Upper Body Magic Circle

Okay. So we're just going to do a nice quick upper body workout or a mini class using our magic circle. And what I want us to start with first, you just hold onto it loosely with your arms and just raise and lower your shoulders naturally a few times. So take a nice easy inhale. Exhale, nothing specific here. Just lift and lower. Okay. I'm just gonna roll the shoulders few times in each direction. You may hear and feel some little crunchy things in your shoulder joints.

Don't judge anything, just let it happen. And that's our life happenings, maybe history and your shoulders. And what I want to work on though with the circle today is alignment but also strength and awareness around the shoulder girdle. And I find the magic circle nice and helpful for that. So we're all like us. To start is open hand out on the outsides of the ring, got the legs squeeze together. Just a nice easy reach forward of the chest, shoulder level, and then lowering down. And then the lift, what I'm thinking about on my back is that my shoulder blades are wide, but I'm not uh, too far forward this way with them wide.

So they're wide and down and lower. So we'll take it four more times up. It's feeling the rhythm of lifting the arm and dropping the shoulder blades in contrast to lifting the arm and there's our four adding to that inhale as we bring it to the front. Just stay there. So this next one, the chest pole, bending the elbows, reaching the elbows nice and wide to the right and left and pulling the ring toward my chest. I'm going to breathe in there. Okay. And then exhale as you reach it straight ahead. Doing these eight times, inhale to the chest as if that inhale would elevate my spine.

I'm thinking more extension. Axially meaning up and inhale, being careful not to push the ribs forward to meet the ring. So definitely not that whole thing happening. Trying to feel more stable through the ribs and really working the ball and socket in the shoulder. I'm not pushing on the ring, I'm just simply holding it. One more time. Inhale and exhale for.

So we're going to take the whole pattern and breathing in [inaudible] and lower eight times and lift. Bring it into the chest and reach to feeling the deltoids, feeling the lats muscles on the side of the body, even the front of the obe leaks in and reach and form more times. Lifting to the chest, front and long, making sure not to lock the elbows yet the arms are getting straight and to more. Reach to the chest. Lengthen and down and last one, lift and in and reach and lower. Okay, now change by feet, foot position, just slightly little external rotation and changing my hand grip as well.

Moving my thumb to the inside of the ring. I'm going to do a larger range of motion and then as it reached the ring forward going higher now toward the top of my head or above my head, this for me, very important to keep sinking my shoulder blades down but at the same time in the front bringing my rib muscles in and my sternum up and then the long arms to come down. Full breath [inaudible] so although this is arm and shoulder focus, the abdominal muscles are very active. The spinal extensors, very active. I've been going two more times this full range, dropping the shoulders to float the arms up and reaching long to come down and last one reach and lift. I'm going to stay here actually and just try to pull the ring apart slightly. I can't do much motion.

I'm just pulling a little bit and not thinking with my hands but rather trying to widen my shoulder blades on my back. Just holding that awareness and lowering that down. All right, I'm going to move my feet again out to second position. You know a little more full body movement. Now taking the ring all the way above the head. Again, side bending, so full breath [inaudible].

I'm very much engaged with my inner thighs. I'm trying to think that there's one of these circles actually between them that I'm squeezing in against so that I'm staying anchored and supported in my lower half and all the way to center. Four more times. [inaudible] long on both sides of the waist, long on both to come up. [inaudible] almost as though I can reach farther out on my underneath side, underneath side.

That'd be my left one on this side and lift and once again up and over really enjoying the bend of my spine and center and lower, so I'm going to add into that [inaudible] side. Bending now instead of a chest pool, I'm going to do the same range with my elbows and then stretch long. Going further on that top waist, bringing all the way up full lowering down to the other side. [inaudible] over my elbows. Wide, shoulder blades, wide stretching long. I'm trying to reach a little further on that diagonal lift and lower four more [inaudible] feeling that just opposite foot right now. It's my right foot into the floor, elbows, bending. Now when I straighten my arms, I want to think of going further into my side bend going further than I was before and up.

Lower same feeling on the other side and over bending those elbows, reaching, going further, further and up. One more on each direction and [inaudible] last one, enjoying the stretch in the spine, feeling the obliques, getting stretched, lengthen and all the way up and lowering the arms down. Okay, no walk the feet back in two parallel now taking the ring to the side of my hip and I'm really at the greater trow Kantar kind of right above that bumpy ridge on the side of the thigh and putting the hand on the ring opposite hand on ribs because there's a tendency that side might translate and shift to the side. I don't want that to happen now with my working arm or this arm that's holding the ring, I want to move it into an external rotation alignment and then feel my tricep muscles pulling contracting toward my lats and I'm just going to do a nice easy press release. And this hand is uh, important for me so that I don't shift again. That's what that could end up looking like.

And going back into thinking of being tall, feeling tall through my spine and my sternum, pulling in release for more [inaudible] back of the shoulder, contracting triceps toward my lats. And in last one I'm going to stay in and do a little percussive rhythm of breathing and pulsing this position. Here we go. [inaudible] growing taller and [inaudible] or three and release and the other side that's right above that bumpy ridge. Pretty good hold opposite hand on the rooms. And then once again, starting that upper arm in external rotation, feeling the shoulder down and here we go. Easy pull in, pressing in and release with control and exhale and harassed his hand. On the opposite side is also nice to feel.

You can feel your muscles contracting these oblique muscles and formal and try steps toward lattes but also rear shoulder. Last one's the low holding here. Let's percussively breathe and rhythmically move. Growing Taller. Yeah, and four, three, two and one and release.

Couple more hands behind us now. So working more directly for our triceps. I've got my thumbs hooked again in the inside edge. I'm going to go back to parallel legs and just for the moment taking the ring behind me but lengthening the arms down, down but without crowding the shoulders forward, which is very easily possible. So when we reach down it's more reaching down. But broadening the collarbone, widening the shoulders there and just reaching that down. Little release, reaching down couple more and that is going to precede the tricep press or the chest expansion. So holding here, let's breed ticket ready. One is to exhale.

Remove the ring back and wards you moving it back and wards you. Now feel free to play with the hand position. I just moved my thumb to the outside, which is for me a little more challenging because I can't default and tug on that thumb. So really got to find those tricep muscles. My rear shoulders, trying to spoke my fingers wide and let's hold here. Try to squeeze it now and press release per rs.

Not much happens. A couple more. Press release and press hold. Percussive reading, pulsing up [inaudible] without dropping the sternum war chest for [inaudible] and two and one and down last one, going back out to second position with the legs, bringing my hands back out to the outside edges for just a moment for spine twist or just a standing rotation. Let's breathe here to the left or right. Exhale. Now I want to aim my nose for the center of that ring. So if I'm turning my torso, I don't want to right now include my arms going too far, so it's more of a modest rotation. Hip can't come along.

We want that hip to stay back and then find it on the other side. So really it's still waste dropping the shoulders and come center. [inaudible] inner thighs helping me stay stable in my lower half and twist. And who is, once again, I'm going to go back into the little chest pool. So I have twist Paul and reach back to the center.

[inaudible] [inaudible] and so with as if I'm pulling up taller. Each time that ring comes toward the body, pull up taller and reach for more twist, lift, feeling that energy through the arms. Pull really feeling muscles in my back to west. Lengthen and Marie. One more and twist. Pull in, reach and center and just simply lower your ring.

Walking your feet in. Thank you.