the foot and we bend and two down and lift down and lift and bend and reach out. Just once this time, bend the knees in, swivel the heels to touch and reach out and pull in.

So there's equal energy on the n as on the Ama. Maybe we even put more energy on the end. We drag or pull ourselves in. I don't want to feel that nice straight leg position. Then a drag last four and pull three and pull two and one and we pump out and down and two oh Kristi, I didn't make as pun than our parallel toes, but that's okay because we'll have plenty of pumping to happen.

We'll do three more here, two one stretcher and bent and wide. He else coming into a wide plea, a position flexing through the feet, do a little up, press on the five so you feel the inner thighs engage and keep that engagement as you reach and pull little up press on the thighs so it's barely noticeable. Maybe it doesn't even visually happen, it's just an energetic inward pull. Bringing the size into or the insides of the thighs into the equation press. And we'll do this four more times. Double-Check for neutral pelvis, three, two and who won.

And we pump down down, down for fide. As you're reaching the body down, feel the uplift of the knees to, I don't know how to count that. I think that's close and we reach and, and I'm very aware of that fact and although I'd like to be able to count better, it's just sending that. I want to try and let go off right now. Rich and bet. Same idea here with societies. There's a little in squeeze but we still keep the knees lined up with the second and first. Huh?

You just feel that energetic out and in that rhythmic work. So we'll do four and three and two and one. Bring the kerogen and pump down inner thighs strong. Three, four, five, four, three, two. When we take it all the we have strain, we bring it back, coming into the center of the bar on the toes, reaching all the way on and then we reach one heel down and both up and down and both.

So there always some sort of rhythm and it's not just the rhythm of the exercise, but your relationship to the rhythm of the movement in your own body. Feeling that articulation of the foot, that beautiful stretch to the bottom lane. We'll do two more. And last one, just pause here for a moment. Reaching the heel under two very lift in change and reach two, three. Bend the knees and bring the carriage and take the left heel onto the bar.

If you want to change your spring, now would be a good time to do it cause he's gonna change her spring. I'm going to do my very best to be brave, but I might regret it. We're going to straighten both legs. The left leg straightens out, the right leg straightens up. I'm going to take the right leg down, up and bent. Reach out, stretch up, go down, up and bend and reach and kick and pull and bend and up and bend. Just two more down. Lift and bend down.

Lift and bend, placing the right heel on the bar, the left heel on, we reach and stretch up. We take it down, up and, and both like straighten simultaneously kick and they bend simultaneously and reach down, up and, and reach down. Ah, and Ben last too. Okay. And then, yeah, and back to right foot. Carla, sorry. Left foot comes back onto the bar, right? So it lifts up. We're gonna reach out, stretch on, going to flex both feet point both feet and reach out enough flax point and then controlling that heavy spree with our supporting lay fury more Ben [inaudible]. Two more. Yeah. And then last time point and that right for comes to the bar, left foot lifts off, we reach flex point an n and reach a flex point.

And then Anna, reach out really strong through that top. Like Chrissy, how many have we done? Okay, too. Yeah. Oh and we're coming all the way in and now we're going to lift ourselves up and I'm going to take my reformer down to a one red and one blue for some abdominal work. How am I going to come back down? So we take the straps in our hands, bringing the arms just above the shoulders and then connecting to the center and picking the feet up off the bar.

Inhale here. Exhale. We're going to straighten the legs and reach the arms forward. We're going to hold here. We're going to lift the lanes, lower the lay and the knees and come down and exhale, reach and lift and yeah, and and XL. Reach and lift and down and bend and reach up, down bend and last one up, down and bent. And now we lift up and reset a lifted. We externally rotate the hips and the shoulders. We open and close and feel the legs reach all the way outside to the room and breath and reach and press and reach and press.

Last to act and back. One more and back. Everything comes back to parallel and we come down and now we live right back up. And now we take the right arm, right? Like that's a leg up in the left leg down and we kick kick and we're constantly reaching through the arms to bring the body to the leg. Last two, two, one more.

One both legs, knees bend and down. Reach back. Take your headdress down. Okay. Bringing the arms back over the shoulders, lifting the feedback up off the bar and oppress the legs out in the arms. Down. Inhale to lift the legs. Exhale to rollover.

Flex the Thien. Separate the lanes. And as we roll down me reach to the arms. We feel the arms going further forward than the spine. The toes point, the legs come around, we you bend and lift the arms. Exhale, press outreach and lift and rollover and flex and separate and roll down. Okay.

Yeah. Employee and around and in one morning and I reach out and lift a rollover and flex and separate and roll down, finishing down, lifting, bending and, and bringing the arms up, placing the feet down on the bar there. Just press out and put the feed into the strength. [inaudible] heels together, toes apart. We're going to take the legs forward and back and forth.

So giving herself a moment again to bring herself inward and forward and bed forward. And Ben, yeah, forward and hold. Now press the legs down low as you can without losing your spinal stability and around and keeping the pelvis down and down and around and up and down and around in them. And just two more and one more. Pausing from the top.

We Open [inaudible] we reached down and together and lift and open. You can reach down and together and lift and open and down and together and left and two more and one more. So now I want us to bend our rights knee and separate the left leg out straight and then press with the left leg focusing on the straight leg. As we come back together, bend the left knee, right leg goes out, straight. Press with the Riley to come back to center and in here and exhale.

So even though when these bending and one leg straightening, you can think about the five bones, the femurs splitting away from one another evenly and pull and reach and Paul and range and Paul and range and pull legs together and bend the knees, press, legs forward. Exhale, headrests are down. Inhale to come all the way into the stopper. Xcel to roll upon the shoulders. Don't go too far. There's a little surprise here and I bend the knees in towards the hips. We're going to press out.

And so I'm a little round in my spine and bend the carriage moves and out [inaudible] and backed and add in a [inaudible] and bend. And from there we roll the spine down, rolling the pelvis away from the feet and then bringing the legs through and press forward and Fuld and coming all the way into the stocker and Rola, not too high and bend the knees towards the tailbone and press out and up. It's a little bit more forward than it is pressing behind you and you've got to control that moving carriage out in up so the legs are reaching straight up. But the spine is inflection and bend, hold and rural away dropping the pelvis and bringing the legs through. Let's do that one more time. Folding all the way in. First coming in to touch the stopper than lifting the body and bending the knees and reaching.

So stay strong in your midsection. Feel that power for work in the backs of the legs. This time let the legs go over the top of us straight. Separate the length and roll the spine down with the leg straight, coming all the way to the pelvis. Circle down and bend your knees. Take the feet out of the straps, put the straps back, and you go into some control balance. Kristie, are you ready? Great. Okay, so scoot a little bit away from the shoulder blocks. It's going to happen right here. Yeah, and I'll take the hands and hold onto the pegs. The metal pangs.

Lifting the legs up off to the bar, stretch the legs on, lift the legs, and then roll the spine over. So letting the legs drop through the center of the reformer. But lift the spine. Now the right leg is going to reach down towards the floor is the left leg reaches into the air and we pull up with our spy and then we carefully change and the elbow stayed down and wide and one leg drops and one leg reaches and we go again. So you use the back of that leg, but you also need your back extensors so much and we change sides. And one more time through change side, splitting the legs in the air and splitting legs in the year and both legs carefully down and the legs drop behind us into the well and we bring the body down [inaudible] and we're going to turn and come up.

I'm going to go to a red spring. Let's put the right foot up against the shoulder block. Oh come on Meredith, keep your roof armor quiet and we're going to bring the left leg up onto the foot bar. Let me press the right leg back. Am I lifting up through the chest? And then rent is going to start pressing that left pelvis backwards. And I'm going to do my best to get my leg straight today.

But I just don't know if it's going to happen. Okay. Lengthening through the spine. You're going to bend the knee, the front knee, the back leg just stays exactly where it is all the time. Are you gonna take the arms out to the sides and you're going to press that front leg towards straight hole. Rotate towards the Lange. Rotate Center. Rotate away from the leg. Rotate Center and in [inaudible] one more. Press down. Find your balance.

Lift through your center. Stabilize. Oh Christie, I just saw you actually get taught that in rotate holding the back legs. Still rotating. Fincher Bendon take the bar and press out and then the knee when we come in. Good job. I wasn't quite sure I was going to hold it together just then, but okay.

Okay, so changing sides. Taking a moment. Find Yourself finding your stretch. Breathing into your stretch. Start to press that right leg, lengthening the spine. So if you can't straighten your leg and say, if you have to round your spine to straighten your leg, then hold back on the leg a little bit and really work towards elongating spine, a flat spine, lifting the tailbone up towards the ceiling.

And now we're going to bend in to find our footing. We're going to find our balance. We are going to find our inner peace, right Christie. And we're going to press out and fun. There are going to rotate and center. Yeah, and Roti. Yeah. And Center and Ben [inaudible] just can I adjust my knee up really fast? Okay, here we go. Can we hear a chat?

Any rotators to be very careful with yourself and center and routine and center. I don't know. He'd bend. Alright, take the bar and I tilt the tail happened me stretch back and he bring the carriage back in. Can you take the right foot off the bar and bring it onto the reformer into the down stretch position. So we do three down stretches. We press the carriage away, keep the eyes forward. We lift the chest using the backs of the legs. And the front of the body for support. We push out, we bring it in all the way in.

Feel the reformer, come to the stopper and reach out and bring it in. And now around the spine and pressing Isa and bring the knees under one and Ah, and under two and out and under three. And now we're going to tie those together. So from here we flatten the back. We're going to press down with the body. Don't go below the bar, not today. Press the legs out. Bring the body through and round the spine, pulling the carriage into the stopper with the knees and extend the spine and press out with the arms, bringing the body into alignment with the bar and then press out with the legs and allow the palace to drop in and extend. Lifting through the breastbone.

And we pull the reformer in with our knees as we sit back and extend and press and reach down and lift all the way up and round. And then brewing yourself up onto your feet, standing on your feet. Walk your feet back towards the shoulder blocks in a find your long back. So we do three regular elephants. We inhale out and we exhale back looking for a long line.

Inhale back, exhale in bringing the front of the ribs back just slightly so the backstage flat and bring the carriage and then transfer the lefthand over towards the right hand. And now lift the left leg out to the side, bring it all the way up to the level of your pelvis and then swing it around behind you and find the line from the foot all the way down through the hands. And then the right leg presses out and pulls back. And as the right lake comes underneath us, we lift that left leg even higher and one more out and in. And then we lift that leg up, it's as high as the pelvis, and then we step in and then I transfer the wane.

Bringing the Hay on the right hand over near the lefthand, re-establish your flat spine rightly reaches up and then turns to go around behind us. And then we take the left leg out and that, right, like even higher as the left Lee comes in and out. Yeah, back when out and back. And then the leg lifts higher, higher, higher to come back. And we placed it down. We separate the hands and we flatten out the back.

And you just do one more with both feet anchored on the forward and we pull and lifting the toes. Okay. Are you gonna come down now onto her knees? Sliding the feet up against the shoulder blocks? I'm going to go to a blue spring. I prefer a blue spring for my arm circles, which is what's happening now. If you keep it red or blue.

Yeah. Christy is going to be brave now. I feel like I should use a red. That's okay. Okay, so taking the items down, are we gonna reach the arms up the left all the way to the ceiling and then we're going to touch the outsides of the room again and as you exhale, scoop up the air. [inaudible] eh? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Reach up. So feel the body reaching up with the arms. It's not just arm work. Feel that it's spinal work. It's trunk work.

The legs have to work to help us hold our bodies in space. Last two times. Exhale, reach up and open and one more. Reach up and open and now we reverse. We go out, we're right up near the ears. We rotate to bring the arms down, their rotations in the shoulders and you see it in the hands. The shoulders rotate the bring the arms down and d, celebrate the arms like you're holding something heavy up and reach and, and holding at the top. Make a diamond shape with your hands. Bring your hands behind your head, bringing the back of the head towards the hand. We take the arm straight.

[inaudible] [inaudible] straight up and bad. [inaudible] and shoulders go down to send the arms up. And two more. Yeah, know one more. We open the rooms out to the sides. We bring the arms straight across and open. Pull back with your abdominals before your arms start to move and open and three and oh and too, and I know Ben and what and open and take the arms down.

We're going to sit back onto our feet. We're going to set the straps down. I'm going to change back to her red spring. We're turning around through chest expansion. We're going to add something fun or taking a hold of the ropes, pressing the pelvis forward, aligning the shoulders directly over the knees and bringing the arms just in the front sides of the thighs. And from there we reached the arms down and back and forward and down and back and forward. And as the arms reached down, we lift the chest and reach and we'll do three more dragging, scraping the knuckles along the floor and two and one. Okay, Christie, we're going to sit back with our pelvis flat back arms right at the sides of the body. Three tricep extensions. One, two, three. Hold the arms, roll the pelvis forward.

Lean back. We're going through the thigh stretch going through the thigh switch. We find that nice long line and we lift and we take the pelvis back and I do it three times. Push back one, push back to push back. Three pause. Paul, this comes forward. So there's an articulate a Tory pattern there. And then we find our long line and then we left. Ah Man, we sit back one more reaching out and two and three and rolling the spine back post.

Tearfully rotating the pelvis to support the lower back. We hold it here and we do three test expansions back here, Christie, one and two and three and we left all the way back up. Oh that'll get you going. So we're going to back up with the knees, come to the back of the reformer with your knees and reach down and place your forearms onto the reformer. Your hands are going to reach around to the outside so you're gripping the reformer in your hands and step back onto the foot bar with one leg point that foot and go very strong in that leg cause they're about to lift the other leg off the reform. And when we do, we want nothing else to change. So prepare yourself and lift the right leg or whatever leg is left.

And now we hold and we take the arms forward and back in. The body stays still, and the arms reach forward and back and forward and back. And now lift the spine, bringing the top of the head very close to the reformer. Reach back through your heels and flatten out your back. And then as you come back forward, bring your arms directly underneath your shoulders here, back in that 90 degree, we're gonna reach flowering and back and reach forward and back.

Then reach forward and that, and now we lifted back that nice flat position. The head's just floating off the carriage. You want to try to bring the reformer all the way in, bring the body forward. All those underneath the shoulders are going to do that one more time. Press forward and back. Strong legs, strong abdominals two and three.

And now we lift and get that nice stretch the shoulders, not nice. Stretch to the hamstrings. And then we're going to bend the left knee, bring into the reformer, then the right knee and bring the right knee in. So we're gonna finish up. This class is some snake and twist. Twist first followed by snake. Let's take the bar down today. Yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to do this with my bar down. Sometimes I like to practice with the Barra. It's definitely more challenging, but I like to just move through it today and I think that that will be a little bit easier with the bar down or more fluid.

So one hand, let's say if we step the right foot on the bar, the right foot hand comes close to the right foot, the left hand goes onto the shoulder buck, and then we lift and cross the left ankle, lowering the body into a long diagonal inhale. As you press the carriage away, present to your feet to keep the carriage still and rotate around. Inhale to come back and exhale to bring the carriage in. And we reach out not too far. That's the hard part. Exercise gets easier and easier the further you push the carriage away. So let's try, because we have our bar down today to minimize that out and then spiraling around and then reaching back and then in and stepping down.

And Chrissy, let's go the long way around, the long way around and have a moment. Okay, so the same foot, that same foot that goes up onto the bar first, the inside leg, that hand comes to the front, the other hand comes to the opposite shoulder block. Find your control, keep the carriage still. Step up long spine and inhale, the carriage goes out. And exhale we spiral and look back over the shoulder. Inhale and exhale to come in and reach out and sure up. Feel those obliques working on the end and in here and rotate back in and carefully set to the floor. We'll take the long way. We'll make that part of the workout. Okay. Three snakes, same setup foot hand and be prepared before you step up and foot.

And now we take the carriage out. We're going to bring the pelvis through, lifting the chest, kinda come back and pull him and inhale and exhale as you lift the chest and back and in and last one, reach and back and down. Who's that? Pull out. This isn't hard. And walking around and I last time. Here we go, holding it together, Meredith, everyone, Christi and Hindfoot and fun and push the food into the bar. Help use your legs to help you stabilize. As you reach up, looking up, come back and in and inhale out and exhale as you reached through back and all the way in and one more and reach through, lifting back and, and, and commonly sat down to the floor and let the reformer rest and just standing on our feet again. Here we are standing on our feet. We take the arms out, no pushing, just easy, easy, easy feeling, the energy traveling of the whole body. And then rounding the spine down, letting me arms dive with you, reaching out, looking inwards, mentally and physically and lifting, uh, rolling.

And when my reaching out, you know, and I have to push. How, how can you make that feeling of movement feel like it's just happening all by itself. And then you're all, yeah, diving in. I mean the answer to come to the floor, allowing the spine to lengthen or the legs and rolling up. Okay. And reaching up. Then allowing the eyes just to fall down, trickle down like water, falling down glass and just hold still in your body for a moment.

I appreciate energetic energy that is moving through you and enjoy the rest of your day.