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Chapters (15)

Morning Hip Release | 15 Minute Yoga Practice

Yoga With Adriene · 15:19

In this practice

Key teachings

  • Conscious waking and intentional start to the day
  • Mindful breath and body awareness in hip sockets
  • Gentle movement for mobility and release

Ideal for

  • Morning practitioners looking to wake up gently
  • Individuals seeking hip and lower back release
  • All levels, including beginners
  • Anyone wanting to set a positive daily intention

Lesson

Instructions

A 15 minute yoga and breath session to help you wake up consciously. Slowly open up the body, wake up the core stabilizers, stimulate your brain. Set yourself up for a wonderful day with this hip release focused practice!

As always, made with love.

Let me know how this goes for you in the comment section.

(Make it a ritual each morning! xx)

Steps

  • Deep diaphragmatic breathing
  • Cat-Cow flow
  • Tabletop hip stirring (circular knee movements)
  • Seated Forward Fold (Siddhasana variation and Paschimottanasan)
  • 90-90 hip rotation drill
  • Supine Figure Four stretch
  • Supine crossed ankle rocking
  • Bridge Pose (implied)

Benefits

  • Slowly opens up the body
  • Wakes up core stabilizers
  • Stimulates the brain
  • Provides hip release and increased mobility
  • Lengthens and releases tension in the lower back
  • Promotes conscious and positive start to the day

Transcript

- Hello my sweet friend and
welcome to Yoga With Adriene. Today we have a
morning hip release. So hop into something
comfy and let's get started. (upbeat music) Alright, let's start in a seat. Come on down to the ground. Cross the ankles. You can sit up on your
blanket if you brought one. Just allow the hands to
rest gently in your lap. We're gonna take
three deep breaths here. You can close your eyes. And as soon as you're ready, take a deep breath
in through the nose. And as you exhale,
just relax your shoulders. And again, deep inhale
in through the nose. And exhale, relax the shoulders. And one more time,
deep breath in. Exhale, shoulders drop
away from the ears and maybe the jaw softens. Nice. Now keep a consciousness
going with your breath. Find what feels good,
trying to deepen the breath throughout the duration of
our practice here together. We're gonna come to all fours. Hi, sweet Benji. So slowly move to
a Tabletop Position. Sorry buddy. And you can use
your blanket here. Go ahead, go ahead. You can use your
blanket here to pad the knees. Oh okay.
(chuckles) It's like a comedy
of errors over here. Commedia okay. Commedia dell'arte,
Benji Edition. You're like,
"What, lady?" Okay, Cat-Cow,
drop the belly, open the chest,
look forward. Exhale, round through
the spine, chin to chest. Just a couple of these. Inhale, drop the belly, open. Exhale, round through. Nice, from here
we'll come back to center. You're gonna
press into the palms, press into the left foot
and lift your right knee. We're gonna do some
stirring with the right knee. And you'll feel your low
abs turn on a little bit here. Same with the glute, but focus on drawing
a circle with your knee. And then draw your
attention up to that hip socket. And think about
what's going on there as you keep this
movement nice and slow. And then reverse it. Again, start by just stirring
with the knee and then draw your awareness up to
the hip socket eventually. Focusing on the
quality of movement here. Nice, then from
here you're gonna take that right knee all the
way up like we do for Pigeon, but you're gonna turn, can peek at
me if you need to, to the left side of your mat to sit here with the right heel in front of the left.
(chuckles) Then we're gonna
take the fingertips and we're just
gonna spider fingers, crawl all the way out
into a Forward Fold here. Breathing love, awareness into that right hip. Stretch it out. Breathe, feel free to find
some soft, easy movement here whether that's walking the
arms to the right and then the left or maybe swaying a
little from side to side. And then slowly
begin to rise up. Now listen carefully. You're gonna take your right
foot to the ground and you're gonna turn towards the
back edge of your mat now. So you're on all
fours at the back. Take a second to shift the hips a little side to side
and then when you're ready, ground through your foundation and we're gonna stir
on the left side now. So left knee comes up and
we start to draw circles. And again, really focusing
on that hip socket sensation. Careful not to collapse into your wrists but
lift the chest up. And whenever you're ready,
you're reversing it. Keeping it nice and slow. Remembering to breathe. And then slowly release that. You'll bring it up and in like you're going to Pigeon and
then you'll turn to the left side of your mat but I'm
gonna turn to the right here. Or you can
really go to any side. Just make sure that left foot is in front of the right
and then when you're ready, crawl the fingertips out in front and we'll find this
Forward Fold here in Siddhasana. One foot in front of the other, opening up through the hips,
feeling that stretch, that lengthening through the lower back as well. And soften the jaw,
find your breath again. Maybe you find
some movement here, walking the hands to one side and then the other. Maybe swaying a
little side to side. Take one more
cycle of breath here. Really think about reaching
your sits bones down towards the mat. And then slowly roll it up. We're gonna extend both legs out towards the
front edge of our mat now. Inhale, reach this fingertips
all the way up and exhale, drape the belly over
the tops of the thighs. Come into a seated Forward Fold,
Paschimottanasan. You can keep the knees nice and
bent here 'cause we're wanting a nice deep
stretch in the low back. Relax the weight of your head, relax your shoulders,
close your eyes, listen to the
sound of your breath. And then slowly release that,
roll it up. Okay. 90-90 or a 90-90 variation. You're gonna take
your right knee, bend it. You're gonna take your
left heel behind you, bend it. If you want,
you can use your blanket to prop this front knee up, coming into two 90
degree angles in the hips. Or try. Alright, breathing deep. For this session, focus on sitting up nice
and tall and think about an internal rotation
in your left hip. You can maybe even bring your
left hand to your left hip there to guide it. Then inhale in, exhale. Keep the feet where they are.
You're gonna roll through center and just take
it to the other side. So now you're facing
the back edge of your mat. Right hand can
come to the right hip. Think about lifting up through the front body and
grounding through the back body. Wooo. And then we'll go
one more round each side. So coming through. Again, grounding
through the back body. So shoulder blades draw down,
heart lifts. Breathe and then
take it through center and towards the
back edge of your mat. Nice. Now come back through center. Send your legs out in front of you towards the
front edge of the mat, just like we did before. And we're gonna
slowly roll down, nice and easy,
all the way to our backs. Center your hips on your mat. And when you're ready, we're gonna bend one knee
all the way up to the chest, then the other. Rock a little side to side. And headed into a Figure Four. So you'll drop
the left foot down, cross the right ankle over. When you're ready, right hand presses firmly
into the right inner thigh. And you might stay here
or you might lift it up. Legs hug in towards the chest,
the arms kind of support that. And we're gonna breathe here for a bit so you
can close your eyes. Soften the skin of the forehead. Relax any tension in the neck,
the shoulders. Great, take one
more breath here. Inhale. As you exhale,
listen carefully, you're gonna just slide your
right ankle all the way down your right shin so
the ankles are crossed. Then you're gonna reach and grab your big toes or the
outer edges of your feet here. And then bend
your elbows left to right and start to
rock gently side to side. If that feels good, if that feels
safe in your body, you can even take it in a little circular motion on
the low back, the sacrum. And then release both feet down. We'll take it to the other side. Neck is nice and long,
shoulders relaxed. Cross the left
ankle over the right. Start here by just pressing
firmly with the left palm, kind of guiding that external
rotation of the left femur. And then you can
hug the knees into the chest whenever you're ready. Maybe close your
eyes and breathe here. One little nuance for
this figure four is playing around
with leveling the hips so maybe pulling
your right hip down a little as you squeeze up. Maybe lengthening
the tailbone down. Then release your grip. Slide your left ankle down
your shin to meet your right and we'll grab the outer edges
of the feet or the big toes. And once again,
pull the elbows left to right. Maybe rock a little side
to side or draw a circle. And release the
feet back to the earth. We're gonna close by opening
up the front of the hips. So feet firmly
planted on the ground. Hands on the
earth to support you. When you're ready,
ground through all four corners of the feet and start to peel
up starting with the tailbone. Slowly, slowly, slowly
making your way up the spine. Lifting the hip points,
shins forward. Chest lifts to chin,
chin lifts to sky. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Maybe on your next exhale, you take a bind here,
opening up through the chest. Lift the hip points
a little bit higher. Inhale, exhale,
release everything slowly, slowly, slowly to the earth. Soles of the feet come together for a nice Reclined Cobbler or, listen to your body,
that could be great, or we can go opposite and go internal rotation
in the hip socket, bringing the feet wide
and the knees together. So choose your own ending. Hands come to the belly. And we'll close with
three deep breaths here. Whenever you're ready, inhaling deeply
through the nose. Exhaling out through
the nose and mouth. And after your
third cycle of breathing, you can allow your breath to just go back to a
nice easy natural rhythm. Maybe bring the palms together and the thumbs up to the third
eye to close this practice. In every end is a new beginning. I hope this is the
start of a gorgeous next hour of your day. Thank you for
spending this time with me. Take good care. Namaste. (upbeat music)

Practice summary

Level
all levels
Duration
15 minutes
Equipment
yoga matblanket (optional, for knee padding or hip support)
Target areas
Hips (primary focus)Lower backCore stabilizersSpine
Energy
balancing

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