Basic Practice: Spiraling the Legs and Torso (Standing Poses)
The practice begins with seated poses to wake up the ankles, feet and knees. It follows with reclined poses to stretch out the backs of the legs and to open the hips in outward rotation. After that come lateral standing poses, in which the theme of the day, the spirals in the legs and torso, can be optimally employed. It ends with restorative poses to settle and center the system.
Intermediate Practice: Armpits and Elbows (Inversions)
This intermediate inversions practice begins with reclined poses to soften and widen the chest and back, and open the shoulders. It follows with floor poses to integrate the legs and arms into the torso before going into Adho Mukha Vrkshasana (Hand Stand), Pincha Mayurasana (Forearm Stand), Salamba Shirshasana 1 (Head Stand 1), and shoulder stand variations.
Advanced Practice: Torso Back and Up, Knees Forward and Away (Standing Poses)
This practice features a brief warm-up against the wall and is followed by an extended vinyasa sequence going up on toes and down to the floor. After a brief resting period, the intelligence and openness cultivated in the legs is taken into Head Stand and Shoulder Stand variations, taking the weight of the body off the legs, but requiring the legs to remain articulate and directed.
Basic Practice: Softening and Widening the Hips and Buttocks
This practice features standing poses and twists. As you go through the sequence, consider the following points:
- Lengthen the sides of your torso, keeping the back and chest equally wide to create a long and evenly balanced spine.
- As you twist, when you turn your chest in one direction, turn your hips in the opposite direction so that the twist happens safely in the middle of the torso.
- Allow yourself to be supported by your inner thighs by narrowing and lengthening them. From that support, allow your buttocks, outer hips and lower back to soften and widen.
Thanksgiving Special: The Idle Hands Practice
The big day is over and you still have a long weekend ahead of you. You’ve got time on your hands and an abundance of energy. Time to put it to good use. This practice has a little bit of everything in it: inversions, standing poses, core work, back bends and twists. Feel free to cut it back according to your capabilities and the time available to you. You might try doing about half of the poses in the practice today, half of the poses tomorrow and then have a go at the whole thing from beginning to end on Sunday.
Thanksgiving Special: The Moment’s Peace Practice
This is practice is for when you need a time-out. Perhaps after the meal is underway, after cleaning up, or after company has finally gone. It is a quiet practice designed to restore and rejuvenate.
If you have an eye pillow or a face cloth, place it over your eyes in the supine poses.
Thanksgiving Special: The Family Friendly Practice
All this week, in celebration of the Thanksgiving Day holiday that we’re having here in the U.S., I thought I would do a special series to help you cope with the trials and tribulations of guests, entertaining and too much time off.
The aim of this practice today is to find you some peace of mind in the face of stressful interpersonal relationships. You could practice this in anticipation of the arrival of company, after company has left, or even in the midst of the holiday if you can get away.
The thought behind the sequence is to give you a gentle warm-up, followed by some relatively quick pose progressions that you don’t have to think about too much, culminating with Ardha Chandrasana (Half Moon Pose), a balancing pose that will require a certain amount of presence of mind to do well. All of this will get the blood moving and hopefully facilitate unblocking any emotional holding. The inversions will then help to stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system, reducing the effects of stress and bringing you to a more serene state, which can then be consolidated by the restorative poses at the end of the practice. Keep this in mind if you find you need to edit the practice to fit within your capabilities and the time available to you. (more…)
Basic Practice: Softening the Hips and Buttocks in Twists
In this sequence, consider the following points:
- Lengthen the sides of the torso, keeping the back and chest equally wide to create a long and evenly balanced spine.
- As you twist, when you turn your chest in one direction, turn your hips in the opposite direction so that the twist happens safely in the middle of the torso.
- Allow yourself to be supported by your inner thighs by narrowing and lengthening them. From that support, allow your buttocks, outer hips and lower back to soften.
Basic Practice: Narrowing and Lengthening the Waist and the Inner Thighs
Each of these poses has a core component to them. Very often, people think engaging the core means squeezing the abdomen, tucking the tail towards the pubic bone and gripping the pelvic floor. All this serve to do is compress the spine and organs shortening and hardening the true deep core muscles: the hip flexors and the muscles of the lower back. This can lead to all sorts of problems over time.
Throughout the practice, apply the following points:
- Find your inner thighs. By this, I mean allow your inner thighs to be part of the pose, narrowing them and lengthening them away from your head.
- As you find and engage your inner thighs, soften and widen your buttocks, outer hips and lower back.
- Narrow and lengthen the sides of your waist towards your head.
- Draw your navel into your pine, keeping the abdomen long and wide.
- Soften the neck, the jaw and the tongue.
Basic Practice: Grounding the Feet and Unlocking the Joints
In this basic standing pose practice, we will focus on freeing up the soles of the feet and drawing weight up through the torso in order to take the weight of the joints and hopefully create a greater sense of freedom as you move. Consider the following actions as you go through the sequence:
- Ground evenly through the toe mounds.
- Lengthen the toes and heels without gripping the top of the foot.
- Allow the top of the shin to shift towards the toes to unlock the knee.
- Draw the torso headwards to take weight out of and unlock your hips, ankles and knees. Initiate movement into and out of your poses with this upward movement.
- In standing poses, lift through the torso to roll the toes up and rise up onto the heel of the front foot. Maintain the lift in the torso. Roll through foot to bring it back down and soften towards toes.
© 2010 Witold Fitz-Simon.
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