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want to become more flexible yeah
join the club we all do but what i find
is that
when most people say they want to be
more flexible what they really mean
is they want to be able to use their
body freely
without stiffness and limitation most of
us as stiff adults
got that way because we stopped using
our body the way
that we can use it so instead of sitting
around and doing boring
stretching all day long what we can
actually do
is use our body the way it was designed
to be used
so human beings were designed to do a
lot more
than just sit in front of the computer
all day long we got a lot of things we
can do in our bodies
these are three exercises that we're
going to get started with
first is the bridge and reach i
love this basic simple exercise because
it uses extension of the hips
reversing that sitting we're always
doing with some rotation
and side bending of the spine which
guess what
in everyday life we're very rarely
aligned perfectly sport activity
being a human is to be out of alignment
you've probably done a glute bridge
before
lay down on your back bend the knees
feet flat on the ground
extend the hips by pushing them up to
the sky
squeeze the glutes then you're going to
take
one arm and you're going to reach
to the opposite side of that arm
you're then going to windmill the arms
back to the other side and really
reach through that shoulder i want that
shoulder to come up
close to the ear so now as we
use this hip extension and we're using
those glutes to fire
we're also stretching this lat muscle
and we're rotating and side bending
the spine feels really nice have fun
with this one
next straddle good morning i love the
straddle good morning
because it invites us
to really extend through the spine
the pelvis and to stretch those
hamstrings that we're sitting on
all day long take a wide stance your
feet can be
slightly turned out you're going to
extend the spine by keeping that chest
nice and big
i want you to place your hands on the
back of your head
now this is going to help you keep that
chest big
don't let those elbows come forward i
then want you to
anteriorly tilt your pelvis and this
means
sticking that tailbone backwards like
you're posing for a picture
now we hinge forward at the hips
driving the hips backwards keeping the
knees
straight sorry this is a lot
keeping the knees straight bring that
torso as far
forward as you can while still keeping
that spine extended
and then raise yourself back up those
are a lot of cues
but really it's simple knees straight
back straight hinge forward come back up
a great hamstring stretch and
a great strengthening exercise with your
knees
completely straight which let me tell
you
probably none of us are doing and
finally we have the squat
fold one of my favorite exercises and
to me the measure of a human being's
functionality
is interacting with the ground how well
can you get down to the ground and stand
back up
and how creative can you be when you're
doing this now the squat fold
teaches us to really compress our body
and to control our spine
moving on to the ground using momentum
to come back
up we get all of this coordination
athleticism
range of motion mobility strength all
those buzzwords
so we start in a standing position we
can squat
down now you're going to start by using
your hands
to lower your butt down to the ground
you're going to sit
then you roll back on your back let me
just do it right now
like so bring those feet up
and compress the spine
round the spine so you're bringing those
knees as far to your head as you can now
you're going to use the legs to
unwind that motion to reverse it the
legs will give you some momentum
to then bring your torso back up
and you can push yourself back to that
squat
ending position now as we go here
we can use less and less assistance from
the hands
so you can start by just using one hand
to get down into your back fold and
eventually
you can use no hands this requires
a lot of core strength a lot of hip
flexor strength it really just requires
a lot of coordination
of the body now i'll throw in
a more advanced move here in all honesty
this
is just to show that these skills
that start very basic can become more
and more complex
as you practice them and as you put time
into them you can start to control your
body
at higher and higher levels and getting
back to what i said in the intro
this is what most of us are after it's
not
flexibility it's control
over our physical body and our physical
existence
here's the deal if you enjoy these
movements we use these
and tons other just like them in our
guided program which is a monthly
membership
where you get workouts just like these
to keep you moving and keep your body
supple
and functional guys like the video if
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and as always
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you