Class #4208

Good Things Come in Three's

55 min - Class
119 likes

Description

Flow with purpose through this Mat class with Amy Havens. She offers a balanced workout with every exercise done in three's, adding challenging variations throughout such as Rolling Like a Ball into Teaser. Enjoy the openness you create, be with yourself, and have no judgements as you move within what feels best for your body today.
What You'll Need: Mat

About This Video

Oct 06, 2020
(Log In to track)

Transcript

Read Full Transcript

Hey, hi, everyone. It's so good to be here again today. Welcome to Pilates Anytime Live with me in my house. I call it my den, but it's actually my guest room. Anyway.

I was gone last week, and I missed everyone, but I'm here doing a class that has flow. We're doing three reps of everything, eclectic, so it's not probably gonna follow all the traditional form, which you know that's kinda how I do it. So again, thanks for joining in with al of together globally, and good thing comes in threes is the title, and I love the idea of doing a class with three reps or few reps to make the most out of it. So we really have to commit, body, soul or spirit, whichever you wanna cultivate or all. You get three reps of everything, okay?

So come on along. If there's an exercise that doesn't work for you, just omit it. Let's move. Let's be together. No judgment with yourself whatsoever, never allowed for me, right?

Let's stand. Be with yourself. Take your arms up to the ceiling, that's okay, and just clasp your hands a little bit, guys, and just wiggle yourself into your body. Just stand tall, root your feet down, lift your shoulder blades up. It's quite all right.

They're gonna come down quite a bit today. Okay, get a lot of space between your rib cage and your pelvis. Good things come in threes, body, mind, and spirit. Let's concentrate, let's breathe, let's breath in here. We're doing a roll down, exhale, head, neck, shoulders.

Softly bend your knees if you need to. What's nice about these live classes, so many nice things. Roll yourself up to standing. You get to do what you do in your personal space, wherever you're working out. Lift our arms again.

Make it yours. Do three of these totals. So whatever you need to do to make this standing roll down feel delicious, to feel purposeful, and I'm gonna bend my knees now. Make the work yours, right? One more time, I am gonna lift my arms again.

Getting that space in my waistline, and my lower back, and the whole spine. Head, neck, shoulders rounding down. Staying over this time, everyone. Shift your weight slightly forward of your ankle so you're unlocking those knees. Let's take a walk.

Let's walk our hands out into a front support position. Really widen those hands. Lengthen your chest as if you're pulling your chest through those arms. Spoke your fingers wide, spread your toes wide. From here, I want us to fold at the hip joints, elongate through the hamstrings.

Just look back towards your toes. I'm gonna walk the hands back to the feet, bending the knees, rounding your spine. Let's take that two more times. See if you can remember what hand you start with and see if you can go alternating. So you're not always starting on the same hand as you walk out.

Pushing the floor down, but without protracting your scapulas too much. We don't want thoracic flexion. I want you to feel like you're extending. Keep your legs very energized behind you. Lift the stomach so you're not dropping that down to the floor.

And then again, piking through your hips or folding. Think of that elongated hamstring line and long arm line. Walking, pushing with your hands. I'm gonna come down. This time my personal choice is to a deeper squat position.

If that's okay for you, come along. If your knees don't love that, just do a little bend. Round that table and under. One more time, guys, walking out onto your hands, front support. Settle in.

Three breaths in and out. Body, mind, soul, and spirit. Touching the knees down. Separate your knees. Let's go into a nice quadruped position, yep, and flexion and extension of our spine.

So breathing into prepare. I'm gonna go into very round Cat. I'm pressing my shins and feet down, my hands down, spreading the scapula. Trying to lift the lower thoracic spine and lumbar up to the ceiling, and then working through extension of your choice. Take yourself as much into extension as you need right know, knowing that you have three of these, right?

Inhale, exhale, press into flexion. Continue breathing in and out, feeling like you're spreading the spine wide, the back muscles wide on your spine, coming into extension, again, of your choice. I'm making this one a little bit more extended. I'm thinking of pulling my chest through my arms, pulling my arms back towards my knees, and then last one of flexion here. Pressing the shins, pressing the feet, spreading the scapula, and then moving into extension of your choice.

From this beautiful extension, whichever you have, let's shift our weight back off of our wrists. It might feel like a Child's Pose. I'm not gonna stay here. I'm gonna move into another Cat, lifting up through my spine, moving into that nice undulated flexion extension. I'm going back through that extension, lowering the head.

Let's do two more. Shins pressed, feed pressed, securing that Cat spine forward. A little bit of Kathy Grant influence here. I'm not doing exactly the detailed Cats, but I wore these pants kind of on purpose. (laughs) Coming into that flexion and extension one more time.

It's just loosening our spine, getting us in motion. That was our third and final one. Come into more of a quadruped. I've been doing a lot of these hip mobility things lately, so get a solid, solid quadruped position. Pick up on of your knees and bring that knee close to your chest, not flexing your spine.

Let's create three giant circles with that leg. I'm moving my thigh back first, and making as big of a thigh circle as I can, only three. Try to keep your weight centered on your hands. It creates a nice challenge in the stability of the torso. Here's the third one, okay, and then reverse it.

Front, out, up, and back. Loosen the hips, but you are gonna feel the glutes contract, waking up that nice big complex of muscles. Other leg, here we go. Keep an extended spine, okay? Here we go, three circles, loosen.

Breathe. Make everything count, each one, that's all you got. Three, other way. One. Concentrate.

Two. Can you make it a little more fluid. Three, and down. Okay, weight off of our wrist. Let's go ahead.

I'm gonna turn around. I just like to go this way. Let's started seated. Now everyone get right on top of your sit bones. I want you to put your fists, make a fist, push them right here by your hips.

Push your arms straight, so you're actually suspended. Your pelvis is kind of suspended above the ground if your arms are short like mine. Okay, and then really think as you place your sit bones down. You don't collapse back in your body. You can lift your arms and stay all the way lifted there.

Arms long in front of us today. Take a breath in. Let's go back into flexion, exhale, lower back. Do what you need to do. If you wanna hold on the back of your legs, you know you're allowed to do that.

You're allowed to do anything. I'm gonna go all the way down to my lower back. It's pretty far for me. Inhale. Coming up.

Now carry that forward, lifting through my lower back, all the way up to sitting tall. Inhale. Lower back leads the way. I'm kind of pushing my feet into the floor. Arms have energy forward.

I'm trying to round my back. I am rounding my back. I just look like I'm flat. Inhale and exhale, energy in the arms. Hold back with the abdominals if you can.

Keep yourself rounding over your thighs and elongate to sitting tall. One more. Inhale, exhale, lower back leads the way. No judgment. No, not at all.

I'm moving. This is my body moving. Inhale, exhale, rolling up. Three times. I want us to raise the arms.

As they lower to the side or T position, you go taller. You're gonna come down, and two more times. Relift the waistline in case you feel like you've settled down at all. And one more time, all the way up. Lift, make it count.

Okay, guys, I'm gonna scoot my pelvis a little bit more towards my feet, so that when I roll backward I'll have enough room on the mat. We'll all roll down now together, all the way down. Yeah. Perfect. Okay, let's line ourself up for some bridging, pelvic curl.

Heels quite close to the sit bones. I'm going hands on thighs. Take a breath curl the pelvis. Roll up through your spine. You're doing that nice slantward position, so those hips pressing strongly up into your wrists.

Charge up the back of your legs without thrusting the base of those ribs out. One time, reach the arms back overhead. Get a beautiful stretch in your spins, in your arms. Returns the hands to the thighs, breathe, and exhale coming down. You're bringing the sternum down away from your chin, mobilizing, feel the articulation that deep contraction on the stomach.

Last two or two more. Exhale and curl up. Feel how the feet really help. As we push the feet down in the mat, we can push the hips up. You can press the hips without pushing the ribs.

It's a really nice contraction in a certain part of your abdomen wall, and your hips, arms over head. Breathe bigger, exhale, hands to the thighs, another breath. Mobilizing down, sternum comes down away from chin. Mobilize if you can get sit bones a little further forward. Okay, third one, here we go.

Exhale. And we lift. How about taking the arms all the way overhead and keep them there? Big deep breath. Keep the arms there this time as we roll down the spine, stretching your arms even more, even more, even more.

Once the pelvis lands and connect into neutral, keep it there. Walk your ankles in, knees in. Press the legs firmly together. So make that a contraction, not just that they're touching, really activate. Interlace your hands.

Place those hands behind that skull for that support. Elbows rise up off of the floor a little bit. Notice that when you lift your elbows up the floor, your scapula do widen on your back, so that your thoracic spine can feel the floor. You want that thoracic spine to lightly touch the floor. You don't push it.

Three chest lefts. Breathe in. Here we go. It's easy, concentrate though. Get the most out of three basic chest lifts and roll it down, breathing in.

Lift that head, roll the ears forward. You're mobilizing the thoracic spine. I want you to lead with your elbows kind of forward to the wall and ceiling in front of you. They help pick you up. Your abdominals left to move the spine into flexion.

Inhale, roll back. One more time, basic chest lift, exhale. Okay, keep that upper body there. Take those hands, put them around the back of your thighs. Bend your elbows, everyone.

Use your arms. Use them to help you come a little higher above off of your shoulders. Stamp your feet down. Now from here let's deeper, (chuckles) deeper, go deeper in your pelvic tilt. Oh boy, that's a nice contraction.

Keep your upper body where it is. Come out to neutral pelvis. Two more, exhale into a deep pelvic tilt. Feel how your lumbar now is very much on the mat, even up into that thoracic. Inhale into neutral pelvis.

One more time. We're going into deep flexion. Keep using your arms. They're helping you hold yourself up. Inhale to neutral.

Reach your arms toward your knees. Hold it. Three times only, arms up, framing your head. Exhale, reach toward your knees. Two more, and press your knees together.

Challenge yourself not to lay back. You're not there yet. Don't go down. Think higher chest lift. Oh boy.

And now we can all come down to the floor. Extend one leg long. It's your choice which one. Take the other in towards your chest, hands behind your thigh, extend your knee. Bend your knee.

Extend your knee and bend your knee. Last one, simple, extend, and bend, and thread it to the floor for the other leg. Bring it in. Hands behind your knee. Intentionally only three repetitions.

Stay all in your landmarks, your neutral pelvis, your shoulders, your back. Your body is long. Now if we take our leg all the way down so the two legs are touching on the floor, I want us to integrate the legs very strongly together. Heels touching, toes slightly away. We can't really do the 100 because there's 100 pumps, right?

But we can do three breath cycles in the position of the 100, and sometimes that's all we need to do. So I want us all to lift up into our gorgeous hundred position, whatever that is for you right now. Hold it there. Hold it there. Now let's do three big breath cycles, here we go.

Two more, bigger breath. Exhale. Get it out of there. Squeeze those lungs. One more, guys.

And exhale, squeeze the lungs out all the way. Fold your knees in. Let's rock up to sitting. Extend your legs. Three roll backs all the way.

Roll back to roll up. Use whatever choreography you like with your arms. Use whatever you need to get your self through the roll up exercise. Knowing we only have three, what do we need to do to get the most out of it for efficiency? No judgment.

complete the feeling of the exercise, which is mobility and flexion, right? Articulation. There we go. So what I'd like to do now is move my body a little bit toward my feet. Let's do a little combination here of a roll over, extending the legs behind us, and a little roll up to kind of a little mini teaser like this.

It's a playful version of roll over. You've seen me do it. Lots of us do it, it's fun. Bend your knees. Reach your arms forward.

You're gonna put your arms on the floor. Roll over, extend your legs. Bend your knees to your nose. Roll up a little teaser. And two more.

Have fun, guys. It doesn't always have to be the traditional method as I said at the beginning. Balance. One more, and roll over. Roll up and reach.

Okay, let's take ourselves down. Three legs circles. But before we do, whichever leg you like to start with, I'm gonna get myself more on my mat and pull my pants up. Oop, boom, boom. Let's do a little bicycle movement of our legs.

Okay, so ribs are stable, pelvis is neutral. Bend one knee, pull heel in, and bicycle it up to the ceiling, and put it down. Do the other side. I want you to use that foot on the floor, whichever leg you're bicycling and like you're pulling your heel through some mud or sand at the beech, or pulling a heavy string if you had your ankle strap. Pull that in.

Okay. We've got one more. Make it count. Use your hamstrings. Get that leg up.

Lower down. Your last one. I want you to keep this leg up for three leg circles. Do what you want, small or big. Go, one, round up.

Two, round and up. Three. That's it. Other way. One more.

And then after this one, just a scissor leg change. That's it, three circles. Be in the moment. What if you don't get any other chance today to do the leg circle? That's all you do.

Other way. That's it. What if you don't do anymore movement today? Make it all count, right? There's your third.

Now bicycle the other leg in. Put both knees toward your chest, hands behind your thighs. Use your arms, and let's all start a little rocking. One more time to get us all the way up. Try not to put your feet down.

Let's do our more classical traditional set up. Hands at ankles. Fold into or round into that beautiful ball position, heels pulling toward the sitting bones. Three, rolling like a ball. Here we go, roll back.

Roll up, try to balance. Roll back. Roll up, hold. Can you pull your stomach back more? One more, roll it back.

Roll it up and hold. A very traditional transition, take one leg forward, hands on the other shin. Before you roll backward, hold. Change legs. Hold.

So I'm off my sit bones a little bit. Let's go back again. Trying to kinda merge myself to the back of the sit bones. I'm almost on the edge of falling backward, but not quite. One more change.

Second to the last, you hold it there. Now let's roll back with control. You've gotta oppositionally reach that straight leg. You're rolling back. Hold the knee close today, guys.

Pull it deep, right into you, that heels align with the sit bone. Changing sides, just hold it for one nice slow one. Okay, now we just two more changes kinda quick. Change, change. That's it.

Change and hold. That's all. Both knees in. Three double leg stretch. We're not rushing it.

We're gonna stretch and hold. Get long. Make your lower back lengthen for you. Circle the arms, hold it in. Pick up your tailbone a little.

Two more. Stretch. Get the max in the stretch. There's more. Stay there and stretch a little more.

That's right. Curl in, contract more. There's always a little bit more. Only one more now. Inhale, stretch.

Exhale, fold it in. How are we doing? Scissors. Pick a leg up. Take the other leg down.

Three changes. So we have a pull pull and a pull pull. Two more rounds. Pull pull. Get what you want out of it.

That's it, hands go behind the head. Straight legs up. Lower lift, three rounds. Down. Up.

Lengthen, fold. Lengthen, fold. We'll take three crisscrosses. They're slow today. Bend the knee, twist.

Try to look back to that elbow without leaning back. Other side. Hold. Rotate, rotate. Other side, rotate.

Breathe, rotate. One more. One more. Beautiful, everyone. Rock yourself up.

Move your hips back. Open the legs. I am going for classical Ordon. I can't break myself. All right, three spine stretch forward today.

Let's think about this as not necessarily going so far forward as how much can we lift, elongate up through the lower back spine prior to going forward. Okay. I'm really working on that. I always am. So I'm lifting my back.

If I were right against the wall, I'd be thinking of going, sliding my ribs up the wall behind me as much, as long as I can. And that creates the forwardness, but I'm not just folding the hip joints. In fact, I really haven't changed that angle at all. I'm trying to lift my back up and then roll back up to sitting tall. Whatever your arms like to do, think about this is your spine movement.

Lifting, trying to imagine that I'm sliding up a wall, opening that space. I definitely feel my tummy roll up to the sitting. One more, we are gonna add a little variation onto it. Okay, we won't go right into open leg rocker. That's next, but let's do this.

From this flexion, move into extension. So now I do want us all to hinge out the hip joints. Lean forward, arms in front of you. They can be in line with your shoulders. They can be starting to move up on a little diagonal.

Stay looking forward. Hitchhike with your hands, and just three times you're starting to move your arms a little further behind you. One. It's really getting your back muscles. And two.

And three. Keep them there, interlace your hands behind your head. You're on this hinge, and a little rotation now. Rotate, I'm coming toward you, trying to keep myself in a nice leaned hinged extended spine. Forward.

Other direction. Rotate. And since you've got two more choices or chances. Make it count. Body.

Maybe your spirit livens up a little more in this rotation which takes you further around. Maybe you think more body mechanics, like muscles. Your mind sees more rotation, spiral. One more. Play with those dimensions.

Our body, our mind, our spirit. It's amazing what we can access, right? And around. We're gonna take ourself into open leg rocker now. Bring your legs together, move your hips up.

Hold your ankles. Balance. Breathe three times with both legs at the same time. Let's extend to the diagonal breathing in. Exhale, refold.

Keep your balance and your posture upright. That's the challenge. Two more. Focus, concentrate. Breathe.

And in. One more to stay open. Third one. Okay. Legs are slightly externally rotated.

Arms can stay straight. Some of you prefer bending your elbows. It's fine, make it yours. Rock your rocker. Roll it back.

Lift your hips. Lift your chest. One more. Roll, lift your hips. Lift your chest.

Okay. There's another kind of open leg rocker. We've seen me do it before. Learned this from Pat Guyton, love it. Put your hands on one leg.

The other leg is down. You're kind of a small scissor split. This is open legs, isn't it? Open leg. We can rock it.

Three times with this leg, three times with the other one. Here we go. It's an interesting exercise. You've gotta try to concentrate on keeping the scissor split the same. Roll up.

Last one, roll. It's always a fun challenging I think. Here we go, three only though. So deepen the contraction of the abdominals. Lift the pelvis.

You might stretch some of you backs a little differently with the legs in this design. Come on. And then both legs out again. Okay, we did that. Bring your legs together.

Let's go into a teaser position. So you're letting go with your hands. You all can. If you fall back, you fall back. Reach back.

Hold and roll your pelvis down. Go all the way. You can bend your knees and bring your thighs, your chest. Do a little bit of thigh circle here. Good job, guys.

Okay. I'm gonna do shoulder bridge right now with the leg kicks, because I just want us to feel like we're getting a little more openness in the hip joint and hip flexors. Set yourself up. You can do feet together all the way or you can have a little space between before we bridge the hips. Heels are close to the bottom.

Shoulders are anchored back. Let's use some of the arms strength that we have, the back of the shoulders, into our upper back to help us. Ready? Lift your hips up. Okay.

So yeah, we can use those upper bodies. Bring one leg to your chest. It's your choice which one. Bring one in. Leg up to the ceiling, okay?

Now when you take your leg down, flex your foot. Hold it down, and then keep the foot flexed today as you go up. How'd that feel? Try the same thing again. Down and up.

A little different footwork I know. Sometimes there's point and flex. Today was flex and flex, and then just bring your foot down and up. If you prefer your normal way, that's fine. Down with your leg and up.

And down with your leg and up. Use those arms. Down with your leg and up. I want us to bend the knee. Put the feet down, bridge your hips.

Okay. A little variation. Walk your shoulder blades together underneath your back, clasp your hands together. And the pinky finger side of your hand everybody, really stamp that to the floor and lift your hips higher. Okay, chin is not jammed down on the chest.

So this is somewhat of an exaggerated bridge for sure. You are gonna be using your low back. See if you can get more weight up on your upper back. Okay. Hold it, hold it, hold it.

Release your hands, lower your spine down. I want us to do it a total of three times. We're gonna up again. And see if you can remember which hand was crossed over. Ready?

Lift up. If you can remember how your hands are crossed, it's gonna feel probably really awkward the second time around. But your arms are strong. The pinky finger side of your hand and wrist is pushing down. See if you can get up on your upper back a little bit more.

Hold those strong arms. Release the arms and come down. So if you remember which hand crossed felt more awkward or that you feel like you need a little more work on that one, please cross that one again. Here we go, third one counts. They all count, but see if you can make that change.

We're gonna breathe. Three total big breaths. There's a second round. Fill up those lungs. We need it.

We need the lung health. Here we go. Exhale, release, and we're done with that. Bring your knees to your chest. Rock and roll a little bit from side to side.

Okay, rock yourself up. So I didn't do cork screw. That's okay. I'm not gonna do saw. I'm gonna do spine twist, so come along.

Today's spine twist is brought to you by goalpost position. Okay, so here we go. I'm sitting tall. Flex the ankles, reach those elbows out wide across the room. Mine are a little bit more in front of me, my arms, so that I don't change my scapula position.

Okay. Inhale, here we go. Three exhale pulses toward one direction. We have one. Two.

Three, center. Other side. One. Two, grow taller. Three.

That image comes to my mind of the creeping vine or the ficus tree vine trunk that grow taller, taller, taller all the way around, or the barbershop pole stripes. And two and three. One more each side. Rotate. Feel that ability to ease in twisting and twisting center.

Twist from your ribs and your chest, and twist, center, and release. Okay, I want everyone to place your hands down. Bend your knees, put your feet close to you. Finger tips are facing into hips as one option. Finger tips can face away as one option, or I mean out to the sides, or finger tips can face back.

I'm going finger tips facing my hips. That just feels good for me. Let's bridge ourself up. Put weight on your arms. Okay.

Now curl your hips. Curl your hips, push your arms straight. Start to extend your hips up to the sky, your knees forward, your triceps pulling back. Stamp your heels down, really lift up. You can start to send a little more weight back on your arms if you'd like.

Keep pushing those arms straight. Breathe, get higher into the air. Push your arms and feet down. Now as you come out of it, curl. Round your chest forward.

Round your tailbone under. We're gonna round all the way to place our feet down and our hips down. I mean hips. Two more times, inhale. If this isn't working for you, we're almost done with it.

I think everyone's got it. Lift up, send your knees forward. Bring your hips up. Not your ribs, your hips. You gotta contract your butt.

Look up to the wall in front of you, right where it meets your ceiling. Can you widen your collar anymore? Yep, you can, that's right. And then curl it down. One more time, we've got this.

Breathe in. Curl in under. Roll it up. Lift, lift, lift, lift, lift, lift, lift. Good.

Can you lift a little more, take one more ounce of air? And exhale, let's all come down. Well done, you guys. Let's give it a little stretch though. Take your legs forward.

Ooh, those hands. And reach and just stretch. Okay, I want us to come into side lying today, and I think I'll face you first. And I wanna actually come into up on the elbow, legs slightly in front of us. I'm not coming all the way in front, but the legs are not straight in front of my hips, a very cute little angle there.

And then my hand behind my head to make sure my head stays leaned back, right? So I'm not drifting my heat forward. Okay, parallel leg. Three. Abduction movement, lateral leg raise.

Two. Three, hold it. Flex your foot front back three times. And back. Flex your foot as it comes in front of the body.

Point your foot as it goes behind. Just like we're walking down the street, we present our heel forward and we push our toes back. Same legs adding some torso movement. Leg forward, rotate torso up. Leg back, torso rotates down.

Two more. Leg in front, lift open the chest. It's delicious. Rotate, chest face down. One more, and up.

Open. Leg behind, rotate looking down. Now what I'd like to do next is just have us put our legs together. Keep your hand behind your head. Keep the feet flexed for a moment and bring that top leg up again.

Now with this small circle, I am gonna extend my foot of the top leg, and just use three modest size circles in that thigh. That's all. Other way. One, there's your parallel. Two, and three, and bring your leg down.

Flex both feet. Extend both feet. Now turn both legs out. Let's do top log again. Just hip height and small circle in turn out.

One. It's different, isn't it? Two. Try to stabilize your upper body, three, and reverse it. And one, and two, and three, and lower.

Exactly, okay. Bend both knees. Come all the way up. Wrap your top hand across that ankle, and let's raise this outside arm. Now as you took your arm up, be honest, did your ribs kinda go (blows raspberry) and lift up?

Bring them in. Use these muscles right here. These obliques and these upper abdominals to kind of I've yourself a little corset, right? And then as we're in that corset, elongate it up. And let's do a little lean toward the foot side of our body.

Can your arm press against your head? That might be enough. You might wanna bend the elbow. I'm gonna look down to the feet as if I'm that mermaid looking at the reflection in the water. Really spend some time here breathing and opening these ribs over here.

Okay, three times. I want you to extend, brush your fingertips toward the wall over there, and then rebend. Mm-hmm, two more times. Rush your fingertips. Kinda keep those ribs open on the opposite side and refold.

Okay. Everyone, here it is. Third one, reach. Keep going, guys. Go, go, go.

Lift higher with the arm. It feels so good, doesn't it? It feel delicious, come down on the elbow. I've used the word delicious about five times. Maybe I should eat something.

And them arm overhead, and exhale toward the hip. Last two. Something as simple as an arm gesture and a big breath in is satisfying and healthy. Yeah, and there. Okay, we'll do some other side body work, but for now let's just toggle right over to the other side.

Get into position. Again, once again, your legs are not directly in line with you. They're just slightly in front. You've got your elbows supported, your scapula supported, the hand behind the head. Notice how when you lean your head back into your hand, it might even connect in some of your core muscles there, which is really lovely, right?

And make sure those ribs are behaving. Here we go, up and down for three. And two. The third, lift and hold, front and back. So exhale, leg in front.

Inhale, press your toes behind you. This should be a glute contraction, and stomach goes back against your sacrum and lumber spine. And press the wall behind you without thrusting your ribs too much, and front. Did you catch that phrase? Ribs shouldn't thrust, but they can extend, right?

So let's add the torso. As your legs come forward, I'm not leaning down on my scapula. I'm pressing the elbow onto the floor and trying to use that press to open the chest more. Same thing, my base elbow on the floor still pressing. I'm rotating.

I'm trying not to collapse that scapula girdle. Two more, and chest up. Rotate, chest faces down. Contract your glutes. Lift.

Rotate, bring your leg together. Keep your hand behind your head, okay. Three parallel leg circles. Flex the top foot. The bottom is still pointed and just a little circle, and a little circle, and a little circle.

Three the other way. Your head leaning back, yeah, it is. Your posture is so beautiful. Three and down. Queen Pose, externally rotate both.

Lift your thigh just hip height. Three circles here. One. Two. Three.

Concentrate. Lift your chest up. A little more tummy in, and a little more joy. And last time. Bend the knees, mermaid time.

Here we go. Coming up, hands on that ankle. My different side. Arm lifts. Okay.

So I want you to concentrate. I'm bringing the upper arm close to your head as much as you can. Start to lean. The other arm, I'm using this one to pull me in this direction. As I lean, it's a beautiful stretch along the left side.

This is my left side of my body. Okay, do what you can. Bend your elbow. You can look over your feet. Simple position.

Take deeper breaths into that left rib side, everybody. Okay, here we go, extending the hand, finger tips reaching toward that wall, and rebend. Two more, the bend matters. Inhale, big, big, bigger. And exhale.

Last one. And exhale. The next one is gonna be the one that brings us all the way upright. Oh, I think I gave you one extra repetition, but I think you're probably fine, three breaths, and lower. Again, simple, effective movement.

Click, click in my shoulders. I have one more, inhale. Okay, we're gonna bring in another little side bend or lateral example of work. So open the legs, do your straddle. Mm-hmm.

Settle in. Okay. Hands behind head. This is not an easy task. If you'd rather sit in a way like this way, you can, or even cross legged.

You're allowed to do that if you have a pillow, a box to sit on. If it's handy, please make it easy-ish to sit here. Okay. It shouldn't be so easy that it's like, what's the deal, but you should be in ease to sit, if you know what I mean. Okay.

Side bending. As you bend to one side, can you get the elbow toward the back of the knee without moving your pelvis? That's the challenge. The opposite side has to really long. We just did mermaid, but this is another example, right?

And then bring it up. We're only doing thee rounds each side, so make it count. Yep. And note you're not gonna have different feeling on each side. So what I notice, this bending for me to this direction is much easier.

I know that about myself. So I have to really work on going more this way. But with only three reps, I really have to make my mind, and muscle, and spirit. Do more to get more balance to the other side. Here's over there.

Still feels good, just a different challenge. Okay, one more round. That's just my language to myself. Yeah. And up and last one, and then we're gonna be coming up onto a high kneeling position.

Okay, guys. Excellent. So if you know that you need to get me padding underneath, you can roll your mat up underneath you, or you can bring pads if you have them, but let's come up onto high kneeling. Okay. Arms up to the side.

Circle your wrist three times each way. That was it. Three times this way. One, two, three. I'm going to lean over to one side.

Stick out the other leg. Now it's your choice. You can be on your flat hand here. You could be on your wrist right here. I'm choosing flat hand today.

This arm is gonna come up. The leg that's down on the floor, you're gonna move that one and thread it behind the other leg, and you're gonna lift. Take the other arm over head. Can you come out of it just as easy as you went in? Two more, go into it without collapsing.

So you're doing a one-arm balance. Pretty impressive. And in. Make it a little more sassy, so come on in. Okay, now I'm gonna rotate my pelvis, so are you.

Rotate, the standing arm is gonna push the floor. Let's reach our hand back to our heels, back to your heels. You're somewhat of an extended spine. Let's come out of it. We're gonna rotate.

We'll put the knee down. Okay, two more times. So that standing arm, doing a lot of work. I'm pushing. Notice that push in the arm, the hips start to lift.

You rotate and you're reaching your other arm. Two of those ankles are saying, "Hey, I'm gonna touch you." And then we come down. And we have one more to complete the third round, ready? And reach. Use your spirit.

Lift. Use your spirit. The sense of joy, levity, levity, live. Don't be so heavy. It's just an exercise.

Okay, and come all the way out. Come up to high kneeling. Oh, that's not easy. Take your arms up and lean towards the straight leg's side. An interesting sense, lean away from that side, and lean towards that side, and lean away.

And lean toward it, and lean away. Bring your arms down your knee, and of course we have the other side, so out you go. Coming down. All right, so single arm, scapular stability, all the fundamentals. This arm comes over head.

Now you're taking weight bear on that arm on the floor. Lift your core and just thread your legs. Hold yourself together, and then exhale, Let's come out of it. Okay, go into it with nice lift control. Come out of it with keeping those hips lifted to bring the knee down.

Last one, we're gonna add into it now. Here's your third. Ready to rotate? So turn your arm, your chest. Lift your hips, the standing arm pushes you back.

Your hands are reaching to those ankles any amount coming around. Look toward me. Put your inside knee down. Stay lifted on that waistline and shoulder blades doesn't collapse. Ready, last two, guys.

Again, maybe conjure your spirit. This is easy, light. Strong and light. It is the thing. Can you extend?

Can you lift and reach back more? Strong and light. Yeah, last time. Exhale. And reach.

Well done, come all the way down. Come up to high kneeling. Lift both arms over to the straight leg sign and over to the knee side, and over to the straight leg side, and over to the bent knee side. And one more over to the straight leg, and bent knee, and then come all the way down. Okay.

Down to your knees. Just come back to, well, on your elbows. I want us to do front support or leg pull on our elbows. If you want to come up too on your hands, you may. I'm gonna stay down on my elbows, and I'm taking my legs together.

Scapula stability. Lift one leg. Lower it down. Other side. And lower, first leg.

Lower, second leg. Just lift. Lower first leg. The last one, lift, lower. Second leg, lift, lower.

Bend your knees. Come down. Roll up your spine. Okay, let's take a look at our seal. Okay, seal, move your hips forward.

Wrap your hands across the front of your ankles. Raise your legs up. Focus and concentrate. Again, you're pressing your elbows out, your knees pressing in. Three repetitions.

Have some fun. Roll back. Roll up, hold. Let's do our one, two, and our three. Roll back, roll up, and you're one, two, and you're three.

Last time, roll. Roll up. One, two, three. Okay. Place your feet down every one.

I want you to move your hips back a little bit. Extend one leg forward. Hold the calf or ankle of your other leg. Extend that leg. It's a kind of climb a tree moment for a second here.

Let's just do a little bit stretch for our hamstring. And I want you to... It's kind of also nice for a little teaser line. Holding on your ankle, round your spine, and rotate your hips back, but I'm pressing my calf forward against my hands. Then I'm gonna try to round through my lower back a little more.

Walk your hands down slightly. Maybe you go to back of your thigh, and you're going a little further back, and walking all the way up. I really wanted to do more of the top part of this, so pulling your leg closer to your torso and your chin up towards your forehead. Down we go and up. And pulling that leg up towards your torso, lift it as I'm trying to also just really elongate through my whole line and my leg.

I'm shaking. It's so nice walking down, walking up. Lift. Wow, I can see half of the world with their shin on their head. Good.

Other side. I can't really see you, but I trust you that you were doing it. Okay. And naturally, if your shins not on your head, it really is okay too. So, pressing your legs against your hands, let's flex that lower back back, and then coming up.

And here we go. We're trying, keeping that hips square, the pelvis. Using your arms, it's okay. Try to pick your leg toward your head. Get up toward your head, and then lean away, and then you can walk your hands toward your hamstrings a little bit.

Scoot, maybe that's a place you can square your pelvis a tiny bit more. Walk up. Here we go. Pull on the leg. As I'm pulling it out of my hip a little bit and toward my head, it's closer.

Okay. No judgment. It feels good. Rolling back and rolling up. Walk, here's the third one.

Up, up, up. Yeah. Pretty close. Okay. And then we're gonna do one more exercise, and I wanted to finish with swan today to leave us with feeling open in the chest, the heart, the hips, not leaving with feeling rolled.

That's just the way I'm feeling today. Okay, so if you're ready with me, come along. We're gonna come on to our tummy. Three swans. Hands by chest.

Do to your legs in a position that feels supported for you. Here we go. Get long, reaching your chest forward. Take off ramp position. Use those arms to push down.

Gaze forward or gaze up. I want you to do this one that feels good for you. And as you come down, stretch your body forward. Elongate, come all the way down, touch your forehead. We've got two more to go.

Lifting the forehead, roll the nose forward. Eyes, nose, chin, chest. The chest leads the way. What's inside that chest? The heart and the lungs, vital organs.

Stretch them, expand them, lift them, and lower down. We need those vital organs, don't we, guys? One more time. And we reach. They're strong or full.

They're there. Concentrate, body, mind, spirit, soul, breath, and come all the way down. Don't rush away. Don't leave your swan quite yet. We'll go to your hips a little bit.

Move to back to a little rest pose. It matters how you treat your spine. Take a moment or two breath. So we just did a little movement journey, didn't we? All the way through mostly the classical mat.

It doesn't matter really. Oh my gosh, thank you. I feel like I've just been on a little... It feels good. Thanks for being here with me, letting me do this with you.

Next week, some of you are so wonderful. You're messaging my dog. You're wondering where my dog is. She's not at home right now. I've taken her to doggie daycare on Tuesday mornings, just so she has a little bit of social time, and also not locked in my bedroom in my house.

But next week, I'm going to do a standing class. We're gonna use a long dowel or a pole. You can use a broom stick, gondola pole, something like that, and I think I'm gonna try to have Luna with me. And she does better when I have a standing class because I'd like her to see you, and feel you, and have you guys see her too, and we can move together standing. So, posture, shoulders, legs.

We'll probably use the wall a little bit. Okay, so kinda get your stage set for next week. Thank you so much. Have a beautiful week. I appreciate you all so much.

Okay. Mwah! Bye bye.

Pilates with Amy Havens: Move with Amy

Comments

Vimi
1 person likes this.
Just what I needed on this grey rainy autumn morning in Stockholm, thank you.
1 person likes this.
brilliant class!! love it!!!! Thank you so much!
1 person likes this.
Really enjoyed the movement and your energy - thank you! The side lying kick variation was "delicious", I agree.
2 people like this.
I saw this class and thought great! One new class from Amy! And it did not let me down! Love your classes Amy thank you!
Norita
1 person likes this.
I feel great after your class. Thank you. 
Anne M
1 person likes this.
Hi Amy,
Greetings from Australia!
Thank you so much for your wonderful classes. Love your gorgeous smile too :) X
Anne
Pilar S
1 person likes this.
Great class!! Thaks
Meg
Meg
1 person likes this.
Really nice class!! Good things DO come in 3s -thank you Amy!
1 person likes this.
I have followed for for a few years, Amy, and am never disappointed.  I wanted to finally write you a note to tell you how much I appreciate you and your classes.  Thank you so much...and I love the idea of three's!
1 person likes this.
Amazing Amy!  This is going in my favorites. I cannot wait until I can see Luna!  Thank you for making this class!  XO
1-10 of 42

You need to be a subscriber to post a comment.

Please Log In or Create an Account to start your free trial.

Footer Pilates Anytime Logo

Welcome to Your Pilates Era

Experience Your Joy

Let's Begin