New Beginnings

Happy New Year, here we are again, another year has gone by and it's time to celebrate a new beginning, hopefully. So that's in my imagination, anyway, let's get moving. So what we're gonna do, I'm gonna take a minute to close my eyes and I invite you to do the same or not, you decide, but feel here the feet, find your feet in the earth and feel them pushing down into the earth grounding. And as the feet press down, feel that spine lift, create a sense of uplift through your body, maybe in your mental, emotional state as well, that's a possibility. I forget that sometimes, I forget that sometimes.

Open your eyes when you're ready and take your arms out to the side, take up a lot of space and then lift your arms over your head, let your chest lift. Reach out to the side with your arms, again, taking up space. Allow your arms as I said to come down to your sides, soften, let them fall, let your chin drop towards your chest and then just begin to roll down. And we're gonna soften our knees, we're gonna feel the weight equal over our feet, and we're gonna take our body forward. Forward, forward, forward, forward, letting any tension just flow out through the top of the head, inhale and push down into your feet, grounding yourself there on in the connection to the earth, roll through your spine.

Stand all the way up tall. Lift your eyes, lift your arms, reach overhead. So I'm imagining here, like scooping up some gratitude and open wide and soften, and take the head and take the body forward. So just a moment to let go of anything that is not important in this moment. Probably a lot of things aren't important in this moment.

And then push down with your feet, lift up through the center of your body, articulating your way back up to a standing position. We're gonna do that one more time, taking the arms out, scooping up gratitude, lifting the spine, lifting the chest, taking the arms wide, reach and then soften and then take the head, and as we go down, we allow the arms to hang, we allow the head to be heavy. We take one more moment to let go of tension, distraction, and commit here just to being in our body for the next little while and then push down with your feet so there's grounding there, and then there's lightning and there's extension. There's a moment of reaching, finding a nice little bit of extension through the spine. Take your right arm down, press into the right thigh with your right arm and reach your left arm first up.

And then as your right arm slides down your right thigh lean and then stand back up, taking the right arm back up, take the left arm down, press the left arm into the side of your thigh and reach up and over with your spine. And then lift your spine, lifting the left arm back up, take the right arm down again, fly the right arm down the side of the thigh, pressing into the thigh with the arm. Now take the left arm and reach it forward. Reach it all the way around down towards that right arm and then back around to the side and then stand. And as you stand, let the right arm come up, take the left arm down, reach the left arm down, the side of the left thigh, take that upper arm and reach it around.

So you're taking rotation, taking a stretch through the body, take the arm back around, come all the way up, both arms, overhead, and then open the arms out to the side for the very last time in this moment and bring them down. And as you do, we'll come down onto the mat. Positioning the feet so that they're lined up with the sitting bones, taking a minute, takes me a minute to find my sitting bones, take the hands behind the thighs. So with the hands behind the thighs, let's draw back against the backside of the thighs like you're pulling your thighs toward you, perhaps lift your chest, lift your eyes, and then return to a straight body and begin tucking the tail under. As you roll back towards the mat, we're gonna allow the arms to straighten, we're gonna try and feel centered in the spine.

That is a particularly difficult challenge for me these days, centering in my spine and centering in general, open the arms out to the side, close the arms back, take a breath in, lift up, holding on any moment. I'm gonna hold on pretty strongly for lack of a better adjective, lift the chest, take the body to straight, flex the spine, round the spine. As you round your low spine, notice that the shoulders don't have to round, they can stay open and then we roll back. And what I'm doing is I'm letting my arms slide down the outsides of my thighs we're gonna take the arms out to the side. Wide, wide expansion, contraction, and lift.

Shoulders come over the pelvis, lift the spine, lift the chest one more time, come to straight, go into flection, go back, bringing your attention to the details of your movement. Finding the idea that there is possibility for expansion as the arms open, there is possibility for contraction as the arms close, there is possibility for expansion and contraction all the time. We just have to choose which suits us better, expansion or contraction or both, lift the chest last time, come back to straight, roll back, allowing the arms to straighten. And then this time I'm just gonna take it all the way down and as you come down onto the mat, split the arms down, scooch the pelvis towards the feet, put the head down onto the mat, preparing for some bridging. So once again, we pay attention to the weight of the feet into the mat or into the earth and then we roll up, lifting the pelvis up, rolling through the spine, filling the arms, reach forward and feeling the head, reach backwards, inhale.

And then we start going down, softening throat, softening mid back, softening lower mid back, working through the lowest part of the spine, dropping the tail all the way down and inhale. Pressing down with the feet, lifting up with the spine, articulating through into a straight line and inhale and exhale to roll down, feeling the weight of the arms soft on the mat. The weight of the head soft on the mat, remembering that sensation or quality of sensation as easily created, softening sensation as is as easily created as contraction, heaviness. What are you looking for in your practice? I'll let you decide, lifting the hips and lowering the spine.

Starting out a new year, setting an intention perhaps, and lift up, last one. From there we go down, nice and simple. Take the arms off the mat, reach them over your head, take them out to the side, feeling the rotation of the shoulder blades against the ground, against the mat. And then you can either leave them in the T. I'm gonna bend mine and wrap around my mat, lifting one leg, lifting the other leg, gluing the knees together for the spine twist, taking the knees in one direction on the inhale and back to center.

And taking the legs the other direction on the inhale, mobilizing the low back, mobilizing the whole back and center and inhale. Reaching out with the opposite arm and exhale, center and inhale, and exhale, center. We're gonna do just a couple more to each side, feeling the quality of contraction, the quality of connection is maybe a better word and center. The depth of connection to the center of the body and center. We do one more to each side, inhale and exhale and inhale and exhale.

And as you arrive back into the center, place one leg down, place the other leg down. Bring the legs and the feet together, reach your hands behind your head, press down through your feet, pull back with your heels, lift your head and chest, curling up into a chest lift position, trying to navigate the imprinting of that lower spine into the ground and then lay down. And as you lay down, do so with intention, with focus, with connection and lift, exhale. As you press down into the feet, you could also create a sensation in your imagination like you're trying to pick your feet up at the same time. Won't see any movement, nothing happens, but just that idea and down, might help you feel more sensation, more connected to the center of your body, it works for me.

If doesn't work for you, you can certainly let that go. I mean, we all make our own choices, lifting, heavy, head into the hands, and then you could pull back on your skull, stretching through the neck of the spine lays down, longer than it was last time. And two more, lifting up, pressing down with the feet, maybe you'll try and float those sticky feet and down. Last one, lifting up. From here, we're gonna take the hands behind the thighs, we're gonna bend the arms and just recommit to that shape.

Find your best shape, your best position, let go. Take your arms up, back behind your head and rotate in one direction and rotate to center and lift and rotate into the other direction. Staying lifted above that bottom shoulder blade and center and rotate the elbow, stay still. The head stays heavy in the hands and rotate and center. And lift as you take yourself into rotation, and center.

And as you rotate, keep trying to lift up off that bottom shoulder blade, and center. We have one more to go, my friends, we go over, noticing that the pelvis stays very still as that upper spine is moving and over and center. And in the center, take your arms forward and with your arms forward, take one leg straight and with your arms forward, take your other leg straight. And now keep the position of your torso, as you reach your arms up, take your arms back, take your head back, take your arms out to the side. So there's expansion possibility.

Again, collect your head, reach for your feet. And now from here, lift your spine, reaching the arms parallel to the floor, bringing the shoulders over the pelvis and then lift your spine, let your arms follow along or come along for the ride, open out to the side expansion, reach forwards, connection, roll back. So words like expansion and connection are very relevant to our Pilates practice, arms first, then head, then take the arms around, reach forwards and lift. So expansion, connection, relevant to our Pilates practice, but also relevant to our experience in the world, right? My imagination anyway, open your chest, open your arms, take your arms forward and around your spine and roll back, allowing each moment, each movement to just become the next thing.

Each movement, arms reach, head and chest come up, body comes up. Each piece of movement connects into the next piece of movement. So it flows, floats, take your arms out to the side, take your arms forward. We're gonna do this one more time. Roll back, establishing the chest lift shape position, taking the arms, keeping the height of the trunk, take the spine, take the arms around, bring the head up, roll up.

Can you find the sensation of floating as you reach up with your spine and reach up with your arms, then take your arms to the side and flex your feet. And we're gonna twist, so we go one direction and center and the other direction and center. So it's probably not super visible, but there's a twist and then a little bit further, so like a double twist, but it's like less of a balance and more of just going as far as I can and I'm trying to go further. I don't know if you can see it on the camera, but my legs are trembling. So if you're working hard, know that you're not alone and lift as you rotate and center, and lift as you rotate, keeping the arms straight across and lift as you rotate, and center, and lift as you rotate and one more.

And lift as you rotate and center, and lift as you rotate and center. Now go back to the first side, put the hand that's behind you down. Bend that arm and reach up over the top of you with the arm that's on the top. Push with that bottom arm, float back up and return to center and then rotate. The back hand goes down, the upper arm reaches up and back.

With the arm that's on the mat, push, float, suspend, and center and rotate and reach up and back and float, and center. One more time, rotate, hand reach up and back, float and come back to center. And as you arrive in the center, put your hands behind you and bend your knees, creating a straight back, feeling connection to the mid back area. Push down with your feet, lift your pelvis just off the mat and then roll, articulate through the spine. Lift up until you've created a straight line from your knees to your shoulders, and then keep pushing the mat away with your arms as you roll through your spine, coming back into that straight line again.

Staying lifted out of the shoulders, push down with your feet, articulate your spine. See that the knees, feel that the knees fades, so you just parallel, just lined up with the hips. Nice connection to the back of the legs here to open up the front of the legs and then roll down, down, down, down, down, down, returning to a straight back. One more time, go up. Can you feel the quality of weight over your feet?

Can you feel the connection to the center of your body? Place your pelvis down, step your feet together, round your spine and reach for your feet, drawing in, lifting the feet. And we're gonna roll back and balance and back, awareness, simplicity of movement, connection. Let's do two more. Back, squeezing the knees together, keeping the shape and left and back, and left.

Take a hold of your ankles, stir at your legs and bend and as your legs straighten or go towards straight, lift your spine and bend and lift your spine. And bend just to parallel now, take the hands off the feet, roll down, control, control, control, control, control, control, hands on the knees, double leg stretch, reach out and around and inhale. Here's another moment of expansion and connection and expansion, now the connection doesn't go away when the expansion happens, but they exist side by side, in the same moment, reaching out, keeping a low spine connected to the mat. Using the arms as they come to the knees to maximize the connection to the center of the body, to maximize the commitment to the shape, to and around and one and around, both hands to the right knee, left leg goes forward and we change. And as you change from side to side, you feel the one, the straight leg reaching long and you feel that bent knee come just pass that hip joint and you watch or think about the pelvis and how still it can be.

As you change from side to side, can pull down and wide and with the elbows, as your hands connect to your knee. We're gonna do four more. Upper body stays still three, three, two, and two and one and one. Please bend both of your knees. Please take your hands behind your head, stretch one leg long again.

I'm taking my right leg out straight and we're rotating to the bent knee and change, keeping the feet reaching on the same vertical line. So touching an imaginary point out on the horizon, keeping them consistently reaching or/and bending simultaneously, let them pass by one another actively. Last three, three, last two, two, one more. Bend both of your knees into your body. Put your head down, put your arms down, stretch your legs out, lift your legs up.

Reverse curl your body, so your legs come over your body, parallel to the ground, flex your feet, open your feet. Perhaps your legs will lower, perhaps they won't, up to you and then roll, reaching out through the lengths, opening through the spine, keeping the arms active, pelvis touches feet point, legs go down, touch together and lift and reverse curl. Control, feel supported, through all the movements, supported in your movement, supported in your life and go down. And take the legs and lift them and go over and open and down and roll, and take the legs and lift the legs, this is our last one, we take it over. Even in this upside down shade, can you feel the connection, the commitment to the focus of the center of the body.

Roll down through the spine, take the legs down together, bend your knees, lift your head. We're gonna get up the way we got down. Can we hold the leg still? As we lift the body up, can we take once again the ankles, and stretch the legs and bend, and stretch the legs and connecting to the center, and stretch the legs, take them apart. Can you hold yourself in this shape and let go and take the legs and lift the body and inhale and take the head down, round through the spine, reaching out through the feet.

And then as we lift back up, creating ease of movement, ease of articulation in the spine, letting the head lift last and going again, round and down, reaching out through the feet and inhale and lifting up, rolling, one more like that. Go forward, drawing back through the center of the body to create support. Notice maybe there's more freedom every time, more freedom every time if you look for it, more freedom all the time if you look for it, if you're open to it, exploring the range, round forward, take the arms up, follow the arms with the spine taking your spine up into extension. Take the arms out to the side, bring the body upright and the arms come back together and roll down. Take the spine out, finding a nice flat spine back extension there, take the arms out to the side, expanding through your wings.

Sit up all the way, arms come forward, again around and reach out, always creating support through the center of the body. As we move the spine through space, one more, reaching, opening, coming up. This time round down, this time go back to extension. Now from here, take the left hand to the mat in between your legs. Take the right arm, reach all the way around behind you.

Reach all the way back, lift the left arm. Take the right arm down, take that left arm and reach around behind you, pulling yourself further into extension. Come back up, back to center and go left arm, reaching up around and to the back, up, around and find your center position and right arm and up, around and to the back and up and center. One more time in each direction left arm, reach around, reach around and back. I don't know about you, but this makes me feel really happy.

And that's a blessing, happiness, and back come all the way up. Take your arms out to the side, slide your feet together. Point your feet, reach all the way down over your legs. So full, full stretch forward as far as you can go, it doesn't look like much in this body, but I'm trying go all the way down, onto the mat. And once you arrive, turn to your side, coming down into the arm, lining the body up straight, soft with the hand on the mat and take the legs out and down, and out and down.

And three, working through the center of the body, committing all the time to being our best, doing our best. That's another possibility in life, not just Pilates, do your best, lift your legs, separate your legs into a scissor shape and go pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center, stabilizing in the center of the body. Four, in my imagination is our count here, and five. Now we come to the center, take the top leg back, the bottom leg forward and lift both legs up and down. And up, and down, keeping the gaze soft, the next soft, last two and down.

And last one and take the legs down, bend to the bottom knee, take your arm and your leg, the upper arm and the upper leg away from one another in space. Come back out to the side with that leg, reach down and out, and down and out. And down, very simple, can you find work in the center of your body here, last two and up, last one, and up, take your leg to the front of you, take it down, take it up, bring it around behind you and down. And lift, suspend and then get heavy and suspend and then get heavy and suspend and then get heavy and suspend and then get heavy, just two more times up, around and down, keeping the spine stable up, around and back. One more time up, around and down and up, around and back, and then bend that knee, take a hold of your ankle.

Pull back on the thigh. So coming into a quad stretch, and then what I want us to do is I want us to push into the hand with the foot and allow your spine to start extending, extending, extending, extending, extending any amounts, and then bring the leg around. And sit up and bring the knee into the chest. If you're like me, stretching is important, hugging that knee in, taking a moment to see if there's any possibility of more spinal lifting, more ease in the spine, more heaviness in the pelvis, and then take that leg around to the side. Lift the opposite arm and side bend, over, over, over, over, over, and then up and over, over, over, over, over, over, and float.

And over, over, over, this time we're gonna let the arm come onto the head. We're gonna bend that elbow and let the weight of the arm take us a little further. We're gonna stretch the arm, increasing the stretch to the side of the body. At the same time, we're gonna come all the way up and then the arm can come down, right? Just gonna take the legs around to the opposite side of the mat.

One more time, take your spine all the way forward into that stretch and then take your body down, reaching through the legs, reaching through the arms, controlling your way down and then turning to the side, lining the body up straight. So with the body aligned straight, and the head softly resting on the arm, we take the legs out and up and down. And out and up, and down, and out and up, working through the center of the body, last two times, out and up, and down, last time out and up, hold it up. Make a scissor shape with your legs, top leg back, bottom leg forward, and pull, pull center, and pull, pull center. Happy New Year.

And pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center and stay stable in the spine. Last time, pull, pull, center and pull, pull, center and scissor again, top leg back, bottom leg forward and now both legs go up and down and up, and down, and up, and down, and two, and down and one and all the way down. We take the bottom knee into a bent position, take the top arm and the top leg, and we reach them away from one another in space. We come back to the side with the leg and we take it out and down, not too high, and more long. Could you imagine that you're increasing the length of your body with your leg and down last two times, out nice and simple and down last time, out.

Now, take your leg to the front, go down, float and get heavy and float and get heavy and float and get heavy, quality of sensation, quality of connection, two more like that. Please forgive me if my accounting skills are off or lacking, or anything, I'm a human with flaws, just like everyone else. Here we go all the way to the back. Bend your knee, take a hold of your foot with your hand, pull that side back so it's level or slightly behind the pelvis. The knee slightly behind the pelvis.

Knee is lined up with the pelvis and then push into your hand with your foot. Like in my imagination, it's kind of like a sideline or rocking shape. Take the stretch, we let the spine extend and then we come back, we bring the leg around. We bring the knee into the chest. Hug it in, take time to notice.

What is the spine doing? What are the hips doing? Are they grabbing or can they soften? Can you use your arms a little to give yourself more stretch if you're open to that or wanting that, and then bring the leg around to the side, take the opposite arm up, side bend. I'll use my hand that's holding my bottom thigh to pull.

You can join me in that endeavor or not. And then up and lean. Maybe you'll go a little further, or maybe there's capacity for more movement, more stretch, more growth, I don't know, I hope that for me. And go a last one. Let that arm rest against the head, if it feels tight in your shoulder, just let it come a little forward.

Bend your arm, lean in, reach out, come all the way up. Take the arm down, we're gonna come onto our hands and knees. Feel the connection of the hands to the ground, to the mat. Step one foot back, step the other foot back. Finding a plank position.

Lift your pelvis, press down through your heels. Lift your heels, roll the spine forward. Bend your elbows, straighten your arms, lift your pelvis, you're welcome. Lift your heels, roll through the spine. Bend your arms, straighten your arms, lift your pelvis.

Lift your heels, roll the spine. How many you say, it's a surprise. And lift your pelvis, two more. Oh, oh, I just gave it away, oops. Roll through, bend, press and lift, last time.

Heels, roll through, bend, press, take your knees down. Take your legs out straight. Take your head to the one side, hands behind your back, lifting the legs up, we take the heels in. So bend one, bend two, bend three, and stretch, expand. Feel, even though your fingers are pulling together, could you try pull them apart at the same time?

That feels good to me. And then head the other way, pull one, pull two, pull three and reach. And pull one, pull two, elbows low, three, and reach. And bend one, stability, two, control and reach. We're gonna repeat that twice more.

Bend, two, three and reach. And bend, two, three, and reach. Separate your arms, bring your arms over your head and inhale, two, three, four, five, swimming and inhale. Two, three, four, five stability. Inhale, two, three, four, five, ease.

Inhale, two, three, connection. Last time, lower your legs, put your arms down, press up. Slide your knees in, sit back towards your feet. Taking a stretch through the shoulders, through the spine, allowing your eyes to soften, your spine to soften, bringing awareness to your breath. And with that, bring your body up.

So allowing your arms to glide along the mat as your pelvis leads your feet, the arms leave the mat, the body comes up. Just like you were finding connection to your feet, can you find that connection, even though your feet are behind you, so you find connection to your knees, take your arms out to the side. As you reach forward, take your pelvis back towards your feet, suspend. As your hips come up, take your arms down, out to the side and round and reach, one more time. Arms come down, hips go forward, arms come out to the side and round and reach.

This time going back, going back, keep reaching out through your arms, like you're reaching for something that you really, really, really, really desire. There's plenty of things that I'm desiring in this moment. Hips go all the way down, spine comes all the way up. And then just pause here, allowing the arms to feel soft and heavy. Can they feel soft and heavy simultaneously?

I invite you to close your eyes, or if you don't wanna close your eyes, then soften your gaze. And if you have a vivid imagination, you can hear with me the waves, crashing in the background, and then we're just gonna inhale. Fill up, oxygen, energy, gratitude, and exhale, release, softening, ease, and inhale, expand, oxygen, energy, gratitude, and exhale, soften, release, ease. That is my wish for us all in the coming year, gratitude, energy, ease and release, and of course, oxygen.