 Hello, my name is Emily, and tonight we'll do a short practice to focus on unwinding our shoulders. I don't know about you, but I find that lately, I feel like my shoulders have been getting tighter and tighter and tighter, so instead of being relaxed and open, they're just right here. So this practice will take place primarily in a chair, and you could do it anywhere if you wanted to be on the floor or standing up. Some of these stretches I'm going to show you would be perfect for in school or if you have a few minutes at the office. And so when you're in your chair, just be sure that you've got some space to swing your arms, and then if you're on the smaller side, perhaps you can come forward in your chair so that your knees are at a 90 degree angle. If you're on the taller side, perhaps you need to bring your hips up, and you can do that by putting a towel under your hips. So for me, I'm on the front of my chair, so I switched up just a little bit. So my knees are at a 90 degree angle, my feet are parallel as if they're running along railroad tracks, and then let's get ready to get started. We're going to start to dasana, or mountain pose. It's a very grounding pose, very important that our feet are flat on the ground. Your hands can come onto your knees, or if you prefer, you can drop your shoulders, bring your hands out, and then imagine there's a string extending from your head to the sky, so we're lengthening through the spine. If you find that your chin is up, bring it down. And if it's comfortable, feel free to gently close your eyes, and we'll inhale through the nose, and exhale through at your own pace. Checking in with our body, quieting the mind. Definitely pay attention to your shoulders, see if you can relax. Melting the shoulder blades down your back, eyes open, and we'll flow. For the most part, we'll do everything for a count of three. So inhaling, arms float up, all over the head. Exhale through the mouth, inhaling, arms come all over the head. And on this one, you can hear, you want to check in with your shoulders. If you're here, maybe keep your arms a little wider, and drop your shoulders down. And exhaling, arms come down. Inhale, one arm come straight up, and we're reaching straight for the sky. Imagine trying to pick an apple, we have been a branch. Whoo, check in with that shoulder, too. Whoo, and then let's bring it to the side. Inhaling here, exhaling release. Let's inhale, bringing our arms straight up. Imagine picking an apple, checking in with your shoulder here. Inhaling, inhaling, coming over to the other side. Let's inhale, and then exhale, coming down. So opposite hand, coming up and over on the inhale. Exhale, let's bring our ear to our shoulder. Attention to your shoulder, it might be up here. Try to relax it down. So we'll inhale here. And on the exhale, let's drop our chin to the cook of our neck. We're not adding a lot of weight to our head. Just helping guide. Exhale, let's release. Whoo, let's shake our head. Opposite hand, inhaling, up and over. Exhaling, bring the ear to the shoulder, checking in with the shoulder. See if you can create some space in dropping the chin to the cook of your arm. Inhale, and exhale, hand coming down. Let's nut our head, yes, and then shake side. Ooh, excuse me. From here, let's drop our hands and do some large shoulder circles back. If you'd like to get your elbows in, let's get our elbows in. Now let's put our fingers on our shoulders and another. Now while we're here, let's bring our arms up so they're parallel to the ground. And then we'll close our elbows and then inhale. Open, let me drop my hands down and inhale, bring my hands up. And exhale, swinging them back. Inhale. Now for this one, inhaling here. On the exhale, I'm going to bring my hands back and then perhaps just hold them out. If you'd like to take the stretch further, you bring your hands closer together or for the fuller expression, clasp your fingers behind your back. So here, on the inhale, pulling my hands down towards the ground, opening through the chest. So inhale, I can look up and exhale, ooh, relax. Inhale, looking up, opening through the shoulders, opening the heart and then exhale. Let's inhale here and relax. We're gonna inhale, just finding length in our spine and exhale, we're going to release. Let's take a few more shoulder circles. Just for the last pose, we're going to do the ego pose. So here, we're going to inhale arms coming up. On the exhale, right arm comes under the left. You can stay here if you'd like. For my shoulders, this feels perfect. If you'd like to take it deeper, you can cross bringing your right palm over on your left palm. Let's be on deep for me today. So I'm gonna stay right here. And on the inhale, bring my elbows up, shoulders up. And on the exhale, bringing my elbows into my navel. Inhale, exhale. On the inhale, coming to a neutral position, finding length in the spine. Exhale, let's release. Let's do the opposite side. So inhale, arms coming up. Exhale, left hand comes under the right hand. Again, this right here feels really good for me. If you want to take it deeper, you can cross your hands with your left palm in front of your right palm. And we'll inhale. And exhale, bringing your elbows in. Inhale, on the inhale, let's find length through the spine. Exhale, releasing the shoulders. Shoulder circles back just to loosen up. Ooh, excuse me for all of my cracking but my shoulders are very tight. Let's inhale, bringing shoulders up to our ears. And release to the side. And last one. Inhale, bringing hands up and over. Bringing palms to the center of your heart. May you move throughout the week. With ease, peace, and joy.