Hi, I'm Tara Stiles and today on the Yoga Solution, I'm gonna show you a nice routine
that you can do to build flexibility in your entire body and your mind too.
Let's get started.
Start sitting up nice and easy here, however you can sit comfortably.
Gently close your eyes and start to draw your attention a little bit deeper inward.
So whenever you're trying to get a little more flexible, it's great to draw your attention
on your breath, every inhale opens a bit more space, and every exhale moves you right in.
So setting a nice, big, easy pace of breath you can stay with for a little while.
And when you feel nice and settled here, we'll come onto all fours on your hands and knees.
Rest right onto your shoulders, knees right under your hips.
And then we'll come right into your Downward Dog from here.
So tucking your toes, use a big, deep inhale to lift yourself all the way up and back.
And then maybe sway a little side to side here, just to put a little bit of movement
into your body, feeling into all your corners, any creeks here, just working everything out.
And then we'll take your left hand, see if you can grab ahold of your right ankle here,
just spin your hold body around here.
Easy twist from your tailbone all the way up your back, all the way down the top of
your head, through your fingertips here.
Should feel like a really nice opening.
And same thing other side here.
Right hand grabbing ahold of the left ankle, and then just use that grip here to really
spin yourself all the way around.
It should feel really nice.
And, of course, breathing a lot.
And when you're ready, bring yourself all the way back to your middle here.
Take a big inhale, reach your right leg all the way up and back behind you, Downward Dog
Split.
Open up the hips and shoulders if that feels nice.
Make some space for the hips.
And we'll take your knee right up into your forehead, softly bring your foot between your
hands, Low Lunge.
So keeping your fingertips where they are, lift your hips all the way up and let your
torso here fold and relax over your front leg.
Breathing a whole lot into the back of your body.
And we'll visit a Warrior 3 from here, so put a little bend in your front knee, just
enough so you can start to shift your weight right on top of your standing leg.
Top of your head floating foreword, heel reaching back behind you.
And then we'll round all the way up to stand here.
So soften the knees, round your back here, give this knee a nice squeeze.
And then from here, just bring your two left fingers of your hand to your toes, bring your
right hand to the hip, maybe stay right here.
If there's a little bit more space, slowly extend your heel, go for that.
And if there' a little bit more space to bring it out to the side, go for that.
And if it's out to the side, go ahead and bring it all the way back forward.
And then we'll hug your knee into your chest, give it a good squeeze.
Point your knee down to the ground here, catch a hold of it with your hand here behind you,
just finding your balance.
So we're gonna open up the back of it here, so maybe stay right here, just start from
a really relaxed place.
If there's a little bit more space, slowly start to press your foot into your hand, lengthen
all the way up with this opposite arm, and just staying really calm and easy.
Don't worry so much about the shape of the pose -- can be all the way down here or somewhere
in between.
Just make sure you're pressing your foot into your hand and staying calm with your breath.
And when you're ready, draw the knee all the way back and give it a nice squeeze.
And we'll send the leg all the way right back behind you into your Low Lunge.
Plant your palms firmly down, and we'll step right back into your nice Downward Dog here.
Relax your head and neck and shoulders.
And we'll take a big inhale, lift your left leg all the way up and back behind you, Downward
Dog Split.
Again, open up the hips and shoulders.
And we'll take your knee right up into your forehead, softly bring your foot between your
hands, Low Lunge.
Keep the fingertips on the ground, lift your hips right up and let your torso fold over
this leg.
Breathing a lot into the back of your body.
Maybe even swaying a little side to side if that feels nice, help to loosen up any areas
that could use a little loosening.
And then we'll put a little gentle bend in your knee here.
We're gonna shift your weight right on top of your standing leg here, Warrior 3.
Top of your head floating forward, back heel floating back behind you.
And we'll round up to stand here.
So soften the knees, round your back here, give this knee a nice little squeeze.
And then we'll take the two fingers of your right hand to the right big toe, left hand
finds your hip, just finding your balance, really strong through this standing leg.
Maybe stay right here.
If there's a little bit more space, slowly extend that heel forward.
If there's a little bit more space, extend the heel out to the side.
Leg doesn't have to go all the way straight, you can always bend it in.
However it feels like you can stay easy.
And if the leg's out to side, got it all the way back forward.
And then we'll hug your knee into your chest, give it a good squeeze again.
Pulling your knee down to the ground, catch a hold of your foot behind you.
So before you move into anything, just start from a really calm, relaxed place.
Make sure there's lot of movement for you in your body.
So maybe stay right here.
If there's a little bit more space, slowly start to press your foot into your hand.
Lengthen all the way up here with this opposite arm.
And just staying nice and calm and easy.
And once you've had enough of that one, hug your knee back into your chest, give it a
good squeeze.
And we'll send the leg all the way right back behind you.
Plant your palms and we'll step right back into your nice Downward Dog.
Again, softening up the heels and head and neck and shoulders, we'll round all the way
out to your Plank Pose, nice, long wave.
So we'll come over to a Side Plank here.
Lift up your hips.
This time here, see if you can grab a hold of the toes with the fingers and see if you
can extend this leg right upward here.
If the leg doesn't go, no worries, you can always just kinda hang out in between, you
can come into a Low Tree Pose here, or maybe a Tree up on your thigh if that feels nice.
So just stay wherever you can breathe really calmly and easily.
And then once you've had enough of that one here, let go of the leg.
We'll step it all the way back here.
Open up the whole front of your body here, nice, easy, simple arch.
And just breathe a lot.
And we'll come all the way back to the middle.
Same thing on the other side here.
Lifting up the hips a bit, keeping the fingers of the left hand spread nice and wide.
So any version that you like to do, it can be a regular Plank, it can be this one where
you lift the leg, it can be a Tree Pose, however it feels good.
And once you've had enough of that one, bring the toes back behind you.
Open up the whole front of your body, nice big stretch here.
And when you're ready, bring yourself all the way back to your nice Downward Dog.
Relax your heels and head and neck and shoulders.
And real softly, we'll start to walk your feet all the way up to your hands here one
step at a time.
Folding inward over your legs just like you're a rag doll here.
Relax your head and neck and shoulders.
And we'll come all the way down to sit on your hips here.
Send your legs out in front of you.
Put a little easy bend in your knees.
Let your hands relax down by your sides.
And we'll start to crawl your torso all they way up and over your legs here.
Nice long, long spine.
And just breathe full and easily into the back of you.
And we'll slowly start to roll yourself all the way down to the ground till you're lying
on your back.
Take your knees with you here, give yourself a nice squeeze.
And we'll bring the bottoms of your feet on the ground right next to your hips.
So we'll open up the back here.
Press your hands on the ground, your whole arms, lift your hips, lift your chest, maybe
roll your shoulders underneath each other if that feels good.
Make some space here.
Breathe a lot.
And once you've had enough of that one, gently relax everything all the way back down.
So up to you, if you wanna stay and relax, that's great, if you wanna go for one more
of those, that's nice.
If you wanna come into a Full Wheel, bring your hands by your ears.
So for this one be really careful here.
Press down, start to lift your chest up.
If there's a little bit more space, lift up all the way.
That's nice, but make sure you can stay easy and breathe the whole time.
If you can't breathe and carry on a nice, easy conversation, then just soften out of
whatever you got going on.
And when you're ready, ease yourself all the way out of this one here.
Tuck your chin and bend your elbows until your all way on the ground, nice and softly.
Hug your knees into your chest, give yourself a nice squeeze.
Rock a little side to side here.
We'll keep ahold of your right shin.
Let your left leg draw down the ground and just breathe a whole lot.
So we'll get into your hips a little bit more.
Hug your knee and your shin into your body.
Maybe just grab your knee in right above your foot there.
If there's a little bit more space to cradle your leg and shin in that's nice too.
And if there's a little bit more space, relax down, that's great.
If that's causing any tension on the knee, don't do it.
You can make it a little bit softer by just holding onto the foot.
Really nice way to get into the hips there.
And then we'll just extend this leg straight upward for a few breaths.
And just staying easy here, big inhales, make a little bit more space.
And then as you exhale, you can draw the leg a little bit closer to you, right, and moving
into that new space.
And then when you're ready, we'll do the same thing on the other side.
So relaxing that leg down, hugging the left knee into your chest, give yourself a nice
squeeze.
Maybe roll it around a bit, see what's going on in the hip joints.
And then draw your torso up a little bit.
So go slow and easy here.
Make sure there's no pain on the joints.
You can hold the foot in right above the knee.
If there's a little bit more space in there in the hips, no pain in the knee to hug your
shin in, that's great.
If there's room to relax down, that's great too.
Again, if there's any twinging at all, just soften out, make this a little bit simpler.
Go easy on yourself.
You never wanna have joint pain.
It doesn't mean you're working hard or anything, it just means you're in pain.
So just soften out that.
And then when you're ready, release out of that one here, we'll stretch the leg straight
up.
And just breathe for a few moments here.
So both sides maybe a whole lot different depending on if you favor a leg or have any
injuries or one leg's more open than the other, so just go real easy on your body here.
Big, deep inhales and long exhales.
And once you've had enough of that one, hug the knee into your chest and just relax everything
all the way down.
And when you're ready, hug both knees into your chest, give yourself a squeeze, and gently
rock yourself all the way back up to sit.
And great job.
So there you have it: A nice routine that you can do to build flexibility in your entire
body and mind.
I'm Tara Stiles, and I'll see you next on the Yoga Solution.