WEBVTT

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- Hi everyone, 
my name is Adriene,

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and welcome to 
Yoga With Adriene.

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Ding!

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Today we're going 
to learn Tadasana,

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one of my favorite poses.

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A very basic pose but 
it has a lot going on,

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a more than meets 
the eye kind of pose.

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So Mountain Pose, or Tadasana,
is great for sciatica,

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it's great for stress, 
it's just an overall great,

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grounding pose.

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Definitely can help 
you improve your posture,

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and it's a great 
little container for

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tapping into the breath.

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So let's hop on the 
mat and learn Tadasana.

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(upbeat music)

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Okay, so to begin we're going

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to be standing on our feet.

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I'm gonna take my feet,
and I can do this,

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typically in a yoga class
this is a basic foundational

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pose that you often do 
at the front of your mat,

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but stand anywhere on your
mat or if you don't have a mat

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and you're on the floor, great.

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Stand anywhere in 
your house that you like.

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Or in your office, 
or wherever you are.

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And let's bring the feet 
hip-width apart to start.

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And because I have been 
practicing building my poses

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from the ground up, I'm going
to immediately think about

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my foundation, that 
which is touching the earth,

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and look down at my feet.

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I'm going to lift my toes...

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I got distracted by 
my own toes there, sorry,

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'cause I realized you're all
going to see my bling toe,

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which there's a great 
story behind my big toe art.

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It's a new thing for me

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and I will write 
that story on my blog.

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So if you're curious you can
read that story on the blog.

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Let's stay focused together.

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Tadasana, the Mountain Pose.

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Starting at the feet, 
I'm going to lift my toes,

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and right away I'm gonna 
see if I can connect

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all four corners 
of my feet, okay?

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So that's the ball joint of
the big toe, the ball joint

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of the pinky toe, and the
back two corners of the heels.

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So I'm going to turn to the
side here just so you can see

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that when I lift my feet 
I can really tell if I've been

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sitting in the 
front part of my feet,

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or if I tend to hang 
out on the back part,

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by lifting the toes 'cause
then it requires me to go

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through all four 
corners of the feet.

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We also call this in yoga,
in Hatha Yoga,

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four part standing.

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So that's where 
that comes from is

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ball joint of the big toe,
ball joint of the pinky toe,

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and the back two 
corners of the heels.

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So I'm going to 
spread my toes wide,

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and then I'll relax my 
toes back down once I have

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more of an awareness or 
consciousness of my footing,

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or where I distribute my weight.

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That alone is worth the price
of your time in this video.

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Just understanding 
where we carry our weight.

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And you'll notice the 
more you start to practice this

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four part equal standing,

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the more comfortable 
we become in our bodies.

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The posture improves 
naturally and we just gain

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more awareness of 
how we stand regularly.

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And it makes sense, 
because if we're hanging out

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here all the time, with a child,

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or just carrying things 
all the time, then we need

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to take the time, consciously,
to counteract that.

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Even in line, paying bills
at HEB, sometimes I'm like,

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"Oh my god, this person cut me!

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"Who cuts people anymore?!"

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And then I'll just 
take a deep breath,

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and come to my 
four part standing,

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just building a little 
bit more awareness in the body

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and becoming a happier person.

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But back to the pose.

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So I'm going to lift the toes,
then I'll relax them down.

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And, let's see, we're 
at feet hip-width apart.

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Then I'm going to 
travel up from my foundation,

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drawing energy up 
from the arches of the feet

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all the way up through 
the legs, engaging the legs,

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all the way up through 
the groin, the pelvis area,

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and then of course, traveling 
up the spine through, up the

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crown of the head, fingertips
relaxing down at my sides.

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So Mountain Pose, or Tadasana,

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it's as if the tip of my head
is the top of the mountain,

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and then my 
fingertips grazing the sides.

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You can turn your palms 
open or keep them parallel.

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This is a good moment to
give a shout-out to my family

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and friends in Colorado.

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Mountains. The Rocky Mountains.

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And now for some action points.

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So the great 
thing about Tadasana is,

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and this is great for sciatica,
by the way, great posture pose.

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I want to notice right away,
and I'll turn to the side here,

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I want to notice if my heart
is beginning to collapse in

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and I'm finding this 
roundness in the spine.

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And so of course I'll 
want to loop the shoulders open

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and find that 
natural lift in the heart,

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that lift in the sternum.

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This is going to allow 
me to draw my navel in,

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supporting the belly 
and toning the belly,

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so we can get beach body ready,

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as my friend Dustin likes to say.

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And as I loop the shoulders,
draw the navel in,

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open my heart, 
I have what I kind of call

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"Adriene getting carried away"

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which is like, I'm like "Oh yes. 
Feels so good. Yoga!"

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And then I start to feel 
this pressure and pain in my

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lower back, and I'm 
like "I feel so open!"

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And then, pain.

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So I'll take that awareness,
that check-in, and I'll scoot

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my tailbone in to support 
this openness that I have.

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So I'll literally, I'm gonna
exaggerate for a second,

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so I'm going from here,
like Titanic...

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Titanic. I love Titanic.

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So I'm going to go from here
to scooping my tailbone in

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to meet the pubic bone,
or the pelvis,

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which also tones my belly 
naturally without having to

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hold any tension,
but engages it.

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So navel draws in as 
the tailbone scoops in,

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I've opened my 
shoulders and my heart.

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And now you're starting to see
that I'm not forward or back,

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but I'm centered, 
head over the heart,

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heart over the pelvis.

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And then it's like, okay, well
boring, Mountain Pose, Tadasana.

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In kids' yoga we 
go "Tada!...sana"

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But actually 
it's all but boring.

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It's a very conscious place,
where I'm present with

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the breath and there's a 
lot of activity going on,

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where I'm actually engaged 
from the crown of the head

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all the way down to my heels.

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I'm drawing energy 
up from the earth,

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and the tops of the 
thighs have this really sweet

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inner rotation.

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They're rotating 
in towards each other,

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out towards the wall behind
you, or the windows behind me.

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Right? And then same thing,
just to show you a little

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exaggerated version is 
I have this engaging quality

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in the legs, where the 
tops of the thighs, the quads,

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are rotating in and 
out towards the back wall.

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And a great way 
to feel this, actually,

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is if you have a block, 
or you can just, I don't know,

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put your smartphone 
in-between your legs?

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Don't do that. 
But you can put

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anything substantial or square

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between the legs. 
How about a yoga block?

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And this is just a great 
place for me to feel

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that engaging quality.

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So here I'm kind of 
standing with my pelvis forward.

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A lot of us stand 
like this naturally,

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putting a lot of 
pressure on the lower back.

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But with the block there 
I feel this intense squeezing

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sensation, and when 
I rotate my thighs towards

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each other and 
towards the wall behind me,

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it's almost like 
a Pez dispenser,

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I really feel that action.

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And now my legs are like,
"whoo," working like mad.

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So I'll just come 
into alignment here,

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just so we can 
experience the full thing.

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Navel drawing back, 
heart lifted, shoulder blades,

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shoulder blades are 
coming together,

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melting down towards the tail,

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and the tail is scooping 
in to meet the pelvis.

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I would invest in a block,
it's awesome.

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If I had tons of 
money I would say

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"Send me an email and 
I'll send you a block."

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Maybe one day, but not today.

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Someday it will happen. 
Blocks for everyone!

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Another great way to...

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I shouldn't make 
promises I can't keep.

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Another great way 
to practice this pose,

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particularly for beginners, 
is to back it up against a wall.

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And use the wall 
to really check in

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with that alignment
of the head over the heart,

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the heart over the pelvis.

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Then once I'm here in Tadasana,

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tops of the thighs 
rolling in together,

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tailbone scooping under 
to meet the pelvis bone,

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heart open, shoulders open,

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let your armpit chest 
breathe sometimes.

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Long neck, lengthening 
through the crown of the head.

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Of course, I'll begin 
to tap into my breath.

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What good is doing the asana,
or the pose,

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without marrying 
it to the breath?

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And then from here 
I can close my eyes,

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and if you close your 
eyes you may start to feel

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a little drunk, a little wobbly.

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So that's okay.

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Just hold onto your foundation,
spread the toes,

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stay rooted in all 
four corners of the feet.

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And if you still start 
to feel a little unbalanced

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or dizzy, or like 
"I don't know if this is safe,"

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just part the eyes open,
and find a Drishti,

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or a focal point on the 
earth to kind of hold onto.

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A great tip for balancing poses
to talk about another day.

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But holding onto a 
little piece of lint or a little

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heart-shaped piece of grass
or dirt or dust or whatever

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on the earth.

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Holding onto that 
as we lift and lengthen

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and engage the full body.

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Often we'll bring the 
palms together here in Tadasana,

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lifting the 
sternum to the thumbs,

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lengthening through 
the crown of the head.

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And another option that's super
yummy just while we're here

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is we can take the fingertips,

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bring them up behind 
the tailbone here,

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still checking in with 
the lower body, going through

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all my checkpoints of 
Mountain Pose, or Tadasana,

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but this time I'll 
interlace the fingertips,

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draw them down past the 
tailbone towards the heels,

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navel to spine, 
as I open up the shoulders,

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open up the chest.

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If I can bring the 
palms together here, I will.

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Otherwise I'll just keep 
the wrists nice and square.

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Shoulder blades drawing together
and down, creating space.

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Counteracting all those 
hours at the computer

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or anything that we do 
with the shoulders rounded,

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which is almost 
everything. Heyo!

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And fingertips drawing down,

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allowing the shoulders

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to rotate away from 
the ears, heart lifted.

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Yummy. Open chest. 
Open heart.

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Mountain Pose.

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We can also do this 
with the feet flush together,

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but I say as a beginning point
it's nice to go hip-width apart

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the bones stacked,
heels underneath the hips

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just for balance and stability.

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Tadasana.

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Okie-doke, so that was 
Mountain Pose, or Tadasana.

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Or Tada!...sana.

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The great thing about 
Tadasana is you can do it

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anywhere, everywhere. 
Anywhere and everywhere.

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Not everywhere.
(chuckles)

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I'm thinking 
about liability here.

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Not everywhere, but 
you get what I'm saying.

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It's great pose to check in
with your posture, with your

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alignment, great container
for breath as I've said before.

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You can do it in 
the grocery store or

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you can do it at the bar,
you can do it on the mat.

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Anywhere and everywhere.

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Leave comments! 
Read the blog

00:11:57.660 --> 00:12:02.855
if you want to talk about
my bling big toe, let's chat.

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I'll tell you the story.

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Subscribe to the 
channel if you haven't already,

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and see you next time.
Thank you so much.

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Namaste.

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(upbeat music)