 everybody. It is Tuesday morning, October 11th and I wanted to do like another asana yoga prep physical video for you guys because I know a lot of you guys have been starting your ashtanga journey. I know you found some of the half primaries on YouTube, all that kind of stuff. And there's some stuff that I want to address, especially if you do not have a teacher. Now again the ashtanga series, the primary series of ashtanga yoga is called yoga chikita and that just basically means physical therapy. So the sequence of asanas of postures that are called the primary series aren't necessarily basic or beginner postures. They're just postures that bring in physical therapy. So that means something different for every person. If you are someone that struggles with weight, that's one thing that's going to happen is you will start to drop weight. If you don't struggle with weight, if you're like me or more on the thin side, you will start to immediately develop more muscle in your body to hold your joints and your bones. Now with that being said, it takes approximately 10 years to really work through the primary series. And even when you start working into the second series, the intermediate series, which is for your nerve therapy, you're still working through primary. You're kind of doing them together until you get to a certain point, second series where you drop primary. Now with that being said, every series of ashtanga yoga can stand on its own as its own series. In my opinion, the primary series is the best out of all the series. It's the most grounding. That's kind of one of its purposes too. But they all build on each other as well. And so what you're going to notice in the primary series is a high demand for physical strength. And I've said this before and I'll say it again, even though in ashtanga yoga, you're seeing more extreme postures like leg behind the head, catching ankles in the back, then all that kind of stuff. The emphasis is not on flexibility. In fact, we're not even looking for flexibility. We're working for mobility. And mobility is that combination of flexibility and strength. I've said before, I don't know if I've said it on YouTube, but I say it in my classes a lot. As a teacher, if I have a student come in that's like hypermobile, I panic. I would rather have a student come in that's really tight because the tighter students, they're going to find the mobility the fastest and they're the least likely to get injured. If you're doing yoga with hypermobility, you run the risk of hyperextension, which is something I struggle with. And that can lead to injury. What we're also looking for is that strength to protect the mobility. So I've said this before, when you get into the more advanced postures and you're putting your legs behind your head, many times, super hyper flexible students that can already put their leg behind the head, we hold back, we refrain from them doing that because we need to get their core really strong. That strength is what's going to control the posture. It's going to control the shape that your body is making. If you look at like ballet dancers or athletes, they move with agility, with control, with purpose. That's the same thing we're looking for in the asana practice too. Because once you start to learn how to control your body, then you start to learn how to control your own mind because you start to learn through the practice that the body is 100% the mind field. Okay? So one of the most physically demanding things of the Ashtanga series is what we call the jump back and jump through. And it's of vital importance that this is something that is heavily worked on while you're in primary series. Because once you get to second series, the jump back in and jump through is going to change and it's going to be even more demanding on your strength. Same with third series, fourth series, fifth series, so forth, so forth, so forth. And what tends to happen with human beings is we tend to want to mimic what we're seeing instead of actually learning what we're seeing. So if you're watching an Ashtanga practice on YouTube, you're watching someone who has been doing this for probably 20 years. And so what that means is they're going to have what I and what most yoga people would call a clean practice. It doesn't mean that there's not weaknesses still. There's always going to be weaknesses and things to work on with every person, but their practice is clean, meaning that it's controlled. And if you've been doing this for six days a week for 20 years, it most likely will be controlled, right? So the problem is, is that when we're watching these practices on YouTube, we're comparing our chapter one to someone else's chapter 10. And because of that, because we're doing that comparison and we're trying to leapfrog to how they're able to control their body, we get injured. Now injury, there are three teachers in Ashtanga yoga. The teacher, the practice and the injury. Injury is not something to necessarily fear. It will probably happen at some time. And our perspective on this is that it is teaching you that the posture didn't hurt you. You hurt yourself in the posture. So now we have to go back and go, okay, I need to realign. Now the biggest place for these entries to happen and for the mimicking of a teacher to happen is again, the jump back and the jump through, especially for women. Now the first video I did on Asana work was a video on the shoulders on protraction and retraction. And that's what we're looking for in the jump back and jump through series. That's why I did it is because that's super, super, super important. So again, what I mean by that is being able to push the floor away from you so that your shoulder is in its particular lock. It's not, it's not dropping, but it's in a lock. Okay. And what tends to happen is when you start to push away from the floor in order to get garnish that strength, you're also going to be pulling into the abdominals and into the perineum, which is where the power of the bundas lie. Now with that being said, I am going to show you some work with blocks. I do this in workshops sometimes with students. Traditionally speaking, we don't use props and ashwami yoga. There's a reason for that. However, if you are by yourself practicing, I'm going to encourage you to get blocks to start working with this for your own protection and for you to be able to feel your own alignment so that you can start to self-correct. As always, another disclaimer, the best thing to have as a teacher, this is just an alternative to a teacher. 100% though, if you're able to find a teacher, find a teacher. So once again, let's look at protraction and retraction. So what is again protraction or retraction? I've got two blocks here. I would definitely suggest you want to have blocks for this exercise that are the same size. My dog got this block. They're the same size. You'll see why and then. But just to start, remember what protraction and retraction is. So this is retraction and this is protraction. So if you're doing a handstand, you're going to be in protraction. When you are a downward-facing dog, you're going to be in protraction. That's getting the serratus anterior muscle to start to activate, which is one of the muscles that's the supporting muscles needed for the jump back and the jump through. So let's look at that from the mat again. Let's practice that from the mat before we even get to the jump back and the jump through. So once again, when we're doing protraction and retraction, let's come to all fours quickly just to warm the shoulders up and just feel that sensation so that you have the information in your head. So retraction once again looks like this. This is retraction. This means that no, you are completely out of alignment. You are not activating your muscles. You're completely headed for an injury. This on the other hand is protraction. So the body is engaged. The stomach is pulling up. Now when we're talking about jump backs, jump throughs, if you're retracted, look down. You don't have much space to get your legs through, right? But when you're protracted, that's a hell of a lot of space to then get your legs through. And before anybody asks, no, your arms are not too short. No, your legs are not too long. The only excuse that would be viable is if you are a chondroplasia dwarf. And if you have a chondroplasia dwarfism, then I would automatically have you working with the blocks to create that length. But most people don't have that. And so your body is in proportion for your body. Every course I get someone saying, I think my arms are too short. No, if it's not happening yet, that just means you have to build up strength and keep practicing. It takes about roughly seven-ish years to be able to really get a jump back and a jump through. Men are going to get it faster than women, generally speaking. And that's because the male's body is bigger in the upper body, where a woman's body is stronger and bigger in the lower body. And so what tends to happen is that water tends to run downhill. And so when we have weaker joints, as women, we'll take that weight and dump into our shoulders. Now, I am going to make a video over the sun salutations, and I'm going to talk about that with Chaturanga, modifications for Chaturanga and what I don't want to see happening in Chaturanga too. But as women, I just want you to think about that, weight, water runs downhill. So be very careful with your shoulders. Okay. So when you're doing the Ashtaka Sequency, the jump back and the jump through happens in the primary series between two different sides of the posture and between two different postures. This is because each posture has an alchemy, and each side of a posture has an alchemy to it, the left and the right side. And so in order for us to take a new posture or take the opposite side of a posture we just worked, we then have to flush out the karma, the work from the previous posture or the previous side. This is where the jump back and the jump through happen. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I will place a link to Ashtanganers doing our primary series so you can watch it for yourself. But what tends to happen with a lot of students, especially new students, is they tend to come to the mat, and after they've done their posture, they tend to kind of cheat the jump back, where they'll just kind of pull their legs in and then just kind of haphazardly like jump back and see how my shoulders are not in alignment. You can do that a thousand times and be okay. Thousand one times, not okay. You're going to throw your shoulder out. So we're looking at the jump back specifically. The count, I won't use the Sanskrit for this, but it's usually inhale, lift up, exhale, jump back. Now the inhalation is most of the time used to chronically lift the body. For example, if you were to do a handstand, as strong as you are, you will never come up on that handstand on an exhale. Your body will instinctively know to inhale as you lift up because that's what the inhale does. It's chronic. The exhale is more deflating breath. So what do I need by inhale, lift up? This is where I want you to get your blocks. And when you have your blocks, you are going to be creating more space on the mat. However, I don't want your hands to be way out to the side. I want your hands to be right under where your shoulders would be. So if your hands were on the mat specifically, that's where you're going to put the block. So let's look at the jump through. So when we're looking at the jump through and these blocks, what's going to happen is you're going to inhale, pull your legs into your chest and then lift up, inhale. Then exhale, start to twist backwards. For beginners, I want you to then put your feet on the mat and then step back to plank position. Alright, so let's do that one more time on that practice. So cross your legs, ball them up because you have to get them in in order to get the body back. Ball the legs up, inhale, lift up, exhale, go back, step back, plank. And then after that, if you're following in the Asanga sequence, you're going to come to plank lower, Chaturanga, inhale, up dog, exhale, down dog. Now from down dog, we have the jump through. Now most of the time in the beginning of a practice, students will, lower it down a little bit, students will dive bomb. We see this all the time in Asanga with the jump through, with drop backs, this idea of dive bombing. And that's coming from more of a panicked place. And when we jump through from downward facing dog, we're actually jumping through again on an inhale. We're coming on an inhale. So what does that mean? We're taking off. Alright, and something about the jump throughs. So if anybody was ever a swimmer, so when swimmers are at a swim meet, you're on the block of that swim meet, hunched down about to take off, right? Track runners, hunch. The gun goes and they run, right? If you have a cat or any type of animal that likes to play like they're hunting, what do cats do before they catch their prey? They spring back, they crouch, and then they spring. That's what you're going to be doing in the jump through. From downward facing dog, you're going to be pulling your butt back, back, back, back, back, back, and then inhale going. So crouch, spring, crouch, spring. So with the blocks, what that's going to look like is this, alright? Very, very easy. Now if you find yourself putting your feet down, as you jump through it, your feet start to hit the ground, that's a fear response. That's a fear response. And I say this in my classes a lot. If you've ever been snow skiing, we used to go snow skiing with our dad every spring break. And it's fascinating because little kids, if you watch little kids snow skiing, they don't use poles, right? They're just kind of like going down the mountain by themselves. Well, why is that? They're so close to the ground, they don't need poles, right? If they fall, it's like right there. Same thing with the jump through. If you fall, you're right there. What does it, Marnie Alton says? If you fall, the earth will catch you anyway. Don't be afraid to fall. I've face planted multiple times in this practice. It's just part of it. So if you find yourself putting your feet down before your butt to hit the ground, that's a fear response. So you have to now ask yourself, as my teacher asked me, why fearing? Why fearing? Your butt can take the fall. It's not that far from the ground. Let's do it one more time. So once you're in downward facing dog, you're in downward facing dog, you're going to bend your knees, bend your knees, pull your butt back and then inhale, catch and come down. Yeah. So I hope that that makes some sense. Now again, this is going to take practice. This is not something that you're going to get, that you're going to be able to do easily right away. It's going to take years and years and daily practice of you developing that strength of you getting to know your own body, getting to know how to control that body, right? So don't freak out. Don't quit because you don't get it right away. Again, all of the people you see on YouTube doing Ashanga Yoga, they've been doing it for years. They're showing you a clean practice, what it's going to eventually evolve into. But in the beginning, you're having to learn that. And you are a beginner in traditional yoga. You're considered a beginner for the first 10 years of your practice, which is amazing. Because as I've said before, in a beginner's mind, there are many possibilities. In an advanced person's mind, there are a few. So it's awesome to be in that place of being a beginner. Now, of course, another aspect of the jump back and jump through, as I said in the beginning, is the pushing into that. It's going to trigger the bundles. And that lower belly area between the navel and the crotch basically for women especially, for women especially, is a very, very hard area to access for many reasons. As women, we are typically weaker in this area. We have a lot more softness in this area because of being pregnant, pregnancies, all that kind of stuff, having a uterus basically. And also psychologically, in our multiple cultures across the world, we're taught to kind of like fear this area, like fear it. Like we don't want to go near the crotch, like it's taboo. And so being able to pull up and find that access there into this area is going to be mentally challenging for a lot of people. So there's also that obstacle you're going to have to break through. That's something I had to break through in my own practice because I grew up in the South, right? And that's all taboo. So to be able to really work on this area of pulling it up into my navel was something that took me years to be able to even slightly understand how to do that. But with that being said, I'm going to show you another exercise you can do to target the lower belly within yoga. Now, this is why I promote bar a lot as well because bar is really going to have you start to access this area with the way they thrust their pelvis. The bar teacher will have you move the pelvis in a certain area. And that is going to actually trigger access to that area, which is moa bunda and Udyana bunda, the combination. So moa bunda is literally right in your crotch. It's that pulling up sensation. Udyana bunda is pulling the navel into the spine. So everything is pulling up into the body. This is why in yoga classes, we never want to belly breathe, like do not belly breathe in a yoga class because we want to keep that contraction in the stomach, keep that rising up. Now, again, the bundas, even though this feels very physical, it's actually related to the breath, to a pranayama practice. I know that's hard for beginners to understand, but the more you get into the practice, you'll start to understand how the breath is actually the one doing this. And so again, if we look at pranayama, so pranayama, breath work, prana is rising up of life force. So the life force rising up, yama is extension. So extending the life's capacity through breath. Now, we know, if you've been on this channel for a long time now, we know that in this bowl, all over the camera a little bit, in this bowl down here in the torso, right in this area is what's basin in your pelvic region, is where this entity, I don't want to call it entity, we'll call it an energy, where the energy of kundalini lives. And kundalini is present in all yogas. And it's often represented by a sleeping snake, a curled up snake. It's not a snake, it's just an energy. This is the priced consciousness. So it rests down here in this pelvic bowl. For some people, it stays asleep in dormant for their whole lives. But through the practice of yoga, we start to pull and harness that energy up the spine of Shoshuna. This is what gives us enlightenment. This is what gives us Christ consciousness, right? And it shouldn't happen all at once. It takes years to engage kundalini, okay? So when we're looking at Mollabunda and the bunda specifically, what we're doing is locking in that energy. So if you're familiar with the chakra system, you also need to be familiar with the bunda system. Because in order for those chakras to start to spin and move in a balanced rotation, you have to have control when the bundas too. The bundas are like that plug, you know, or the gas tank, the gas pedal, right? So we're pulling in for women that could be like a Kegel exercise, would be like Mollabunda. Women, when you are on your periods, you will not have Mollabunda because the body's trying to be a panic and detox. So you need to respect that and rest for a couple of days and not practice. When you're having a baby, your Mollabundas aren't engaged because you're trying to get something out of you. But you know, the rest of the month when you're not on your cycle, it's totally accessible. And so you're learning how to control that energy. That's what Hatha yoga means, right? Hatha yoga is the posture practice. Hatha is sun noon. Well, what is sun noon? Prana apana, the balancing of energy up and down the spine through posture work. That's what Hatha means. So this is an exercise that you can do if you're strong enough to do this. If this is too hard for you right now, just work on getting strong. I'm going to try to show you here. So it's you're not going to. So with this, I'm actually going to have you come off of your yoga mat. So you're going to just pull your yoga mat to the side. Okay, because especially if you have a hardwood floor, you can't, you won't be able to do this on a carpeted floor. You can also wear socks. I pulled out one of my binding towels is like a lungi from India. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to put the binding towel here on the floor and I'm going to put my feet. I don't know if you'll be able to see it, but I'm going to come to a plank position and I'm going to put my feet on the towel. Now the towel is not going to be, let me back the camera. The camera is under my battery block right now. So again, you're going to come to a plank position with your feet on this binding towel. You might not be able to see my full body. We're just going to do it as we can. You're coming to plank. I want you to watch your butt, especially with lemon. I don't want to see this and I don't want to see this. This is very weak. We want this. You're protracting. Let me back up a little bit so you can see my shoulders. You're protracting in your shoulders. Now what I want you to do is I want you to bring your feet in between your hands and then you see that. So this is getting you into like a handstand. My knees that didn't bend, they stayed straight and then you're going to go back out again. Coming in, coming out, coming in, coming out. And that's going to trigger that lower belly response. Okay, so I hope that made sense. I will be trying to put a sun salutations video up. It's going to be a little better. I got to figure out how to do it because there's so much movement and I want to be able to get a close up so you guys can see. So you guys can see like modifications and stuff that need to be there. I'm going to try to again do the sun salutations for beginners so that you're not rushing to make your practice look like somebody else's practice but just being where you are. And if you are practicing from home, then you are in a great position to not have to worry about that ego kicking in, right? All right guys, I hope that makes sense. Leave me your questions in the comment section below. The new yoga course is going to be posted soon. I think we're going to be starting it on Sunday, November 20th. I will put all that information up with the link very, very soon. Ask me any questions you have down in the comment section below and I will talk to y'all soon. Bye guys.