Mat with Theraband

Hey everybody, welcome to class. I'm just thrilled to be able to be here and that you're with me. So today's gonna be mat with TheraBand. With that really means to me is it'll be sorta intermediate but you'll be able to make something a little harder, some things a little easier, sometimes you assist yourself, sometimes you advance something. So I'll try to give you some options as we go.

Probably do need a TheraBand to make it really kinda fun. So if you don't have one, play along with me, but if you do have one get it now, or hopefully it's with you. Mine is really long, thank you to my friends in South Africa for bringing this to me, yes, and, I end up folding it and wrapping it and just make it work for you. So, if you were with me last week, I think that we all are our own teachers, no matter if you're a teacher or you're not a teacher, or you're newer, you really just have to pay attention to yourself. So, if something gets in your way, fix it.

If something doesn't feel right, question it. Observe what's happening for you no matter what I say. Sometimes you're your own best cure. So, without further ado, again, mine is super, super long. I'm going to fold it, I think, in half, no I'm not.

I'm gonna wrap it up because I know what I'm gonna do. I'm just wrapping it up 'cause mine's really long, setting it down right in front of me so I can grab it when I'm ready, so why don't you do that same? Super cool to have you all here. I know you're from all over and I'm just kinda lettin' it sink in, shall we move? Stand with your feet apart.

Look straight down, look down. You're your own teacher, look down. Your hips are over your ankles. Your ribs are over your hips. Your shoulders are over your ribs.

Your head is up on top. Last week I gave myself the cue. I don't have a mirror either. Maybe you do, I hope you do. And reach into the crown of your head, reach into your hand and then let it go.

Decide how you're gonna end this workout feeling and then make it up, that's all. I can only lead the way. So from there, just inhale. I like to rock back and forth, you're gonna see that. It's a soothing thing for me, too.

Rock forward, rock back on your feet just to kinda find center. Sometimes that's a really big important point of starting any class or any movement practice. So, once you've done that and you kinda know where middle is, aim ever so slightly toward the front of your foot and just hang out and just feel yourself now. We'll try to do this at the end as well. Take a deep breath, nothing else to do, just be here.

That's the hardest part, you got here, so now let's just have fun. And let it go (softly exhales) I'm gonna do it again before I even move, (softly inhales) although it's moving me, and exhale. From here, just rotate your whole arm out. Collect some energy, whatever you need. Inhale, reaching up (softly inhales) and exhale, just let 'em fall down, drop down, float down, whatever you need.

And again, inhale (softly inhales) and exhale, I kinda look at the TheraBand as my friend. So I'm not totally alone in here and I know you're not alone either because here we are, and down. Okay, from here we're just gonna do a standing roll-down. I'm gonna turn, 'cause that's what I do. Same position, you just inhale, leave your arms down, and exhale, let your head nod forward.

Let the weight of your head, as if there really was a weight, pull you down, or just go down. Try not to shift back. If you're not ready for that, you can bend your knees, I'm bendin' ma knees. Hang out for a second, I gotta shimmy out a little. There's nothing right or wrong about what we're gonna do.

We're just gonna kinda move our bodies and feel good at the end because we did our practice. Inhale here, exhale, you could also put your hands on your knees. Again, lot of us aren't ready right away. Roll back up, again, trying not to shift back. You're still in that slightly forward stance of your feet, your head comes up last.

If you want to, you can raise your arms on the inhale. I'm just gonna leave them down. Exhale and nod the chin, round yourself down. Round yourself down, try not to shift back. If that gets too tight too fast, and anywhere, bend your knees.

You're nice to yourself. You have to be. (softly chuckles) 'Cause you get to be, and you don't, anyway, inhale, exhale, up we come. (softly exhales) I am gonna take my arms up this time, inhaling up, exhaling down, when they get about shoulder height, I let my head go down, I roll down. All the way down this time for me, which does mean I'm gonna bend my knees, hands to the floor, fingertips are fine, and then inhale, let your head be heavy. I'll be as clear as I can so you don't have to look up. Exhale, try to straighten your legs but stay folded over.

Ooh, I didn't get all the way, did you? Inhale, pull those knees, your spine, everything back into a rounded position, so re-bend them. Exhale, we're doing one more after this, exhale to straight. Inhale, bend. Exhale to straight, and where's your head?

Let it be heavy, top of the head to the floor. Just like when it's at the ceiling. Take an inhale, feel free to bend your knees, I'm going to, and roll back up, hands on legs is absolutely fine. Feel yourself, that's the other part of being a teacher, is what do you feel? One more of those, inhale, up.

Exhale, when the arms get to about shoulder height, you round forward. Do what you need, see if you're starting to already achieve the goal that you set for being here. How do you wanna feel, bend your knees, inhale, that's how I do it, exhale, straighten. Inhale bend, notice what you do and just go, huh, that's interesting. Why does one knee bend first?

I don't know, curious. And last one, straighten. Inhale, exhale, roll up, and for one more we're gonna go down and pick up our band, so inhale. (softly inhales) Exhale, round over, roll over, smooth yourself over, whatever you need today. Find your band on the floor, however you need to grab hold of it, and I'll explain more when we get up, and roll back up.

Roll back up. Okay, so here we go. Again, mine is so long, I was tempted to cut it, but I want it longer later, so I didn't. So I'm just kinda grabbing on where I need to and I know what I wanna do is be able to take my band overhead, without hurting my shoulders, as overhead as I can, which I can. But a little bit of tension, just a little bit.

It's not like I'm pulling, just a little bit 'cause we're gonna pull, so you wanna just be ready for that. All right, hopefully you're with me on that. Take your feet wide, let 'em turn out naturally, but they're pretty wide, and then shrug the shoulders up. We still have the tension on the band or did you let it drop? 'Cause you gotta pay attention to this stuff.

Not really, you do, but, let 'em come down, inhale, rise up. Exhale down, and something I learned, I don't know why this happens, but a lot of times when you tell someone to drop their shoulders, they automatically bend their elbows. So look at yourself, don't do that. They could be straight and your shoulders can be the only thing that moves sometimes. Okay, here we go, I'm actually gonna wrap again, 'cause I need a little bit more and I want to be able to hold the thing.

So, we're theoretically band directly overhead. We can drop it down and touch the middle of your head. From there we're gonna inhale, we're gonna reach over, and exhale, come back up. Inhale, reaching over, and come back up. That's all we're doing for a little bit but here's the thing, you keep your weight equal on both feet, really.

You can even push into the one, but don't lean into it. Push into the one foot, stand on that opposite foot. Reach over, it's like you're in between two plates of glass. Exhale, come back up. Inhale, over, exhale, come back up.

Inhale over, if any point that the neck takes over, it's worth it to just drop your arm, shake it out, and come back. So good enough, do you feel a bit of a stretch when you go over? Really reach way over there. It's not just down, up, down, up, it's over there, up there, over there. Let's go a little faster if you're body's ready for it, if not, slow it down.

Inhale, now exhale, come up, check your shoulders, check your elbows, up. Breathing (softly exhales) that's part of the, it's part of expanding our body so that we can move more freely later, that's my thought. I gotta tell you, I swear I feel better already. It's always a little, like, hm, I'm not sure, and then you get on and you're like, right, I belong in this body, and up. All right, let's change it a little bit.

We're gonna go over, reach into it further. Is that opposite foot anchored? Press that bottom arm down. Bring it up and come up, other side. Go over, check yourself, is that other foot down?

Anchor it, then you can use your lat to push down, come up. Same idea, here we go. (softly exhaling) And up, and over, and press, and up. Remember the elbow thing? You gotta watch your elbows. It's super easy to bend 'em and then it's just like dumb exercise.

But right now we're just tapping into the center of our body from way out here in the arms and hands. (softly exhales) Couple more here, we go over, press down, reach out, and up. You can be mechanical for now, we'll flow later. This time we're going over, we're staying there, we're gonna press down for five, find your ground, find your anchor again, I just did. And I do it in my feet and I stand up off my feet.

See if that means anything to you. Press down, come up, press down, come up, one more. And then, remember, we're reaching way over, but also way up in the ribs, and then come up. Taking our arms down if you need to, go right back up, go the other way. And we press down, up.

Down, imagine pressing with the upper arm rather than just the hand maybe. 'Cause that gives you a little more energy toward the center of the body, which is kinda what I'm doing this for, not to mention the shoulders. All right, let's make that the last one, come up. You can stand however you want. I'm gonna go back to that parallel 'cause I can feel the earth a little bit better, and then from here, you might have to unwrap your band, you might have to fudge this a little bit, meaning bend the elbows if you need to, and we're just going to go back and release.

You can totally release at any time. Back, what I am trying to do is, or trying not to do, I should say, is not thrust anything else forward or back. So I'm trying to keep the back upright as I reach the band. Now to be fair, I am in fact pulling on the band to do that. So don't be a hero here, just opening up the chest.

(softly breathes) Take it a little further back if you can, and again, you might have to pull more to do it, and come up, and you get to relax at the top. Get to relax whenever you want, to be honest, and up, and back. Funny, like you sit at your computer, or, well, yeah, all of us, I think. And then all a sudden just doing something like this makes you go, huh, the sky is bluer! All right, I'm going further. I am gonna go all the way eventually.

If not, you don't wanna do it, don't. But going back a little bit further, that's about it, come back up. You can, let's take it all the way down since we're going so far up. All the way back, or most of the way back, and up. If it is available to you without a huge bending of the elbows, go all the way down.

All the way down, come back up. That's the hard part for me, I don't know why, but it is. And inhale, come up to the top, all the way around, exhale somewhere in there. The inhale somehow expands us, doesn't it? Of course it does. (softly inhales) And over. (softly exhales) Just one more, it's up to you. (softly breathes) I'm gonna stay back here.

Okay, so if you aren't able to go back there, quickly take your band around the back and hold onto it however you need to so that we can then wrap the hands still more. So, still on shoulders here. There's no right or wrong, just get close enough that you can pull and have a little resistance. Like if you go to the side, to the side, I don't know if you can see that, but it's the idea that you've wrapped the band close enough to your body that you can still pull both down and out to get a little bit more energy coming into the center. Hard to explain that one but I think you might feel it.

Okay, from there, it's mild, like not even tension, it's just taut. I'm not pulling, it's just taut. You're gonna bend your elbows, but you're not going forward, you're just keeping yourself upright, whatever you got. Then, you straighten the elbows and pull to the sides, and then just relax down. So it's bend, try to keep your upper arms where they are.

As you straighten, you pull to the side just a little. It doesn't have to be a lot. But keep your posture and relax. Bend, breath, and reach, and down. Bend, stretch way back there, whatever you got.

Doesn't have to be, it's just nothing to measure. It's just to do, bend, stretch, reach. Bend, bend, stretch reach, and down, just one more. Bend, my arms are tired already, and down. Right, all right, I'm just bringing the band around the front, I'm loosening up a little.

If your hands get tired you gotta shake it out. You're gonna take care of yourself, no one's gonna tell you other than that right there. All right, a little bit of foot and leg work for those of you who are used to working on a reformer. Again, I'm just making it taut. But I also want it to end up over my shoulders, so you'll adjust.

All we're doing is we're parallel feet, we're just gonna sit down. This time you've got a little more weight in your heels. So before I was sorta talking to the front. Tiny bit more on your heels like they're on a foot bar and then come up, if you want a little more, you can press that band into your legs, it's up to you. But actually, just caught myself rolling my shoulders forward, don't do that.

You're proud, here we go, inhale (softly inhales) push. (softly exhales) You drive those heels to the floor. You're just letting your arms be in opposition. There's nothing really going on here, with the band anyway. (softly exhales) Not much, some, and up. And (softly inhales) I tend to inhale as I bend, exhale as I straighten.

I know that's exact opposite for half of you here. So do what works and I'll do my best not to breathe too loud into the mic to mess you up. Okay, but think about those things that you might, if you were on a reformer, or even if you weren't, the back is not wobbly. It's, in this case, let's keep it steady. Sit down, sit up.

Sit down, sit up, use your arms as much as you want. Okay, either do that exact same thing again, or for a tiny challenge, actually, it feels like it's gonna be a big one for me right now but I'ma try. I'm gonna float my heels. Now the energy is a little more toward the forefoot, like a credit card underneath the heels, that's it, not way up here, just there. And we're gonna try, let's go, down.

Oh, it's slower isn't it, and pull back. And you focus on a spot on the wall or the plant in front of you, and you go right, I got this. And yes, my ankles are gonna wobble because that's natural 'cause they're helping you stay upright. So let those muscles work. And bend, and straight.

And bend, again, I'm keeping the band taut. It really helps me to do that. If I don't I'm a mess, up. Bend. And up, ooh, I lost that one.

How 'bout you, how you doing? You're doing fine. You're doing fine, you're moving. Movement is life, right, one more time. Okay, you're up, you can lower the heels for the moment.

Let's go into a small V. Maybe a little wider than a really small V, but not super wide. So somewhere where you can actually feel like you're standing on the ground without being on your tiptoes. If it's the same exact exercise, we, oh. Float the heels or not.

If you don't float the heels, you're gonna be forward more, that's cool, no problem. If you do float the heels, chances are you won't have to lean forward as much. I have to pull a little tighter on the band to stay in my center, come back up. It's up to you if you pull back on the legs or not. Inhale down, doesn't have to be deep.

It's about balance, too. You change your orientation to space and you got a whole new exercise. Inhale, down, exhale up. (softly exhales) Keep doing what you're doing. I'm gonna offer one more cue but, which is like I push up. I'm thinking of my upper arms pushing up as I go, as I bend my knees.

Like it's a solid that kinda helps me, visually, conceptually, stay on my feet. (softly exhales) Bend, straighten. Oh, and by the way, when you get, keep going, when you get to the top, squeeze those inner thighs, come on, why not, why not? Right there, if you have to have your feet apart, fine. Fix it, do it, squeeze them though. Get closer to the center.

All right, we're gonna go feet wide, same drill. Feet wide, a little more weight on the heels. I'm turning sideways 'cause it just seems more right, and you bend, the heels are down, you bend. Reach the arms all the way up if you can. And come back up, all the way, pull back.

Inhale, find with your heels, push into them so you feel the back side of your body. Lot goin' on. (softly exhales) On the next one, hold it down. When you turn your head to look at the screen, hopefully you're sideways too or if you're not, hopefully you're looking under your arm. If you're not, it's okay, but that's sort of the goal. You don't wanna be down here with your head up like that.

You want it up, so aim for that, let's do five more. One, and press, and two, and press. More on your heels than your toes, I think just one more. Except for this next one, go down, stay down. If you have the room in your band, you're just gonna rotate your thumbs toward the ceiling and pull back, back, keep those ribs still.

I'm just pulling from the shoulder blades or the upper arm. It's not about the band right now. It's just there to remind me where my hands are. Let's do five more, one, two, you can lean into it more, three, why don't you? Four, five, hold, and then just stand up with your arms overhead, let the hands, I mean, yeah, the hands come down.

All right, shake it out. I wanna do one more but I'm gonna wait. Let's go to the floor, have a seat. Still have the band, again, if it's too tight on your hands, you'll hate me by the end of this. So, loosen it up when you need to.

Adjust it as often as you need to. Wrapping the band at your feet, I always like more surface area. So, try not to get it where it's in that little tiny, you know, band of a band. (softly chuckles) Put your feet there and at this moment, I have, my toes are sticking out over the top, at least most of them. I wanna feel the earth now going, out there in front of me. Heels are dug into the ground, I'm sitting up as tall as I think I can, and from there, we roll the pelvis back.

Ooh, my band is pretty tight, that's a lot of help going down. But because of that, I get to think about my shoulders. My collarbones are wide, I hold it around the shoulder blades, inhale, and exhale, do not bend your elbows. I know you want to, come forward. I know you want to 'cause it gets harder or easier, whatever it is, just don't bend them, that's all.

Inhale, you're back at the top, exhale, hips roll back. It's as if you're pushing the band, or that the band is a wall. By the way, the walls a great trick to, for whatever reason. Inhale, start the exhale, look at your belly. Sink the belly, come forward.

Let those arms just be sort of like an addition to the band and then at the end, sit up tall, inhale. Exhale, roll back. (softly exhales) we're there, inhale, exhale, start the breath first. It's key, in my opinion, to just know that I'm doing that because if I do nothing else, the abdominals, the center, will naturally sink. If we think too much, which, well, maybe no one would accuse me of that but, if I do, I overdo and I just need to be here right now. So, that's what I'm encouraging.

Stay down here when you get here. Now if your back is up, you probably came too low. So you're gonna be a little higher. In fact, let's all come a little higher. From there, you can look at your belly for the moment.

Start the exhale as if somehow the band is pulling you with that exhale, Just straight forward, not up, and come back. (softly exhales) And come back, oh, look, you can see your feet, what are they doing? Are they turned out, are they turned in? Are they aware of what's going on? 'Cause they're your anchor for the most part.

I'm just pulling out. (softly exhales) I'm letting my neck go along for the ride, easy peasy. Abs are starting to go, hey, Kristi, hello? Stay there in that little bit and let's just make it smaller still, exhale. Two, three, check your feet. Notice what you do when things start to get a little harder. (softly exhales) How 'bout four more, one, and two, and three, should we go up or down?

Let's go down, press the legs, let your head go down. Now we'll go up, pick your head up only. Do not bend your arms. I hate to be so direct, but that's what I've always seen. Right here people wanna bend their arms as if they can get up, nope.

You, if anything, press your feet further apart into the band. Try that, that's kinda cool. I learned that from Wendy LeBlanc-Arbuckle, I think. Anyway, so if it gets tough, rather than use what you think is gonna help you, get the whole outer line of your body, go back down. Touch the back of your head, we'll go a little quicker.

Inhale, head up, exhale, start that exhale first. Then you go, your arms are straight, you're good, you're cool. You can even let the band go loose as you reach forward a little further this time, roll down. Ooh, don't let your feet come out of the band. Now that would be bad.

And touch, inhale, head up, exhale, sink the belly. Just, it's like natural going forward, and (softly breathes) one more time, please. This time while we're up here, sit up tall again. Let's take, I'll say the leg closest to the front, or your screen if you're sideways. Sideways is kind of a good way to be. (softly laughs) Well, not always, but sideways to the screen.

So you can look if you don't know what I'm saying. I have the leg in the back, still on the very end, and I am kinda covering the toes a little, I don't want it to fall out. We're just rolling down to the take the leg straight up. Now if this is too tight for your hamstrings, and I do want your elbows on the ground, so let's go that far. If it's too tight for your hamstrings, rather than bend the upward leg, bend the lower one, okay?

And just kinda get a feel for that. We're going into circles, inhale across the body. Let the leg almost drop into the band, let it swing back up, stop. Same direction, inhale, exhale, around, and stop and the thing, keep going. The thing we're doing is holding the hips as still as possible, I love this band.

Even when I got better at doing leg circles, I just love the support and the freedom I get in my hip joint, one more. We're going the other way of course. Now, before we do, that lower leg, what's it doing? Whether it's bent or straight, anchor the part that's touching your mat. Push it into the floor, not to lift your butt, but to just go right, I'm there, other way.

Out, down, on and up, boom. Make it sharp like an exclamation point, boom. Inhale, exhale, breathe however you want. (softly exhales) That's good, stay up there, just switch legs from here. Step into it, take a little hand break if you need it. Other leg is down, however you need it.

Oh boy, oh boy, tight side. While I'm thinking about my tight side, I'm gonna encourage you to think about is the hip of the leg that's in the air higher than the other one? Meaning closer to that shoulder. It probably is if you didn't ever think about that. So, aim the sit bone, the butt bone, towards your opposite ankle and keep that foot flat.

What did we do, we went across the body, your elbows are still on the floor, right? And exhale, come back up, stop. Inhale, exhale around, boom. Inhale, exhale around, boom. One more time before we switch.

Check yourself, other way, inhale out, around, and down and up, stop on a dime. Pay attention to those bony landmarks, any bony landmark you feel, so that you're not wobbling around. Just the leg is moving, theoretically. Mortar and pestle style.. I think this will be the last one, voila.

Right, put that, let's put the other foot back in. This is a little trickier. I got my feet and knees together. Bend me knees, set 'em on the ground. Arms straight, look at your knees, and roll up.

You can wrap those arms tighter if you need to, shoo! Let 'em go, all right. This one, couple different ways we can do this so this is how we're gonna do it today. And again, you don't have to use your band on this one at all. I'm taking the band around my back. More surface area is better 'cause you can feel it, and it's sort of, rolling like a ball is sort of the joke with Pilates until you really understand it.

And, I mean, yeah, period, that's all, leave it at that. And there's so much to it that leads to so many other important exercises. So, what I've done is I've wrapped the band around, I don't know, I'd say lower ribcage, maybe a little higher, mid ribcage. Crossed it in front, that's what I'm trying to do anyway, and then just held it in opposite hands. So I have that ability to pull tighter.

And then just, I'm placing the band lower shin. We'll see if it stays there, and then you're just trying to, I gotta wrap my hands 'cause this thing's so long. Wrap it and, or, you could also hold onto your shins. The idea that I'm trying to get here is that we're not going anywhere. I hovered my feet, I'm behind my sits bones and even behind my tailbone and I'm just gonna try to breathe into the band for a minute.

I'll pull the band pretty tight, so you might feel that. Whether your knees are together or apart makes no difference to me. I gotta pull a little tighter for me to really go for what, I wanna feel like my back is billowing out, inhaling, (softly inhales) and exhaling. (softly exhales) All right, we are gonna roll like a ball like this. So pull as tight as you can because, and elbows are up and wide as, or hold the shins. We got back on an inhale (softly inhales) exhale up, you can almost push into the band to get up.

Inhale, go back, shins into the band, up you come. If it rolls down your back, just hold onto your shins and keep going. (softly breathes) We're only doing three more. Inhale, but you're getting some arm work too, why not? You can tuck deeper, if you can tuck deeper, go ahead. Don't wait for me, I'm just giving you all the tools for today.

This is it, up you come, and you can set your feet down. Right, let's just take the band away for the moment. Let's put it off to one side. And we, ahh, I change my mind, I change my mind. I knew I would do that, we're going down.

I've got, I did, again, folded mine in half, 'cause it's so long but just hold on somewhere kinda near your hips, a little wider than your hips. We are rolling down, we're rolling down. We're rolling down, we are picking our knees up. We're resting our head for a moment, we're wrapping our hands so that we can press up, that make sense? Just a little bit, you could do it the other way, but I'd like your hand, your arms externally rotated.

All right, so you may find you have to go grab closer later, but let's just see what happens with the 100. Boy, oh, boy, inhale, exhale. Reach your legs forward and up. Slide that band to where you know it's not gonna just slide off you, and press up, two, three, four, five, and exhale, two, three, four, five. I'm wrapping, one, two, oh, that feels better, and up.

It's like it's holding my legs, but it's still hard. And inhale, wherever you are, and out, two, three, four, five, inhale. I have a slight bend in my elbow 'cause I am so prone to external rotation, I'm sorry, hyperextension, and in and, and da, da, da, breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe. Five inhales to five exhales. I'm giving you two more rounds.

Once you're done with your round, just fold your knees in, take the band off from underneath you, hold it maybe a little closer, this'll totally depend on your shoulder extension. So when you go back, if it's really tight, hold it wider. All right, curl up. Band on the ankles. Double leg stretch, we inhale, reach back, exhale, pull in.

Back, and pull in. Parallel or turned out, you choose. I'm not getting that picky 'cause you are your own teacher. But I will remind you the body itself is not supposed to move, assuming you don't count the legs and arms, just the body. Back, and just one more, back, hug the knees and rest your head.

Little shimmy, rock, rock, rock, la, la, la. Right, next one, probably hold a little closer. You're gonna take the band behind your head. This is sort of more just fancy, but sometimes I, I mean, it's not fancy. It can be a really nice assist like a pillow.

If it rolls up on you and it gets annoying, it's gonna be better to just lace your fingers and drop this thing off to the side. So, from there we're gonna curl our head, neck, and shoulders up. Let the elbows be in view, little bit in view today. It's like a sling, and you drop your head into it, literally just push back, I'm talking just head and neck. Push back into it, let it go.

Push back into it, your arms aren't moving at all. They're gonna get worked here. All right, you can widen the elbows a little if you can. From here we're gonna just extend one leg, and switch. Now bring your band up a little higher.

Don't rely totally on the band. Bring your shoulders up if you can and go, and go, it's single leg stretch. We pull in, in, and out, now be precise with your legs. You got a pillow here so look at where you're landing your feet. It should be the same every time.

And in, in, out, out, and in, in, and out, and out. Both knees in, rest your head briefly but do not let go. Take the deep breath, come right back up. You're gonna rotate to the front, you can bow those elbows out a little bit more maybe. Rotate to the front, same leg position.

Now think shoulder to hip on this one with this band, switch. It's the same exact cue, ready? Pick it up, in, and in, and out, out. Breathe however you want but breathe. (softly breathing) Remember the bony landmarks? The pelvis should stay still.

I'm noticing a little bit of a wobble so I'm gonna try and work on that when I zoom. Let's do one more breath pattern from in, in, here's the out, here's the out, both knees in. Take the band out from underneath you, rest your head, and the arms on your legs. Okay, I'm unwrapping mine one 'cause we're about to just do a little shoulder bridge and the arms will go overhead. If that doesn't work for you, just put your arms down by your side, okay?

So for now... For now, I know where I'm going. I know it sounds like I don't, but I do. I'm thinking I wanna have the back of the shoulders, I wanna feel that. So even though I have the band touching my thighs, I wanna feel the back of the shoulders, pretty much, I think, throughout the whole exercise.

So for now, with your wrists straight, they're not flexed, they're straight, you're gonna exhale and just roll your pelvis up. If I didn't say so, my feet are a little bit apart, like the way we started standing and I just kinda left my hands there. So I start to feel a little pressure on the band. Oh, but I just caught my shoulders off, so I'm fixing that, how 'bout you? Inhale, exhale, roll down from the throat, from the sternum, from the front of the ribs, from the belly, all the way down through the pelvis.

And down, ready to go again, inhale. Just leave that band where it is. You'll feel pressure a little bit as you go up. Exhale, roll, roll, push those thigh bones into the band, even though the hands aren't moving and don't let those shoulders come up, Kristi. Don't let those shoulders come up off the mat, inhale, exhale, if you can slide the band further up your legs without letting your shoulders come off, do.

Exhale, roll down, roll down, tension gets lighter. Back is softer, more flexible, that's a good thing. Inhale, one more like that. Exhale up, (softly exhales) up, up, oh, shoulders again, gosh. My own cue and I can't stick to it.

All right, now you're here, right? So, maybe just see if you can slide the band up your hips and it's still flat there, basically, right? You're in as much of a long front of your body and back your body as possible. Let's take the arms overhead as we roll down. So inhale, exhale, roll down as you take the arms overhead.

They do not have to touch the ground. A bit taut on the band is a good idea, and we're down, going back up, inhale. Exhale, roll the hips up. Press the arms through the air, keep the band taut. You're not pulling hard, you don't need to do that.

We don't have to work so hard all the time. Press, you could push down here though, that's kinda fun. And roll back down, I tend to inhale on a roll if I don't say it. And inhale at the bottom, reset. Start that exhale, feel yourself come up, up, up.

Can we shimmy the feet and knees together as close as you can? Ooh, when you cramp, you just shake it out. So have a little downward pressure on the band and I'm in that upper position, shoulders are round. Inhale, exhale, extend the lower right leg. But keep the thigh where it was.

Pull it back in, other side. Try to keep the hips still too. (softly exhales) And down, again. (softly inhales) (softly shrieks) Sorry, I just heard my pug tilt his head upstairs with that little scream, my hamstring cramped. And back, we're going back down, inhale, exhale, roll it down, you can reach those arms overhead. Stretch your body out, get long. Feel good about already what you've done and then however you want to, just come on up.

And let's tie this baby kinda loosely but enough that it stays tied around the ankles. We're just gonna do some side work here. Very, sorta simple, but sometimes this helps me. So, by loosely, what I mean is don't tie it so tight you can't undo it. But also the distance between the legs is not gonna be much more than hip height, so it's gotta be kinda close, but not super tight, sort of like that.

All right, and then just lie on your side. You're gonna be shocked, we're almost, we're not almost done, that'd be unfair to say, but we're getting there. Alrighty then, so your position is such that if you can, you're just resting on your upper arm. You may need a pillow, some people like to bend their elbow. That's all I got, but when you look down, make sure your feet are a little bit in front of you and that's more for once you get moving.

But just so they're not behind you already, that's a tendency. You're stacked on the hips. Your upper hand, top hand can either be off or on the ground, let's start with it on the ground now. All right, so for the start of this, I'm putting both feet together. So the band is loose, my toes are aligned.

We're gonna inhale, we start the exhale. We don't roll back or forward. We just simply exhale and somehow both legs lift up. We keep reaching the legs, we inhale and go down so it's not so much of a teeter totter action. Kinda depends on your bone structure, but the idea is that, right, I start the exhale, I feel those obliques work, you can touch 'em.

You can touch yourself, you heard it here, and lift, and down. If you find yourself really wobbling, swing your legs a tiny bit more forward, exhale up. (softly exhales) If your fingers are white knuckling, try to figure out where you can do this move, it's small, I know, without them being white knuckled, or white tipped, whatever you call that, and down. Next one, we stay up. Think about putting the bottom leg down on the ground. So right there already has some resistance, right?

Look at yourself again, don't roll back. Let's not have the quad face the ceiling. Instead, let's have the side of the body face the ceiling. From there it's just a simple lift, pushed into the top side of the band, two, three, and four, and five, and six, and seven, you can push hard as you want, provided you didn't tie it too loose. All right, that's cool, right, you got it, no problem?

Can you leave that up there? You're about to lose tension on it though, so don't be surprised. Pick up the bottom leg, touch the top one. Push the bottom leg down. Touch the top one, push the bottom leg down.

Up, and down, and up, and down. And up, push down, lift up, push down, two more. Up, push down, up, push down, right? No big deal. We're gonna turn over, right on your belly, so just roll straight down.

I'll do my best to be clear. Put your forehead on your hands. Bend your knees so the feet are facing the ceiling. And then just kinda check in with your body. Are your shoulders kinda down?

They can be, I'm lifting my leg if you're watching. Don't watch, but if you are, because of the mic. So, rest your forehead. Pull the belly up, how do you do that? I don't really know.

I mean I do, but how do you do it? Sometimes if you just push your thighs into the ground first, you can kinda get the sense of the belly pulling up. But then you gotta keep it there and lift the thigh bones up, oh boy, oh boy. It's hovered, it's hovered, but those kneecaps are up. From there, the entire inner seam, or outer seam of the legs tries to press out, it's small.

Just a little, it's a little pulse, out. Out, keep those knees up, out, out, out, and out. From there you can rest the knees down for the moment. Think of drawing the belly away from the floor. It's not like it's not touching, don't get me wrong.

But it's helping you, let it support you. From there, keeping the knees bent, lift those knees up again. Now straighten your legs, but as you do, the knees are staying up. As you do, you're gently pulling outward on the band, right? Then you just set it down, and you re-bend the knees and we start again.

Abs are in, lift knees. As you straighten the legs out, you're gently pressing the entire outer seam. It's not about the ankles, not about the knees, and set it down. So this time let's do it again, same exact exercise, bend, hover, as if it came directly from your butt, which it does. Start to straighten your leg.

Don't get 'em so high your low back feels it can be lower. And down, last one like that, bend, lift, stretch toward straight, stay out there straight. You may have to go lower, it's okay if your toes touch. Try to keep your kneecaps off, try to stay parallel, and now just press out. Out with your straight legs, three, four, relax your feet, six, seven, eight, nine, and 10.

Right, let your feet relax. Ordinarily, we'd just roll over but because we might forget what we were doing, we're just gonna come up and switch around so we can all still see each other. Lying down, all the way. Remember the setup, big toes line up. You can kinda see your feet a little bit in front of you.

Wow. So funny the different sides. All right, keeping them together, rest your head however you can. We lift both legs and it really comes from the middle. So sometimes I like to take two fingers there and feel that exhale first, then it's just the legs lift.

I'm not tightening my legs at all, for what it's worth. And lift, I know the band is loose, I know that. You can do it with it apart but you're really not getting much at all, which is also okay. Start the exhale, feel the center of the body being kinda the powerhouses, sometimes say, and down. The powerhouse is a movement.

Okay, next one goes up, it stays there. The lower leg goes down, you might feel the resistance there, and then it lifts back up, so you lose it again. Down to lift up. Down to lift up. Down to lift up, we're still going, about four more.

(softly breathing) And hold it up, hold it up. Take the bottom leg back down, reach into the top leg a little more. Check yourself, did you roll back, did you roll forward? You wanna be as pretty much in between those two plates of glass we talked about earlier. Kneecap pointed ahead, we press into the top leg, one, two, let the foot kinda just relax.

Fiveish, six, seven, eight, nine, and 10, oh, reach longer (softly mumbling) Right, I think that's what we did there. We're not going, well, we are going back on our tummies but I need you take off the band. So why don't we just sit up and do our best to untie it. It would have gotten tighter with all that energy put into your feet. And if it doesn't, you don't have to use the band on this one, so don't get frustrated by that.

Right, maybe stay where you are for a second. I'm gonna lay down, I'm gonna put this behind my back. I'm gonna wrap it to where I can handle it, kinda like the beginning but a little wider, and we'll just finish up with some back extension, 'kay? So, we're gonna, in a moment, you'll come with me or come with me now. We're just lying down, we find wherever we need to hold the band.

I like to wrap in a little bit so it's I have the potential to unwrap mostly. So I'm close, I'm holding on. Actually, I might only wrap one hand. No, I don't wanna go for it. So, in the start position, it would be your forehead will end up being down.

But the collarbones are wide, the arms can be straight. So you have to find that spot first because then you're gonna bend the elbows as high up on your back as you can. Turn your face, come with me now. Again, you can lace your fingers, you can now hold your hands, you can now hold the band, whatever you want. Pull the belly up.

Hover the, sorry, hover the thighs, and we kick in three, two, one, straighten your legs, straighten your arms. Look down, pull the band to the side. So the moment your palms are facing the ceiling and you're like a, what are you? Superman, a bullet, a torpedo, any something that's not so warlike would be nice too, if anyone knows, turn your head the other way. Bend your knees, bend your elbows, rest your head, and kick one, kick two, kick three, and stretch like, pull to the band once the arm's straight.

Bend the knees and the elbows. Rest your head, turning it each way, each time, if you think about it, two, three, and stretch. And again, one, and two, and three, and stretch. Pull the belly up, don't let those legs get so high it hurts your back, you're not trying that. We wanna work it, but not hurt it.

One, two, three, and up. This will be the last one, here we go. One and two, and three and up, unwrap. If you have it in you, you're gonna take your arms overhead. If you wrap too tight, you're gonna drop the band.

You're gonna drop your, not drop, but put your feet, push your feet into the ground. Pull that band as wide as you want to bring it back overhead. Just when you touch down, pick it back up. Stay low in your chest, stay really low in your chest. Keep your feet on the ground, take it all the way back down.

Again, you can go as wide as you need to. But you pull the band, if you're holding it, if you're not, you just go wider, over you come. Ooh, it gets heavier up top, doesn't it? Last one, here it is. Reach back, reach back, start to feel the strength that you have, even in this like face-down position.

And there, you can leave the band on the ground or move it off your back if that's where it was. Take a moment, just rest your forehead on your hands. Maybe kinda shimmy a little, kinda let your back go all right, all right. I did it, I'ma relax now. And then when you're ready, hands by your shoulders.

Might as well still think about your abs to help your back get yourself out of this position. Push yourself up, take a rest position briefly. And then just curl those toes under. Lift yourself back into, if you can, this squat position. If not, let's just all go straight to lifting our hips up.

Do your best to hang your head, kind of like we did, not kind of, exactly like we did in the beginning. But take a moment here. If it feels good to have your legs straight, go ahead. I sometimes just think it's just so nice to keep the knees bent and keep my spine connected to my heels. Hang your head, really see if you can hang your head.

You can nod your head yes. Try that and then just let gravity take over. So you can almost feel the skin. In my case, I really feel the skin dropping off my face toward the floor, and it kinda feels good. It doesn't look good, but that's all right.

How 'bout shaking your head no? No, and then just let, again, gravity or whatever happens. But don't force it anymore, just let it be. (softly exhales) Hands to shins or just roll up. I'm going hands to shins again.

I like that sense of pulling the belly away from the hands. I'm not working anymore, I'm supporting myself. I'm massaging myself all the way up to the top. You gotta touch yourself when you're in lockdown. And I mean that in the best possible way.

Take a deep breath in. Arms up, we're not reaching. Feel your space, feel your body. Claim your space, just let the arms come down however you want. I'm gonna go up from the side this time, so shake out whatever you need to.

It's like your body, right? Whatever, inhale, (softly inhales) and then exhale. (softly exhales) Whether you're starting your day, you're going to bed, whatever it is, just take a moment and go, right, this is how I'm gonna end this moment. And I'm really glad I gave myself the time, that's what I'm gonna do. Thank you for being here, thank you for your patience in the beginning there, and I hope to see you again next Thursday.