Primitive Movement Reformer

Hi, I'm Myriam Kane. Thank you for joining me for the third class of the series that we've been working on, reclaiming, reintegrating some of our most primitive or basic movements that are necessary for healthy and efficient walking, hiking, running, the movements that we absolutely need in life for longevity. We don't move enough in our culture, but I'm not telling you anything you don't know, and I know we're all working on this, but we want to do so in a manner that doesn't break us down or disintegrate us. So, we've already covered a basic mat class that I hope you've been practicing on your crawling and your breathing, with your tongue at the roof of your mouth. These are basic neurological resets that are just really, really important.

Please do research, if you need to, to help motivate yourself. But these are ways to reclaim things that you'll lose along the way that really age us much faster and in not as pretty of a way as we'd like. Today, we're gonna be working on the reformers, and Mandy and Daria are going to be using the jump boards for high intensity intervals, so we're gonna ramp up the volume. So that's why it's so important to have that foundation in place. We're gonna start with some hip openers, or actually, low back openers.

We're gonna take our right leg and grab right behind it, and then I want you to press. If you're sitting at home, all you need is a jump board, by the way, but I think you can see that. We're gonna press down into those arms, that hand, and then you're gonna roll your pelvis away from your leg. So I want you to think of opening up the very front of the pelvis, and keeping the other foot pressed down. So you might feel that your foot, it's not unusual for that foot to want to pop up, but you're gonna keep pressing down, using those hamstrings, and coming right back up.

So you'll do that two or three times. And then lifting the spine all the way up, and then again, we're gonna exhale and roll back. So as we're rolling back, you're trying to fill the air with your lower back. Beautiful. And then pressing that leg down into your hands as you come back up, and all the way up.

And as usual, you're honoring your body, you're listening to what it's saying. If it doesn't feel right, please don't go so far that it doesn't feel right. Just stop shy of that. Let your brain integrate what it is that you're feeding it, and it'll take you a little further, probably, next time, and lift up, beautiful. We'll stop right there and we'll switch legs.

So this other leg might have a whole different story. Take a breath and as you exhale, again, you're thinking of bringing your pubic bone up to your belly button. Think of opening up the front of this hip as you roll away, and trying to press that foot on the floor, down. These guys are doing a great job. Shoulders are down, and as you come back up, just drawing the abdominals.

Flection doesn't have a whole lot of value if it's a collapse. It's all about drawing in to really support that lower back. So back we go, just lengthening that spine. Beautiful. Pressing that leg down into the hands, and then articulating from the bottom, all the way up.

Nice. Inhale, exhale, we'll do that one more time. Just kinda warming it up, waking up the body. And then exhaling, coming all the way back up. Very nice, and coming all the way up, beautiful.

And now we're gonna come to a lying down position, safely as possible, and bringin' our feet up on to the jump boards. So we have two reds on these reformers. It depends, it's all relative whether that's heavy or not to you. I want you to be comfortable, we're just waking up the feet. And we're gonna start with what I like to call toe gym.

We're gonna press away, and so we're straightening our legs. And first, we're just gonna get a feel for where we're at in space. Immediately, the little sensory nerves on the feet are sending information to the brain where you're at, and bring it back in. And you're on your back, so it's a great stimulator for your vestibular system. And push away again, and bring it back in.

And just notice what it is that the body might be telling you, if one side feels longer or shorter than the other. And bring it back in. One more time, you're gonna press away by pushing through the heels, which activates your back line, beautiful. Stay where you are with the legs extended. Walk your feet down, if you will, to where they're in alignment with your sit bones, as if you were standing.

Your head rest, by the way, is wherever it's comfortable. Eventually, we'd like to have the head rest down, but for right now, we're not going to even worry about that. I want you to be comfortable. You're gonna PEZ, where you feel a little bit of connection where the hip bones or the femurs are just slightly rotating out. And you're going to press down with your big toe, your pinky toe, and your heel, creating a tripod.

Now, what you can do at home is bring your arms overhead, make a hammock for your head, and you can do it here as well, and bring your head up so you can see your feet. You're gonna lift your big toes up. Most of us, especially if we wear flip flops, we're pretty good at that. We're gonna press that toe down, something we may not be as good at, and then we're gonna lift the second toe up. Yeah, right, okay?

And bring it back down, and then the third, and if you can't get that to happen, that's not a surprise. That's really difficult, actually, it takes practice. Bring it right back down. And so, we can have the mitten effect, where we lift the big toe, and then we bring it down. And then we lift all the toes, we spread them out, and we press those guys down.

And then again, we're gonna lift just the big toe, so just big toe, calling all big toes. Leap that big toe up. Try, in your mind's eye, send a message to number two and say yo, and see if number two will come up. We have a number two. It might be different foot to foot.

And then the third, and then the fourth, beautiful, and then the fifth, so we're doing the wave, and then you're gonna bring your pinky toe down, and then your fourth toe down, your third toe down, your second, and then your big toe. Beautiful. Okay, and so you can see that it'll start becoming a little bit easier with practice. We're creating those neural pathways, or etching them in a little deeper. And why is that important?

Because we get so much feedback from the bottom of the feet to that vestibular system for our balance, so we really want that connection, and our feet get a little tired sittin' in shoes. They get a little, yeah, stupid. All right, hold the toes up, no offense. Bring the pinky toe down, 'cause mine too. Fourth toe, third, second, and big toe, beautiful.

And now, you're gonna bend your knees and bring it all the way in. You can put your head back down, bring your arms back down by your side. Take a nice deep breath with your tongue to the roof of your mouth so that you really get the air in through your nose, (inhales deeply) and out. (exhales deeply) Nice, diaphragmatic breathing. One more time, nice deep breath in. (inhales deeply) Feel the rib cage expand, exhale. (exhales deeply) Feel that connection, that X that we drew that connects the right and left hemisphere, or the right and left hemispheres of the brain to the body.

And one more time, deep breath, (inhales deeply) and exhale. (exhales deeply) You're gonna go ahead and press away now. So we're just pushing away, and then drawing it back in. And when you press away, let's think hamstrings. You're gonna press through the heel and activate. All you're really doing is a squat.

We've been doing squats, so you can do the same thing. Neutral spine, so to speak, right? Spine is even front and back, you extend, you're thinking back of the legs down to the floor. Then you lift the kneecap up and drag it back in. Toes are going to be nonreactive in a perfect world.

And reach, and draw it back in. Stay in the bent knee position right here, and I'd like you to roll through your feet. So we're gonna lift our heels up, and roll through the foot. And do that again, so you're gonna lift the heel, and then I want you to think of rolling through the midfoot, and all the way through that foot. So there's 33 joints in these guys, and down, down, down, rolling through the foot, and it's just really interesting, sometimes, how we can lose touch with the arch of the foot.

So you're gonna drop your toes down, like a Barbie foot, and then roll through the whole foot, bringing it down to the heels, and again. But if we stand in shoes, we'll do that two more times, that have arches, and back up, make sure you have equal representation with all toes, that your knees are tracking over your second and third toes. If you're not sure, bring your head up and look. And one more time. But shoes with arches just tell our muscles they don't need to be arches anymore, right?

And back up. I mean, sometimes, we need that though, right? But you need to know. And maybe start to work on your footwork, and that's gonna help the muscles of those feet. Awesome, bring it all the way back down.

Beautiful job. Bring yourselves in a little bit closer, so now you're as if you are sitting in a chair. So if you have the range of motion to you available, like Daria does, you're gonna push away a little bit more so that there is some action going on in your quads, like you're sitting in a chair. Right, so, great, Mandy. Now, we're gonna bring the heels down, so wherever you can be with your heels down.

So you're sitting in your chair, your heels are down. We're gonna lift the heels and drop them back down. Roll through the foot. And back up, and right back down, rolling through the whole foot. And back up, and you feel a little bit of crepitation, or a little bit of a shake at certain parts of that movement.

That's not unusual, and that's just the brain and the body just working together to understand what the process is that's going on. So just take your time with it and honor it. Don't speed through it 'cause then we just won't be strong in that range of motion. Give me one more like that. Beautiful, leave the heels up.

Bring the right heel only down, and then prance. So as that foot goes up, the other one goes down, and then your mission, should you wish to accept it, is to remain connected at the X. All right, pelvis neutral. Notice any tension that might be happening in your body and just let that go, 'cause there's no need for that. And again, two more.

And one. Keep both heels down now, and I want your heels to be down in a place where you feel comfortable, and not too restricted at your ankle. So bring your foot up. I know I like to have my feet up a little bit higher, and then you're just going to do a few basic extensions, and bring it in. So before we jump, we want to have a great foundation for the movements that we're then gonna add some stress of speed and plyometrics to it.

Makes sense, right? So first, we want to just kinda warm ourselves up. Push away, reach, and drag yourselves back in. And notice what your feet might want to do. I know I have a left foot that likes to overpronate a little bit, so sometimes I'll look up and I'll see that rogue foot going left, and so I'll just adjust it, right?

And bring it in, and then notice what that feels like when you're doing that, if it feels different. One more time. Extend, and we bring it all the way back in. And now, we're going to externally rotate from the top of the hip, bringing the heels together. So if you happen to have any tension in the lateral calf, you're gonna know it right about now, and we're gonna press away, reach.

Peroneals tend to get a little tight, especially if they do work for the glute med. And push away, and reach, exhale. And then drag yourselves back in. So we all know we don't need to drag ourselves back in. The springs will be perfectly happy to do that for us, but I want you to pretend that you do.

Keep your tailbone down, and keep reaching both hips away from you. Reach away and zip up the back of the inner thighs, drag those bones together, own it, and back. You're gonna do one more like that. And bring it all the way back in, beautiful. We're just going to bring the feet parallel now, back to parallel.

We're gonna take the right leg, bring it up to tabletop. So this is more like real life. Unless we're hopping through life, typically, one foot's on the floor, one's in the air, we're in a mid-swing, or mid-strike of the foot, right? So we want to have balance at the pelvis. You're gonna press away with your left leg.

Reach, and drag yourself back in, and again. So notice what happens when there's just one leg. It's a whole different ballgame, right? And bring it in. Nice, two more.

Gonna keep that lower leg just parallel to the floor, bringing it back in. Exhale out, use that breath, (exhales deeply) first and last thing we do, very important. And bring it back in. My license plate says breathe, just to remind myself. I know we all forget.

One more time. Hold it out, and then drag yourselves back in. Bring the foot back down, the other foot down, and then we'll bring the other leg up. And reach. So here, if you bring your hands to your hip bones, you'll notice, perhaps, maybe one hip likes to rotate.

Maybe you'll look up, whatever works for you. Ideally, our pelvis is neutral, something we move in and out of. We're rarely in neutral, but we need to know where it is. And reach away. Beautiful.

And really grounding through the leg that's on the jump board. We're gonna do that one more time. Bring it all the way back in, and bring the foot down, beautiful. So we're gonna bring the carriage all the way in, and place the feet up on top of the board. So the foot is actually going to, I'll help ya, all the way down, okay?

So we all like to avoid hammy grams, and hopefully, none will be delivered at this juncture. So, by pressing down, we're using hamstrings, and we're gonna try to avoid those hammy grams, you know what I mean. Take a deep breath in, and we're gonna go into a posterior tilt of the pelvis, just a little one, and then we're gonna release and come right back down to neutral, but then beyond. So let's take an anterior tilt, bring it back to neutral, posterior tilt. It's important to know these positions so that we know where we're at in space.

And again. So, up and then we come right back down, lengthening that spine away, reaching the front of the hip bones away from us. And again, take a breath in, deep posterior tilt of the pelvis, thinking pubic bone to nose, just the pelvis coming up, and then bringing it right back down to neutral. Beautiful. We're gonna slide our feet down, and now we're gonna get ready to jump.

So we've been working on our foundation, we've got this awesome foundation. We went back to crawling, made sure we had diaphragmatic breath. We've graduated from crawling forward to maybe crawling backwards again, maybe cross-crawling, and now, we're ready to actually add a little bit more of intensity, and I definitely believe that these jump boards can be pretty intense. What I want you to make sure that you do is bring it down when you need to. Take it down to one spring if you need to.

If you use one spring, it's gonna be a little bit more of abdominal or core work, and you'll feel it. This will be a little bit more of your legs, okay? So, feet are going to be down, and then we're just gonna jump, and when we jump, we're gonna take off, reach, the heels are gonna come off, and then the toes are gonna land, the heels are gonna drop, and then we're gonna do it again, okay? So we've got a little bit of time to get used to it. At first, it might feel a little hiccupy, and that would be normal, okay?

But as we get used to the movement of jumping, I want you to start to really think about how you're jumping. Take a breath in, and exhale, and exhale, and exhale. When the heels land, the knees bend, and then we jump again. These guys are doing an awesome job. I know, sometimes, if my calves are feeling extra tight, I tend to want to jump from a heels-up position, but we would just be encouraging a little more tightness, so I want you to think hamstrings.

So extend through the back of the leg, beautiful. Now, these guys could go for five or 10 minutes, and you probably could too, but we're not going to. We're gonna do two more jumps. (Mandy mumbling) (Myriam laughing) We're gonna bring it all the way back in and take a breath, so nice deep breath in. (inhales deeply) Exhale everything back out. (exhales deeply) And deep breath in, (inhales deeply) and exhale out. We're gonna bring our feet back up to the jump board up here, pressing down with the feet, and we're gonna go into a little bit higher of a pelvic curl and add rotation.

If that feels good to your body, you're honoring what you feel, not what I say. Now, head rest needs to be down. We're gonna take a breath in. As we exhale, we're going to begin to peel the spine all of the way up, all the way up, up, pushing the feet down, not out. We're gonna rotate the pelvis to the left, and we're gonna roll down the left side of the spine.

Think right outside of the spine itself, and drawing the abdominals in, really getting into that lower back, QL. It feels really lovely. Take a breath, or if it doesn't, then you're not gonna do that. You're gonna come up the center first, so take a breath in, deep posterior tilt of the pelvis. We go up.

Nice. And you'll notice that things start to try to help, like toes, eyebrows, it's amazing what can compensate. And then we're gonna come down the other side of the spine, and notice if that one feels different. Our words are gonna be notice and feel. And articulate through, beautiful, and bring it slowly, ah, doesn't that feel great?

And all the way down, nice work. Bring the feet down, and now, from the hip, again, you're going to externally rotate, which is going to, from the hip, bring your knees over your second and third toes, and that's very important, okay? So we can push away, Mandy's gonna press away, until the heels are down, and then bring it back in. Good, and feel at what point do your heels want to pop up, and that's gonna be the point that you're gonna stop when you jump and jump again, and stop and jump again, all right? So when you're ready, we'll go ahead and do that.

We're gonna come in, and then we're gonna jump, and as you jump, the heels stay together, heels glued together, and the heels are gonna override the knees coming together. So sometimes, our knees will come together, but the heels won't. Heels stay together, adductors, beautiful. And exhale, jump. And I want you to notice what's happening at your X.

Are you able to connect the X? And that's very important. If you feel any of this in your back, then you're gonna take a moment and you're gonna regroup. And again. And you've got five more jumps, that sounds like a good number.

Four, and breathe. Now, you can do this, you can put it on pause, and you can say, "I want to do three minutes, "and then I want to relax for a minute." Three minutes or two, or not, and bring it all the way back in. Bring the arms straight up, if you will. Bring them out to the side. You're gonna bend your elbows and find the posts that we like to hang those straps on, or you can grab a hold of the shoulder blocks, either way.

We're gonna go into spine twists, so you might want to move away from your shoulder blocks just a bit so you're not stuck in there. Bring your right leg to tabletop and left leg to tabletop. Beautiful, knees right over the hips. You're gonna inhale towards the ocean, lovely thing to say. Exhale, dig deep into the abs to return the knees to center.

Inhale away. Well, so much for that cue, right, Daria? You're going to the ocean, and back. As long as one of us is going towards the ocean at all times, we're good to go. And bring it back.

(exhales deeply) Nice. And again, inhale over. Notice any tension that might start happening in the front of your shoulders and your neck, and you can give it permission to go away. Bring it back, keep the knees firmly glued together so that you're not at risk of compensating with these outside muscles. Remember, we've been talking about how the brain will rob movement from a muscle to use it as a stabilizer, if it doesn't have it where it needs it.

Brilliant, but it's not sustainable, okay? And bring it back, beautiful. We'll do one more on each side. Inhale over, exhale, bring in the pubic bone towards the belly button, bringing it back. And one more to the other side.

That knee is sliding over top of this knee, just like we do on the mat, and bring it all the way back down, well done. Arms can come down to the mat. Feet are going to come down to the foot board, and we're ready for single legs. So, we're gonna bring right leg to tabletop. So left leg's gotta jump by herself.

The arms are gonna be up in the air. I'm gonna go ahead and lighten this up, is that okay? I know Mandy would prefer to add more spring, but I'm gonna just go ahead and take it off. And here we go, take a breath. And you're gonna jump with one leg, beautiful.

Now, what happens when we lighten it up, as you know, and how does that spring feel to you, is that okay? (Daria mumbling) It's light, is it too light? I feel like I'm having to gather more, so it feels like a little more work. Excellent. So you can use whatever you want as springs.

I'm gonna go ahead and add a little bit of spring because the core is working very hard, but I want it to be able to show up for a little while. And bring it back in. Can I add a spring to you? (Mandy mumbling) Okay. Okay?

So as we jump in the air with one leg, you've got one leg in the air doing one thing, another leg in the air doing something else. That's a real challenge to that X that we've been talking about. Two more. So I've been talking a long time, and we'll add arms on the other side. You've probably already added arms.

Bring the other leg down. We're gonna bring the other leg up. How are we doing? Good. Good.

So you guys tell me if you need more or less spring, okay? And springs are just a really personal thing, and different pieces of apparatus, the spring feels different, the length of the time you've had the spring feels different, they're different when they're new, so please, just use what feels right to you. We're back to single leg on the other side. This time, we're gonna add the arms in a cross-pattern, and then when you practice again on your own, you'll just add those arms every time, right? So here we go, the right leg's gonna jump, and we're not gonna use the arms yet.

Left leg stays in the air and we reach. These guys look awesome, reaching through those feet. Try to point through the foot, not the toe. Now, as that leg extends, Mandy's got it, (laughs) yup. Thank you, she's cuing me.

As the leg extends, the opposite arm's gonna go down, so think straightening leg and straightening arm, that's how I think about it. And the arms are gonna stop at shoulder height. So here we go, back into this cross-patterning of the right and left hemispheres of the brain, doing different things with different parts of the body, right, with the opposite side, I should say. And give me two more if you have it. And one, bring it all the way back in, and give it a break, take a breath.

How are we doing? We're doing good? Good, take a nice deep breath in, (inhales deeply) through the little holes, and exhale out. (exhales deeply) Nice deep breath in again, (inhales deeply) and we exhale everything out. (exhales deeply) And one more nice deep breath in, (inhales deeply) and exhale everything out. And now, we're gonna tie those two together, so another interval to challenge another system of the body. Something that's really cool is that we are a fully integrated system.

There's nothing that we can do in one part of the body doesn't affect another part of the body, which is just a beautiful thing, okay? So we're gonna bring the arms straight up. We're going to bring the right leg up, all right? In the air, the legs are gonna come together, and then we're gonna land on the other leg, okay? So in the air, we're gonna leave the arms up for now, and in the air, the legs are gonna come together, beautiful.

In the air, they come together and you land. And now, should you wish to accept this, as you jump with that leg, the opposite arm's gonna go down. (Daria and Myriam laughing) Exactly. Me too, all right? So it's kinda like chewing gum and pattin' your belly, and...

(Daria laughing) just trying to coordinate these movements. It's a lot harder than you would think. So if you're sitting watching this, that is not fair. You need to get on your reformer and do this with us, beautiful. And breathe.

And you got two more jumps on each leg, so that makes four more jumps in real life, right? One more time. And bring it all the way back in, well done. Bring both arms down. (Mandy mumbling) You were great. (laughs) You know, it's about challenging our systems, is what this is all about, right?

And so, once you've got it going one way, then try it the other way and see how that works, and that's what builds those neural pathways that we want to have, that keep us young and vibrant, no matter how many years we have on our mileage, right, on the odometer. Okay, take a deep breath in. (inhales deeply) And exhale everything out. (exhales deeply) Try to bring that tongue to the roof of the mouth. Deep breath in for four, (inhales deeply) and we're gonna exhale out for six. Deep breath in for four, (inhales deeply) exhale out for six. (exhales deeply) And one more time, deep breath in for four, (inhales deeply) exhale out for six. (exhales deeply) One last set of jumps. We're gonna do jumping jacks, remember those?

So we're gonna jump in the air, and we're gonna land wide. We're gonna jump in the air, we're gonna land feet together. Beautiful, exactly. Nice. (mumbles) So, I could have added more spring, and it would have made it a lot easier on our cores, but less easy on our legs, okay? Or we're going a little lighter, so there's a lot more happening at the X, and that's a good objective as well.

You can mix and match. Out. Feel free to do what Mandy's doing. I think it's a good thing to look and check our work, because sometimes, where we think we're at is just where we're usually at, (laughs) but not necessarily where we want to be at. So to see it, sometimes we're able to integrate.

As we were saying, it's all connected. And so here, the eyes can help us to integrate what we're trying to reintegrate into our systems. Give me two more if you have 'em. One more. And we bring it all the way back in.

Well done. So now we're going to come off of the jump board and come on up to a standing position. I'm gonna take it to one red. Okay, and actually, while we're standing, what we're going to do is go ahead and take these jump boards away, so why don't you do that as well, and we won't have those in our way for what we're going to do next. Awesome, so the jumping probably woke up the quads just a little bit, I guess, and we're going to switch over into a little bit more work for the backline for the glutes.

So what I'd like you to do is make sure your foot bars are down like we've brought ours down. You can have a blue spring, you can have a red spring, whichever works best for you. You're gonna stand with your leg to the side of your reformer, halfway back from the carriage. You're gonna take the leg closest, and you're gonna put your heel on the shoulder block, and you're gonna stand tall in your standing leg. Hips are square.

So, oftentimes, again, just like the footwork, we think we are where we are, but then we realize we're not. So we look down, and we wanna make sure that we are square to that foot. You're gonna extend the back leg, press, and then you're gonna drag it back in. And I want you to think posterior tilt. So by going posterior tilt with the pelvis, it's not really gonna be posterior tilt, okay?

Your glute is extending, and we want to make sure it's not gonna take your lower back with it, right, 'cause that's one of the problems with walking and running. It shouldn't hurt our backs. It's not designed to. And reach. So I want you to think about really pressing through that heel, and can you completely extend that leg?

And maybe you shouldn't if it doesn't feel right to you. So go to where it feels right, and bring it back in. Your arms are going down by your side, and back in. As the leg goes back, the opposite arm goes back, and bring it back in. So if the left leg goes back, the right arm goes back, and that can be very confusing, 'cause oftentimes, we don't walk with our arms, and we need to.

One more time like that. You're gonna hold, hold it right there. Bring the arms down though, sorry. You can hold the leg there. And then you're gonna bend the standing leg, so you're gonna bend, and come back up.

And bend, and come back up. We're just gonna do a couple like this. Bend, this is not easy, I know, so you may need a pole, or something, to balance. That's fine for now. You're gonna hold it low, hold it low.

We're gonna hinge at the hip. We're gonna hinge forward, and we're gonna come back up. And the movement'll be felt in your stabilizing leg, yes? You're doing a single leg deadlift. And forward you go, nice and long, and come back up, and back down.

Beautiful, this is courtesy of my dear friend, Alec Wong, and I just really like this. And keep that knee bent. It keeps a little bit of the hamstring out, and really keeps us in the glute. One more time, just one more, you guys are doing great. And reach, try to keep that leg back, beautiful, and come all the way back up.

Bend the knee and bring that foot to the floor. And now, we're, right away, gonna go into side splits. So coming up safely, I think a red is a good spring to have on there. If you want to use a blue, that's fine, if that's what you usually use. But we're gonna step on to the stable part of the reformer.

Bring the other leg out to the carriage. Find your balance over your foot, so I don't want your bottom way back, okay? And then you're gonna use that deep core to roll yourselves up, holding the carriage in, and I want you to feel that you're weighted evenly on your big toe, pinky toe, and heel. If that means bringing your leg in closer, by all means, do that. Arms out to the side.

I want a little bit of a PEZ, that little external rotation at the hip, as we go out, and then we draw the legs back together, something like being pulled up through a straw, keeping those ribs down, beautiful, and bringing ourselves, our bodies, maybe slightly forward from the hips. So oftentimes, we drive from the back seat, and we want to make sure that we're stacked, okay? Out we go, and then we exhale, draggin' it back in. (exhales deeply) Nice. And back out we go, inhale out, (inhales deeply) and exhale, bringing it all the way back in.

Hold it in place, dragging those leg bones together, femurs just dragging together for two and one, and back out we go. Bootiful. Drag it all the way back in. Think of really wrapping the back of the inner thighs as we come all the way in and hold it right here. Now, from here, we're just going to hinge forward.

So as we hinge forward, don't let your bottom go back. It's a little scary, actually, okay? So hold here. You're gonna go out with the legs, and as we come in, we're gonna rotate towards the shoulder block. It's always gonna be in the same direction as you return, pulling that same leg back.

We go back out, we're not in any hurry. Oh, no, we're not. And then we bring it all the way back in, and going towards that shoulder block, beautiful, guys. We go back out. So I know my tendency is to start to go back into my knees, or into my hips.

I'm gonna ask you to avoid that. And one more time, we go back out, and we drag it in. I want you to hold it in place, bring it in, bring it all the way in, all the way in, all the way in. Think of wrapping at the top of the hip. Bring the arms out to the side, and then we're gonna roll it all the way up, (hoots) and bring it all the way in.

Awesome. And go ahead and shift your body weight over to the stable part, or bring both hands down first, and then step off the back. I know, right? (laughing) Yeah. (exhales deeply) Working hard.

Spaghetti. Spaghetti? Okay. We're gonna go to the other side of the reformer. We didn't fling spaghetti, hmm.

Okay, and so, we're gonna do the same thing on the other side. Different side, different story. So you're gonna stand tall, about halfway back the length of your carriage. Bring that other leg up. Stand tall, get the knee off of the reformer.

Turn out just a wee bit to get into that glute max, and then you're going to extend, and bring it back in. And then think pubic bone up, reach, and bring it back in. Arms are down, as that leg goes back, the opposite arm goes back, so really, it's gonna be the arm that's closest to the floor, and back, right? And long arm back, and forward. As the leg goes back, the arm that's closest to the standing leg goes back.

And it's just interesting how, I know! You just don't even think about that! It's like, who thinks about that? But that's cross-patterning, and so, this is really good stuff to integrate the work between the right and left hemispheres of the brain. And bring it back in. Little harder to feel that cross-patterning when we're on this reformer, but what I want you to think about is as the leg goes back, the opposite arm's gonna go back. It's just like a cross-pattern when we're walking, right?

And back we go, nice. And so think leg goes back, opposite arm goes back. So (breathes out forcefully) and bring it in, and back, nice, and bring it in, beautiful. Two more. (laughs) I know, who would think, right? Difficult patterns.

One more, we're gonna stay upright, and hold, hold right here. Go ahead and bring the arms out to the side and hold that leg back. And now we're ready to bend the standing leg for a lunge, holding that leg back and coming back up. And make sure that you don't go into your lower back, that you're really thinking deep posterior tilt. Good, and back we go.

Reach. We've got just one more to do like that. And back up, one more. You're gonna hold it back, hold that leg back, the knee is bent, and you're just gonna hinge. So at the hip, you're coming forward, and coming back up, and coming forward, beautiful, and coming back up.

Nice, Mandy. You guys look really great. And reach forward, doing what you can to extend this leg, and bringing it back up. This is just the last one, and forward. I think we got extra credit on this leg.

And bring it back up, beautiful. And now, bend the knee and bring it all the way back in, and we're ready for that side split, I know you're craving it, right, on that side? So we're gonna stand. We're gonna go ahead and put a foot on to the stable part of the reformer, and go ahead and bring your hands down to the frame for stability and safety. Bring the other leg up, beautiful, and hold it together with your adductors first and then you're gonna roll up, keeping your pelvis nice and balanced and neutral.

Beautiful. And out. And now you can meditate as you look out at the ocean, right? We go out, and then you're gonna drag the legs back together again, nice. And bring it all the way back in, beautiful, and hold, and out we go.

I want you to think a little more external rotation at the hip, lifting the arches. Feel how that just wakes up the arches of the feet, yes? Hold it in place for four, and three, and two, last one. We go back out again. Drag it all the way back in, thinking of closing the legs.

If you could bring that reformer in just a little bit closer, you're gonna hold it in place, and you're going to hinge forward at the hip. Arms are going to go out to the side, and trying to stay right over your feet. It's a little scary here, so just trust. And we go out first. Now, as we come in, we're going to rotate.

So there's many ways to skin a cat, but the way we're skinning this one is when it comes in. We're gonna go out, and we're gonna bring your bottom just slightly forward, and as you come in, beautiful, out we go. And as we come in, it's happening at the waist, so think of pulling this hip, the one that's on the stable part of the reformer, out, or back, excuse me. No, on the unstable, I was wrong, on the unstable part. And bring it all the way back in.

Hold it in place, hold it in place. Bring the arms back out to the side, sorry, girl. Draw the abs in as you roll through the spine. I know, you guys are working so hard. Roll through the spine, coming back to neutral, and all the way back up, well done.

Bring your hands back down to support, and go ahead and step off the reformer. Wow! I know. It's so hard to keep it in. Yes, it is, especially when I have this thing down. (Mandy mumbling) Mm-hmm.

Let me do this and be your friend. Okay, so we're gonna come up to a thigh stretch because we've earned that. We're gonna be kneeling, facing back. I'm gonna add a red. These two guys have been working really hard, and I know you have as well, so we're gonna go for two reds, so it really is a thigh stretch, 'cause we all know a thigh stretch isn't really a thigh stretch.

It's thigh work, yes? We're holding on, it's gonna be a little bit heavier. Take a breath in. You're standing nice and tall on your knees. Deep posterior tilt of your pelvis.

You're gonna leave the arms right in front of you, and you're gonna hinge back from the knees. Beautiful. Thinking posterior tilt, just like we did on the mat. And as we come back up, you're gonna remain nice and long. Inhale, deep posterior tilt of the pelvis.

As you go back, I want you to keep your eyes on the horizon. Think pubic bone to nose, pubic bone to nose. You can think it all you want, it's really hard to do. Pubic bone to nose, and coming right back up. Yes, we get a stretch, but boy, do we have to pay for it! Inhale, and again, deep posterior tilt of the pelvis, arms are straight out, and try to do not much as we go back.

Now, stay in this position if you can, and you're gonna lift your heart to the sky, and try to go into some back extension. Don't force it, allow. See how high your heart can go, beautiful! Nice! And then bringing it all the way back up, well done. You're staying there. If you have two reds, I apologize, you're gonna have to take one red off.

You don't have to, but I assume you're gonna want to. Your hands are gonna go into the short loops for now, or into the loops. Palms down, thumbs down by your side for chest expansion. So, the hands, you're thinking lats here. The arms are straight, and that's as much work as we need out of those arms for now.

Squeeze your armpits down to the floor and press back, and slowly bringing it back and forward. And again, down and back, and forward, and down and back. Beautiful, keeping the ribs down, and again, drop your ribs, there you go, nice and long. And forward, and down, back. So if we're used to being in the back seat, so to speak, it really feels odd to be in the front seat, so to speak, right?

So I want you to really think about that. If you can see yourself in a side mirror, notice where your ribs are, if you are back here behind your hips. That's gonna make it more challenging when we walk and run, if we're in the back seat. And down back, and that's something I think the majority of us are doing. And down back, and we hold right here, and bring it back forward, beautiful.

We're gonna bring the right foot on to the head rest. Okay, nice. So it becomes a little more challenging here. With the right foot on the head rest, the left hand isn't going to do much. The right one's gonna come forward, and I want you to think posterior delt, so you're gonna bring your elbow back and wide.

You may need to tighten up and hold on to the strap instead of the handle, and that's just fine, or the loop. Good, so we're gonna drag the elbow wide, and bring it forward. So that's one way to work posterior delt, but we're gonna bend the elbow and pull it back, and that works as well. I want you to keep the hand at 90-degree bend, so you're gonna bring it back and then forward, beautiful. Think back of shoulder, hold.

Now, look at your arm, and you're gonna rotate, and then bring it forward, and then we're gonna integrate that whole movement. You're gonna go wide with the elbow and rotate, and forward, and again. We're gonna go wide, we're gonna rotate, and forward, and again. One more time, we're gonna go wide, we're gonna rotate, looking at that arm, and coming forward. And last one, we're gonna go wide, we're gonna rotate, looking at that arm, keepin' the hips as square as we can, and forward.

Nice challenge to the balance, yes? Bring that arm down and we'll switch legs. So adding that little bit of instability on a moving surface, not only are we strengthening ourselves, but I want you to notice how it starts to work more closer to that X that we've been talking about, right, a little closer to our center. If we're more balanced, we have a tendency to just work the limbs and forget about this, but you have to remember, that's what got us in trouble in the first place, so we want to get away from that, and then we can add even more resistance. So here we go again, other side.

This arm is loose, and left elbow is going to drag back. So we have a 90-degree bend at the elbow, and imagine that your arm is on a counter, or on a table, and it just glides back. You're thinking posterior delt, back of your shoulder. And back, pause, and then forward, nice. And then this time, I want you to look at your arm as it goes back, so your eyes are looking, and then you rotate.

Here, we're really challenging the vestibular system, or balance. As we do this, every single muscle of the body is connected to the vestibular system, so that should say something. It's right behind our ears, and forward. It measures where we're at in space, how we feel about it, so think good thoughts. And come forward, and again.

We've got two more like that only. You guys are doing a beautiful job. I want you, in your mind, to think posterior delt. Back of shoulder, hands are relaxed, and then you rotate, and I think we said one more. Is that what we agreed on?

Good, okay, so the arm goes back, and then we rotate, and forward. That's fine, I just couldn't count. And bring the arms all the way down, beautiful. And you can bring the other leg down and turn around. I'm gonna bring the foot bar right back up, and I'm gonna bring it up high, there you go, I'll do that for you, so you may want to do that as well.

We're gonna go with the red and a blue for our shoulder push, and we're going to be kneeling with the forehead right over the foot bar. So if you can find that foot bar, bring yourselves in, bring your hands in alignment with your shoulders. Essentially, what we're doing is an overhead press, right? The fingers are reaching forward, the thumbs are with the fingers, and we're gonna press out. I'd like you to think that you're gonna balance a fine glass of champagne right about here, so please don't drop it.

And you're gonna press back with these muscles here, and slowly. So if you want to get technical, no, you're not. You're pressing back with the triceps, but I want you to bring your energy into your stabilizing muscles, and back, beautiful. Nothing's spilling, shoulders are staying right out of your ears, drag it back in. And as you do this, and you're integrating that X, so you feel stabilized, right?

I want you to think of reaching your heart forward, feeling those mid-back extensors reach, beautiful. Bring it back in, take your time. So if it's easy for you to actually extend your arms, you may wonder are you actually using your stabilizers, or is it all arms, right? So it should be really challenging. You're really squeezing from under your armpits.

If you can bring your hands the width of the shoulders, that's great. Otherwise, you can start wide and bring 'em back in. We've only got one more. You can exhale out. (exhales deeply) Press it all the way back out, and reach. Extend.

Now, you're gonna press down as you bring yourself in, lifting your heart, pressing down, down. That looks beautiful! And bring in your arms down by your side. You're gonna sit back on to your feet, and you're gonna turn to face sideways. So we're gonna face forward, sitting on our feet, like so. So we've been practicing sitting on our feet, and the ankle mobility is getting better and better, yeah?

I think so. And even our toe mobility's gotten a whole lot better, so we have more proprioception through our feet. We're gonna take a nice deep breath into our rib cage, (inhales deeply) and we're gonna exhale everything out. (exhales deeply) One more time, deep breath in, with the tongue to the roof of the mouth, (inhales deeply) and exhale everything out. (exhales deeply) So we're gonna imagine there's a bug right in front of us, or maybe it's a spider, and she's just going right up her little string. And I want your eyes to follow her as you look up, up, up, up, up. She's amazing.

You're gonna turn your head to the right, 'cause she's scooching to the right, looking as far to the right as you can with your chin still up, and then you're gonna bring your chin back down, and you're gonna bring it forward. Hopefully, the things we've been working on with our necks are facilitating this movement. Spider's going back up, so you're gonna look with your eyes. You're gonna follow with your face, you're gonna look as far as you can with your face up. You're gonna go to the left, and you're gonna come right back down, that side and back to the center.

Again, the eyes are gonna lead. So you're gonna look up, you're gonna go straight up the wall. Look straight up. You're gonna turn your head to look as far, with your eyes up, as you can to the right, and then you're gonna bring your face right back down, and you're gonna bring your face center. And one more time, we're gonna go up, and to the side.

This used to cause all kinds of crunchies in my neck, and now, it doesn't, so I'm really grateful for that, and bring it back, and I hope that does the same for your neck. All right, beautiful. We're gonna take a nice deep breath into our rib cages with our hands right here. Deep breath in. (inhales deeply) We exhale everything out. (exhales deeply) And again, as we inhale, we feel that expansion, (inhales deeply) in that beautiful, flexible, I don't know if I even like calling it a cage, but that rib cage, and exhale, the holder of our heart and some very important organs, and exhale out, beautiful. And so then, we're gonna swing our feet to the floor, and we're gonna scooch ourselves forward.

Bring your hands to your quads, and you're just gonna lift your bottom. So I want your rib cage to stay with your legs for right now. And you're gonna lift your chest, lift your heart into back extension, nice. Now we're gonna round the lower back, but leave your heart where it is, rounding that lower back. Go ahead and put your hands on your lower back, actually.

I think feeling it makes a really big difference, that tactile feedback. And so, you're gonna hold this, and then you're gonna lift your heart, beautiful. Now, hold your heart up, shine it forward. And then you're gonna round that lower back, bringing your pubic bone towards your nose. Hold that where it is, and now, lift your heart, so you're inch-worming your way up.

You're gonna round that lower back, you're gonna lift your heart. And you're gonna round the lower back, and you're gonna lift your heart and extend your knees. Come all the way up. Take a nice deep breath in, fill it up. (inhales deeply) And bring the hands together, bring them down in front of your heart. Take a nice deep breath. (inhales deeply) Exhale everything out. (exhales deeply) Thank you so much.

Very grateful for your time.