Gratitude In Motion Reformer

Hi, everyone. Amy Haven's here for a moving meditation reformer session or experience. It's not really a workout. There'll be Pilates in here, but I wanted to bring in, kind of gratitude and motion and really just keeping our bodies moving. I love Fasha influence of things. And it what that means to me in the class is or this session is continual movement flow, some swaying. You've seen me do this before. Sometimes with a little compressive force, think that's positive compression, lots of extension and reach, and a lot of breath. Okay.

So we're gonna get started with our breath. So I want you to enjoy yourself. Go on a little journey here. And hands on your rib cage, the sides of the ribs, and give yourself a little bit of press in with your hands. That feedback, right, so that we breathe in from inside the walls of the ribs and expand out. Take that breath in through the nose.

And little light press with your hands to feel the change of the ribs. We'll do a couple of those. We want a lot of articulation in these rib bones, the joints of the spine and exhale close. At least one more. Nice breath in.

Can you expand to the back just as much as the side? And Alright. We're gonna just reach the hands down and start to circle your fingers and your wrists. And move your toes and your feet a little bit. So we're gonna go distal and come into some proximal. K?

And any movement that feels good for you. And that might be too vague and not descriptive enough, but make it your movement and your dance kind of. Okay. Bend your knees a little bit. And we are gonna take our arms up. Of course, a roll down is coming.

So big, inhale, exhale, and round yourself down. Let things be loose in those arm. Bend your knees, feel your c curve spine shape, and bring that spine up to a vertical position. We'll do that again. See if we can make one thing flow right into the next through this class.

As your upside down, really see what's behind you. Notice it. Bend the knees. Seeker shape and roll up. We're gonna stop at the top here and do a little lateral flexion.

Just let that arm be very heavy. And bring yourself tall other side. The lateral flexion really starts at the skull and goes down through. The back, right, and then adding a little curve to come down and roll back up. Let that alive and awaken up the side of your spine, the side of your back.

The lower back quadrant. Roll yourself back up. We'll do that each side again. Just a little reach to the side curve and rolling up. You feel the skin on the back.

It's getting some sensation aside, Ben. In a curve, and we're gonna roll up Just take your arms up. Feel what it feels like around your neck and your shoulders here. Again, those little circles of your hands. Maybe just a little sponging on the top of this shoulder and a little sponging on the top of that shoulder. And we're gonna come around to the front of the reformer.

Kering on with some of that roll down work, but continuing to waken up, woke up our body, have your fingertips right in the bar, everybody, and get close. So your thighs right against it, hands against it. Give yourself a little pressure with your hands so that you connect into your upper back. And let's get that high release. So your sternum is the high point. Read in again.

I'm gonna do that. Roll down once again, but this time adding, placing the hands on the mat. I've got my knees bent again. Right against the frame. And I want you to go out where comfortable distance inflection of your spine.

Okay. Sometimes we move into extension from here, but I'd like us to say inflection. And bring the carriage back in, We'll do it again moving the spring open. The farther you're going, lift your tummy up more. Head can be above the arms.

Okay. I want us to sway the rib cage left to write. And as you're swaying, bring the carriage back to the bumper, just slowly. Remember, Fasha likes different angles and diagonals and positions. Right? Go back out again round.

Take some breath into your lungs and expand and lengthen your diaphragm and start the sway. I want you to feel your hands pressing against the mat and let that press of the hand shift your ribs to the side. Let those ribs dance. Let that cage have some mobility. Okay.

Close the spring, bring yourself up one more of that high release. It's arch, arch, just enough. Let the arms come back. Like, you're wearing a big cape on a windy day and just take that in. Okay. And that little arm gesture starts to invite the stretch of our pictorial muscles.

So I want us all to take our foot bar all the way down. In front of the reformer. We're on a blue spring, so make that choice now. And just have a seat on your foot bar. Sitting bones right on that edge.

Where that cape again? Feel your arms are in that external rotation. And then round your spine, let your arms kind of come into internal rotation. I want you to spread your back again. Again, wear the cape.

It's okay if your your body wants to arch up, mine usually does there. And then we're gonna flex. Okay. Now hands back on the mat. Externally rotate your upper arms, everybody. Slowly stretch the spring.

You can do it with an extension of your spine, or you can do it with a little bit of flexion. This is for your body. I'm gonna externally rotate my armbands and lift that sternum. I'm gonna do it again. And this time, seeing a little more extension of my spine.

I'm not leaning too heavily on the elbows. I'm trying to stretch the width of the pecs. And come back in. Lift your hands off the mat. Round yourself forward.

And just let the skin of your back get a big stretch. Let's do that again. So just rolling yourself up. If you need to look to put your hands there, that's also fine. Take a nice breath through the nose.

And I like afflection as I go back a little bit of curl of my tailbone. Try to think of the arm bones going back. And coming forward. Round yourself forward. Now here's something fun.

I want you to kind of windmill your arms So I've just taken that windmill arm, and I want us to do the single arm pec stretch. So looking out over the arm, is in external rotation. You don't have to go far. Maybe even placing your fingers on your sternum, right, that to your armpit. That's what we're trying to broaden.

It's not so much about the arm. It's the chest into the arm. And coming back up. Let's windmill that arm up. Collect that air and over.

The other arm sweeps. And rotate, place a hand. Again, I like to put my fingers on my sternum and tap and then just feel that intention over to the underarm. The pectoral muscle is quite big. You know, that's across your chest. Needs a good breath.

We'll do each arm again circle. Just make it flow. Let's feel that elongation. Little windmill arm. And the other side, once again, should feel good.

Let some breath come in. And come all the way up, everybody, and we'll come over those legs. And again, you're just gonna kind of wiggle those ribs. Bring yourself up, we get to add some spring onto our setting now. So I want you to add a red take off the blue. And an Eve's lunge series.

Okay? So I'll start on the side closest to you. And with this road, the hip stretch, we gotta do it differently. So I want you to take your normal Eve's lunge, what you do. But take the pelvis of the long leg and rotate it forward. It puts me down on my elbow and rotate your ribs Can you see your back foot? That would be what I'd like you to try to get to, come out of your spiral, and come back in.

Couple more times. Really full. Visualize a spiral. Visualize a spiral. Put that through your head to your tail and feet to head and coming all the way in.

And, again, last one on this side. You can go farther out. That's fine. Let the pelvis be a spiral. I want you to feel this inner line of your waistline.

Make some sense for me to stretch that back. And coming all the way in. Other side, we'll walk around the front of the reformer. Notice how that side feels after adding that element of rotation, I think you'll feel differently than just the same plane of motion. Here we go.

Coming down. It's this hip that rotates forward. Oh, yeah. Allows my rib cage to spiral. My neck and eyes to spiral. Coming out and rolling all the way forward.

And, again, just moving consistently stretch and open Let that hip rotate forward the whole pelvis. Open the space from your ribs and your hip. Feel free to reach the spring longer coming back in. My spring is talking to me. I love that. And last one here, that lovely, broad stretch, and rotate Can you see that back foot? That would be my goal for us.

And bring that carriage all the way in everybody. Okay. We're gonna stretch our lats and get more ruby. I'm coming around the front again. We're still on a red spring.

Have a seat somewhat in the middle of your mat carriage path. Inside hand on the bar. Don't worry about where your feet and knees go. They may end up doing something like that. It's fine. Take this hand and arm and side bend stretch.

Okay. Again, and through your ribs. Right? Rotate this top hand, I want you to put on the sidebar and hold it. The foot bar hand I want you to push with it, side bar hand I want you to pull is to broaden the latissimus muscle on this arm here. Rather than staying static, you probably guessed it, sway the ribs. Check your breathing. Unwind, a couple more times.

So merge the side bend rotation pole with this, push with this. Open the skin of your back. Let those ribs have some dancing time. Loose some things up there. Come all the way in.

We're gonna do it one more time. Big breath. Whole, push. Sway those ribs. Hopefully, that feels really good to everybody.

Okay. Other side. So come all the way around. Hand, arm, side bend. Rotate. Hand on the bar on the outside pulls this one pushes. Reach your ribs back.

Sway that rib cage is fine. Should feel pretty luscious and good in there, and we're gonna do it 2 more times. The arm sways around. Rotate, push with the footbar hand, pull with the outside hand. Reading fully.

Find even add some spirals here with your head and your neck. Right. Anything that feels right for you, one more round? Latissimus muscles, that big broad one on her back, and it needs opening up. Let the ribs slide and glide through that tissue. Yeah.

That yummy. I think that feels really good, Linda, share it. Take off that spring, though. Alright. Here's what we get to new next. Is more trunk rotation, but no tension, no spring. You may want your head rest up.

Let your carriage glide away from the footbar end and put it about half way between the two. And then we stand close to the foot part air, the carriage end. Get your knees right up against your frame. Rest down on your elbows. Roll the carriage toward one end of the reformer.

Let your trunk rotate and the bottom arm get an outside shoulder stretch. Roll it back through the center and the other direction. So it's more rib cage trunk rotation, but now it's the side of that shoulder. Bring a little bit of Kathy Grant, queuing, listening, listening to the map. Let your ear hear the mat.

Or the top ear here, what's above? Couple more times, really generating that from the spine rotating on our axis. Wheels of the carrot so smooth. Right? It's like us, nice and smooth in our movement. Good.

And then we're gonna move on and add some spring now. Some spring for this series, let's do 3 red springs. I want us to be pretty secure at this end, head rest down, feet on the foot bar, in line with sitting bones, A little space above your shoulders and the edge of the carriage here and a pelvic curl. Just check into you what your back feels like to move through after all that swaying. And rotating.

Try one more. Breathing. Maybe your back feels more ready to do an overhead element which we're going to do. So for this, please put your hands on the shoulder posts, leg straight up to the ceiling. We're gonna breathe here.

Use your hands a little bit. We're rolling over everybody. Feel free to roll down if you want to or I thought I would bring us up into a little jackknife of your choice The legs at the hip level and roll yourself down. You can take your legs down if you want to. We'll do it again.

Take your breath. Exhale roll yourself over. Using the muscles in the back of the legs, the spine itself, taking your legs as high as you feel like you could control, flex at the hips and come back down. Let's try one more. I'm gonna move my hands just a little bit.

I'm sweating, so it's slipping. Wanna jackknife those legs a little bit more if I can. Flex at the hips and roll your spine. The bar is there for your feet. Let both knees drop to one side.

Let both knees come through the center and rock to the other side. So just to assessing into yourself. Was that rollover in Jackknife easier than usual if you don't do those elements? Maybe opening the back and different planes of movement as a preparation gives that skill more, efficiency for you. Did for me. Sharing what I know, and potential.

Alrighty. So we are then about to come up. Give yourself a hug, though. And then as we come up We don't need all this spring on. You can take off one of those reds or just leave 2 reds on your reformer. We're gonna stand up everybody.

You can bring your headrest up. Let's take a look at an inverted v. Or if you like the shape of a triangle, I was always thought that looks like a nice easy to see pyramid or triangle. Alright. Spike your sitting bones up high, reaching your sternum nice and long.

I'm starting with my right foot, whichever you want to, you can. Take that foot off the, carriage. Stretch it straight back. Turn the pelvis. Open your pelvis toward the front.

Let you kinda open that hip and bend that knee and let that foot just hang. Open that hip up. Come back around straighten the leg and spiral that leg around the front of the other leg, bend your knees. Get into little c curve. Pull it back up and step down.

We'll do the other side. So you release the first, second foot, stretch it through an parallel, arabesque, s, line, rotate the pelvis, really let your pelvis rotate, like we did in lunge today, bend the knee. See if you feel more activity in your glutes here, you probably Stretch that leg. Now you've gotta do a little bit of ab work to scoop this leg around. Tuck it next to the other and bend both knees.

Okay? We're gonna do each side a game. You may have more range to play with now so that leg goes through a parallel, arabesque. Turn the pelvis. Bend that knee and just let that leg just kind of hang and bend, open that thigh.

Now this leg, instead of crossing, you're gonna land front foot, back foot bend the knees. 2 of our single leg knee stretches. Take front foot, lift yourself, and place it back. 2nd leg. So it's a parallel arabesque first. Turning the hip.

Lift the hip open it up and let that thigh, open right in the knee bend and let it just kinda hang and soften. Now lift it, open the hip. That foot's gonna come right to the front of the carrot. You get to bend your knees. And two times, knee stretch with the single leg.

And then everybody pike it back up And just extend that spine, feel that beautiful, long line of energy through your hamstrings. Wait shift forward and place your knees down. Knees, tall knee position. Walk yourself back if you can get your heels against the pad. I'd love that against the shoulder rest, and just take the arms somewhere out. Let's do a little mini thigh stretch.

I bias to a little posterior tilt. Oh, it feels so good. And up. We should do another one. Little size stretch. So that tech stretch with the single arm we did earlier.

Prepared us for right now. So you windmill around? Size stretch and arch the back, everybody. Curve. Yes. It's okay to arch the back.

And windmill. Just come on down. Another side, right? So the other arm windmills hand lands on the shoulder block, trying to square the pelvis, rotate extend. Coming all the way out. Come back down to kind of the weird arms there.

We'll round shape And then one more, thigh stretch to even that out. Hands, maybe, on the thighs. Oh, yeah. And coming all the way up. Okay. Well, really good.

Springs can stay the same. Let's take our foot bar. We can keep it up. Feet straps are ready. Head rest. You can have up.

I'm actually gonna slide mine down. Let's come on to our back. You know what's coming. I said the word feet strands. Feed in straps are coming.

So if you're a person who likes to push the feet off the bar, try it this way today. Let's just play. So I want you to lift your thighs up, pull the straps a little bit. Yep. And place them on your feet. Say hello to the straps. They're there. I could tell there was a kinkin one before, but We had a conversation.

Now I got it. So I wanted to take the leg straight up and interlace your fingers here. Okay. A little different rather than just go right into circles. Let's activate the back of our hamstrings It's as if we're pushing the legs that way, but our arms won't let our legs go that way. We're going as if we're about to start a leg circle. Think you probably feel that.

Bend the knees, open the knees, pull the heels down and toward the sacrum. Do that just one more time, straighten. Try to sit your sit bones on the wall across from where you are. Really feel that. Breathing deeply.

So we're actively stretching our hamstrings. And then come into a little froggy place. Okay? Separate your hands and keep holding these ropes today. Open into what, if you do a yoga practice, a happy baby type of a stretch. So what that is, knees are apart, legs are apart, knees are bent, feet, relaxed, please, and just keep a hold of the straps.

Nothing should be gripping anywhere. Feel the breath. Now, like I said, at the beginning, kind of perpetual movement, I'm swaying from side to side. I'm not going so far that I'd be in jeopardy of rolling off the reformer. No. Are you? Just opening that line of the inner thigh stretch.

I love this feeling. And then hold it right in the center. Heels together. Arms by your size. Now if your head rest is up, go ahead and lower it down.

It should be down. Let's see what the back of our spine feels like at this point. Right in the hamstrings and the short spine. You're just gonna park that carriage there and just do a beautiful lift up. Bending down, keeping everything moving everybody. So just roll through.

Place the pelvis again, breathing in, stretch the legs, It's a nice moving meditation. Rolling up to the top of the shoulder blades. Bending down and rolling your spine down. Let's take it one more time. Actually, we'll do 2.

This next one, we're rolling down one side of our spine. Once you bend your knees, I don't have a preference, but just maybe bias the right side of your back. Let your knees kind of toggle to that side a little bit. All is good. Place the pelvis. And we'll do the other side of the spine.

Opening the front body. We've opened our side bodies. We're opening our back body. We're about to open our front body. Stretch those legs forward.

Once again, let's go wide. This time, hands on top of the ropes, invite a larger split or stretch. Play with the pelvis position. Okay. If it's a little bit posterior, changes in the leg area. And then if you move your pelvis more neutral.

See what you feel. There's not one right way or wrong way. There are ways we move in stretch and open and feel. So good. Bringing those legs together. Just like we stepped in, take your hands here on the straps, really feel that connection, take your feet out.

Carriage comes in, straps can come all the way down, everybody. Once again, a nice hug for yourself. And then bring ourselves up, and we're gonna load all of your springs on so that the carriage is nice and safe. And I want you to turn around. And just for right now, actually open the legs Get your pelvis to the very back edge of your carriage, hug your legs into your shoulder strap or your shoulder rests, and think of the exercise and mat class of neck pull. We'll be kind of doing a version of that here in a second.

But right now, I want you to take your hands hide your head, hinge yourself back. The bar is there. There it is. Yeah. Lean back and arch your upper back. Arch that upper back.

Flex the spine forward peel off the bar. Come over. Stretch stretch. Stretch. Deep breathe in and leaning back again. I'm using my legs to really hug those shoulder blocks.

There it is. Opening the sternum, taking an upper back that high release. Deep breath in. A little side bend of that thoracic spine. Keeping your elbows back, lift your head, neck, and chest.

Press your spine back. Flex for And everybody roll up. We're gonna do one saw each direction. Open up your arms. Is that nice, broad pack area again? Right? So then the front hand just reach to your pinky edge of your foot. This hand for me feels better down today.

Take yourself forward as much as you want, and just one on the other side. Bringing yourself up. Take your hands down. I want you to bring your legs forward. We're gonna come to this a little closer.

Take a hold of one ankle. And lift that leg up. I want us to take the hamstring stretching, flex the spine toward that leg You can rock back on your sacrum a little bit, everybody. And then come forward in, you know, energize your back, reach your sternum to the foot. Get a little glance up.

I'm gonna do it again. Pull your leg out and up and then bend the elbows and bring yourself into that deep stretch of the back of the body. And the extension. Yes. Let's do our other leg.

Bicking that leg up. His continual movement, bend the elbows, bring it toward you, flex into your spine. Moving into extension. Take a big breath. Now lift the leg kind of pull it out and then up as your elbow has been.

And reach the leg forward. Yeah. Let's do a little teaser here. You can do it. You can hold the shoulder rest. Just hold your legs.

You can hold. We can also let go. Moving meditation. Take those legs down. Turn and put your feet on the floor.

And then the feet around on the footbar headrest stays down. One more spinal articulation. Yes. Hands here. Peel yourself up.

Inhaling, exhaling, rolling down slowly right in the center of our spine. Bring your legs together. Hands can go around on the shoulder rest again. Cross an anchor, a knee over a knee, please. That same leg crossed we did earlier, that supine twist Now you've got the added element of a little heavier leg.

How far can you allow yourself to go into the stretch of this top hip. To come back, gather up in the abdominals, gesture that leg just straight up and back to the bar. 2nd leg and crossover. Keep your breath fluid. Allow the stretch to happen in the top hip here.

The spiral again through the ribs, breath, nice, and fluid. And unwinding, come right back to the center. One more hug of yourself And let's find our way just to sitting on our carriage. Check-in. Right? And I want you to turn your head.

Enter in your head. Look center. Round forward, easy, easy, easy. Take one more final deep breath in and roll yourself up. And I think you're probably all in a very light meditative state, which I hope, but you can just float yourself out Thank you for joining me for this very magical Movement class.

Thank you.