Letting the floor help you changes everything

Welcome or welcome back. Today's lesson

is a classic and instead of giving you instructions, I will lead you through this lesson with questions.

How is it to have a rest right now? How

do you feel about that? So, please come to rest on your back and we will start on the back.

>> [music] >> So after you have taken a moment to arrive on your back uh to sink onto the floor to lean with

your full body with your full back with your head against the floor. First

question is, are you comfortable?

Do you need a pillow, some support or are you fine? Are you excited, ready to start with the class?

So the first thing we want to know is is it easy for you or would you like to lift your head to look at your feet?

Is this within the realm of possibilities to lift the head and look at the feet or are you not inclined to

do so? Are you more like

do so? Are you more like I better I rather not?

And if you did if you did lift your head, did you go through the midline?

Did you come up exactly over the midline or more over the left or more over the right?

If you did lift your head, where did you lean against?

Was it like the middle or is it the middle of your back? Is it more towards your neck? Where's the point you lean

your neck? Where's the point you lean against? And which muscles can you feel

against? And which muscles can you feel are contracting, are pulling you up? Are

you using your shoulders? What do you do to lift your head?

If you did lift your head [laughter] at all, we will come to that step by step.

Then please bring both of your feet to stand with your knees bent. The knees

pointing towards the ceiling forwards feet standing. And feel

feet standing. And feel the soles of your feet. Feel your right foot.

Feel how your right foot is standing.

How much pressure there is against the floor with your right heel, the inside of your right heel, the outside, the back, or do you have more pressure

against the floor with your fore foot?

Your toes. Do all your five toes touch the floor and compare it to your left foot.

Your left foot is standing with the same weight or is it lighter?

On which areas of your left foot are you leaning against the floor? Also, do all five toes of your left foot touch the floor? Can you feel that? Like this is a

floor? Can you feel that? Like this is a exercise in feeling. Can you feel all the five toes separately or at least the forefoot touching the floor?

How much tension do you have in your legs to hold the legs so that they don't fall?

Then you lean against the back of your pelvis maybe. And where is it you lean

pelvis maybe. And where is it you lean against the floor with your back, the middle back? Is it the shoulders and

middle back? Is it the shoulders and your head?

Your arms is your left hand resting supported by the floor in a different way than your right hand.

What are the differences you can perceive? What are the circumstances you

perceive? What are the circumstances you can perceive?

Then interlace both hands and bring them behind your head.

And the question is, can you lift your head with the help of your hands?

And how do you do that?

First of all, did you rest the back of your head in your hands? This is how I learned it. And then just a few weeks

learned it. And then just a few weeks ago, I was thinking, why is everybody doing this? Why don't we have the hands

doing this? Why don't we have the hands on the neck?

So, the hands supporting the neck, not the back of the head. And lifting the neck and the head. I liked it a lot better. I have a feeling I have I I'm

better. I have a feeling I have I I'm lifting my spine and there's not so much pressure on the first few vertebras on the base of my

skull.

So from now on I will always have my hands at the back of my neck instead of the back of my head. How is it? Did this

question occur to you?

Where do you have your elbows out to the side or more in front?

What is the more efficient way to lift your head?

To peel your spine off the floor?

What's more comfortable, more fun? Maybe. Where do

you feel you have a better lever?

If your elbows are almost touching each other, where your elbows are out to the side, the position of your hands, maybe the hands can be in very different

position. One hand behind the head, one

position. One hand behind the head, one hand behind the neck.

And here we suddenly see it's not 100% symmetrical. So maybe

symmetrical. So maybe you want to play or ask the question, do you come up? Do you lift your head exactly in the midline? Or do you bring

your right elbow closer to your left knee? Or your right elbow closer to

left knee? Or your right elbow closer to your right knee? Or your left elbow closer to your left knee. Or your left elbow closer to your right knee.

Slowly slowly we try one variation at a time and try to answer the question which is

the most efficient, most comfortable, maybe most fun way to lift the How much how far do you lift the head?

Where do you lean against?

How often did you lift the head at all?

Or are you imagining the movements and at some point take a rest again and see how you feel. How do you feel when

you rest your legs again down? How long

are your legs now?

Or at least how long do you feel your legs are? Where do you feel that your

legs are? Where do you feel that your legs are resting? Is your left leg closer to the midline or your right leg?

Are your legs very far spread out or very close together as if you would be standing While we are at it, resting on the back

with the legs extended, try to see if you can use your feet to rock

to rock your body.

So maybe your heels can grip the floor or it's just a movement of the feet to rock the body. And while you rock the

body, when you have the hang of it, feel the top part of your neck where your spine meets your head and see if your

head can bob freely up and down. You can

do this very slowly. How fast are you doing this? If you're doing it very

doing this? If you're doing it very fast, try it very slow. Try the opposite or try it a bit faster.

Maybe you can help with your hands. And

the main objective is to roll your head.

So the head can freely be pushed and pulled.

So you have the feeling that your head is free to roll in response to the

rocking motions of the rest of yourself.

Will this be better if we stand the feet? So we have to try that. Bring your

feet? So we have to try that. Bring your

feet to standing again with your knees bent and see if you can push with your feet to

roll your head.

So actually you might start to feel that you're rolling your pelvis with the help of your feet. The feet pushing against the floor.

The pelvis is rolling a tiny bit backwards posterior and a tiny bit forwards anterior.

And because the pelvis makes this little roll, it pulls or pushes the spine and your

head can bob roll a little bit up and down.

This is a nice movement in itself. can

feel maybe how much tension do you have in your jaw? Can you let go of your jaw of your eyes?

What do you do with your eyes? Do you

roll the eyes up and down as well?

Can you let go of the eyes? Can you

obstruct the movement with the eyes by gazing in the wrong direction?

When you push with your feet up, you look down.

And when you pull with your feet down, can you look up?

Then bring your attention more towards your legs and towards the pull to roll your pelvis forwards to

hollow which hollows your back a little bit. So there's a little space forming

bit. So there's a little space forming in between the floor and your lower back.

But how do you do that actually with your legs when you feel into it?

It's not exactly a pulling if you think of it. It's more of a taking weight of

of it. It's more of a taking weight of of lifting your legs or is it in order

to roll your pelvis?

How do you have to use your legs so that your pelvis rolls forwards down?

Let's take a short rest again.

How is it to have a rest right now? How

do you feel about that?

and then stand only your right foot. So

keep your left leg extended, stand your right foot and see if you can push the floor.

Can if you can push upwards to roll your pelvis backwards upwards just with one foot

or pull only with the right foot. So

asymmetric uh diagonal almost where do you have to stand your foot for that motion?

Same thing like before just with one leg. Now just the right foot is active.

leg. Now just the right foot is active.

You feel the right foot, the heel, the forefoot, the toes maybe. And how you push against the floor, how you lean with the sole.

You feel the contact or can you feel the contact with your right foot and the floor and how you push harder which

causes your pelvis to roll.

Let's try that with the left foot as well. Extend your right leg.

well. Extend your right leg.

Then bring your left foot to stand. Feel

the left foot. The softness of the left foot against the floor, the heel.

Or what image do you have when you feel your left foot in different areas of the sole of your left foot? When you start

to put pressure against the floor or take pressure off the floor in order to roll your pelvis in which directions?

Is it up, down, left, right, diagonals?

Where does your pelvis roll?

Take a short break again.

How do you feel now?

We will do one last thing we have been building up to right now. So please

bring both feet to stand again.

Then with the help of both hands, lift your head see how that feels. Now

what is the question? How do you lift your head now? Can you feel that your body is more involved? Your whole self

is more involved in this movement now.

Does it feel smoother, warmer, easier, more comfortable? Do you feel like more parts of yourself are participating? Which parts can you feel

participating? Which parts can you feel your left leg, right leg pushing to? What amount in which directions?

to? What amount in which directions?

How do you round yourself? Do you round your pelvis backwards? Do you push the middle back against the floor? Do you

push with your feet against the floor to lift your head?

And let's try the last variation to roll the pelvis forwards to have a gap in between the floor and the uppermost part of your pelvis

and your lower back and maybe your middle back. And at the same time, lift

middle back. And at the same time, lift the head. So the spine makes like this

the head. So the spine makes like this double double curve this S shaped curve very strongly you roll the pelvis

forwards and at the same time lift the head. [laughter]

head. [laughter] So how do you accommodate these two movements with just one spine to lift the head and at the same time

roll the pelvis forwards downwards away.

So a very strong scurve as opposed to can you do that as well the C curve to roll the pelvis backwards to lift the

head.

Can you alternate these two ways of movement to arch your back by rolling your pelvis and lift the head or by

curving your back?

And what else do you discover? or do you discover that it would be nice to [laughter] just extend the legs?

Uh, okay. So, these were all the movements I wanted to ask you about.

Now, how do you rest? How do you feel your imprint on the floor? Your contact

with the floor.

[laughter] A gentle rush of energy.

Doesn't it feel so much better now? Just

rest on the floor.

Are you able to feel the difference to the beginning of the lesson?

to enjoy, to rest on the floor. Every

couple of months we need to do this. The

longer you haven't done this lesson yet, the stronger the difference from the beginning to this feeling you have now will be.

[sighs] This wonderful feeling of just resting very softly.

And this is part of the lesson of course to enjoy, to be able to enjoy, to be able to sense

this kind of peace, peacefulness, this kind of distribution of restfulness throughout yourself.

So this was the last task to feel to be able to feel. Did you have you been able to feel how you rested at the end? And

then we will somehow move up again. Roll up and see how do we feel in standing when we rest the entire

body on the feet.

When our entire structure is balancing on the left foot and the right foot.

So how does this feel like?

How do you feel like to feel your right foot, your left foot? How you balance on top of your feet in a way

pushing down and by pushing down being pushed up.

Thank you so much for watching. It's my

pleasure to have been able to lead [music] you through this movement sequence. It's you who is making my work

sequence. It's you who is making my work possible, who is making my world possible. Take good care of [music]

possible. Take good care of [music] yourself and see you again in the next video.