Opposition

Hello, everyone. Welcome or welcome back to Plot Twist Pilates. My name is Kira and I'm coming to you from Brooklyn, New York. Today's point of view that we're focusing on is opposition. And the reason why I love training with this point of view in mind is that it really teaches me how to leverage my body in order to achieve maximum strength and control.

It also helps to pull my body out of compression, it helps me find my balance and it helps you find stability and length. So we're gonna start off with centering. If you are new to this class, I'm gonna start facing you so you can see how I scoop my powerhouse. You can start with your feet parallel and together and your hands on your hips. And then take a second just to pivot on your heels and find your pilate stance, root down through your feet.

So just as a review, you scoop your powerhouse in and up to create stability and length. Your hands have landed on these hip points, these bony landmarks right here, feel like you're using your abdominals to lift these hip points up into your navel. So I'm pulling my hip points on an upward diagonal. What that feels like, if you wanna try this for reference, place your hand on your lower back and feel like you're drawing your lower abdominals back into your hands. That scooping up is what's gonna give you stability.

Then from there, you pull your hip points up into your naval or pull your lower abdominals into your back. Now lift your navel, it travels up the length of your spine goes behind your chest bone and land at the base of your skull. I like to feel like my navel is helping me to lengthen out the back of my neck. So there's opposition from my tailbone to the base of my skull. I support that with the scooping in and up of my powerhouse.

So now I'm gonna go to the base of my mat. We're gonna start off with some centering exercises before getting down on the floor. If there's anything in this class that feels like it's unsafe for you, or you feel like you're straining, just omit it. No big deal. All right, so we're gonna start at the base of your mat.

Start again with your feet parallel and together, hands on your hips. Pivot into your pilate stance and look down, there should be like four fingers distance between your big toe joints. And then take a second to really root down on the three corners of your feet. That'll be the ball of your big toe, your small toe and the center of your heel. Just take a second and really feel the weight of them and make sure that your weight is distributed evenly across your feet.

And then once you're rooted down in your feet, pull your hip points up into your navel and you'll feel how that lengthens your tailbone down towards your heel. Pull your navel to the base of your skull and lengthen out the back of your neck. Start with your arms long by your sides, maintain that scoop. Take a big inhale. As you exhale root down through your feet and lengthen your spine up towards the ceiling.

And again, inhale, root down through your feet and as you exhale, feel like your spine is piercing through gravity so you feel that opposition. We're gonna add some movement. You're gonna do arm circles so that as your arms go forward, pull your waist back. As your arms go up feel your tailbone drop. You open your arms wide to the side, as your arms go down, lift your hip points into your navel.

So you circle, arms up, tailbone down. Circle your arms and lift your hip points into your navel. And again, reach forward and up tailbone down, exhale and grow taller. Two more, inhale, so lift tailbone heavy. Exhale and return.

Final one, inhale, pull your navel back as your arms go forward and up, exhale, and now we'll reverse. As your arms go up feel your tailbone lengthen down towards your heel. As your arms go forward pull your waist back, arms go down, hip points up, and we'll do three for flow. You inhale, reach up, exhale scoop as your arms lower. Inhale, reach up, exhale, pull your waist back.

Two more, reach up, shoulders down, exhale. Final one, reach up, hold the up, relax the tops of your shoulders. Try to pull your ribs back, pull your waist back and your arms reach forward. Stack your arms one on top of the other. Feel like your elbows are trying to reach for the wall in front of you.

Pull your waist back. You're gonna start by bending your knees. Once you bend your knees, just peek down to make sure that your knees are lined up over your second toe. Take a second to feel the weight of the three corners of your feet, and then just scoop. Imagine you're lying down on your reformer, your back is on the carriage and you're gonna initiate by pulling your powerhouse in and up so much that it straightens your legs.

Root down through your feet and keep lifting your spine up. Feel like your head is velcroed to the ceiling so that even as you bend your knees, your head is lengthening up. Once you bend your knees, feel the three corners of your feet, let your hips feel like they're just hanging from your waist. And then start by pulling your hip points up into your navel. Lift your navel to the base of your skull and straighten.

Keep reaching your legs through the floor, your spine pierces gravity. One more like this. Bend your knees, keep pulling your waist back, feel the three corners of your feet, and then lift your powerhouse to come up to standing. We're gonna do three more you have the option to go deeper or you can continue doing what we did. Switch the stacking of your arms, reach your elbows forward and pull your waist back.

So just bend your knees like we did. Imagine you're gonna sit on or right behind your heels. So I have to really pull my waist back and lower down until my thighs are maybe parallel to the floor. Most importantly, I wanna feel the three corners of my feet. I pull my waist up so much it straightens my legs.

Two more, my head is still velcroed towards the ceiling, I bend my knees feeling the groundedness of the three corners of my feet. Now I really have to pull my hip points into my navel and reach my elbows forward, chest forward. And then I pull my waist up and reach the three corners of my feet into the floor to stand. One more, bend your knees, keep pressing your head up, your abs back, tailbone reaches down. Now pull your abdominals in so I initiate by lifting my hip points into my navel so it's almost like my legs didn't have to do a lot of work.

So now you can either meet me on the mat or we can continue the squat to the floor. Reach your elbows forward, pull your waist back. Feel the three corners of your feet and bend your knees. Now try to take a seat right behind your heels if you can, pulling your abs back, with control you sit and then slide your hands behind you, scoop back. Your knees are bent and feet are together.

Place your hands at the backs of your thighs for some half roll backs, lift your spine and set up as tall as you can. I want you to think of the opposition of your hip bones that we palpated earlier, going to the back edge of your mat and your tailbone to the front edge. So lift your spine, pull your hip bones back. And as your hip bones go back, reach your tailbone forward. You'll stop when your arms are straight.

Keep pulling your hip points back, pull your navel back. Now your hip bones keep going back, but the crown of your head goes forward. Notice the opposition, hip bones back, top of my head goes forward. Stay here. My forehead wants to stay over my knees but my hip points pull back.

So my shoulders have no choice but to move because my abs are pulling them back. Keep pulling your hip points back, tailbone forward. Now, as you exhale, you leave with the crown of your head, but your hip points keep traveling back towards the back edge of the mat. You round forward. One more, instead of initiating from your shoulders, initiate from your hip points, pull them back to the back edge of the mat.

Your shoulders stay over your hips as long as they can. Once you're here, your arms are straight. Pull your hip points into your navel and then reach your arms forward and then roll down one bone at a time. And then from here, straighten your legs, reach your arms up towards the ceiling and just feel the weight of your body sink into the floor. Feel the scoop of your powerhouse.

So you pull your hip points into your navel and notice how that reaches your tailbone to the bottom edge of the mat. And then pull your navel up your spine all the way to the back edge of the mat. As much as you pull your waist back, feel your inner ankles reach forward to the bottom edge of the mat and then reach your arms back in opposition. So my inner ankles are reaching forward, my arms are going back. On your next exhale, empty your lungs so much that your ribs sink into the floor and hover your arms up.

Just hold your arms at a hover and breathe. Feeling the opposition between your inner ankles reaching forwards, fingertips back and what's stabilizing it is that deep scooping your powerhouse. From your powerhouse, reach your arms up towards the ceiling, and then from here you'll chest curl. Bend to the bottom of your chest bone, reach forward. Now keep reaching your inner ankles forward, pull your hip points into your naval, naval to the back edge of the mat.

Try to make your leg six inches longer and pull your waist back and then roll all the way down, arms go up. Feel the weight of your rib as your arms go back inner ankles forward. Arms go up towards the ceiling. As you exhale, curl your head and shoulder blades up. Try to reach a little bit further forward, press your right leg down and then pull your lower abdominals in and up to float your left leg up, and then lower.

Reach your leg forward and up and pull your navel in and up and then lower. Other side, reach your leg forward and up. Navel goes in and up, and then lower. One more, lift and then lower. Keep reaching forward but pull your waist back rest your head, arms go up towards the ceiling.

Weight of your ribs arms go back. Keep reaching through your inner ankles in your fingers, but feel the scoop or the weight of your powerhouse. Last one, arms go up towards the ceiling, curl your head and shoulder blades up. Now, press your right leg down, float your left leg up noticing that I'm not lifting by gripping, I'm lifting by pulling my powerhouse back in opposition and then lower. And then reach your right leg forward and up and keep pulling your navel back and then lower.

One more each leg. Exhale, reach forward and up and then lower. Final one, reach forward and up and then lower, rest your head. So remember that when we do the hundred, that the support of your legs no matter what height is gonna come from your deep abdominal. Bend your knees into your chest.

Find your frog position where your heels are together, knees are apart. Tailbone is heavy, abs are scooped. Reach your arms up towards the ceiling. Start with your chest curl. So bend to the bottom of your chest bone.

Reach your arms forward, pull your waist back. You can start with your legs high, but as much as you reach your legs forward, pull your waist back. Pump your arms. Inhale, two, three, four, five. Exhale, two, three, four.

Inhale two, three, four, five. Your arms are reaching forward, but your navel is pulling back. Two, three, four, five, and exhale. Two, three, four, five, two more sets like this. Two, three, four, five, and exhale.

Two, three, four, five. Final one. And then pause. Pull your hip points and your navel back. See if you can reach your legs forward, but scoop deeper, scoop deeper, scoop deeper.

So my legs reach forward, hip points back and we finish it. Inhale two, three, four, five. Exhale, two, three, four, five. Inhale two, three, four. Exhale.

One long inhale. Exhale all the air out. Two more sets. Exhale, two, three, four, five. Last one.

Now reach your legs forward, pull your hip points back so you can lower all the way down with control. Reach your arms up. You're ready for the roll up. I'm gonna grab my black strap and I place my feet underneath the strap and flex. So imagine you're standing up again and you're feeling the three corners of your feet on the floor.

Feel your inner ankles reach forward. Pull your hip points into your naval, arms up. Keeping your ribs heavy reach your arms back. Arms go up towards the ceiling. Now just lift your head and shoulder blades up without moving your arms.

So my head goes up, my ribs go down. Dive your head through your arms. Now as I round forward, my hip points are going back, my head is going forward. Stay here, reach your heels forward, pull your hip points back. Feel like lower back is trying to touch the wall and slide up the wall, and your head is trying to touch the wall in front of you.

Your shoulders stay here as long as you can. Pull your hip points back, head forward. Hip points back, head forward, hip points back, head forward. Find the back of your hips on the mat. Hold here, pull your hip points into your navel then roll all the way down, arms go up and back.

Arms go up towards the ceiling. Curl your head and shoulder blades up. Check out your inner heels forward, hip points back. Now, just think about your hip points going backwards as your head goes forward. Round forward, pull your abs back, roll to the backs of your hips only.

Pull those hip points back and reach your tailbone forward. Keep pulling your hip points back and then pull your waist to the back edge of the mat. Like all the way down. We're gonna add a little flow. Arms go up.

Inhale, roll up through your spine. Exhale, pull your hip points back, head forward. Inhale, roll to the backs of your hips. Exhale, roll through your spine emptying your lungs. Arms go up, inhale, lift up.

Pull your hip points back as your head dives forward. Inhale, pull your hip points back, not your shoulders and then exhale roll all the way down. I think we have one more. Arms go up, lift your head and shoulder blades up. Remember my hip points are going back as my head goes forward, exhale, inhale, roll to the backs of your hips.

Exhale, roll all the way down, arms go up and back. All right, single leg circle. I'm gonna slide my feet out of the strap. Interlace your fingers behind your left thigh and pull your knee back. As your knee goes back this standing leg has to stand on an imaginary floor.

So find the three corners of your feet. I think of reaching my inner heel forward towards the front edge of the mat and then press this legs forward into a tabletop. Feel your right leg gets six inches longer and push your thigh into your hand and against that forward reach pull your waist back. So just keep trying to create length you'll stretch and bend the top leg, you straighten it, keep pushing your thigh forward pulling your waist back and then bend. This time as you straighten your leg, press your right thigh down as your left leg goes up and then bend.

Two more, exhale, reach your leg up, press your right thigh down and then lower. Final one, keep your leg straight. Rotate it in its hip socket, line your toes up in front of your nose. Now press this leg forward and down and this leg up. Stand on your arms and we go, inhale, cross, exhale, pull your hip points into your navel.

Inhale, cross, leg forward, naval back and lift. Inhale, cross, exhale, press your arms down, leg up. Cross, exhale, press your arms down, leg up. One more, exhale. Now you reverse.

Open, exhale around and lift. Open, what is that right leg doing? Keep reaching it forward like it's standing on the wall in front of you. Two more, exhale. Final one, open, pull your hip points into your navel, leg up, hug your knee in.

Switch legs. So slide the left leg down, interlace your fingers behind your right thigh and pull your knee back. This is your standing leg. So keep sending your inner ankle forward and reach that leg out of your hip socket and pull your right knee back. Then press your leg forward into your hands, you'll feel the back of your thigh fire, fire the back of this leg by pressing it down into the mat.

And then straighten your top leg and pull your lower abdominal in, and then bend. Exhale as your leg goes up, pull your lowest abdominals into the mat and then bend. Two more, leg goes up, pull your lowest abdominal deeper and then lower. One more. Keep your leg up.

Keep pressing your legs away from you and pulling your waist back. Turn your leg out, stand on your arms and circle. Cross, exhale around and lift. Cross, keep pressing the backs of your arms into the mat. Cross, exhale, pull your lower abdominals in.

Two more. I like to feel like there's a suction underneath my lower abdominals pulling them into the mat. Reverse. Open. I pull my lower abdominals into the mat. Open, pull my lower abdominals in.

Then as my leg goes forward navel goes back. Open, leg goes forward, naval goes back. One more, exhale and then hug that knee into your chest. Slide this leg straight so both legs are straight. Once again, you're reaching your inner ankles to the bottom edge of the mat.

Pull your hip points into your navel, pull your navel up your spine and it lands way back here. Just feel the weight of your back. We're gonna do a transition into rolling like a ball. It's gonna be kind of like our warmup. Reach your arms up towards the ceiling.

Feel the weight of your chest bone, the weight of your ribs and the weight of your lower abdominals. As you pull your hip points into your navel, curl your head and shoulder blades up off the mat. I'm gonna reach my legs forward and up and pull my abs down and back into rolling like a ball position and then lower your feet down. Let's try that again. So I take the deep scoop here in your lower abdominal, reach your arms up and then pull your hip point into your naval.

Really fire this up. Curl your head and shoulder blades up. I'm reaching my arms forward and pulling my waist back so that I can scoop and float up into rolling like a ball and then find your balance. Keep pulling your hip point into your navel and curve over your rib cage. In order to roll back, you initiate by lifting your tailbone.

You start at the base of your spine, to roll up, you start with the crown of your head. So here we go. Lift your tailbone up to roll back, dive your head forward and find your balance. And again, start by lifting your tailbone. Tailbone tips you over, now dive the top of your head forward and find your balance.

And again, lift your tailbone up to roll back, dive your head forward. Notice I'm trying to keep my shoulders close to my knees. One more, lift your tailbone up. Now press your shoulders forward. We're gonna do four in a row a little faster.

Here we go. Inhale back, exhale up, inhale back, exhale up. Two more, still in that tight ball, heels close to your hips. Final one, find your balance at the top. Keep pulling your hip points into your navel, bring your legs together.

We're gonna focus on a transition into single leg stretch. It takes opposition. I'm gonna begin rolling back by pulling my hip points back and extend my right leg and pull my left knee into my chest. Hold here no matter where this leg is, no matter how high or low, reach it away from you and then pull your waist back more. Hug your knees into your chest, rock up to seated.

Same thing the other side. So we're trying to control our way down using opposition. I curl my tailbone under, as my hip points go back, my leg goes forward, that's like my counterbalance, everything arrives at the same time. Now make that leg longer, pull your waist back and then bend to the bottom of your chest bone. And then we flip.

Ready? And pull your knee in and pull it in, and in, and in. Pull your lower abs into the mat. We're about to slow it down right here. Ready?

Hold. Make that leg longer, pull your waist back more. Scoop and switch, make that right leg longer, pull your waist back more. One more set. Reach that left leg forward, pull your waist back.

Switch and hug in, hug everything in, rest your head. Double leg stretch. So keep holding onto your ankles. Feel the weight of your tailbone, but already fire up those lower abdominals. Think about those hip points traveling back.

Exhale, curl your head and shoulder blades up. We're gonna do this return to lifestyle. Immediately pull your hip points into your navel, reach your legs forward. We can start off high. I'm pressing my hands into my thighs like I'm squeezing a magic circle and pulling my hip points back.

I scoop and hug in. Inhale, reach your legs forward, pull your waist away from the reach of your toes and then bend. And again, reach your legs as far forward as they can go and then pull your waist back. And then bend, maybe challenge yourself, go lower, but you have to scoop here first. That's your stability.

Now try to touch the wall. Sorry. And pull your hip points into your navel and then exhale, this is hard. And again, reach your legs forward, pull your hip points back. Touch the wall, try to curl up higher, bend your knees.

One more, pull your hip points into your navel. Remember that suction pulling your lower abs down and then bend your knees, rest your head. This series wears me out. Okay, onto number three, single straight leg. So curl your head and shoulder blades up, reach your right leg up, left leg forward.

Remember it doesn't matter how low it is, it's how much you scoop. And then reach your leg forward and pull your waist back. Pull your top leg twice. Pull, pull, switch. Now freeze.

Reach that leg forward and pull your waist back. Pull, pull with a flow. Pull, pull, reach. Pull, pull. Feel the opposition of your legs reaching in different directions.

Pull, pull, scoop. Pull, pull, naval in. Pull, pull, and pull, pull, and exhale. Pull, pull. One more step, pull, pull, and pull, pull.

Bend your knees, rest your head. Stack your hands one on top of the other. They're going to cup the base of your skull and help you create traction, okay? So I'm stacking my hands. I connect my arms to my back by slightly lifting my elbows up and feeling like I'm sliding my armpits down the sides of my body.

And then I exhale, curl my head and shoulder blades up, curl up a little bit higher. Now reach your legs up, lower abdominal down. Inhale, reach your legs forward and down. But all I'm thinking about, not my legs, I'm thinking about pulling my hip points into my navel and scooping, scooping, scooping, and then I lift from here to bring my legs up. Inhale, I'm thinking about my hip points pulling back so my legs can move, and then exhale, scoop and lift.

Inhale, maybe your legs go to here. That's fine, you want stability. Exhale, lift. Inhale, maybe they go to 45 degrees but you are pulling your waist back and then lift. Last two.

Inhale, reach your legs forward. Try to touch the wall in front of you and then lift. Final one, reach your legs forward, legs forward, waist back, lift, bend your knees rest your head. Whoa child! (exhales) Last one. criss-cross.

(clears throat) Stack your hands one on top of the other behind your head. You can tell this is my fav. Lift your elbows up a little bit, connect your arms into your back. Already I'm scooping my powerhouse. Curl your head and shoulder blades up and then curl up higher.

Make your right leg touch the wall in front of you. Really reach. Keep reaching that leg forward and then twist your left elbow back in opposition to that reach. And then switch, reach your left leg as far forward as you can, twist that right elbow against it, and then switch. Rotate against your own midline and then switch.

We're all gonna do one more. And then last one and switch. Final one and then switch, hug your knees into your chest, rest your head. Oh my God. We did it. Next is the spine stretch, which feels delicious after that.

Just rock yourself up to seated. Separate your feet a little bit wider than the mat. Opposition is the theme, right? So even as you're sitting feel the weight of your sitz bones drop into the mat. You scoop your powerhouse, so I'm pulling my lower abdominals in and lifting my whole spine up.

So think about your naval lengthening the back of your neck. And as you scoop your powerhouse, reach your arms in front of you shoulder height and shoulder width. Inhale, chin goes to your chest, exhale round forward, try to dive your nose into your naval, arms stay parallel to the floor. Now just stay here for a little bit. Can you lift your hip points up and back?

Feel like your lower back is touching the wall behind you like the roll up. Fire it up the wall as you press your leg down. And then lift your waist as you press your legs down, roll all the way up, exhale. Inhale, chin to your chest. Exhale, empty your lungs, allow your ribs to bend.

Press your front ribs into your back ribs. Try to get your nose in your navel. Press your thighs down, lift your waist up. Increase the length in your spine, exhale. You're piercing gravity with the crown of your head, then you curl your chin into your chest, each vertebra goes up towards the ceiling and rounds forward like a conveyor belt.

Feel like you're peeling off of a wall. My lower back is sliding up that wall. I Inhale, lift my waist and press my thighs down, at the top I exhale. Two more. Inhale, chin to your chest.

Empty your lungs completely. Pull your waist back and then press your thighs down, waist goes up and exhale. Last one, inhale, lift. Chin to your chest, waist back, arms forward, waist back, arms forward. Now press your thighs down, lift your waist up, roll all the way up to a tall seated position.

All right, I'm gonna play around with this transition. If this transition creates any strain in your lower back, just avoid it for now. We're gonna do it three times and then we're gonna go into open leg rocker. Make your feet just as wide as your mat or as wide as your shoulders I'll say. Reach your arms in front of you, but really reach forward with your fingertips like you're trying to touch the wall in front of you.

This is like the half roll back, I pull my hip points back and my tailbone forward. Hip points back, tailbone forward, hip points back, tailbone forward. Now I scoop and try to lift my legs up so I'm hovering. Now reach your fingertips forward and then take a seat again. All right, we're gonna do two more.

Lift your spine, think of the roll up, the rolling down part. Lift your spine, I pull my hip points back instead of my shoulders. I'm trying to keep my shoulders over my hips. My tailbone is forward, hip points are back. Now all this leverage comes from here.

I scoop to lift my legs up, and then I come forward. One more, lift your spine, curl your tailbone under. My hip points are going back, my fingers are going forward. My tailbone is going forward, my navel is going back. Now pull your lower abdominals in, hover your legs up.

If you wanna lift and grab them you can. If you are not there yet, no biggie. Come to the bottom edge of your mat, grab your inner ankles, everyone meets here. Now take a second to press your thighs forward and pull your hip points away from your leg so your lower back is round. And then relax the tops of your shoulders.

Now we roll. Remember when you roll backwards you start with your tailbone. Bottom of your spine starts, top of your head finishes. Dive your head forward and then lift. And again, lift your tailbone to roll back, dive your head forward.

And again, lift your tailbone, roll on your lower back. Press your front ribs into the floor to come up. Yikes. Two more, roll back, lift your tailbone up. Press your front ribs down to help you come up.

One more, lift your tailbone up and then exhale, press these front ribs down, find your balance. Press your legs together. Even if they're (indistinct) get the hold on here. Hold on, feel like you're pressing your legs forward and curl your tailbone under and pull your hip points back so my lower back is round. And then walk your hands down your legs so your legs are up towards the ceiling.

Hug your knees into your chest. Corkscrew. Press your arms into the mat like you're doing chest expansion. Already I'm pulling my lower abdominals in. I lift my legs up towards the ceiling and find my pilate stance.

Keep your tailbone heavy and try to use your lower abdominals to pull your inner thighs towards you. So I'm not moving my hips. I'm trying to my inner thighs towards me. That takes a lot of lower abdominal work. Press your arms into the floor, legs go to your right hand, they circle down around to your left hand and they stop center.

Tailbone is heavy, even if you have to bend your knees, that's fine. You pull your inner thighs towards you, circle to your left hand, pressing them into the floor, circle your legs down around and lift. Pull your legs towards you. Circle to your right hand. Now pull your abdominal in and up to circle your legs and center.

Pull your legs towards you. Left hand, pull your hip points into your naval and center. One more. My shoulders came off the mat. So press your arms down like you're standing on your arms.

One more, pull your inner thighs towards you. Left hand, reach forward and pull your hip point into your navel and then come up. Hug your knees in, rock up to seated for a stop. Separate your legs so they're slightly wider than your mat. Stand on your feet like we did in the beginning.

So I'm reaching my inner ankles forward and pulling my pinky toes back. I pierced gravity with my spine by scooping my powerhouse in and up. Reach your arms out to the side. As you twist your ribs to the left, feel like your hips are rotating to the right. Are you still seated on that right hip?

Try to rotate more and then round forward, reach your pinky finger to your pinky toe. I like to make contact. So I'm pressing the outer edge of my foot into my pinky toe and I try to lift my ribs and twist. And then like tug of war, someone's pulling this arm back and up and then I roll all the way up and return to center. Scoop your powerhouse, as your ribs go to the right twist your hips to the left.

Keep sitting on that left hip, keep sitting on that left hip, round forward. Connect your outer edge of your foot with your pinky toe. Now can you pull your lower abdominals back and rotate your ribs to the right and lift that right arm up. Feel like someone's playing tug of war with your arm. And then someone pulls you from that back arm to roll you up and center.

Twist to the left, round forward, pull your waist back. Your right arm goes forward, your right hip goes back. Right arm goes forward, right hip back. Right arm forward, hip back, roll all the way up and center. Lift your spine to twist.

Round forward, left hand goes forward, right arm goes back. And twist a little bit more, left hip back, round a little bit forward, come all the way up and center. Lift and twist. Round forward, reach your arm forward, hip back. Reach your arm forward, hip back.

Last one, hold. Can you press this left arm to the back right corner of the mat, then roll all the way up, center. Final one, lift to twist, round forward. Reach your left arm forward, left hip back, and then rotate. Rotate a little bit more, rotate a bit more, come all the way up and return center.

Alright, so now we're gonna go onto our stomachs. I'm gonna adjust my mic pack just a little bit. So I'm gonna lie on my stomach. We're gonna do it a little bit differently today than we've done in the last two classes. Today you're gonna stack your palms one on top of the other and rest your forehead on your hands.

Let your legs be heavy. First, I want you to connect to your powerhouse. So in this position, pull your hip points up into your navel and pull your navel up to your thumbs. It can also feel like you're lifting your lower abdominals into your lower back and stretching your tailbone toward your heels. And then gently press your inner elbows into the floor and slide your armpits down the sides of your body.

Then you press your arms down, feel like you're dragging your chest forward and up. So I'm sliding my shoulders down, but I'm trying to scrape my chest on the wall. It's almost like I'm trying to drag my body forward and then lower all the way down avoiding any compression here because I'm creating opposition between my tailbone and my chest bone. So reach your tailbone back towards your heels, pull your chest forward and up. Even my hip points are pulling forward towards my arms, and then I lower all the way back down.

One more, I reach my tailbone towards my heels, pull my hip points towards my arms. I scoop so deeply, that floats my chest forward and up. Notice I said forward, it's not just cranking up as high as you can. Now just hold this position, switch to fist. So like my hands were stacked, I just switched a fist and I'm gonna feel like I'm dragging my chest forward and up.

So I'm never gonna collapse. Forward and up with my chest, down and back with my tailbone. Bend your right knee, pull your heel to your seat, see how far you can go. And then pull it in closer, but keep sending your chest forward. As your leg goes back your chest forward and up.

Other side, pull your feet to your seat, (indistinct) then try to pull it in closer using the back of your thigh. Your leg goes back, chest goes forward and up. Now we flow. You pull it in, pull it closer and lengthen. You pull it in, pull it in closer and lengthen.

Pull it in, pull it in closer, pull your chest forward and up. Pull it in so you're stabilizing your upper body. Pull it in and mobilizing the bottom half. Reach your leg forward or your legs back, keep sliding your armpits down the sides of your body and pull your chest forward and up. Now we're gonna do double leg kicks a little bit differently.

Stack your hands one on top of the other on your lower back, pull your lower abdominals up into your hand so your hips feel heavy. Instead of letting your elbows drop today, lift your arms up so they're parallel to the floor and feel like your elbows are trying to touch the walls. And then look slightly forward to the front edge of your mat. And then you'll bring both heels to your seat three times. Pull them in, pull them in closer, pull them in closer.

As you reach your legs down, pull your hip points to the front edge of the mat. Press your triceps up, send your chest forward and up. It's the same position you were just in, okay? And then lower all the way down, bend three times. Three, two, one.

Lower your feet. Now find that lift of your lower abdominals into your hands and then press your arms up and reach back with your arms forward with your chest, lower, kick three, two, one. Lower your feet, pull your chest forward and up, press your arms up and back. Last one, kick for three, two, one, lower your feet and then press your triceps up and send your chest forward. And then sit back on your heels, round your spine.

I like to tuck my toes under the stretch, my feet a little bit. Even here, pull your hip points away from your thighs and drop your tailbone towards your heels. So it's an active stretch. Neck Pull. Everyone knows this is my favorite.

But this is a great one to practice opposition. It helps a lot. But there's a lot of moving parts in this exercise. So I'm gonna put my feet underneath the canvas strap, but it's just a reminder really to reach my inner heels and inner ankles forward and pull my pinky toes back. Your feet are actually super important in this exercise.

And as you reach forward with your inner heels, pull your lower abdominals into your lower back and lift your spine. Interlace your fingers behind your head and squeeze the bones behind your ears. And the reason why I'm doing sitz like this today is I want you to focus on tractioning your spine up as you feel your sitz bones drop. And then from here, keep lifting your head up, pull your hip points back, this sounds familiar, right? And your inner heels forward.

I'm gonna have you bring your elbows forward and press these ribs back. Keep sending your elbows forward, ribs back. Hip points back inner heels forward. So pick what you're gonna focus on. For me, I have to really focus on my hip bones going back.

So from here, traction your neck and reach your tailbone to the bottom edge of the mat. Feel that length. Now peel up. Pulling my hip point back, I dive my head forward. Here is my spine stretch.

And then I drop my thighs into the floor and lift my waist up. Traction in my neck, lift my spine, pull my hip points back, inner heels forward. Hip points back, inner heels forward. Hip points back inner heels forward. And again, traction your neck away from your tailbone and then feel each bone press into the mat as your inner heels reach forward, find your spine, stretch forward.

Press the backs of your thighs down, lift your waist up. Now I'm gonna focus on my upper ribs. Elbows forward, lift your head, curl your tailbone under. My elbows are trying to go forward and touch the wall in front of me. My ribs are trying to touch the back edge of my mat.

Find that opposition here without your chin on your chest and then roll all the way down. Easier with the strap on, sorry. One more. Lift your head and shoulder blades up, peel up one bone at a time round forward, lifting your lower back. Lift your waist, roll all the way up.

Lift your spine so you can pull your hip points back. Pull your ribs back, inner heeled and elbows forward, and then lie all the way down. And I hope that was a little bit easier today focusing on opposition. All right, let's do some sidekicks. Once again I'm gonna adjust my mic pack a little bit.

You can start on your left side and as I'm doing this, line your body up with the back edge of your mat as much as you possibly can. So you're gonna lie down on your side. You lie your whole back body up with the back edge of the mat. Stand on your feet. So reach to your inner ankles and your inner heels, find the three corners of your feet, push that wall away.

And then your hand goes right in front of your waist. And then I take this hand, cup the back of my neck and traction like I did from neck pull. Lift your legs up, traction your neck, angle your legs forward and down. Lift your top leg to hip height and keep your legs out of the pilate stance. Keep reaching this hip away from your armpit.

Swing your leg to the front. Now hold here. Make sure your tailbone is not tucking, it's in line with the mat. And then reach your leg to the bottom edge of the mat and pause. Try to reach past the bottom edge of the mat with your leg and past the top edge of the mat with your head.

And then use your butt and your hamstring to send your leg back. Now we swing. You kick it to the front, exhale, use your butt and hamstring. And again, kick it to the front, exhale. And how do you stabilize?

You pull your hip points into your navel and pull your navel up to the back of your neck, right? Three more. Exhale. Exhale. Final one, press your leg back and hold it back.

Make your leg longer, pull your lower abdominals in deeper and traction your neck a little bit more. Stack your legs one on top of the other, make sure your hip points stacked, shoulders are stacked up and down. Lift your leg up. And then from your hip reach it forward and down. Feel your hip reach away from your armpit to lift your leg, and then reach your hip away from your armpit to lower.

Three more, as you lift in length and traction your neck, and then lower. Last two, lengthen to lift, lengthen to lower. Final one, lengthen to lift, lengthen to lower. Keep your leg here. Five small circles in each direction.

You go front, up and back. Two and three, and four, and five. Reverse. It goes back around. Find that length.

And three, and four, and five. Lower your leg down. Lift your leg up, bend your knee and grab the back of your ankle, press it into the floor. Press this knee up, make your bottom leg longer. You can relax the foot and as you keep pressing both inner thighs together to lift your leg up and then lower.

And again, lengthen to lift. Make that bottom leg longer and pull your head away from the reach of that leg and then lower. You have three more. Lengthen (indistinct) like there's that suction on your lower back. Pull your lower abdominals in to lift your leg and then lower it all the way down.

Final one, pull your lower abdominals and lift your leg. Lower. Stack your legs one on top of the other. From here, slide your feet back so you're back in that standing position. Press your hand into the floor, seal the backs of your upper inner thighs and reach to your inner ankles.

Lengthen both legs up off the floor and reach your head towards the top edge of the mat and then lower. And again, make your legs long, lift them up, reach to your inner heels and then lower. It's like your bottom leg is picking up the top leg. Lengthen to lift. Now, stay here for a second.

Keep reaching your leg long and reaching your head away from your heels Lower all the way down. Turn onto your stomach. I just wanna make sure my mic pack is still on. Yes. Okay, so lie down on your stomach, like we did earlier stack your hands one on top of the other.

We're gonna do heel bit, but we're gonna start off creating opposition. Tuck your toes under and straighten your legs like you're in a plank. I'm reaching my tailbone towards my heels, pulling my hip points up towards my hands. That fires up my glutes and my hamstrings. Keep pulling your lower abdominals into your lower back without dropping your thighs point inner thighs 10 times.

10, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Lengthen your tailbone away from your head, head away from your tailbone. Lower. Sit back on your heels. I'm gonna keep facing you.

Go onto your other side, make sure you're lining up your whole body with the back edge of the mat. Find that standing position that we started with. So your tailbone to the crown of your head is lined up with the mat. Your hand goes in front of your powerhouse, make your legs longer. And as you reach your inner heels to the bottom corner, you traction your neck to the top corner.

Lift both legs up, your tailbone stays on the back edge of the mat, your legs go forward. Turn out, heels together, toes apart. This top hip reaches away from my armpit, swing your leg to the front, make sure you're not tucking your tailbone. And then reach it long to the bottom edge of the mat and pause. Instead of shortening, create opposition.

Reset leg long like it's going past the back edge of the mat and your head is going that way. And then use your glute and hamstring to press it back. Now we flow. Swing it to the front, exhale, scoop and press it back. Swing it to the front, pull your lower abdominals in and to the front, exhale it back.

Think of that suction cup on your lower back, pull your lower abdominals into it. Pull your lower abdominals back. One more. Keep your leg back this time. Can you pull your lower abdominal then deeper so you don't crunch into your lower back and then press your thigh back, traction your neck, stack your legs one on top of the other up and down.

You reach your top hip away from your armpit, lift your leg up. Your foot wants to stay on the ceiling, but your hip insists that it goes all the way down. And again, lengthen to lift up. Now feel like you're lifting your bottom leg up to meet your top leg. And again, lengthen to lift, exhale, lift your bottom leg up or kind of slower.

Last two, lengthen to lift, exhale, feel like you're lifting your bottom leg up. One more, lengthen to lift and then reach your leg forward and down. Now when you do the circle, you don't want it to feel compressive in the joint. So always feel like you're reaching past the bottom leg. Like you're tractioning it out of the hip socket.

And then let it float. Five, four, three. The support comes here. Two, and one, and then reverse. So you're not grinding inside the hip socket.

Three, and four, and five. Lift your leg up, bend your knee, foot goes flat. When you do that, make sure that your hips stay stacked. Lengthen to lift your bottom leg and then lower. And again, lengthen to lift your bottom leg and then lower.

Lengthen to lift, pull your abs in and lower. Last two, lengthen to lift, pull your lower abdominals in and then lower. Final one, lengthen to lift and then lower all the way down. Stack your legs. Technical difficulty here.

All right, so now you're gonna slide your legs back. So your legs are in a straight line again. Your hand is part of your anchor, lengthen your neck. So I'm tractioning my neck instead of sinking. And as much as I length my head that way, I reach my inner heels to the bottom edge of the mat.

I wrap my thighs and lift them up. So I think of pressing the backs of my upper inner thighs together, and then lower. And again, your bottom leg lifts up the top leg, but keep making that top leg longer than the bottom leg and then lower. Final one, bottom leg lifts the top leg, make the top leg longer than the bottom leg, lower your legs all the way down, flip on to your stomach and go into your child's pose or rest. All right, so we're gonna do teaser a few ways.

We're going to start off lying down on your back. And if this is the one you wanna stick with with this version, then we're gonna advance it a little bit. So you lie down on your back, knees bent, feet flat. Make sure your heels are not too close to you. So I'm sliding them forward so there's a longer angle at my knee joint.

I press my inner thighs down and feel the three corners of my feet. I pull my hip point into my navel, navel to the back edge of my mat and I reach my arms forward. As I reached my arms forward, I'm fighting my armpits down the sides of my body so I feel the connection to my side body. Now just do a chest curl, just like we did from the very beginning. As I curl up, I'm focusing on pulling my hip points back.

My arms are parallel to my thighs the whole time. Now can you keep pulling your hip points back but float your chest up and reach your fingertips forward and up and your lower abdominals down and back. So your arms are parallel to your leg. Now keep your fingers where they are and pull your hip points back. My hip points are going back, my fingertips are reaching forward and I lower all the way back down.

Arms stay parallel to the sides the whole time. Before you even move, you connect to your powerhouse. Pull your hip points into your naval, naval back. Now scoop deeper to lift your head and shoulder blades up. Now you really have to pull your hip points down and back as your fingertips go forward and up.

So at the base of your teaser is a pelvic tilt and not here. So notice I'm creating opposition between the reach of my arms and legs and the scoop of my powerhouse. And then I pull my hip points back and roll down one bone at a time. One more. Curl up, scoop your powerhouse.

So you begin to peel and float up to the top of your teaser. I'm on the back of my tailbone, my arms are trying to touch the wall in front of me. And then I pull my hip points back when my arms are still going forward to roll all the way down and rest your head. So we're gonna do another one that's a little bit more challenging. If you find it as too challenging for your body today, I encourage you to practice your teaser like this.

You'll extend one leg, but press your knees and inner thighs together. It's the same concept of rolling up and down through your spine, okay? So know you can do that three on each side. If not, if you wanna try this version, start with your legs straight and your hands next to your hips. You'll press your hand down and forward and pull your hip point down and back.

See how I went into like a pelvic tilt is gonna be familiar. So I'm gonna push down and forward with my hand, down and back with my lower abdominals to lift my leg up and then you can lower everything back down. Press your hands down and forward and find your pelvic tilt. Like we talked about last week, you shorten the distance between your hip points and your ribs. Now reach your legs forward and up as your lower abdominals go down and back to float your legs up.

Your energy of your legs is forward and up, hip points down and back. Now reach your arms up, try to reach past your toes so much it tips you back to your seated position. Try one more. Your hands go next to your hips and you can choose to keep your hands on the floor if you want. You press your hands down and forward, find your pelvic tilt, find the base of your teaser.

Now pull your lower abdominals back so much you can float your legs up and then reach your arms forward and up. Try to reach your fingers past your toes. Now opposition, reach your hip points back, tailbone forward. Try to get the backs of your hips on the mat and then roll down through your spine so that you're heels and your head arrive at the same time. We're gonna do one roll up into teaser three.

So your arms go back, remember this from the beginning, reach your inner ankles forward to the bottom edge of the mat. Pull your hip points up into your navel, pull your navel to the back edge of the mat. Now exhale so much you can feel a weight of your ribs, the weight of your lower abdominals, pull into the floor. Feel that weight, feel that connection to the mat with your powerhouse. From your powerhouse, reach your arms up.

Pull your hip point back as you go into your chest curl. Keep pulling your hip points back, your legs and arms will go forward and up. Keep reaching your legs and arms forward and up. Ideally you want your toes level with your eyes. Tuck your tailbone under.

Try to get the backs of your hips on the mat first and then roll all the way down, heels and head arrive together. From here we're gonna do seal. You can either roll up into a teaser and then meet me in seal, or you can just rock yourself up to seated. So I'm gonna set myself up for my teaser three, feeling the weight of my powerhouse, arms go up. Immediately, I start pulling my hip points into my navel and my arms stay parallel to my legs and I reach forward.

Bend your knees, arms go on the insides of your ankles, and you can place the soles of your feet together. Make a vice grip with your legs. So press your inner thighs into your arms and press your arms against your inner thighs. Bind your pelvic tilt, shortening the distance between your hip points and your ribs, and look through your legs. We're not gonna clap, I just want you to focus on this vice grip.

Lift your tailbone to roll back, dive your head forward to roll forward and find your balance. And again, think of lifting your tailbone up and that's what tips you over. Dive your head forward and this is what pulls you back. Now we'll do three claps here. You clap from your hips.

You clap three, two, one. Lift your tailbone, clap. Three, two, one. Roll up, clap, two, one. Roll back, clap, three, two, one.

Roll up, three, two, one. Roll back, tailbone up. One more set. Roll all the way up, find your balance. Find that vice grip with your legs.

So you're pressing in with your legs, out with your arms, round your spine. From here, come all the way up to standing. When you stand, find your pilate stance again. Root down through the ball of your big toe, the small toe in the center of your heel. Make sure you feel balanced on your feet.

I tend to favor one foot more than the other. And then shift your weight forward to the balls of your feet, and then back to your heels just to rock back and forth a couple of times. So you can find your center. And then find center, pull your powerhouse in an up. So your feet reach into the floor and against that downward reach, I pull my hip points up into my navel, I pull my navel up my spine and it lengthens out the back of my neck.

I press my head up into my ceiling like I'm pressing the ceiling up into the next floor. And then shift your weight slightly forward so your hips are over your arches, but keep reaching your heels down. Chest expansion. As your arms go forward try to touch the wall in front of you but pull these ribs back. So you're not here.

I'm pulling my ribs away from the reach of my arms. I lower my arms and feel my tailbone drop. As my arms go back, I lift my hip points into my navel and here's my shape. It's like double leg kick. So I'm reaching my arms down and back and my chest forward and up.

Then you look over one shoulder, look over the other shoulder, look center. As my arms go down my hip points lift up, my arms go forward, my tailbone drops. Let's add breath, inhale, scoop, reach your arms down and back. Hold your breath, look over one shoulder, look over your other shoulder, look center, exhale, reach your arms forward. Inhale, pull your hip points into your navel, drop your tailbone.

As you look, keep lifting your chest, look the other direction, look center, exhale, return. Now find your inner Titanic. My arms go down and back, my chest goes forward. This is your double leg kick, right? Hold your breath, look over one shoulder, look over the other shoulder, look center, exhale.

Scoop your powerhouse back as your arms go forward. Relax the tops of your shoulders as your arms go up. Feel your shoulders heavy. Feel the weight of your tailbone heavy. Lift your hip points into your navel as you circle your arms wide to the side and all the way down and you've worked out.

Thank you. Thank you for doing opposition with me. Next week, we are focusing on hugging your belly line. So I hope you'll be back. I hope you have found these classes valuable to you, and valuable to your practice.

Thank you and I will see you next week, 8:30 Pacific time, 11:30 Eastern time. Thank you very much.