30 min Yin Yoga for Your Nervous System

Transcript

namaste welcome everyone my name is cassandra and i'm going to take you through this 30 minutes or so yin yoga sequence this is really designed to soothe your nervous system if you've been going through high levels of stress if you've had a hard time winding down or regulating your emotions even if you feel a little bit worn out this should be a really beneficial practice i'm going to be using this large bolster for our practice today but if you don't have one at home a great substitute would either be one block a regular yoga block or even better would probably be just a couple of bed pillows that you can stack one on top of the other or even just a dense couch cushion so we are going to start in a pose which is a variation of supported bridge and reclined butterfly so laying down as if you were coming into supported bridge but we're gonna open up the legs if you're using your props you can lower down and slide what you have underneath your hips [Music] normally for supported bridge we would just have our hips elevated feet flat on the floor i'm gonna do a reclined butterfly pose with my hips slightly elevated i've been really liking these versions of elevating my hips in hip openers it just gives a different feel to the stretch if it's too much again you can just do a traditional variation of reclined butterfly or you could choose to do supported fish instead and bring your arms whatever is the most comfortable to you here [Music] the inversion can be a really nice touch [Music] to help really soothe our nervous system letting our legs be a little more weightless which can be really nice especially if you've been on your feet most of the day [Music] so as you settle into the pose here just take some slow belly breaths in and out through your nose trying to relax a little bit more every time you exhale [Music] so [Music] hmm [Music] [Music] uh [Music] notice if you're tensing up through your quads or even into your shoulders just relax into it a little more [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] do [Music] and go ahead and slide your arms further down so you can lift your knees back up and through to center and just let your knees and thighs fall in towards your belly i always find this really nice especially when my hips are propped up [Music] you can sway and rock a little bit side to side i'm just going to roll off of the bolster so you can just roll to one side coming on up and we're going to come into sphinx pose i love doing this one with a bolster because you don't need to use your arms at all to keep yourself in the pose the bolster can just hold your chest up so you want to just kind of wedge it underneath your chest with your legs out behind you you do want your pubic bone to be able to ground and push into the floor so your hips should not be lifted off the mat it's really just the upper body that can be lifted and then you can reach your arms out in front of you try to keep an internal rotation with your legs so you're not letting your heels come in toes out the tops of your feet should be pressing into the floor [Music] and you can just play around a little bit here the further you wedge the block the more intense of a back bend it will be almost like a seal pose alternatively the more forward you bring your block and the further up your ch your chest you have it the easier this one will be [Music] so try to find the perfect intensity for you right now so that you're opening up through your chest and getting a little backbend without pinching or compressing through your lower back [Music] [Music] soften your shoulders down and away from your ears [Music] and feel your breath go down into your belly so that when you inhale you can really feel your stomach push into the floor uh [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] then we'll make our way into a seated forward fold so you can push either into the bolster into the floor to lift up and i'll let you choose what kind of forward fold you'd like to come in so maybe butterfly with the soles of your feet together knees apart or you can do caterpillar with both legs out in front of you or what i'm going to do which is a straddle fold or a dragonfly pose i'm keeping the bolster somewhere out in front of you initiate the fold by tilting your pelvis forward and softening down into the pose [Music] so [Music] we're about halfway so if you had one ear on the bolster turn the other one [Music] this is a good opportunity to make any adjustments that are required in the pose maybe you've noticed you've gone a little bit too far or maybe you're able to fold a little more always coming back to the rhythm of our breath slow and steady in and out through the nose relax your arms and your spine [Music] [Music] [Music] push your hands into the prop into the floor and curl up inch by inch and before we do any other pose we'll just take a counter stretch or counter pose with a little twist so you can bring your legs back in just sitting in any way that works for you here and you can bring your right hand to your left knee left hand back behind you pull your lower belly in reach and lift up as you twist [Music] and we'll go to the other side left hand to your right knee right hand back behind you open up [Music] [Music] and let's release and you can just crawl your hands out in a little diagonal kind of rounding through your spine just a little counter stretch really reach and extend long through your right fingertips especially it's a big side body stretch go do the same thing on the other side this time you are reaching out with your left fingertips as you round as if you were going to touch down towards your right knee [Music] and we're going to come back with the bolster underneath our hips for another variation of supported bridge pose this time i'm going to start by bringing my hips right away on top and then lowering myself down so rather than keeping both feet flat on the floor for this one let's draw our right knee into our chest and straighten your left leg out in front of you so rather than feeling this in our low back we're trying to instead open through the front of our left thigh and getting into the side of that left hip and you might hold on to the back of your thigh or the front of your shin don't worry if your left leg is not fully straightened as long as you're getting some sensation through the hips that's really all we're looking for here and again adding a gentle inversion by lifting our hips higher than our heart as a way to really promote relaxation and really nurturing our nervous system [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] foreign [Music] so [Music] [Music] let's switch sides carefully here as you pull your left knee in and straighten your right leg notice if this made your props shift at all hold on to whatever is appropriate relax both shoulder blades into the floor let your head be heavy [Music] just using enough arm strength to keep the left thigh steady for really not straining in our arms [Music] oh [Music] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] let's bring both knees in we're going to stretch and reach our legs up towards the sky in this waterfall pose so really letting the legs be weightless while our upper body and the heart is grounded [Music] just feel the sensations in your ankles and your legs as you invert in this way [Music] foreign [Music] um [Music] [Music] [Music] let's release our legs back down to the floor we'll come into shavasana i like to do this with the bolsters under my knees and my ankles or sorry under my knees and my calves so you can just shift either yourself up remove your bolster a little bit further down you can also choose to do this without the prop but it can be really nice especially for your lower back to let yourself be supported here with a slight bend in the knees closing your eyes [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] begin to deepen your breath wiggling fingers and toes waking up maybe by stretching your arms overhead lengthening out and we'll roll over to one side come up to take a seat as you sit up tall join your hands together at your heart feeling the effects of your practice noticing what has changed or shifted for you and we'll close with the chant of om one time let's inhale to chant big breath in [Music] namaste [Music] thank you so much for doing this yin yoga practice with me this was really designed to help soothe your nervous system so i hope if you've been feeling a little bit stressed a little bit worn out that you found some relief from this practice and i would recommend doing this particular meditation after this class it would go really well i hope to practice again with you soon namaste