Gentle Strength Mat

Hi. I'm Ashley, and welcome to meet yourself on the mat. This is a postnatal class to work your entire body after baby in less than 15 minutes. We're gonna start lying on your back. Knees bent at a ninety degree angle for a hundred without anything, but the breath. Take an inhale, breathing into your fingers on each side. And then taking an exhale, feeling your ribs knit together as your belly button deepens towards your spine, inhale, and exhale.

So reconnecting to our breath, getting it more into the belly and out of the chest. Getting that 360 degree inhalation and exhalation cinching the ribs. So keep breathing as I keep talking a little bit about how we wanna keep the pelvis the same as your exhaling. So not crunching the back to the mat, but inhaling ribs expand. It might feel hard to open the side, to open the back, but feel your rib cage pushing back into the mat as you inhale, like you're breathing through a straw.

And exhale through that straw. 2 more breaths. Inhale. Bringing everything together. One more time. Inhale. And exhale.

Just feeling how with that deep exhalation, we can get the transverse abdominals kicked back in to give us that core support. Arms press down by your side for a little tabletop into bridge. Bring your right leg to tabletop, your left leg to tabletop, your right leg down, your left leg down, lift your hips, and then roll through your spine one vertebra at a time. Now, you'll bring your left leg up right leg up, left leg down, right leg down, hips lift, and articulating through your spine, taking more time to go down than any of the other parts. So keep moving through this one leg and the other leg challenge that as you bring your legs to tabletop, again, you're not changing that space between your low back and the mat. As you roll down, you can really feel the space and then let it breathe that low back connection left leg. Right leg. We can move a little faster now that it's in our body.

Get those hamstrings and glutes active and roll through. Right leg and left leg and right leg and left hips lift and press your arms, press your head into the mat, press your heels into the mat. Left leg. Right leg, left leg down. No movement of the pelvis, and now lots of movement of the pelvis. Let's do one more each way. So this is right.

Left right. Left hips, lift, and hips roll down, then we've got left, right, left, right, hips, lift, and rolling down. We're gonna do a little tree. Prep. So hug your right knee into your chest. Stretch that leg as straight as it can go and bend pull the knee into the chest. 2, and bend one more time. 3.

Now keep that leg straight for some lateral side lifts. Press your arms down. Open your right leg to the side as far as you feel in control and that you can keep your left side anchored. Just five of these. So this is 2. If you need a little assistance, you can always keep that hand there. But otherwise, you're pressing everything into the mat to create the stability as you find that adductor and lift and all the while breathing and up hug that knee in after 5.

And we'll switch sides. So left me into the chest. Stretch that leg to the ceiling and bend and stretch. And one more time, leg is staying up. Arms push as you open and lift.

Stretch that leg out, but keep your opposite side down. We're not letting that leg pull us open. So anchor and lift 2 more and up. One more, and lift, hug the knee in. Use that leg to rock yourself up to sit.

We're coming over to a child's pose. So toes at the back edge of the mat. Arms reach long. Take a moment to round your back, then look forward for a roll down. Stuck your fingers a few, inches forward, and then we're gonna lower the body from knees thighs, hips, belly, chest, and head.

Now in one piece, we're pushing back into that child's pose again. So we're finding articulation on the way down, lowering abs pulled tight. You've got that exhale core sitting of the waist. Head comes to the mat last. And then in one piece from knee to top of the head, push back and round.

2 more times, then we'll stay at the bottom. So pull your chest through your arms, just my thighs touching, then my hips, my upper back has to take over and support that. And my low abs are deepening in as much as we can find them at this moment. To keep us nice and lifted out of the low back. This time, we're gonna drag the body down, and we'll stay at the bottom.

A little bit of swan and an isometric stretch. So prop yourself up onto your elbows. You're making a number 11 with your forearms, and then just get active here. So pulling the shoulder blades down the back, pulling the abs in as you push your hips and legs down, and feeling that you're pulling your chest forward You could slide 2 more inches off that mat shooting forward, looking forward, and that's a challenge that we're gonna reach one arm forward, and back, and the other arm trying again to keep weight even in the hips to keep balance in the body, even though we wanna shift everything over. Just one more each side and reach and in, and then you can lower down and push yourself back to one more child's pose.

Great. Let's come into all fours for a knee hover. So palms under your shoulders, knees under your hips curl the toes under, and let's find that same breath we had in our breathing hundreds. So inhaling 3 sixty degrees, And on your exhale, as you cinch everything and hover the knees and hold, push all that air out as your knees lower inhale. And as you exhale, push and hover. And inhale.

Push through the arms. Spread the shoulder blades apart and hold as you push the air out to feel that deep abdominal connection. Inhale. And exhale push. Let's do one more, and we're gonna add a little bit of knee movement. If this is feeling good in your body, it should exhale.

And we're gonna open close. 2. 10 times 3, and 4. You can always do 5, and then take a break and do 5 more, 6, 7 abs pull tight. Birth pushes back and around 3, 60 degrees, last two. And one and lower the knees down. Give yourself a little moment.

So from child's pose coming back into all fours for some rotations. Bring your left leg outside your left hand. Press into your right hand to lift your left arm to the ceiling and rotate your spine. Come back down to all fours and pushing into the hands, bring your left leg back. Now, the right leg is going outside the right hand. Rotate the spine around bring the hands back pushing in to find that abdominal connection as you push.

Let's go. We get left hand outside. Feel your rib cage rotating around your spine. Press into both hands and leg comes back. Right leg outside, right arm to the ceiling as you rotate spiraling the body away from the hips, ribs are reaching to the ceiling. And down, left leg back, right leg forward.

And rotate. If it feels good to press your hips forward a little bit, you're welcome to do that, getting a little bit more of a hip flexor stretch and rotate, and down, and back, and open, and rotate, and down. And back. We're coming to a kneeling position for some side bending. Find yourself in the middle of your mat. Shut your left leg out to the side.

Have your pelvis over your right leg. Left hand can support you on your left thigh and right arm to the ceiling. We're bending over. You can let your left hand slide on your left leg, and then come back up. Use your right glute to keep you right on top of your right knee. You can also press into this hand if you need a little more support and just go where you feel in control.

One more time bending over and lifting from those obliques, reaching out and over now to take the counter stretch and get into a little bit of elbow to knee activation through those obliques. If you need a little higher, you can always put something under your hand to lift you up if this is feeling kind of crunched. Lengthening out now my weight is in my right knee and my right hand. My left elbow and knee are gonna touch for 8 and reach and 7. Breathing. I like to exhale as I come in 6.

Inhale, exhale 5. Inhale, exhale, 4. And 3. Pulling it in and opening it out. 2. Getting that spinal flexion and extension 1 and reach coming on up from your sides and then switching sides. So right leg is out. Your weight is over your left knee.

This is like, it's just a little kickstand, right hand on your leg. Left arm to the ceiling. And bending over into this nice stretch. Use that hand to support you as much as you need. So if you keep the elbow a little bent, it's gonna give you a little more to push and to help you up, or let it slide towards your ankle.

And then lifting, reaching into your counter stretch, finding that stability of pushing into the left hand, left knee, and pull the right knee and elbow together, and open, and together, and open. In and out 8 times 4, and 5, and lengthen, and 6, and reach, and 7. And 8 and stretch coming up, and we're coming to standing now. We're coming up to standing to finish with a standing cat cow. So any face any which way take your arms to the ceiling for a little moment of stretch, tuck chin to chest, and round forward, pressing your hands into your thighs to create this nice c shape in the spine. So it's like your head and your tailbone are trying to come together and empty all your air.

Then inhale. Push into your hands to stick your tailbone out and your chest forward.chin forward even eyes up. Exhale and round. So finding all this movement of the spine our body is so disoriented as we grow a baby, and then we have to kind of bring it back to a new normal, and we don't know where we're at. So just starting to connect where my tight where do I feel strong? Where do I want to get stronger?

Exhale as you round. Inhale as you look forward. This time when you round, press into your hands continue to roll up and unfold your spine. And hopefully you feel a little more connected to your body and head a moment for yourself. Thank you.