Mood Elevating Mat

Hi, everyone. I know that you're expecting to see Christie, but I'm sorry to have to be the bearer of bad news. Christie's not coming today. She's not feeling well and her internet is not functioning well, so she has no filming capacity. So surprise, it's just me.

We have to just do real world things in the real life world. So that's what's happening today. And I have to be honest with you, I'm having one of those days where I'm just feeling a little cranky. Do you ever feel like that? Anyone feel cranky ever?

So I'm hoping that I can let that go. And that we can move together and that we can I can use this moment with you, to elevate my mood and perhaps there was one or two of you, who are also feeling cranky. And maybe this will help you as well. Maybe you're feeling absolutely great, and that's awesome too. So holding your knees, closing your eyes, sitting on the mat, we're gonna breath.

We're gonna inhale and we're gonna exhale. And we're gonna do it again. Inhale, big inhale, and as you inhale, feel the spine. Elongating, floating in space. And then as we exhale, we can just let go.

I'm not using my exhale to squeeze anything to engage anything right now I'm using my breathing to let go, to feel light, or so taking one more breath in. And now this time as we exhale around the spines are drawing in, pulling back to the center of the body, going into a nice rounded C-shape. So I'm using my arms pretty vigorously here to create a position. And then we're gonna lift up and lift the chest and return straight and around the spine and pull the knees towards one another and at the same time as you pull your knees towards one another, you could try to pull them apart with your arms. And so we're creating a lot of work and a lot of different places in the body.

Sign straight and lift the back, arching the chest, the heart and find center and around the spine. And as you come up, pull your feet to the backs of your legs. So, lots of ways to find lots of different things to think about then. Then what then something else. And round, yeah, and go back, straighten your arms.

Reach your arms forward as you roll back. Take your arms up, open your arms out to the side and then take them forward and roll up and then sit up and open the chest as you reach your arms out to the sides of you. And then take them forward around your spine and go back. Feeder connected to the earth. Pulling back towards the back of the side so we get a little work through the back of the legs, the back of the body, lift your arms.

Take them out. Take them forward. And lift up. Thank you for being here. Take your arms up.

Take your arms open. I didn't mean to start class by complaining about my mood. Sorry, and round. And roll back I'm feeling better already. And arms and open and reach forwards.

And roll up, gotta keep it real though. That's what I believe. Arms up, arms open, chest lifts. And take the arms forward and roll back. We're gonna do one more.

Lift the arms, open the arms. Squeeze the air out of your body as you take your arms to your thighs. Now roll up, lift up, open the arms up to the sides. And now take the right arm towards the left arm. Rolled down the left side of your body.

Come through center. Take the left arm to the right arm. Roll up, the right side of the body, all the way up to upright and return. And go, left arm right arm. So we're alternating sides, we go down, we open up in the center, we go right onto the left arm.

We roll up, all the way up, up, up, up, sitting tall and open and right arm to the left arm and go down and open. Left arm to right arm and go up. Sitting up tall. And return and again, one more left arm to right arm. Go down.

Come through the center, to the other side. And up and open now. Keep your arms open. I'm gonna scoot in towards my feet because this is where I need to be for my bridging. So, if you know that we're going into bridging get organized to do that.

Try and keep the arms wide. This is going to be difficult for me, but I'm gonna prove that I'm not gonna prove anything. I'm just gonna try it. And if I fail on camera, I don't care. So we go down, all the way.

And we bring our arms down and our head down and we get ready for a bridge so in you. And press down through the feet and crawl up. And inhale and starting from the throat, soften the chest, the mid back, the lower back. The word soften doesn't mean that there's no work happening. It's a quality of thinking, in my imagination.

May go all the way down and inhale. And acts are stepping into the feet, feeling that equality of weight in your feet, inner thighs, actor, the back of the arms are active, the arms are reaching for the feet. So all of those things can be happening and we're rolling down now. And we can create softness, in my opinion if you're interested. And go all the way down and inhale and exhale pressing down through the feet, lifting the hips up.

Making a straight line from the knees down to the shoulders, feeling the head soft on the floor. And then as the spine comes down, the head reaches in the opposite direction. So there's energy reaching out through the head as the pelvis is being laid down into the mat, spine comes down into the mat. Sequentially bone by bone and the tampon drops on inhale, we're doing two more. Lifting up, and inhale and exhale.

And when we get to the top of this next repetition, we're gonna pause. We're gonna lift on, hold the hips up high. Stabilize to the center of the body, lift the left leg and touch the floor. And lift the left leg and I want us to feel that we're letting the leg float in space. And we're thinking about pulling it up from hips from the center of the body, we're just going to do one more.

So we go up now hold there. Now take that leg out to the side as far as you can without losing your stability in your center and center. And out to the side and center. And out to the side, and center, you're dropping high, I am trying not to drop. And center and out to the side and center and then bring that leg down.

Take your arms overhead, and then start rolling down and as you roll down through your spine, make a circle with your arms. Make a circle with your arms, so that as the pelvis is coming down, the arms are circling back down around to come back to the sides of the body. And inhale and exhale to the left stop. Stepping into the left foot, lift the right leg up and soft touch and flow and touch and flow and touch last two lift and down one more lift. Now holding your key pipe of the body, keep the stability, take the leg out.

And in and out and what I'm thinking about is actually letting it cross my other leg a little bit and out and back and two and hold the hips high Meredith. Add one more and back and please step foot down. Stepping into both feet, take the arms up overhead. And then take the arms out to the side. This time, we're just gonna not circle all the way down.

We're gonna let them float out to to that T shape as we place our spine down into the floor. And then once we arrive down with the pelvis, can reach the arms a little further further further away from each other, stretching through the chest. And then we can lay the arms down onto the floor. Lift one leg at a time, coming up into the tabletop position with your legs. On the inhale, we are taking our knees to the left or the right, whatever you decide, but it's easier for me to talk about left and right and center.

And take the legs the other way, inhale, and center. So as the legs are going in the first direction, we're pulling back through the abdominals, like we're trying to touch that belly button to the spine. Is that possible? Not really, a lot of things in between the belly, bottom and the spine, but the sensation can be created. And center and inhaling to go over.

Excuse me and exhale to come center. And inhale to go over and exhale to come center. Now they're gonna make a tiny change. So we're gonna go left, we're gonna stretch the right leg straight, then to come through center, one knee bent, one leg straight and we're gonna bent. And we're gonna go the other way, inhale and stretch the upper leg straight.

Come back to center. And bend and inhale. And stretch out, come back to center. Or how deep can you connect to your own body? That was a question that just went through my mind.

So I thought I would share it to you. You can ask yourself that question if you're interested. And come back to center and bend and rotate. Last one to each side, stretch the leg, pull back through center and bend and into rotation and stretch that top plank and come back through center. And bend and bring your feet to the floor, hands behind your head, in your hair and feel the feet grounded, we're gonna squeeze through the backs of the leg.

We're gonna let the elbows lift a little so we feel the scapular widen and the mid back open. And now we're gonna curl the head and chest to lifting, lifting, lifting, coming up high enough so that you feel your low back, come into the imprint and go down. And exhale then lift up. Let's pause here. Take the hands behind the thighs lift a little more or deepen or give yourself a better position then let go and reach back.

Your hands come back behind your head and go down and inhale. And lift on and reach ankle and let go reach back hands behind the head and elongate. So work on the way down. It's important to remember to do that in my opinion, and lift on and curl forward. And lift the arms and bring them back and take the body down.

We're gonna do one more guys and we're gonna hold it at the top. So we go up, we find our shape. We intensify or connect more deeply, or just pause and behind the head. Now hold your body here and lift your right leg to your chest and put it down. And bring your left leg to your chest.

I guess not to your chest. It's just lifting up into a table top shape, hip pinching and down. And while the legs are moving through space, the chest is pressing towards the side and the head is resting in the hands. So notice if you're trying to push your head forward or your chin is stuck to your neck and try to heavy up the head in the hands, when are we gonna stop doing this as you ask. Soon.

In fact, now, coming down, you're welcome. And now lift up again. Take the hands behind the thighs, curl a little more forward. Bring your hands behind your head. As you rotate right lift your right leg and center and rotate left left left leg lifts.

That was difficult to say. But I did it. So we're rotating to the leg that's lifting, and we're coming back to center. And we're rotating to the leg that's lifting. And as we come to the center, we're not falling back on the mat.

We're trying our best, or at least higher to skip that curl position and how many more you say. I'll tell you. Two more to each side. And center and one more to each side. And center take the arms forward, stretch your legs out on your mat.

Take your arms back, take your body back, bring your arms around in a circle. As they come towards your thighs lift your head and chest and lift your body. Lift all the way up tall. Open the chest, open the arms and reach by the. (laughing) Okay, sorry guys.

Okay, so it just happened. So let's just bring it back together. Get out of here, babe. Bring your arms out to the side and my husband. Real life happened in my house today guys.

So what just happened? We're gonna roll down and I'll tell you the story. He comes sneaking down the stairs, very comedic, like, like tiptoeing tiptoeing he's trying to make me laugh and then reach for and roll up and he's tiptoeing in my house to make space for the mat. We've got a scooch the sofa very, very close to the stair. And then lift arm and open.

And in between the stairs and the sofa, there's a scratcher with a bell in it for the cat. And he tripped and fell over and go back. And I couldn't not laugh I'm sorry. So that's what all that racket, rackets was. Arm's reach around the thigh, head just come up.

Roll up, still funny to me. Sit up, open the arms out to the sides. And reach for, let's do two more. I'll count, bring arms back, bring it back. We'll concentrate, squeeze the thighs (indistinct), reach the legs and the arms forward and go back and go out with the arms.

And collect, (indistinct) up and lift arm freedom of movement linking each movement into the next movement, open chest, open arms round the spine, reach forward and go back. This will be our last time. Take the arms in the body down, take the arms around, lift the head and chest and lift your body. I think we can all use one more, open spine, open chest, open circle, and then we'll flex the feet. We'll reach around for the feet.

And then anyone who needs to join me can join me here. I have to pull my pants up, they are falling down. And then once we've done that, we'll bring the hands behind the head and sit up top and we're gonna rotate go left and center and right and center and left and center. And right and center, rotating the trunk from the waist and center and twist and center. I'll do two more like this.

So four total, Christie if you're here, last one. So now go left. Take your arms up, open your arms and as you open your arms, take that left arm down, and reach back. Now the arm that's on the floor is gonna push us back up. We're gonna take the hands back behind the head, you're gonna to come to the center, and I wrote it the other way.

Stretch the arms up. As they open we start to take the body back, the hand comes down we bend. Now use a little momentum, push, hands back, and center and rotate, reach out. And as we open we lean and reach and push float and hands back and center and rotate and reach. And open think of reaching for something that you want.

I want many things and center one more time. Rotate, reach up. Open hand comes down and dive and float and hands and center and rotate and reach up and open and take the arm and reach and push and center hands come behind us point your feet. Lift your spine and lift your pelvis. Take a little stretch to the front of the body.

Let the back of the body start to get some work and then let the hips start to come down. Lifting the chest, lifting the head, touching down and lifting right back up lifting up bottom to the feet or reaching for the floor and sit down lift up out of the arms, Pinching from the pelvis or hindering from the hips and lift up and sit back down and lift up and bend your knees and now round your spine come into a deep curl of the lower back and bend your arms and straighten and bend. and straight and bend and straighten and bend. We gonna do five, four, three, two, one and sit down. Bring the hands around to the feet.

Find your shape, you're rolling like a ball shape. Lift your feet up and go back and balance. So, we inhale to go back and exhale to balance. Staying in that shape and inhale to go back and exhale to balance. Let's see three more.

Back, focusing inwards, finding connection. One more. And bring your hands to your knees. Push your knees into your hands. Roll down through your spine.

A little present for you. You're ready for a present? Here we go. We're gonna do this. We're gonna take the arms and the legs out and around and out and around.

Four, three, and two, and one. And we're gonna take the left leg out, and chain single leg, stretch five, four, feel the stretch of the straight leg, three, two, one, hands behind your head. Criss cross, joining the feet. Lying up, it's at the same level, three, two, one, those knees in, stretch your legs to straight, take them away and back five, away and back four, away and back three, keep curling the body up. Last one.

Take the arms and the head down, roll all the way over. Flex your feet. Lower your legs if you wish. We're gonna roll down. So the surprise or not the surprise the present, We're gonna do that all over again.

We're gonna do a set of four. We're going to roll up into our teaser first. We're gonna bend our knees, take the ankles, stretch the spine and the leg. Bend your knees, hands to your knees and roll back. And then we're gonna do a set of three.

But here's our four. So out and around four out and around use your arms, pull down on your knees. Three and four let's take the left knee for system strips the right leg, push down and curl four, three. Criss cross comes next. Here it is, criss cross one, one, two and two lifting up through center, three, four.

For both knees bend and straighten, then go away and back for four, keep your body lifting, three, two, here's one. Here's where we take the arms down the head we roll over, flex the feet, go down and start to soften your feet as you make it towards your low back, lift your head. Lift your body. Reach for your teaser, bend your knees. Stretch your leg, stretch your back.

And again, and ready? Going down. Number three, out and in, out and two, out and three, one leg in one leg out one and crawl fight for it two, well, challenge yourself, whichever way you want to think about it, those things mean the same to me. Rotate. and one, and two, and two, and three, and three and stretch the legs and take them down and back, and down, and back and down and arms come down the legs go all the way over, feet slacks and we go down (indistinct) and we roll up.

And we take the ankles than the knees, reach up, lift the spine and bend the knees. And let's try going back without holding on. I actually find it easier. So now, here's number two, out and around, out and around. Single leg stretch one and one all those down on way two and two crisscross and one, two and two bend your knees, stretch the legs, go down and back, down, arms down head down roll over.

Find and down have these moments in my practice where I can get a feeling of being like kind of weightless, suspended, snapping all the time and I just had one of those moments in it. Okay, let's go up. It's not happening now. And reach up And bent. Stretch, and one more.

Lets try keep the legs straight, roll down with straight legs. Bring your hands behind your head. Take the legs up, then the knee, when criss cross. I'm gonna see if I can do it in reverse. It's a brainteaser.

One criss crossed, one single leg, one single leg, one double leg, hold it and around and take the arms and head down, legs out, lift up, roll over. Did i get everything? Think so. And go down. And lift your head, lift your body and bend your knees and stretch your legs.

Stretch your spine, left, left left. And then we're gonna bend the knees again. Let them down and scoot back or adjust on your mat so that you are comfortable. We're gonna open up the knees into a diamond shape. Hands behind the head, lifting up tall tall tall.

We're gonna roll down articulating the sprinter. We're doing this a little differently today. Going down in the elbows, drop down towards the shins, and then left the spine back up, I wouldn't push too much on the head. So allow the weight of your hands to create whatever additional stretches there for you and inhale and exhale as we go down, pulling back to the center of the body. Not really tugging on my head and in fact, I'm trying to guide my head out towards my shin if anything.

And inhale and lifting up and inhale and going down and long and lifting up and then we're gonna do one more and then I'm gonna make a change. So here we go, down and out holding on the head and up and float. Here's a moment where I can find that sensation. And now we're gonna go down, here's the change my friends. When we press our head into our hands are gonna arch the back up, arch the back up and roll down.

So we're articulating and what I'm trying to find it's a sensation of kind of like moving like a wave. So that the minute we're up at the top, we start going down again. And each movement becomes the next movement. And so we get to move our body like a dance, down and out. And just one more like that, down and out.

And now turn in one direction and go down there. So around take the elbow down towards the shin or the (indistinct) inside the leg you decide. Sit up and come center and rotate. I'm taking my elbow just around my shin. That feels nice to me.

I'm Lifting up, and then return and rotate. And go down. And lift up and return and rotate. And go down. Lets stop.

Let's do one more heavy. Rotate, go down, come up. Come center and rotate. And down and up and center and in the center, take your hands behind, you scoot your feet a little closer. So to you.

What we're gonna do here is we're gonna press the knees down and open to lift the hips to get a little stretch there. Then we're gonna shift the pelvis down towards the feet. Any amount you decided supposed to feel stretchy, and then come back and sit down. We'll do three. Left turn, take the pelvis down towards the feet.

Shift back. Sit down. One way. Left turn, shift towards the feet. Come back, come down, turn your body towards this way.

Cross your top leg over your bottom leg come down onto the floor. Now started to bring my hand behind my head but I'm not into it. I'm gonna bring my arm out to the side. We're gonna straighten the legs, adjusting on the mats. You're ready for your side plank.

Now we're gonna reach under the body to lifting up away from that arm and back. And reach under the body, Lifting, lifting, lifting, lifting. And back, pressing the legs together, squeezing the whole bottom half of the body so the legs are squeezing. The glutes are squeezing, We're gonna do two more. come through and open and come through and hold now hold your waist and now lift.

Almost lifted myself right over. Left like a side pike, and left, left and come back to center. And bent, bring the feet in, push up off that arm, take your opposite hand to the leg, take that arm up, lift up as you go over side bend. And then come back then come back down onto that form and keep our knees bent. Now we're gonna do hand behind the head.

So you have two choices. Let's do this first, open the knee and down. We're gonna do five, open the knee, and down and open. and down, and two so your two choices are happening now. You can choose to stay right here or you can choose to lift your hips.

And open and down and open squeezed down and open, squeeze down and open. I have an itch, squeezed down last two, open and down, one more, open. There's one more thing. So we're gonna open, stretch, bend, come back and open, stretch, bend and back. And open.

It doesn't feel good to have your hand behind your head. Just put it wherever you want. And two reach, bend, and if and one reach, bend and all this comes down, Help yourself up. Going back into that side bend reaching up in over reaching this going forwards, coming back, coming up and then lean back. Take your legs out in front of you.

Come down onto your elbows. Stretch your legs out, sorry, not a beautiful view, but we're gonna take the legs over, down, around and in and the other way down, around and in (indistinct) down, around and in the other way, down, around, pull away back with your legs, one more, down, around. And when where means we have to go the other way too down, around and in and bend and push up and change sides. So we're on the other arm now. On the forearm, we have our top foot cross over our bottom foot.

Take this arm out. I'm gonna lift arm, squeezing the legs together. We're gonna reach under, and back and under and back and under and back and two more under and back. And one more under and hold. Wrap your arm around your body and lift up.

Don't forget to squeegee likes and three and two and one unwind bend your knees. Left arm, take that arm up, and over and back and back down onto the forearm and legs stacked. And I think we did hand behind the head on the first side so you decide what you'd like to do with your arm. We're gonna go up, you really can because no one can see you if you just do exactly what you wish. And down and up and down and up and down.

And one more and down now here's so we have the option guys of coming up with the hips finding a balancing place and open and down and open and down and three (indistinct), those who got to work both hips here. I can see that there's people say speaking to me in the comments, I don't know what they saying it's too far away. I'll look at the end, stretch, bend, come home and open and reach, thank you all for leaving me comments. I always read them. I never say anything because you're always gone by the time I read them.

But I do love them and it does make me feel less alone in my home. So thanks so much for taking the time to do that for me. Last one and back and then we come down. We come up. We take the arm up and over.

Maybe bend a little forwards and then come back and come around onto the front of your body, myself a little stitch in my upper back. Let's come down onto the elbows, the four arms. So what I would like for us to feel here is that we're pushing down with our arms, but also drawing the arms kind of back towards the body and also lifting the abdominals up away from the floor, and also lifting the chest through the arms. And then once all those pieces are in place, we're gonna lift the legs up and we're gonna kick the right leg, one, two, left leg, one, two. So as that happens, and as you continue to alternate the kick of the leg, continue to feel that you're pushing down with your arms, you're pulling back with your arms, you're lifting up with your stomach.

And then we make our rhythm we go kick, kick, kick, kick, Papa, papa, papa, papa, papa papa. And while the legs make these shapes, we hold the torso, very stuff. We keep the activity in the arms in upper back in the abdominals. And shake the legs out strain. And take your head to one side, bringing your arms behind you.

And now bend the knees kicking once, kicking twice. One more kick and then reach out. Taking the arms back, taking the legs back. Notice I'm not as high as I can be, I'm thinking more long. And then you do the other way, kicking one, kick two, kick three.

And when you're doing you're kicking, if you find yourself scooting all over the place moving around on your mat, try to find more integrity in the backs of the size that'll help you from shifting and kick one, two, three and reach out. And kick one, two, three and reach out. and kick one, two, three and reach out. And kick one, we're gonna do one more to each side. And reach out.

And kick one, two, three and reach out. And kick one, two, three and reach out. and hold arms out to the side. Now holding the legs there, externally rotate, feel that rotation in the hips. Now take the arms up, and up, and up.

And up. And up. Now, here's another brain teaser. Bring your arms back, open your legs, bring your legs together arms up to this side. Bring your arms to your open legs and open back up.

I don't think I've ever done this before, but it's fun and back. Last to keep those legs really active and back one more out and back. And then bring your arms down, push up towards your knees, sit back toward your feet. Enjoy. You're gonna come back over the hands and the knees.

I'm gonna pull my pants up again. Thanks for allowing me time and space to do that. So hands on with the shoulders, knees under the pelvis. When they got onto the mat, take the other leg out onto the mat. We're gonna hold here again.

take the right Pelvis down and back, left pelvis, and back. Bend and straighten your arms. Right pelvis still rotating, left, bend, straighten. Feel the work happening through the waist. Bend, straighten two bend, straighten one.

Bend Straighten. Bring your hips up. Press your heels down. Thanks for doing push ups with me guys. I've gotten very lazy with my push ups.

And we're gonna lift the heels. You're gonna come back forward you gonna bring the right knee in. And step back. Left knee in and step back one pushup, right knee in and back left knee in and back One pushup. And three and three.

You can skip the push ups. You can sit there on your mat. I'll never know are you doing with me? Last one, and lift the hips, press down through the heels. You elongate out through the spine.

Lift the heels. Roll forward, cross the body right knee left arm. the other side. One push up. Rotate, knee to elbow, knee the elbow.

One pushup. And rotate. And rotate, and bend and two, and two, and bend. and one and one and bend and hips up, Crescent through the heels, bend your knees, look at your hands, up to your hands. Sit down on your mat.

Take your legs out in front of you. Like some push ups to build a little energy. Take your arms forward enough. Open your arms. Why?

To your sides. Go slow. Just a minute, were a moment where you can, might be able to find that idea of suspension. And then reach forward with your body, with your arms and then lets turn, allow the arms to come with you. Open them wide to the side then as they open we can feel the chest lifting up and reach forward.

Thank you for being here. My mood has improved. And lift up and reach out. And open. gotta be realizing what our feelings can always just be happy, happy, happy all the time.

Or we can also create shift. Right, we can start feeling one way take your hand to your head and shift that times it's easier than others we just gonna stretch the neck here. So, take that arm slowly down. Lift your hand off your head, arms out to the side, lift the left arm on and take the arm slowly down. And take your hand off your head and lift your head on.

And reach arm and lean back and then big open circle one more. And reach forwards. And back I'm gonna close my eyes. I'm gonna bring my hands to my heart. I'm gonna breathe three breaths.

And I invite you to join me. So we are a worldwide collective here. Feel it, we're all in our homes, by ourselves, but there are many, many, many of us living together right now. I'm gonna choose to focus on that and to focus on gratitude and I thank you.