Trust Your Vision

Hello, and welcome back to your mat. I'm excited to guide you in this next practice, which is a vision practice. I love this because it's pure in its yoga, in the yoga that balances body and mind. You see 40% of your brain's capacity is dedicated to your vision. 4 out of 10 of your cranial nerves.

And when we manage the optic nerve, we are greatly affecting the brain. So join me in some new, perhaps, yoga techniques to hone our vision throughout our vinyasa practice, both in body and in mind. You're going to begin by bringing your hands together and build some friction there, build some heat. Once you get nice and hot, cup your eyes. Press the back of your knuckles into your brow and the heel of your hands into the cheekbones.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Let the hands come down, but keep your eyes closed for now. Inhale, open your eyes and look directly up. If you're a clock, you're looking at high noon.

We're going to move the gaze. Bring it to one o'clock, two o'clock, three o'clock, four o'clock, five o'clock, and straight down to six, keeping your face facing forward. Looking to seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, and up to 12. Close your eyes a moment. Now open, and now slowly rolling the gaze along those places on your clock.

You'll go over to one and begin to smoothly send your gaze like a second hand that doesn't tick around the face of your imaginary clock. You'll find when you first begin this hatha yoga practice that the gaze wants to jump over time, try to smooth through those spots. Next time you look up to noon, relax. Rub your hands together again, and press those palms around your eyes. Let the eyes soften, and then bring your hands down to your lap again, eyes closed.

Inhale, open the eyes, lift the gaze to noon, and move to 11. Ten o'clock, nine o'clock, eight, seven, right down to six. Move to five, four, three, two, one, high noon, close your eyes. Here we go. Looking to smooth out those jittery spots as we send the gaze counterclockwise.

Rolling up, and begin to move over to the left with your gaze. One more revolution as smooth as possible. And relax. Close the eyes, and rub those hands. Press them around your eyes, breathing, and beginning your ujjaya breath as we bring the hands away from the eyes, splitting the fingers and opening the eyes about a third of the way, allowing the light to come in, and then relaxing your hands.

Those come to hands and knees. You can shake your legs a little bit, roll your ankles if they were getting stiff as we sat. And then take a few c-cows, inhale arching, exhale round, inhale arch. Go round, find a neutral spine, send your left arm up, and then place it down, inhale right arm comes up, and thread the right arm through, threading the needle pose coming to the side of the head and the side of your shoulder. Now you can step your left foot out to the side, use your eyes to see where the foot wants to be placed, so the left leg is in a gate pose.

Then begin to walk your left fingertips over the crown of the head, past the front of your mat, and turn. Keep the left foot pinning down, look past the obstacle of your left arm towards the sky, breathing in, and breathing out. Walk the left fingertips down, come to hands and knees, but keep that left leg as is, coming up to a gate pose. Slide your left hand down the leg and reach your right arm up again, and as you gaze past the right arm, allow the right arm to breathe a little forward and a little back, gently gliding across the intercostal muscles, breathing in, and back up right. Walk your hands forward on the mat, keeping that left leg out, maybe sending the fingertips a little more forward, and try a cat-cow here, starting to really get in for the hips.

Breathing in, cow spine, breathing out, cat spine, walk your wrist right underneath your shoulders and bring the left knee back, inhale, right arm comes up, follow it with your gaze, and then place that right hand down, inhale, left arm reaches up, and thread it through, threading the needle, coming to the side of the shoulder, side ahead, use your gaze to step your right foot safely off your mat to the right side with a nice long right leg. Begin to walk your right fingertips forward, guide the right hip point back as you look past your right arm at the sky. Breathing in and breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, walk those hands back underneath your shoulders and then come up to your gate, posture, inhale, bring the left arm up and over, we're taking a gentle breeze, bringing the left hand back past the midline and forward, keep going, strumming across those intercostals, exhale, inhale, exhale, come up through center and walk your fingertips forward, right here in this gate pose in our legs, we're finding a cat-cow spine, inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, walk those hands back in and swing your right knee underneath your hip, tucking the toes for short little down dog, breathing in and breathing out, let's roll forward to plank, you'll likely need to walk your feet out for good measure, then for the first vinyasa take that ashtanga panam lowering the knees, the chest and the chin and now slide forward to cobra pose, exhale downward facing dog, breathing in, breathing out, consider keeping your eyes closed as you take a long pilgrims walk to the front of the mat, tune into the feeling of the mat underneath your feet and try to leave a perfect footprint every place you step, once you're to the front of the mat, seal your big toes together, uttanasana, dropping the head forward fold, inhaling long spine, look forward, exhale forward fold, inhale rise, reach your arms overhead and for sunnae we'll bring the hands to prayer, finding that mountain, gazing into the middle distance at a gaze point at horizon or a little optimistically up of that, inhale, bring the arms up, look past the prayer, exhale bow and forward fold, inhale half lift, first time step back to plank posture, inhale look past your hands, cast off toes, exhale chaturanga dandasana, inhale urdvamukasvanasana, up dog, exhale anamukasvanasana downward facing dog, taking the five traditional breaths here, breathing in and breathing out, as you breathe consider that traditionally the gaze should be towards the navel, can you draw the gaze up and in but still keep buoyancy in your armpits, a little lift in the soft of the forearms, press to the front of the palms, gentle lift in the middle of the wrists, inhale raise heels, exhale bend knees, look past your hands and quietly float your feet in between your hands, inhale halfway lift, take a long view, exhale forward fold, inhale urdvahasthasan, gaze in prayer, gaze transcends that, bringing the prayer back to home, your challenge should you wish to accept it, is to take these next sun A's with your eyes closed, consider that your body knows the way, next inhale bring the arms up, exhale forward fold, inhale halfway lift gazing through the window of the third eye, stepping back or even floating back chaturanga dandasana, inhale upward facing dog, exhale downward facing dog, breathing in for one, breathe out, breathe in two, breathe out, breathing three, breathe out, breathing four, breathe out, it's a trust exercise, raising heels, bending knees, looking through the third eye, feet between the hands, inhale halfway lift, exhale forward fold, root to rise, arms come up, feel the hands pressing prayer, exhale bring the prayer back to the heart, last time, consider eyes closed, inhale reach arms up, exhale bow and forward fold, halfway lift gaze through the window of the third eye, vinyasa, inhales the up dog, exhales the down dog, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathe out, breathing in, breathe out, raising heels, bending knees, trust yourself, feet come forward, inhale halfway lift, surrender forward fold, inhale rise, reach, hands find each other, draw the prayer to the heart, stand, samastitihi, feeling the feet on the floor and then opening your eyes once more, back to the flow, inhale sit down into chair, bringing your arms up and establish your gaze point, keep the gaze point optimistic, a little above the horizon, take a breath in and as you stand gather in your left knee, gather in your belly too, inhale hands to prayer, one legged chair, left shin over the right thigh like a figure four, see if you can feel if your hip points are at the same level, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, inhale rise, reach arms overhead and bring the left knee with you, exhale straight in the left leg with the toes pointed, uttida hasta, crawl that low belly in and then slowly, slowly step it back high lunge, breathing in and breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, inhale straighten your front leg, warrior two, right knee over the ankle and the low belly is in but the gaze is in the middle distance, this is when the warrior pulls her bow, so take aim, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, inhale straighten front leg, hands tap overhead, flying warrior spinning those toes towards the side wall, goddess pose the heels come in and the toes come out, you can use your hands as I'm demonstrating to guide the knees over the ankles, then inhale reach your arms out as if to give a big hug and wrap your right arm underneath the left, at least one wrap, option to take the eagle arms, you're lifting your elbows and you're practicing gazing past your obstacles, you'll see that the arms are in between the eyes and the eyes have the capacity to look past that temporary obstacle, inhale lift your elbows and begin to circle to the right with three circles here, finding that clockwise work again, next circle takes you down, release the arms and parallel your legs again in Pasarata Padasana, the straddle pose, you might work that head towards the earth laying the foundation for a tripod headstand, then inhale walk your hands forward coming to flat back and bring the right hand to the left shin initiating a little twist, begin to walk your fingertips forward and peek underneath your left arm, option here to bend the right knee and get a little deeper into the hip, breathing in and breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, release that, inhale to flat back and walk your hands to low lunge, let's step the back to plank pose, here the option for a Vinyasa here, perfectly fine to build that heat, we'll meet in downward facing dog, inhale raise the heels, bend the knees past your hands and quietly bring the feet in between them, inhale flat back, exhale forward fold, inhale rise, reach arms overhead and then settle into chair pose, swing the arms alongside the ears and try to find that optimistic gaze, chair doesn't always make me feel so optimistic, keep your sense of humor, keep looking up, next inhale rise bring that right knee in, one leg chair right shin over the left thigh, keeping those hip points on the same plane, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out, next inhale raise arms, raise right knee, point the toes and strain that leg, low belly in, exhale perhaps a little higher and then step it back high lunge, breathing in and breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, inhale straighten your front leg and like a warrior pull your bow, take your sights as you settle into your second warrior, now is a good time to start thinking of what you can contribute this practice to, what are you aiming at, the present creates your future, what is this powerful present creating in your life, breathing in, breathing out, inhale straighten front leg tap the hands in a flying warrior and then spin your heels out to goddess pose, using the hands to guide the knees to the proper position, open your arms up, you can see my shoulder blades gathering and then the left arm wraps in a hug, option to tap the back of the hands together or find that full eagle, lift the elbows, practice looking past your obstacles, breathing in lift the elbows and now we circle counterclockwise to the left, inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, this time coming up and letting it take you all the way down, begin to lengthen the legs and turn your toes towards the sidewall, walking your fingertips forward in space, left hand reaches for the right shin and the right fingertips crawl forward in space, begin to peep underneath your right arm, bend your left knee, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, breath in and release, hands down find a flat back and walk your hands into low lunge facing the front of your mat, look forward, step it back plank, option for down dog or vinyasa, breathing in, back to down dog, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, inhale, raise heels, bend knees, look and step or float your feet in between your hands, inhale, flat back, exhale, forward fold, take a moment to squeeze the elbows in, elbows shoulder distance apart, setting the seed for a triplied headstand today, then inhale, rise, reach your arms overhead and bring the prayer to the heart again, inhale, chair pose, this time wrap your left arm underneath the right, taking that eagle wrap instead, inhale, rise, left knee comes up, exhale, left thigh over the right, option to take that double twist, sitting the hips down equally, inhale, lift the elbows, exhale settle deeper, inhale lift the elbows, exhale, see it a little deeper, breathing in and breathing out, keep those arms perhaps as you rise and bring the left knee up, exhale straight and left leg, point left toes, then flex the foot, look down, take it to warrior three, option to keep those eagle arms or to take them out like an airplane, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, soft bend in the knees and find your higher lunge, swing the arms up, straighten front leg, exhale pass through your warrior two, inhale flying warrior front leg lengthens, hands tap in prayer, then exhale into your goddess stance, bring the arms up, this time right arm wraps underneath and lift the elbows one half turn all the way down to the earth, release the hands and straighten your legs, paralleling your feet, right hand to the left shin and the left fingertips can reach forward gazing past left arm or consider taking the left hand to the other shin, maybe bring your feet in a little closer to make that possible and then begin to spin towards the back of your mat, looking underneath your left arm, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, relax your arms, whatever your option and shape there, the arms have an uncanny way of feeling longer here, walking your way to a long spine and then to the front of your mat, this time we'll bring that right foot over to the right and tap your back knee down, lower to your elbows and place your hands in prayer, perhaps the prayer can come to the head and the head to the prayer and the knuckles of the thumbs make great massage tools to smooth out your brow, breathing in and breathing out, the tips of the thumbs can press at the point just below where your eyebrows become the bridge of your nose and you can smooth those thumbs gently across these sensitive muscles, breathing in and breathing out, walk into your hands once more and bring your right leg up, shake it out a little bit and walk your wrist right underneath your shoulders, you could put the ball of the right foot back and just open up the front of the hip this way or consider bringing your left hand back to the inside of the foot and kicking back to tiger's pose, slow to the ground but make no mistake, this is a balanced pose, you want to find that gaze point even as you press to the foot, working the integrity of the pose, breathing in, breathe out, gently release those shapes and find the hands and knees, inhale cow pose right up to downward facing dog, inhale raise the heels, bend the knees past your hands and step or float your feet to the front of the mat, inhale flat back, forward fold hands in line with the toes, squeeze those elbows in, breathing in and breathing out, let's rise, reaching your arms all the way overhead and exhale sit down into your chair pose, this time the right arm will come underneath the left and lift your arms, as you rise bring the right knee in, eagle legs wrapping the thighs together potentially taking that double wrap as the toes peek around to the other side of the shin, use the exhale to sit low, use the inhale to bring your elbows high, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, inhale rise, right knee comes in, point those toes length in the leg and then flex the foot, take it through to warrior three, you can keep those eagle arms, bring the arms out like airplane wings, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and breathing out, soft bend in the front knee, deliver the back foot back to high lunge and free your arms, inhale left leg lengthens, take your aim warrior two, inhale straight in front leg, tap the hands in prayer, exhale goddess pose with the knees on top of the ankles, inhale open your arms and this time left arm wraps underneath, inhale lift the elbows, one half turn to the left, lengthen the legs, unravel the arms and take the left hand to the right shin, option to walk the fingertips forward and to peek underneath the arm as we did first side or a double bind, bring in the right hand over to the left shin, begin to turn, look past your obstacles, it's so easy in our vision to find our obstacles, it's another practice to be able to look past them, breathing in, breathe out, let yourself just wet noodle down to the ground in those arms and then walk to a flat back and forward to lizard pose, left foot to the left, back knee down, elbows to the earth, lizard pose, option to massage across the third eye or to bring the thumbs just below the brow and smooth out those muscles, walking yourself back onto your hands and swinging the left leg around, left foot down, finding a stretch there or bringing the wrist just underneath the shoulders and send your gaze forward, the right arm can loop back and find a tiger's pose, kicking as you gently pull, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in and gently release, come to child's pose but perhaps keep your toes tucked, breathing in and breathing out, walk your hands in front of the knees and rise back onto your feet, check out those pinky toes, they like to go rogue and then we're going to set up for a tripod headstand, be curious, I'll give you steps or kramas as we go along, first step is to line up your hands right alongside your knees, the knuckles really are in the same plane as the edge of the knees, then come forward and you can watch me first of course, place the head down as if in a child's pose but keep going, rolling onto the crown of the head, use your vision, be sure that your elbows are squeezing in and that your arms are making right angles, right angles make perfect shelves, we're going to tuck the toes and straighten the legs just like down dog legs, bending the knees, walk the feet in and consider placing one knee on the shelf of one arm and the other knee on the shelf of the other arm, breathing in and breathing out, now if you have the strength here you would need to push into your hands and bring the knees together making another child's pose but this one on the crown of the head, if that feels good you could press the balls of the feet up to the sky and tripod headstand, breathing in and breathing out, those that are adept at tripod might consider revisiting the eagle legs and then taking it to the other side, save a little mojo to come out slowly, drawing the knees towards the chest like child's pose and then slowly using your core and hands as breaks, deliver your feet down to a traditional child's pose, knees together, arms along the side of the body, you're resting on your forehead and then roll left and right, ease and neck, smoothing out any tension that might be across the brow, breathing in and breathing out, slide your hands close to your knees and slowly come up right, gazing forward let the blood regulate then bring your knees hips distance apart and tuck all those toes again, we'll rise to stand on our knees and it won't be a back bend just yet, instead let's develop the trust of getting ourselves out of trouble if we go too far back in the camel pose, place the prayer to the third eye point, keep the low belly in and on an inhale lean back, exhale come forward, take it back and forward two more, the quads will work, coming forward, take it back maybe a little lower, building that trust and coming up right, good now that we have that exit strategy, bring your hands to sacrum and lift your heart up and away from the hips, tip back just to smidge and try to reach back simultaneously for the heels, you can try to bring your hands on the inside of the heels, so delicious to press the heels into the hands, the hands into the heels, opening the third eye to the sky, the heart and the throat to the sky, one more breath in and then draw the abs in and come back to the knees, hands and knees tap out your feet and just take one cat cow, exhale, from here swing your legs around and we'll come to sit for mariti asana, the legs will come forward and I'll bring my left heel in so you can see me, know that there's a little space between the foot and the inner thigh by design, left heel is really in front of your left hip point even if the seat needs to come up, then inhale reach your left arm up, exhale reach past that hand, really reach into the middle distance and then swing your arm around, you can stay here or take a bind, the head can fall to the earth or you can consider how the knee fits perfectly into the brow, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out, first inhale lift your gaze and then exhale come out of the shape, left leg comes out, we have that hips distance in the legs and the right heel comes in close to the right sit bone, sit up right, reach the right arm up and then forward, look forward, reach forward and then swing your arm around, hands on the earth help motivate you forward option for a bind as well, I'll be crawling in a little bit, a little rounding here is a counter to the cobra to the camel, that's interesting the knee kind of wants to fit there into the curve of the brow, the bridge of the nose. On your next inhale look far forward and then release, coming into side stretches, I'll turn so you can see me, I'll bring my right leg out to begin nice and wide and the left foot is in, right hand slides on the inside of the leg and the left arm comes up and over, if you can get the foot that's fine so be it but keep looking underneath the left arm, it's interesting to bring this bottom arm, the right arm down and try to encourage the left hip down too, left hip always wants to come up off the mat, maybe lift up a little bit and ground better instead, breathing in and breathing out, breathe in, find that space in the side body and then breathe out and now reach your left arm forward and let that reach lift you up entirely, begin to bend your right knee and keep that right foot flexed, we're going to bring it into what is essentially a half lotus, no force, just rocking a little bit and then we have some options here for getting deeper in the hip, you can hook your hands underneath the right shin and play with the movement in the hips, another option is to hold the shin like a baby, that way you can bring the shin closer to the heart, rocking, hips love this rocking action, for compass should you choose to move forward, you can find your left hand and the left hand comes over where the shoelaces are in this right foot, here you're going to round your back, it's a lot like angry cat pose and the shoulder comes into the glove of the back of the knee, right hand is a kickstand and once again we're looking past the left arm, kicking through the right foot will serve you, compass pose, finding that direction, breathing in and breathing out, gently reverse it, a few rolls of the shoulder and then we'll swing this right foot back, this is interesting, barad vajasana, it's named for a very knowledgeable character, I'm turning to the left, if you can get the hand underneath the knee that's fine, otherwise holding on to the knee and the left hand wants to creep towards a half bind, look all the way past your left shoulder, twisting completely to the left, keep the body twisting left, turn your face and your gaze to the right, keep your face turning to the right, turn just your eyes to the left, and release, good, past body actions like that are fantastic for memory, bring your left leg out and the left arm comes on the inside of the left leg, the right arm comes up and over and you might find the foot, most people would lean towards the earth if they did that, so if that's you, begin to open up, this lower arm can come into figure 8 and encourage the right thigh and right hip down, breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out, reach that right arm up and come up, bending the left knee, guiding it in, maybe there's a half lotus in it for you and then hooking the hands underneath the shin, keeping the foot flexed for safety, even better holding on to that shin as one would hold a baby and rock. Then identify your right hand, right hand goes over the shoelace side of left foot, you'll need to round, use your hand and hold that left knee over the shoulder like a sack of potatoes, the left hand is your kickstand, kick through, look past your obstacles, compass pose, bend that knee, release, swing the left leg around, taking that knowledgeable shape, the right arm behind, holding on to the knee and begin to turn, turning as far as you can to the right, now turn the face and the gaze back to the left, cross body, turn only your eyes back to the right, then release, a moment of sitting should be easy now, coming to lie down in Shavasana, let the limbs melt and let your eyelids close, allowing the gaze to drift up towards that window of the third eye.

Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Om Radha, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Om Radha, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌nÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌 NÄ쳌mÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌 NÄ쳌mÄ쳌, Ká¹?á¹£á¹?a YÄ쳌 NÄ쳌mÄ쳌, AÄ쳌mÄ쳌, AÄ쳌mÄ쳌, AÄ쳌mÄ쳌. Starting to bring a little movement back into the body. You can draw your knees in, maybe a little twist to the left, twist to the right. And then when you do find your way up to sit, please bring your hands to prayer again and tap that prayer to that third eye point, that pressure point to the forehead and closing your physical eyes and gazing again through that window into the mind space, the chitakash. Is your mind a little more clear after your practice? And how can you use your practice today and all days to clear yourself from those obstacles of distractions, of repetitive thoughts, looking for that optimistic space in between the thoughts? Breathing in. Many thanks. Namaste.