If you're suffering from stress and anxiety, if you're ruminating about past events, or
maybe your head is stuck in the future, worrying about something that hasn't even happened yet,
this video is for you. I'd like to introduce you to progressive muscle relaxation. Hey,
my name is Lucas. I'm a yoga teacher, I'm a teacher trainer. You may or may not know this, but
in the yoga tradition we have this practice called Yoga Nidra. It's a guided relaxation technique.
Often we use it at the end of classes, but it can be used as a standalone practice as well. It's
not actually unique to yoga at all. Mental health researchers, doctors, and counselors, therapists,
they've been using this for a long time. There's actually quite a lot of published literature
supporting the efficacy of guided practices. Part of the reason why is when we're stressed,
or we're depressed, or we're anxious, it's hard to do the things we need to do to get out of
the rut. But sometimes pressing play on a track, lying down on the floor, we can kind of surrender
and fall into a practice, which can hopefully give us some immediate results. In this practice
I'll guide you through a progressive muscular relaxation technique. We'll use a little bit
of visualization and some breathing as well. With the combination of those three usually you can get
some pretty good relief pretty quickly. A quick note before we start: down below you'll find an
MP3, if you'd like to come back to this practice you can download and save that to your computer
or your phone. I'll be practicing lying here on the floor, but you could also do this lying down
on the bed. Let's get started. Lie down on your back with your head slightly elevated on a pillow.
Cover yourself with a sheet or a light blanket, so that you're comfortable.
Place your hands at your sides, palms face up, and close your eyes.
Throughout our practice we'll breathe in and out through our nose only.
To begin I'll ask you to imagine a ball of light. The ball of light is about the
size of a ping-pong ball and it glows yellow in color, a warm yellow glow like the sun at dawn.
With your eyes closed and your body relaxed,
imagine that yellow glowing ping-pong ball of light rolling up into your right foot.
As you inhale gently the light gets brighter and brighter, and as you exhale the light dims and
dims. As you inhale the light gets brighter and brighter, as you exhale the light dims.
Let's see if we can keep the light bright for five seconds by holding our breath at the top
of the inhale, and we'll clench our toes so that the muscles of our feet contract. I'll guide
you through it. Inhale, so the ball of light in your right foot gets bright, bright, bright. Now
hold your breath, clench the toes on your right foot, contract the muscles in your foot, five,
four, three, two, one. Relax, release, and breathe normally. The ball of light glows
bright on the inhales, dims on the exhales all on its own, and now your right foot is
much more relaxed than before. Let's move that ball of light up, up, up to your calf muscles.
Move the ball of light right to the center of your calf. Together let's do that same exercise,
this time with our calf muscles. Inhale, so the ball of light your near calf gets bright, bright,
bright. Now hold your breath at the top, contract your calf muscles by flexing
your toe towards your face. Hold, five, four, three, two, one. Relax, release,
and breathe normally. The ball of light glows bright as you gently inhale,
it dims slightly as you exhale. And now your right calf muscles are so much more relaxed than before.
Move that same ball of light up, pass your knee to your thigh, right in the center of your leg.
Let's do the same exercise with our quads and our hamstrings. Inhale, so the ball of light in your
quads and your hamstrings becomes bright, bright. Now hold your breath, contract your muscles,
hold here, five, four, three, two, one. Relax, release, and breathe normally.
That ball of light glows bright as you gently inhale, and it dims slightly as you exhale.
Now your right thigh is more relaxed, more soft than when we began.
Next, let's move the ball of light over to your left foot. We'll start on your left leg, now
move the ball of light right into the center of your foot.
Inhale so the ball of light inside your left foot gets bright, bright. Now hold your breath
at the top, clench your toes, contract the muscles of your foot, five, four, three, two,
one. Exhale, relax, release, and breathe normally. The ball of light glows bright
as you gently inhale, the ball of light dims ever so slightly as you exhale.
Let's leave your left foot soft and relaxed, and move the ball of light up,
up to your calf muscles on your left side, right in the center of your calf muscles.
Inhale, slowly watch that ball of light get brighter, brighter,
brighter, as you fill up with air. Flex your foot towards your knee, your calf muscles get strong,
clench your calf muscles, five, four, three, two, one. Exhale, relax, release,
breathe normally. The ball of light gets a little bit brighter as you inhale gently
through your nose, the ball of light dims ever so slightly as you exhale through your nose.
Let's leave your calf muscle now, the ball of light rolls all the way through your knee,
all the way up into your left thigh, right in the middle.
Inhale, slowly see that ball of light right in the middle of your thigh getting brighter,
brighter, brighter. Now hold your breath right at the top, engage your quad, engage your hamstring,
strong leg, five, four, three, two, one. Now exhale, relax, release, and breathe normally.
Move the ball of light from your left leg up to your pelvis,
right between your belt line and your pubis bone, right in the center of your pelvis.
Inhale, slowly make that ball of light in your pelvis get brighter, brighter, brighter. Now hold
your breath at the top, engage your lower abdomen by pressing your lower back down into the floor,
five, four, three, two, one. Relax, release, and breathe normally. Your breath is gentle,
the light is brightening when you inhale, breath is gentle, the light dims as you breathe out.
Let's now move the ball of light up above your navel just below your rib cage.
Let the ball fall into the center of your torso, literally right in the middle of your body.
Inhale slowly and make the ball shine yellow and bright as your belly rises, filling up
with air. Now hold your breath at the top, pull your navel in and up, five, four, three, two,
one. Relax, release, and breathe normally.
The ball's light glows brighter when you gently inhale, and it dims as you gently exhale.
Let's move the ball of light into the palm of your right hand, right in the center of your palm,
right in the center of your hand. As you gently inhale the ball gets brighter
and brighter, as you exhale the ball gets dimmer and dimmer.
Together, inhale make the ball brighten, yellow, bright. Now clench your right hand into a fist,
hold, five, four, three, two, one. Relax your hand, relax your breath, and breathe normally.
As you gently inhale the ball gets brighter in the center of your hand,
as you exhale the ball gets slightly dimmer in the center of your hand.
Let's move the ball of light now up into your forearm, right in the middle of your muscle belly.
To contract the muscles of your forearm, I'd like you to imagine that you're holding a tennis ball
in your right hand. Let's inhale slowly so the ball gets bright, bright. Now imagine you squeeze
that imaginary tennis ball in your right hand to clench the muscles of your forearm, five,
four, three, two, one. Relax your arm, relax your breath,
and breathe normally. That ball of light right in the middle of your forearm
gets a little brighter as you inhale, the light dims a little bit as you exhale.
From your forearm, your right forearm, move that ball of light right into the middle of your upper
arm, between your biceps and your triceps, right where the bone is, right where you're humerus,
your arm bone is, right in the middle of your arm. That's where the ball of light shines yellow.
I'd like you to imagine that there is a watermelon between your lower arm and your upper arm, and
when we clench imagine you're squeezing, trying to break that watermelon, but you cannot do it.
Let's inhale so that ball of light gets brighter, brighter, brighter. Hold your
breath, imagine you're squeezing the watermelon between your forearm and your upper arm, five,
four, three, two, one. Relax, release, and breathe normally. Now your right hand, your right forearm,
your biceps, your triceps, your whole right arm, is heavy and relaxed.
From your upper right arm let's transfer the ball of light
to the palm of your left hand, right in the center, right in the middle of your hand. As you
inhale the ball of light glows slightly brighter, as you exhale the light dims ever so slightly.
To engage the muscles of our hand, we'll clench into a tight fist. Inhale,
hold your breath, clench your fist tight. The ball of light is shining yellow, five four, three, two,
one. Relax your hand, relax your breath, and breathe normally. The
ball of light is right in the middle of your hand, but now your hand is so soft and so relaxed the
ball of light rolls through your wrist, through your forearm, right to the middle of your forearm,
right into the middle of the muscle belly, right there. To contract the muscles of your forearm,
we'll squeeze an imaginary tennis ball in our left hand. Inhale, the ball of light in
your forearm gets brighter, brighter, brighter. Squeeze the imaginary tennis ball and hold, five,
four, three, two, one. Relax, release, and breathe normally. Your hand is relaxed,
your forearms relax, and that ball of yellow light is right there in the middle of your forearm.
Allow the ball to roll up through your elbow, past your elbow, into your upper arm, between
your biceps, between your triceps, right in the middle where you're humerus, your arm bone is.
To engage the muscles of your arm we'll imagine there's a watermelon between your lower arm and
your upper arm, and we'll squeeze the watermelon, but you're unable to break it. Together let's
inhale, fill up with air, squeeze that imaginary watermelon, and hold, five, four, three, two,
one. Relax, release, and let it go. The ball of light is right in the middle of your upper
left arm, but now your left hand is heavy and softer, left forearm is soft and heavy,
and your biceps and your triceps, your upper arm is relaxed and heavy.
Let's move the ball of light from your left upper arm, right into the center of your chest.
Your heart it sits center left, but the ball of light is right in the center of your chest,
glowing up on the inhales, dimming on your exhales. Together let's inhale slowly,
this time puff your chest with air, hold at the top, and bear down as if you were trying to
squeeze the air from your chest but don't let it out. Five, four, three, two, one, exhale. Relax,
release, and let it go. Your chest is still now, the breath drops down, down, down into your belly.
Let's move the ball of light up from the center of your chest. The ball rolls up to the center
of your neck, deep into the middle of your throat. Inhale slow and low into your belly,
but imagine that ball of light right in your throat, and imagine you just ate something sour.
Tense up your neck, hold at the top, five, four, three, two, one. Relax, release, and let it go.
Your neck goes soft, the tension drops, your breath returns to normal.
The yellow ball of light moves from your neck,
right up behind your nose, in the midpoint of your skull, the midpoint of your head.
The yellow light is so close to your sinuses that when you inhale now, even gently, the light
gets very, very bright. And when you exhale, it gets so dim it's almost completely dark.
Inhales make that ball bright, bright, bright, and your exhales dim, dim, dim, dim, dim.
Together let's inhale slowly, filling up with air.
Hold at the top, open your mouth with your breath holding, and imagine you're biting
into a big apple. Tense your jaw and your cheeks, five, four, three, two,
one. Relax, release, and let it go. Jaw relaxed, face relaxed, expression is soft and relaxed.
The ball moves up higher now to the top third of your skull. Imagine the spot right between your
eyes right on the bridge of your nose, but deep, deep, deep in the middle third of your skull.
Hover there and notice the light brightening as you inhale. Notice the light dimming as you
exhale. Together let's inhale slowly, filling up with air. Now hold at the top, scrunch up your
brows, scrunch up your eyes, scrunch up your nose. Hold, five, four, three, two, one. Relax, release,
exhale, allow your eyes, your brow, your face, to soften. Calm and heavy skin hangs from your bones.
For our final practice the ball will exit through the crown of your head, but instead of tensing,
we'll use our breath to move the ball this time out and then slowly, slowly, one breath at a time,
up through the crown of your head. Eyes closed, body relaxed heavy down into the ground.
Breath continues in and out through your nose.
Inhale slowly, one, two, three, four. Ball of yellow light goes a little bit higher towards
the crown of your head, but it stops just short. Now exhale, four, three, two, one.
Inhale slowly, one, two, three, four. Allow the ball to roll right up to the crown of your head,
just under your skull, under your skin. Now exhale, four, three, two, one. Now,
to release this ball of light we'll need the biggest inhale we've done so far. So,
let's breathe in slowly and as deeply as we can. Inhale, one, two, filling all the way up, three,
four, and now it's gone. The ball exits through the crown of your head and then it vanishes.
Your body is left completely soft, as if there were sandbags on your ankles, sandbags on your
wrists. It's as if the breath is breathing itself now, so slowly, so gently, in and out through your
nose. No more yellow light, just darkness. No more controlling the breath, just stillness.
The skin on your face is soft. No more ball of light, no more tension, no more practice.
Lie here for as long as you like, and enjoy the peace and relaxation that you've created.
I hope you found this practice helpful. As a reminder, down below you'll find an MP3 link
if you'd like to come back to this practice in the future. If you'd like more science-based
yoga videos, hit subscribe down below. We're publishing pretty much every week. You can find
my full teaching calendar at yogabody.com, and as always your questions and comments
are most welcome down below. Thanks so much for joining me and I'll see you in the next video.