Yoga for Beginners Two with Dr. Melissa West - Episode 107

Today's No Yoga is another beginners class .

Hello , welcome to episode our blanket .

Excellent being uh have the not joining us for the second episode of next week .

The numbest mistakes .

Hello and welcome to episode 107 of Nama Day Yoga .

I'm so glad that you could join us here today .

I want to take a moment to thank all of you who have made donations to Nama yoga .

You can make donations at www dot melissa dot com and these go a long way in helping us to be able to keep up with the cost associated with making these videos available to you for free every week .

Um I wanted to share a testimonial from a listener that I received this week .

This one comes from Janice Lynn and she actually left this testimonial on our Facebook page .

So I would encourage you to support us by going to our Facebook page as well at facebook dot com slash your Day yoga .

So this is what Janice Lin says .

I just wanted to thank you for your wonderful videos .

Your community is also Denmark .

I'm so inspired by your programs and they fit in perfectly .

With A I begin looking at the world differently .

So thank you .

I'm always so touched and inspired by the testimonials and messages and comments that you all leave .

They are really touching to me and I do very much appreciate them .

Another exciting , a couple of things that we're going to have available for you very very soon .

One is a membership site .

We're actually going to be finishing up filming for that today .

This is going to have content above and beyond what we offer for free every week , we will be continuing to have our free weekly videos .

But for those who want more in depth practice , we will be offering more content available to you through the membership site .

So if you're interested in that , you can go to melissa west dot com to find out more about that .

And also I want to thank all of you who have responded to our request .

I sent out an email through our newsletter last week entitled What do you want ?

And so many people responded and I want you to know that we will be creating videos for what you want both on the free podcast and in the membership site .

In fact , today's lesson plan is in direct response to one of the main things that people said was the biggest challenge in their lives and that's time .

So we are responding to your needs as much as possible .

And that really helps us to know what your greatest challenges are .

So if you want to send a request to me do so at info at Melissa west dot com , you can send me an email there .

That would be fabulous .

Also available imminently are the digital downloads of my DVD S .

Now , these will become available to members on a monthly basis .

So if you become a member of the membership site , you will eventually have access to all those DVD s that I have .

However , if you wanted to buy DVD S one at a time and you don't actually need the physical DVD , we are going to have those available by digital download at Melissa west dot com .

And finally , I want to thank Donna from Squeeze for awesome yoga clothing .

I in particular , I wanted to bring attention to this line that I'm wearing this morning .

The one that says yoga makes everything better .

Everybody loves this T shirt and smiles when they see me wearing it .

And I kind of think , well , I obviously think this is true .

Yoga does make everything better .

And the reason why I wear this T shirt today is that I do know that Donna is currently having a sale on the yoga , makes everything better line .

You'll have to check out her site at www dot squeeze dot C A , but I do believe it's 30% off this line and she is doing for yoga viewers .

She is doing $10 flat rate shipping through Canada and the US .

So that is a great deal .

And if you want to order internationally , I know we had some viewers in Italy and Australia that were interested in ordering , you can email Donna and then she'll figure out the shipping costs and get back to you and bill you that way .

So thank you so much for supporting Squeeze Yoga clothing .

It's a fabulous clothing line .

I'm super , super happy with it and I appreciate you supporting her .

So let's get on to our class for today .

One of the biggest problems that people said that they faced this came up again and again , when people responded to my request for , what is the biggest challenge you face in your life ?

People said it was time restraints , lack of time , feeling rushed all the time , having difficulty finding time to practice the yoga .

And this kind of issue around time was pretty consistent across the board to most of the people that responded .

So I thought , wow , this is such an important issue that we need to cover up .

So many people requested shorter classes and we will do some series of shorter classes .

Those will be available on the membership site , but this class actually helps you to reframe your whole relationship to time .

So I'm gonna ask you to go ahead and lie back on your back and settle in now for your yoga practice and just take a deep breath in through your nose and let it fall out of your mouth .

So here's some interesting statistics that helped me to create this class around it .

And I would have to say that my phd in communications and cultural studies really helped me form this class because I think we live in a culture where we are used to this idea of being time starved .

It's kind of programmed into us .

So let me kind of back up and tell you where I'm at with this , apparently 99.5% of people who have electricity have televisions .

So presumably anybody who's watching this has a television .

Now , this is not going to be a slap on the wrist for watching television , not at all .

It's I'm going somewhere with this .

So according to the Ac Nielsen company , the average American watches more than four hours of TV a day .

So of course , there's obviously some time there that's available to you , but I don't even want to worry about that .

We're going to find time without that even .

So research done at the Australian National University found that TV has two paradoxical effects .

First , it induces a more passive state of mind , which is probably why people enjoy it so much .

And we hope to receive that passive state of mind through a yoga practice too .

But here's the paradoxical effect that it actually trains our brains .

Television actually trains our brains to become more accustomed to much faster changes of sequences than those found in nature .

So for example , a few weeks ago , I was watching a movie with my daughter called Cars Two and it was an absolute barrage to my senses .

So I started wondering why is this movie stressing me out and getting me all anxious ?

So I started to count the frames .

And what I noticed was that the longest time a scene would ever show up on this movie was for about five seconds .

That was the longest , in most cases , the frames , the scenes were changing at about a rate of one per second .

This is an incredibly fast pace that our media is moving at .

And this is exactly the point that we are being , our brains are being trained to feel this need to move at a really , really quick pace .

That is quite contrary to the pace that you come to in yoga and quite contrary to the pace that you find in nature and in yoga , we're always trying to imitate nature .

That's how the Yogi came up with their poses in the first place .

So we're actually being mentally trained to move at a pace much different than nature , much different than when we come to yoga .

This I think gives us the illusion of not having enough time of not getting enough done and of not being efficient enough .

So for example , another example is there are some television programs where they can renovate a house and a 45 minute hour .

And in truth , it takes much more than a 45 minute hour to renovate a house .

And also in the show , it usually shows one person being responsible for that renovation .

And in truth , it takes a team of people to get these things done .

So how many of us have the patience to receive the communication that nature offers and how many of us will be able to slow down enough to the pace that we go in , in yoga .

The problem is , I don't think that we don't have enough time .

It's actually that our media has programmed us into believing that things shouldn't take that much time .

So I'm going to use another example from the media , for example , Cupcake Wars .

This is a television program that we quite enjoy , although it does stress me out as well .

So in the first round , they're supposed to , the contestants are supposed to create a completely original cupcake in 45 minutes .

That's kind of a lot to do in 45 minutes .

In the second round .

They're supposed to make three cupcakes in 75 minutes .

That's a lot to do in a short period of time .

And then in the third round of this show , they're supposed to create 1000 cupcakes in two hours .

This is completely unreasonable and it gives us this illusion that we can do a lot in a short amount of time .

And even in the first episode of Cupcake Awards , they actually had four hours to do this .

So I'm getting somewhere with this .

And there's a reason why this is a beginner class too is that we're going to come into a mindset of taking a different pace when we come to yoga .

So my intention for this practice is that we rest into an expanded sense of time with our yoga practice .

So the way that we're going to do this is we're going to begin by bringing our attention to the pace of our breath .

So begin to follow your breath in and follow your breath out .

Notice your breath coming into your body and notice your breath leaving your body .

And as you follow your breath in and out of your body , notice how there's space after your breath in and space after your breath out .

So start to become aware of the spaciousness between your breath in , getting your breath out and just notice when your mind wanders and wants to rush on to something else .

So notice any tendencies to feel like this is a waste of time or I could be doing something else that would be more beneficial to me right now or I need to get to these other tasks and simply bring your attention back to your breath .

So this is a huge task that is coming back to our breath without judgment that we'll have to do again and again , because for the other um hours of your waking day , you , you spend your time going at a much different pace .

And so give yourself some time to slow down here and to take a different pace .

Give yourself this next hour to really rest into an expansive sense of time and feel that through your breath .

Practice , become aware of the pace of your breath right now .

Notice if it's slowed down at all .

Notice if those pauses or spaces between the breath are becoming more spacious , check in with your physical body , your mind and your emotions .

And just notice if you're resting back into a sense of calm into a slower pace , and if you're not just notice that too , there's no right or wrong , no better or best way to be just noticing what's happening right now for you .

So at the beginning of our yoga classes , we start by making an intention .

So what is your intention for your class right now ?

Why are you doing this yoga ?

What's going on in your life right now ?

And how could your yoga best serve you to support you in your present life circumstances ?

And then once you've formed your intention , you can begin to wiggle and stretch out and just gently and taking as much time as you need and pay attention to these transitions too .

See if instead of rushing to the next pose that you can move slowly , so slowly , take as much time as you need to roll over onto your stomach .

So we're gonna begin by opening up your right hip .

We're going to do some standing postures where creating some opening in , in your hips is going to be useful to you .

So bring your , your right leg up to your side and you wanna tuck your tailbone under and just feel gravity , drawing this part of your hips down .

So you're getting a stretch in your grind your inner thigh and keeping your low back long , then you can either leave your right leg here .

This would be a great place for beginners .

And if you're already having a lot of sensation in your leg , this would be a great place to stay .

If you want to increase your sensation , you can extend your right leg out to the side .

Ok ?

Now go back to your right knee bent , take your arms straight overhead .

You're gonna roll away from your bent right leg into a twist .

So keeping your right leg bent at a 90 degree angle , turning your chest up towards the ceiling , looking over your right shoulder .

And then the option here would be to straighten your leg again , in case the beginners will stay with a bent leg and you can even prop your leg up on some cushions or bolsters here too .

Keep tucking your tailbone under , tilting your pelvis forward , keep your low back long .

OK .

And then roll back towards your left arm .

Mm Untuck , your left arm and bring your right leg up to the side .

Again , you're gonna keep your right leg there and we're going to come into a little back bend here .

So press the front of your pelvis into the ground , walk your elbows back to underneath your shoulders so that you're doing a Sphinx pose , bending your back backwards here with your right leg up to the side .

Again , just noticing any tendencies to want to rush out of poses and with without judgment , just notice that that thought probably comes up often and return to your breath and physical sensation in your body .

OK ?

Lower yourself down , slowly , take your hands underneath your shoulders , push yourself up , bring your knees underneath you and sit back on your heels for child's pose .

OK ?

So let me give a couple of options for this because this is a beginner's class one is that you need to make space for your body and child's pose .

So that might mean opening your knees wide here .

So that would look like this and then that makes space for your body .

The other is that if you have knee issues or foot issues that you may need to um lie on your back with your knees to your chest instead .

So that would look like this .

So basically , you're taking the same shape in a different orientation to gravity and this is a great way to modify any pose .

So try and take the shape in a different way .

So here we're taking it on our back instead of facing our bellies towards the ground .

So , a good rule in yoga is that you want to spend as long in your counter pose , this is a counter pose to the pose we just did as you did in your pose .

So now if you're lying on your back , slowly , make your way back onto your belly , you can rock yourself up and this time you'll lie with your left leg up to your side .

So notice any tendencies to rush in and out of postures and see if you can allow yourself to slow down .

So to what extent is it possible to slow down in your practice ?

Now , you can have the option of extending your left leg out to the side .

But if there's already a lot of sensation in your leg , then you might wanna just stay here .

Ok ?

For the coming into the twist , take your arms overhead , you're gonna roll away from your bent left leg and turn your chest up towards the ceiling .

Look over your left shoulder , your left knee is bent , your right leg is straight .

OK ?

And then roll back towards your right arm and your left leg , untuck your right arm , bring your hands in front of you again , press the front of your pelvis into the ground .

You're going to walk your elbows back to underneath your shoulders , coming into a small little back .

Ben here is like a modification of Sphinx pose with your leg up to the side , having your leg up to the side .

And this pose makes the pose more challenging .

So if this is , if you're finding this too much , you can always bring your left leg straight down .

Instead , that would be a nice modification here .

Ok .

Now you'll slowly lower yourself down and for your counter pose again , you can either come up and back into child's pose .

So push yourself up onto all fours and sit back on your heels or you can lie on your back and hug your knees into your chest .

Do what works best for your body .

Notice what's happening in your body now and see if you could shift or change or move at all to find more ease in your posture and then inhale up onto all fours .

We're going to do a simple pose for creating flexibility and warming up your spine , flexibility in your spine , spread your fingers nice and wide underneath your shoulders .

If you have any issues with your wrist , you can make fists with your hands and come up onto fists or you can come down onto your forearms .

So all of these help to take your wrists out of the equation , which will get stronger , the longer you practice yoga .

This is a truth that I've watched happen with a lot of my students over the years .

But do you take care of your wrists ?

Find the best position for you here , here or on your forearms .

Ok ?

And then you're going to exhale and round up through your back and inhale and arch through your book .

So back and forth like that , rounding your spine , dropping your head in your tailbone , inhaling , lifting your chest and your head and arching your spine in the other direction .

Notice any tendency to rush and see if you can slow it down .

Ok .

Great .

And then come back to send , you're gonna walk your hands back to your knees .

You're going to stand on your knees .

And I would encourage you here to uh double up your mat or put a rolled up blanket underneath your knees .

Here , we're going to do a short stance , lunge .

So just take your left leg at a 90 degree angle in front of your right leg for a lunge pose .

This is a great post to open up the front of your hip and your um quad muscle , the front of your thigh muscle .

And in this pose , we're going to take our arms straight up here .

So this pose here is going to mimic a pose that we're going to do standing in a few moments .

It's a lot like warrior one pose .

One of the things you'll also want to watch in this pose is that you don't swing your pelvis forward and shorten your low back .

So tuck your tailbone under , drop through your left hip in this pose .

To keep your low back long .

OK ?

And then release this side from your body .

Slowly switch sides .

So bring your left leg back and your right leg forward , drop your right hip , tuck your tailbone under and bring your arms up for a square lunch one that helps to prepare your body for standing warrior one pose .

OK ?

Slowly release this posture from your body .

Turn sideways on your mat .

I'm actually gonna keep that rolled up part here because I'm gonna use it for my knee again .

So place your right knee on your rolled up part , take your left leg out to the side .

Now you wanna line up your hips in this .

So probably what's gonna happen is your right hip is gonna be really hiked and rolled back .

So to whatever extent is possible in your body , drop your right hip bones so that it's in line with your left hip bone and uh level , front , top to bottom and front to back .

OK ?

You always , you're going to have certain limitations in your body just do the best that you can where you are .

OK ?

So we'll start here .

We're going to do a side bend here .

This is called gate pose .

This class can be a gate towards slowing down in our lives and to moving at a different pace , to moving at a more yogic pace .

So you can take your arms straight up inside , bend over your left leg and you can lower your left arm on your left leg .

If your hand , like in my body , rest rate at your knee joint .

It's not a good idea to put pressure on your knee joint there .

Your knee is supposed to bend forward and back , not side to side .

So for me , I'll bend my left arm to place it here .

But if your hand is above it or below it , it would be fine to have your arms straight here , try and keep your right shoulder back here .

So imagine your back is leaning against a wall here .

You find a way out of this posture and we're going to switch sides .

So I'm just gonna move where I have this extra padding underneath my knee to the other side of my map for me .

And I'll place my left knee on that extra padding .

Take your right leg out to the side and again , let's level off your hip bones .

So probably your a right hip bone will be hiked and pulled back a bit .

So turn it forward and drop it straight down to whatever extent it's possible .

It helps to have your toes pointing straight ahead in this pose .

You want to just check into and see is this pulling on the inside of my knee ?

If it is , that's not good .

You want to always feel your stretches in the belly of your muscle , not in your joint .

So , um , back off if you need to take your arm straight up , lengthen up through your spine , breathe out and bend sideways here , keep your left shoulder back .

So the tendency in this pose will be for your left shoulder to roll forward .

You want to roll it back .

Ok .

Come back to center and from here you're going to stand up .

So it's very easy transition to come to standing , just tuck your back toes under and come up to standing from standing , just close your eyes , take a deep breath in through your nose and let it fall out of your mouth and notice what it's like to go at this slower pace .

So what's happening in your body because of moving at a slower pace that you normally move at for the rest of the day ?

What's happening in your mind now that you're moving at a slower yogic pace , what's happening with your emotions when you slow down was happening with your spirit , when you take a slower pace .

So you can slowly open your eyes .

One of the things that I've noticed since I prepared this class for this week is how much I rush and no matter what I'm doing .

So this has brought a great awareness to me and it's allowed me to see that I can slow down with what I'm doing .

Not everything needs to be a mad panic or a rush that it could be a really interesting practice in yoga .

We call our practice saa and so it could be a beautiful practice to decide that for this day or for this week or for this month , I'm going to move slower and see what that's like .

Or I'm just going to notice how often I rush these are really incredible awareness to have .

And then when we have these awareness , we have some choice around what we're going to do with them .

OK ?

Turn and face the front edge of your mat .

You're going to take a step back with your left foot , take a step that's comfortable in your body .

Especially for beginners .

It can be helpful to do shorter stances .

OK ?

You don't , you're going to exhaust yourself and be really tired doing long stances .

So when I studied with Esther Meyers School of Yoga , all the standing poses were done in short stances .

And that was because this is a more natural distance between your feet .

So if every pose moves from mountain pose to Dana , then it makes more sense that warrior one would be here than this huge leap back .

So just play around with the distance between your 2 ft .

So it could be a normal step .

You might want to experiment with coming a little bit further .

A lot of schools to teach one leg length between your poses , but you can play around with it and see what works best in your body .

It's your yoga , turn your left hip so that it faces the front of your mat , sink down through your front , right bone .

So your front right leg is bent , your back , left leg is straight and then bring your arms straight up .

So this is warrior one and we're gonna do a little variation on it here by taking our arms behind us , roll your shoulders back and down and lift your arms .

So you're doing a chest opening posture with warrior one legs .

And this is really useful because it will help to open up your chest and strengthen your back .

A really important counterpose , strengthening and opening for all the tight muscles in your chest and the weak muscles in your back .

It's pretty much standard across our culture right now .

Release this pose from your body and let's do it on the other side .

So take a step back with your right foot and on this side , you might want to play around with taking a different stance .

The other thing that you might want to do is experiment with where your feet are that you could widen them , especially if balance is an issue .

OK .

So that's always an option .

Sink down and bend through the your front left .

Sit bum in how to take your own straight up , turn your palms forward , he'll take them around behind you , roll your shoulders back and down , lift your arms .

So you're doing a chest opener with warrior one legs , a little variation on warrior one here .

OK .

Release this posture .

From your body , step your back leg forward and turn sideways on your mat .

So for our next postures , warrior , two inside angle pose , we're gonna start this way , turning , taking your feet wide , OK .

And a nice V shape here on your legs .

So let's start with your left side first , turn your left toes out here .

You want to keep your hips facing the long edge of your mat .

Now , there's always going to have to be a choice that happens here going to bend your front left knee .

And so you can see here , my right hip will start to pull forward .

But what's more important than my right hip is my left knee because watch this , if I pull my right hip back , my left knee pulls forward and this is really bad for this joint here .

So most important is to keep your left knee over top of your 2nd and 3rd toes .

So you can see your big toe at all times here .

Again , it's completely fine to play around with your stance .

It's gonna be less to have a shorter stance .

Ok ?

You're going to bring your arms up to parallel to the ground and gaze over top of your left fingertips .

The big trick here and when you do this a lot in classes in person , I can really make this happen .

It's a little harder to portray through video , but you want to take the weight of your arms in your back .

So if you lift your arms with your shoulders , you're gonna be exhausted almost immediately .

However , if you roll your shoulders back and down , find your back muscles and lift your arms with your back muscles , you'll be able to stay here much longer .

Remember , you can always lower your arms and completely take them out of the equation as well .

So do what works in your body .

OK .

So from here , we're gonna bend this post , sideway for side angle , post .

So bend your left elbow , place it on your left leg .

Now circle your right arm around in front and bring it over top of your right ear .

A lot of times I see people take this pose and come here like this and then you get shoulder impingement here .

But if you circle your arm around in front , creates ease in your shoulder .

Remember you can shorten the stance of your legs , less space between your 2 ft will make this easier as well .

OK ?

And then arc yourself up , turn your toes so they face forward again and now turn your right toes out .

I just realized I'm not marrying you very well .

So I apologize for that .

But I know our Yogis are very smart people and you'll be able to get around that .

No problem .

OK ?

We'll do Warrior two on this side .

Sink down through your front , right ?

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So they both face front again .

So they roll your pelvis over your leg bones , lift and spread your sit bones behind you , drop the crown of your head towards the ground .

So you're coming into a wide legged , standing forward , fold as an inversion .

So your head is below your heart .

Now , this is really beneficial for your body .

Great for your brain , gives your neck a rest , stretches out the back of your legs , ok ?

So from here , bend your knees and come down to sitting with your legs straight out in front of you .

So one of the things that you'll notice when you first start practicing yoga is that tightness in your hamstrings will probably cause you to sit like this sitting is difficult .

So , one of the ways to get around this is to elevate your pelvis , a folded up blanket or a pillow .

If you sit up on it will help you to tip your pelvis forward .

We're going to do a twist here , bend your right leg in place your right foot on the floor and play around with where your right foot is so that it best suits you and your body , wrap your left arm around your right leg and turn towards it , turn your body back to the center .

The twist prepares your body for your forward fold .

Take your right foot , place it on the inside of your left thigh .

Inhale lengthen up through your spine .

Exhale hinge forward through your hips and place your hands on the ground .

So be patient with yourself here .

It's taken me years and years and years of practice to be able to come this far .

It used to be worse .

So be patient with yourself .

We have infinite time in our postures and there's nowhere to get to .

We want to be focused on our experience on the physical sensations in our body and not be worried about getting somewhere and hinge back up through your hips , switch your leg .

So your right leg is straight out , bend your left leg in place your left foot flat on the floor , turn towards your left leg , wrap your right arm around it , place your left hand at the base of your spine lengthen up through your spine , turn back to the center and open your left knee out to the side .

Inhale lengthen up tall through your spine .

Exhale hinge through your hips , place your hands on the ground , stay long through your spine , reach your navel towards the top of your thigh , your heart towards your shin , and then hinge back up towards sitting .

So I would like to recommend that you take the time now to lie back on your back with your palms turned up beside you .

I'll actually demonstrate Shabana for you .

If you wanna lie on your back with your arms , a comfortable distance from your side and you'll stay here for about 5 to 10 minutes .

Check in with your neck too .

If your chin is higher than your forehead , then you want to place a pillow behind your head to even out or just tuck your chin and make sure your forehead and your chin on the same level .

You want to stay here for 5 to 10 minutes to allow your body to integrate your practice .

If your low back is tender , you can always bend your knees .

Thank you very much for joining us for episode 107 of Nama Day yoga .

I encourage you to check out all the other episodes of Nama Day yoga .

This is a beginner's class , but I assure you that all my classes are very accessible .

So we call this real yoga for real people for a reason .

You can start at any point .

I encourage you to go through the 100 episodes and look and see what calls to you .

What seems the most interesting to you and try that episode and I bet you'll find that you'll be just fine .

Thank you so much for joining us .

Please do join our Facebook community at facebook dot com slash your day yoga .

Thanks again to Squeeze yoga for our fabulous clothing and I will see you next week ?

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