Week 5: Space Body

Welcome to week five where we'll explore space. I'd like to jump right into a meditation so find something to sit on and find a comfortable seat. Settle in. Notice the parts of your body that are touching the ground and let these areas widen and release down into the ground. As you feel this weight moving down also notice your height. Notice the height of your nostrils and be with your breath. Bring your attention to the four parts of your breath. So there's a little lingering moment at the top of the inhale and a lingering moment at the base of the exhale. Notice what happens to your overall experience when you're with these lingering moments. Can you be with the space without anticipating it? Be with the fullness of the inhale without anticipating the top but feel into the top. Be with the fullness of the exhale. Notice the bottom. If your eyes have been closed gently allow your eyes to open and choose something to look at in front of you. Find something that catches your eye and let yourself really move towards the object so you're being curious. What shape is it? What color is it? Can you sense the textures? Are there any preferences that arise? Do you like it? And as you see in this way notice what happens to your breath. And now let your eyes settle back. So it's like your eyes are coming to rest in the space between your body and the object that's in front of you. And as you open up to feel wide or to see wide notice what happens to your breath. Let your eyes rest in the space between your body and whatever is in front of you. Notice the space between objects. If you're inside notice the space between walls. Maybe even have a sense of the space that is behind you. Let yourself open up to feel into the infinite space that we are a part of. And you may find that when you open up into space or into noticing space there's also potential for noticing more movement. So rather than letting the eyes be really focused on one thing we open up where everything is dancing. And now bring your attention to sound. And listen to sound with your whole body. It's like you're receiving sound. And notice space between sounds. Can you follow the fading of sound? The layering of sound. The space between sounds.

Come back to being with your breath. And the lingering at the top of the inhale and the lingering at the base of the exhale. And feel movement. Your body changing shape with each breath. And be with your fluid body. Your breath like wind on a body of water. And if your eyes closed again gently let them open to again be with the space around you between objects. Be with your breathing moving body and the space around you simultaneously. A body in dialogue with all things. Allow there to be a little bit of movement in your body now. Just relaxing the spine and feeling your weight shift. Let yourself move in any way that feels good. Moving through asana and other creative movements is not not meditation. So bringing the same presence through our whole practice will transition to lay down on our backs. Find the big X shape and stretch into all of your edges. Feeling your hands and your toes, your head and your tail. Bring your knees into your chest and bring your hands to your shins. On an inhale, reach your feet up towards the sky. Reach your arms back overhead. Let the backs of your hands touch the floor. Exhale, bring your knees into your chest and your hands to your shins. Inhale, reach your feet up and your arms back. Exhale, bring your knees into your chest and your hands to your shins. A couple more times like that. Inhale, feet up, arms back. Feel the lingering moment at the top and grow into the top. Exhale, bring your knees into your chest, hands to your shins. Follow your breath all the way down to the bottom. Inhale, feet up, arms back. Exhale, knees into chest, hands to shins. Following the breath to the bottom. Roll yourself up to your seat. Find a downward-facing dog. Let the eyes be soft.

Notice the space between your ankles. Notice the space between your hands and your feet. It's like you have eyes that are looking out on the ocean. Soft. Easy. Walk yourself forward to a standing forward fold. Again, eyes soft and notice your breathing body. Follow your next exhale all the way down to the bottom. Inhale, come all the way up to stand. Lift your arms up overhead. Really grow into the top of your inhale. Exhale, release your arms down to your side. Start to move through your wrists, making some circles, spirals, and feel your joints. You may have heard of joint space and space in the body is not nothing. Space in the body is full. Can you feel the fullness of the joints as you roll your wrists? And now bring that curiosity into the whole hand. The many joints of the hand. So there's this really incredible creativity in our hands. Ability to articulate in a lot of different ways. And here in this practice, this creative practice, we're moving and feeling at the same time. So really in your own experience getting to know yourself. And now bring your attention up to your elbows. Bones talking through fluid. What do your elbows like to do? And then bring your attention up to your shoulders. What do your shoulders like to do? And now let your arms and your hands move in a symmetrical way. So they're mirror images of each other. You're finding your own kind of creative movement and exploration. Hands moving asymmetrical. Again with this curiosity of circling and spiraling. I sometimes catch myself saying straighten your leg or straighten your spine. But really there's no straight bone in the body. We are curved. We are round circles and domes. And now move your hands asymmetrically. Move your arms asymmetrically. Let them do different things. Again circles and spirals. And we're exploring joint space.

A space that is full. And we talk through space. We communicate through space. Just like the bones talk through this full space. Release your arms and bring your attention down to your feet. And just like the hands, the feet have a lot of different bones. A lot of joints. A lot of movement potential. The feet get to move and make contact to a lot of different kinds of surfaces. They're adaptable. Feel your feet on the ground circling. Again talking through fluid. And you don't have to isolate the feet. Other things will obviously move because everything's connected. And come up it's like you're putting the spotlight on your knees. What do your knees like to do? Circle your knees. Spiral your knees. Maybe it feels good to let one leg lift up. And as you're doing this practice, how are you including your eyes? Can your eyes still be soft and receptive? Noticing space. And now bring your attention up towards your hip joints. And start to circle your hips. Your hip joints are between your pubic bone and the ASIS in the front. The hip points here that for many of us are there. We can palpate them. So they're a little bit more narrow than many of us think. Feel into that conversation between the long bone of the upper leg and the pelvis. Again feeling circles and spirals, bowls and domes. And now we'll come up to be with the spine. We'll open our feet up just a bit so that we can sway our spine side to side. The spine has so much movement potential. I like to think of my spine like a water snake dancing around in my fluids. And now what would it be like to go side to side but lead more from the tailbone? So the tailbone goes to the side and then the rest of the spine follows. Moving in a sequence is a nice way to notice if anything is being left out. So when I move through my tail can I sequence up my whole spine? Or am I moving my whole spine in like one chunk? So can I let it sequence? And what about if I lead from the top of my head side to side? Again bones talking through fluid, a space that is full.

And we'll come back to center and we'll let ourselves pour forward leading from the mid-back. And we'll come up again leading from the mid-back. Pouring ourselves forward and rising up. And you're down as you're down and you're up as you're up. So this can be really quiet and soft and subtle or you can lower down a little bit farther. And now we'll lead from the top of our head and let ourselves roll down and lead from the top of your head and let yourself come all the way up. A couple times like that let your head lead you down and let your head lead you up. We don't get a lot of these kind of more fluid free movements in our asana practice so just take it easy and do what feels comfortable for you. We'll lead from our tailbone so let your tailbone head back and then scoop your tailbone forward and let that ripple you all the way up your spine and then the tailbone will come back again. And let the tailbone come forward and ripple you all the way up through your spine and let the tailbone come back. And just a couple more times like that flowing through the spine moving from the tail. And then come all the way up to stand and pause for a moment and feel into the aliveness of your body. And come back to noticing your feet and noticing your wrists. It might feel good to step out a little bit more. And for a moment just let the whole body know circles and spirals, joints that are full, bones that talk through fluid. And really just a minute with this but if this is interesting for you you could always pause the video and put on a good song and dance for five minutes. So circling the whole body with this curiosity of circles and spirals, bones talking through fluid, joint space, a space that is full. I often let myself explore kinesthetic pleasure with this kind of play. Like what is the desire of this body? Can I just let it be pleasurable as I play with movement? And then we'll let that settle to find a tadasana standing at the top of our mat and as I've been exploring through this whole course, what is it like to feel into that free play, that free movement and apply it to a posture? Can the posture have as much aliveness as we just found in the spiraling of our body? How are your ankles doing, your knees, your hips? Are they all available? Are they all curious? On an inhale reach your arms up and connect to the top of the breath. Let yourself linger there and grow. On an exhale fold forward, follow your breath all the way to the bottom and at the bottom curl in. Inhale lengthen halfway, arda uttanasana, find the top. Exhale fold forward without anticipating the bottom, find the bottom. Inhale come all the way up to stand, root down into your feet, rise up, arms skyward, linger at the top of the breath and exhale release your arms back down to your sides. Inhale breath, arms rise. Exhale breath fold down, find the very base, curl in. Inhale breath halfway rise and exhale fold forward again finding the very bottom of the breath. Inhale breath rise to stand rooting down through the feet to come up, arms move up towards the sky lingering at the top of the breath. Exhale release your arms down to your sides. Inhale arms rise. Exhale fold forward.

Inhale breath halfway lift and exhale transition to a downward facing dog. Again include your eyes by noticing space and as you notice space with the eyes feel more breath and more movement inside your body. Inhale breath come forward to a plank. Exhale lower all the way down to your belly. Inhale rise into a low cobra. Pause here for a couple of breaths, feel movement, length through the whole front of the spine, legs reaching back. Push into your hands, find all fours, tuck your toes under and have a seat on your heels. If this doesn't work for you you can always sit on the tops of your feet. Reach your arms out wide to the side, bring your arms out in front of you and cross your right arm on top of your left and give yourself a hug. Wrap your hands around your shoulders and then dive in curling in let your chin come to your chest and receive this hug that you're offering yourself. Like you're receiving a hug from a really dear friend and that dear friend is you wrapping yourself up giving yourself a hug and now look forward and find eagle arms. On an inhale reach your fingertips and the crown of your head up and back. On an exhale bring your elbows towards your navel, release your chin towards your chest. We'll pause here for a moment, keep the arms interlaced like this but feel their weight. On your next inhale come back up, release your arms, inhale reach your arms skyward and exhale come forward to all fours and then back to downward facing dog. Inhale here, exhale transition to the front of your mat, inhale lengthen halfway art at Uttanasana, exhale fold forward, inhale rise to stand, root down into the earth, reach your arms skyward, find the top of the breath, exhale release your arms down to your sides, inhale breath, arms rise, exhale fold forward, inhale halfway lift, exhale step into downward facing dog, inhale breath come forward to plank and exhale lower all the way down to your belly, walk your hands forward out in front of you and then walk your hands in a little bit keeping the arms long and start to lift your head and your chest up off the floor. The tops of the feet will stay down, you're welcome to stay here or you can play with tenting the hands coming up onto the balls or the finger pads. From here experiment with lifting your arms up reaching from your side waist to your fingertips and now bend your elbows back and then straighten your arms back to your hands frame your hips and on an inhale reach your arms out wide to the side and forward and again exhale bend your elbows and let your hands come back framing your hips, on an inhale reach your arms out wide to the side and forward. One more time exhale arms come back inhale arms out come out wide to the side and forward on an exhale bend your elbows bring your hands underneath your shoulders tuck your toes press back walk your hands back and sit on your heels reach your arms out wide to the side bring your arms forward out in front of you left arm on top and then bend your elbows and wrap your hands around again giving yourself a hug and then receive this hug so you're offering yourself a hug receiving it you can even curl in rock yourself a little bit couple breaths here and now lift your head open your eyes find eagle arms inhale reach your fingertips in the crown of your head up and back exhale bring your elbows towards your navel chin towards chest the arms will stay interlaced but feel their weight all that space at the back of your heart inhale breath come back up release your arms reach them up towards the sky and come forward to all fours press on back to downward facing dog inhale breath come forward to plank root through both hands keep pressing through the left hand but turn your heels to the right so you're on the pinky toe side of the right foot and the big toe side of the left foot keep pressing through both hands and feel the right side body shortening inhale breath come back to center and exhale heels to the left pausing and again rooting through both hands in particular you'll have to give more attention to the right hand inhale breath back to center and exhale heels to the right keep pressing through left hand inhale through center heels up exhale heels to the left press through the right hand inhale heels up exhale downward facing dog again soft eyes like ocean eyes wide periphery and in the spacious eyes be with the movement of your body your fluid body where everything is talking in relationship inhale breath come forward to plank turn your heels to the right this time lift your left arm up to the sky for Vashi Stasana press down through the right hand to inspire a lift of the left arm press down through the feet to inspire a buoyancy in the pelvis slowly come back to plank and bring both heels to the left press down to come up right arm skyward root down through the left hand to lift the right arm feel a buoyancy through the pelvis and slowly come back down to plank and back to downward facing dog inhale here exhale transition to the front of your mat inhale lengthen halfway Arda Uttanasana exhale fold forward inhale come all the way up to stand rooting down lifting up arms skyward and exhale release your arms down soft eyes spacious eyes breathing body fluid body shift your weight to your right foot bring your hands together in front of your heart and start to send your left leg back for Arda Chandrasana your hands can open up wide your right hand can find the floor I sometimes like to use a block or a chair the wall and start to find a movement down through the right foot and then it's it's almost like you're gathering movement upward through the foot to then fill up your whole body feel your whole body all at once and now can you find easy eyes even when you're balancing relaxed eyes bring your left foot down to meet your right foot fold forward over both legs rise all the way up to stand rooting down lifting up from the very top of the breath and linger and release your arms down bring your hands together in front of your heart pausing to notice creating space to notice when we want to know the shapes it's really beneficial to notice what happened after the shape noticing what happens from what we're working with what we're doing and now shift your weight into your left foot and start to reach your right leg back slowly take your time and then open up wide for Arda Chandrasana and again feel your whole body you can come back to noticing that idea of like standing on a water fountain letting there be movement that goes from the bottom of the foot all the way up through the lifted leg all the way through the arms and then again playing with this idea of focused but easy eyes soft eyes spacious eyes maybe you can even feel your breathing body here and let's bring the right foot down to meet the left foot forward fold over both legs root down through both feet come all the way up to stand arms rise and hands come back down to the heart again opportunity to pause to notice the echo so what is the residue of the shape shift your weight to your right foot start to send your left leg back coming into a warrior to include your left arm your arms come from your sternum we could also say our arms come from our tailbone through soft tissue so arms connect to our midline feel your arms moving with each breath push down into your right foot straighten your right leg turn your right foot in so now both feet are parallel to the sides of your mat and to each other and then bring your hands to your hips and for a moment feel the weight of your arms feel the weight of your pelvis and let that connect you down into your legs keep rooting down and play with lifting the chest up can you rise up without losing a connection to the ground eyes are still spacious and now come back to center look forward reach your arms out wide again feel your the size of your arms your wings band will inhale here exhale bring your left hand towards your right foot can be to the floor or maybe it meets the foot and keep pressing through your left foot as you reach your right arm skyward press down into both feet and with a big inhale come back up and on an exhale bring your right hand towards your left foot maybe it touches the floor maybe the foot and then root down through your right foot lift your left arm up root down through both feet and on a big inhale come up exhale left hand right foot find the very bottom of the exhale inhale breath come all the way back up exhale right hand left foot find the very base of the exhale inhale breath come all the way back up exhale left hand right foot following the breath all the way down to the bottom inhale breath come back up exhale breath right hand left foot following the breath all the way down to the bottom inhale breath come back up exhale bring your hands back to your hips inhale root down rise up through the chest exhale tip your hips forward come forward and release your hands down to the floor now walk your hands forward out in front of you almost like you're coming into a down dog reach your pelvis back so it's this big wide luscious down dog you're taking up some space walk your hands underneath your shoulders lengthen your spine turn your left toes out bend your left knee nice and deep travel through center bending both knees and then bend your right knee nice and deep take a quarter turn back to the front of your mat press to your hands and find downward facing dog feel free to stay here if you want to explore another back bend then feel free to come forward to plank lower down to your belly for cobra or come onto the tops of your feet and transition to an upward facing dog find a couple of breaths in your back bend and when you're ready back to downward facing dog inhale here exhale transition to the front of your mat inhale lengthen up halfway exhale forward fold following the breath to the bottom inhale rise up to stand root down lift up arms skyward and exhale release your arms down again pausing to notice the echo and then follow the fading of sensation shift your weight into your left foot step your right foot back for a warrior to again really include that back arm your arms include your collarbones maybe you can feel into your back body the lats that come from your tail and spread out through your arms or they connect to the upper arm bone and then be with your breath again movement press into your front foot straighten your front leg turn your left foot in bring your hands to your hips just a moment here to again feel the weight of your arms the weight of your pelvis the weight of your legs let your chest rise up fold forward bring your hands to the floor lengthen the spine turn your right toes out bend your right knee nice and deep stay nice and low traveling through center bend your left knee nice and deep take a quarter turn back to the front of your mat and step back to downward facing dog again you're welcome to stay here welcome to find child's pose you're also welcome to find another back bend by coming forward to plank lowering to your belly for cobra or coming to the tops of the feet and find upward facing dog we have time and we'll meet back up and downward facing dog inhale exhale bend your knees step forward inhale lengthen up partway and exhale fold inhale come all the way up to stand root down lift your arms skyward and exhale release your arms down again pausing to be with sensation in the fading of sensation let your eyes be soft notice the space between whatever is in front of you in your body maybe even have a sense of the space behind you and around you and have a sense of your joint space all of this space is full open up your feet nice and wide so wider than outer hip width distance and turn your toes out bend your knees and come into a wide squat your hands can come together in front of your heart you can always slip a blanket underneath your heels if you need you can also always practice a little bit higher if you need just a few more breaths here the low back is wide might feel nourishing to lift the arms release your hands down and make your way towards your seat bring your knees together reach your hands forward out in front of you and experiment with lifting your legs up for Navasana let the legs draw slightly in towards each other but the hip points move slightly in towards each other release your feet down inhale lift your arms up and exhale rock slightly back and lift your legs up one more time Navasana release your feet down and let's lie back down onto our back into constructive rest so our knees will be bent our feet on the floor our back resting on the ground pausing for a moment to feel your body here supported by gravity push down into your feet lift your hips for a bridge pose you can stay here with your arms long or you can roll your shoulders underneath your back and clasp your hands we're rooting down through the upper arms rooting down through the whole footprint balls of the feet to heal inner legs inner feet again eyes wide eyes soft and release your hands and release your pelvis down extend your right leg out long and hug your left knee into your chest send your left leg over to the right and you might need to lift your hips a little bit so that you can be on the outer right hip and the outer right leg so that your left knee can travel to the side if it's comfortable you can let your head spiral maybe even looking towards your left hand I like to rest the big toe side of my left foot on my right leg and gently roll back onto your back hug both knees into your chest and then keep your right leg drawing in and extend your left leg out long let your right leg go to the left and again you might need to lift your hips a little bit so you can come to the outer left hip in the side of the leg and we'll reach our right arm out wide it might feel comfortable for you to bring this spiral all the way up into the neck and maybe looking over towards your right hand roll back onto your back hug both knees into your chest find a happy baby pose you can hold on to your ankles or you can hold on to the pinky toe side of your feet might feel nice to rock out a little bit side to side and then we'll hug our knees into our chest once again extend your legs out long bring your hands together in front of your heart and rub your hands together notice what's happening between your hands the heat the sound and now pause and allow your hands to move just slightly apart notice what you notice about the movement or the feeling around your hands between your hands and now take your hands and bring the heel of your hands to your cheeks and your fingers will come up to wrap or rest on your forehead so here our eyes are resting in the shadow of our hands but there's no weight on the eyes and now let your eyes rest back into this shadow feel the weight of your eyes right behind your eyes there's fatty pillows can you let your eyes rest into these pillows let your eyes rest in the shadow of your hands let the eyes stay soft and easy eyes closed and then release your arms wherever you like for Shavasana feel your body making contact to the ground and can your whole body feel the vast earth feel the ground beneath your body maybe five feet down ten feet down so that you begin to feel the aliveness of soil and simultaneously feel the movement of your body your fluid interior moving with each breath and be with your breath and the exchange of inside and outside air moving in air moving out feel the warmth of your body your temperature and also be with the heat and the discipline that comes from being in your life right here in present time expand to be with infinite space when we inhale space exhales when we exhale space inhales when we inhale space exhales when we exhale space inhales you stay with the ground movement open up to be with space and start to find a little movement in your body and come back to noticing joint space a space that is full a space that is a place of communication bones talking to each other through fluid let your arms stretch back and feel into your length when you feel ready roll to your side rest on your side body start to root down through the hands come all the way up to your seat find a comfortable seat move around a little bit once you arrive and again consider circles and spirals and fluid space that is full both inside and outside if your eyes are closed gently allow them to open experience space in you and around you thank you so much for being here and for practicing with me so for your journal prompt this week I'd like you to spend some time finding your question and you'll just write a question and questions that don't have an easy answer so if it has a yes or no answer that's not quite your question you want to find a question that that leads you into more curiosity or it opens you up into feeling more potential or more movement so possible questions could be how am I boundless love or what is my legacy questions that open you up even more to possibility for your homework this week I invite you to spend time with the night sky go out on a night that's clear and be with the stars and the planets and the moon and think about where you are in this infinite space when we engage in a formal practice there is an echo or a residue or a momentum and notice what feels alive in you right now and consider a dedication for your practice that feels really meaningful to you maybe that dedication is turning back in towards yourself maybe that dedication is moving you out into the world but consider something that feels resonant or that feels important feels genuine and then bring your hands together in front of you and rub your hands together again two hands meeting and open up your hands find some space and open up your hands really wide feel your hands talking to each other through space and very slowly start to bring your hands together letting the elbows bend feeling shifting space shifting sensation at the skin until your hands come all the way together when they touch feel them touch and with so much gratitude thank you