Chair Yoga for Seniors & Beginners // Energizing Seated Stretches

Hi and welcome to Senior Shape into your all-seated chair yoga workout. All you will need for this workout is a chair, one without any arms. Make sure it's nice and sturdy. And also I'm going to be using a TheraBand to use as a stretch strap for a couple of the moves later in the workout. You could also use a belt or even a dog leash. So that's optional just for a couple of the poses. Put it aside for now. Getting started, making sure that you are seated nice and tall in your chair. Your back is not touching the back of our chair. Making sure the knees are directly coming out from the hips and ankles are underneath the knees. If you are of smaller stature, you need to make sure that those knees are level, so it might help if you lift it up onto a stool or a yoga block. Getting started, roll those shoulders down and back, lifting up from the top of your head and engage that core. Take three nice deep breaths. Inhale and exhale. Blow it out through your mouth. You can close your eyes if you like. Again, big inhale. Exhale. Preparing for our practice today. One more big inhale. Exhale out. If your eyes are closed, go ahead and open. We're going to inhale. Bring those arms up, palms facing in, lowering them to the sides. Exhale as we push them down. Palms down. Two more times. Inhale. Palms up. Reach nice and tall. Exhale. Lower down. One more time. Big inhale up and exhale. Press the arms down. Relax the hands on top of those thighs, lifting the heels, strengthening those calf muscles. We're going to come up onto our toes and then press the heels down. We lift and lower. Use our own resistance here, squeezing those calf muscles, waking up the lower half of the body. Let's do the opposite now. Weight in the heels. Lift those toes and put them down. Lift and lower. Two more like this. Combination. Lift the heels, put them down, lift the toes. A little rocking motion here. Inhale and exhale. Last one. Inhale and exhale. Coming into a cat-cow, warming up the spine. I want you to tuck your hips, drop your chin, round your back into a C-curve like you're trying to gaze at your belly button. And then the opposite. We're going to lift our chin, send your hips back, shoulders are pressed down and back. Let's do that again. Articulating through that spine, round it, trying to gaze at your navel. Opposite again. Proud chest, chin up, shoulders down and back, press those hips back. One more time. Maybe go a little bit deeper, really round that back, suck that belly in. And all the way. Come back to a neutral seated position, going into our camel. So we are going to lean back into our chair, pressing your shoulder blades into the back of your chair. Relax the arms at the sides and then we're going to reach them down. Really relax those shoulders, pull them back and down and grasp the legs of the chair if you're able to. I want you to think about turning your hands out as well so your palms are facing me or even to the sides. Chin is going to come slightly up and again we're going to lean slightly back. Nice, proud, broad chest here. Holding that stretch. Squeeze those shoulder blades together. Maybe walk the fingers down one more inch, lengthening that spine. Big inhale. Let's hold this for two more breaths. Begin and out. Last time, big inhale. Roll those shoulders down and back. Squeeze those shoulder blades together, opening up that chest. And then come out of that. Relax it down. Loosen the arms and sit up nice and tall again. Coming into a seated tree pose, scooch all the way to the edge of your chair. I want you to lengthen your right leg with a nice straight knee or straight as you can get it. And then foot can be flat on the ground, it could be flexed or somewhere in between, whatever is comfortable for you. Holding on to the sides of our chair and then with your left leg, put your toes close to your ankle and then we're just gonna open up that leg out to the side. Continue to sit up nice and tall. Now option to turning out from this hip to leave your foot on the floor or we could pick it up to the ankle or maybe even pick it up to the knee. So you pick what's comfortable for you. I'm gonna hold it kind of in between here at my calf muscle sit up nice and tall. We're balancing, engaging our core. We can have our hands at heart center. Pull up nice and tall through the crown of your head. If you're comfortable here to level up this challenge, we can grow our branches, extending our arms up to the corners. Hold here. Inhale. If this is too much, you can always lower the arms and lower the leg. Nice deep breath again. And last time, stretch, lengthen through those arms and your exhale, release the arms down. Release that left leg and let's tuck them both back in. Switching to the other side, lengthen that left leg and then the right leg is turned out from the hip. Toes are near the heel or ankle of your other foot. Giving it a minute to allow that hip to open up and then you can keep your foot there or up to the calf or up to the knee. Find a place that's comfortable for you. May feel different on each side and let's bring our hands to heart center. Continue lifting up nice and tall and try to keep your hips square. The tendency is wanting to lean to the side. Inhale. Exhale. Option to grow your branches on our tree. Hold here. Take a few more deep breaths at your own pace. Continue to reach nice and tall through the crown of your head. One more big inhale. On your exhale, lower the hands down to the chair. Release that right leg and bend both knees in again. Arms are coming into prayer again, so thumbs are near our chest. Elbows down to the sides. Relax those shoulders down and back. Inhale here. We're going to twist to the side. One side. Come back to center. Twist to the other side. Come back to center. On our third one, we're going to twist, hinging forward, bringing the right elbow back and the left elbow down towards our thigh. Maybe even gaze up with your head. Hold this twist. Big inhale and exhale. Let's come back to center. Let's twist again. Left. Center. Right. Center. Hold this one to the left. We hinge forward. Hold here. Big inhale. Exhale. We come back to center. We're going to do that two more times each side. So we twist right and center. Center. Twist. Hold and hinge. Maybe you can go a little bit further this time. And twist again. Side and center. Exhale. Hold. Hinge forward. Inhale. Exhale. Back to center. One more time each side. Side and center. Side and center. Twist. Hinge and hold. Can we get that elbow further down? Inhale. Exhale. Come back to center. Here we go. Last time. Side. Twist. Center. So good for our spine. Working our core as well. Final side. Hold. Hinge. Get that elbow down. Inhale. And exhale. Come back to center. So good. Release those hands down to the side. Help yourself to move all the way to the side of your chair. I want you to extend your right leg all the way out. Whatever is comfortable for your toes. I'm leaving mine in line with my leg. So just your one leg is on this chair. Sitting up nice and tall. This is going to be our triangle pose. Arms are out to the side. Palms facing down. Relax those shoulders down and back. And again, grow taller reaching from the crown of your head. Take a nice big inhale. And we're going to exhale. We're going to hinge forward from that waistline. Hand can come down on the leg. Other arm can reach up. And we're just going to slide down as much as our body will allow to feel that beautiful stretch. Maybe if it's comfortable to you, you can gaze up at your other hand. Big inhale. And exhale. Two more breaths, guys. Hold this here. Inhale. Exhale. Can you reach further? Last time. Big inhale. And exhale. Lift both arms back to the side. Bring that leg in. Lower the arms. And let's switch to the other side. So scooching all the way over. And extend that left leg all the way out to the side. Front leg is still bent at a 90 degree angle at that knee. Sit up nice and tall. Arms to the side. Inhale. Exhale. Reach those fingertips nice and long. Shoulders down and back. Another big inhale. As we exhale, we hinge over trying to reach that arm down that thigh. And then if you like, gaze up at that other arm to emphasize that stretch. Whatever is comfortable for you and for the neck. You can also look down. Keep breathing. Nice slow breaths. Wherever you're at, give me one more. We're going to exhale. We're going to come back to center, lifting both arms again. Bring in that leg. Lower the arms. And sit yourself back to center. Then helping ourselves again to the edge of our chair. Walk those feet a little bit further forward. Squeeze those legs together. Knees are touching. Ankles are touching. Now we're going to open up those knees for a nice inner thigh stretch. This is like a seated butterfly. And then I want you to turn to the edges of your feet, making sure you stay securely sat in your chair. Maybe press the backs of the palms, the soles of your feet together. And then very gently press those thighs open. A little butterfly stretch. This is great for our hips. Really lengthen through that spine. Grow one inch taller. Big inhale. And exhale. Push gently on those thighs. Again, inhale. Exhale. Allow your breath to help you relax. And one more time. Big inhale. Exhale. Nice job. Release your arms. Bring those knees back together. If you have a strap, now is the time to grab it. Starting with the tricep and shoulder stretch here. So I'm going to take this strap in my left hand all the way up. And then stretching that tricep, I'm going to bend it so my elbow is facing the ceiling as close as I can get it. Feeling a nice stretch down the back of my arm. Other arms tend to come down, back, and around. And ideally, we'd like those fingertips to touch each other. But in most cases, they can't. So I'm going to grab the band with my right arm. Well, my left, but it's right to you. So you guys are mirroring me. So here's what it looks like all the way from the back. Sit up nice and tall. And then very gently, as that shoulder releases and feeling a nice stretch in that tricep, maybe even tighten up on that band. Try to work those fingertips closer together. Sit up nice and tall. Big inhale. And exhale. We'll just hold this for two more breaths. Using this resistance here, keep that elbow pointed towards the ceiling. And last time, big inhale. Exhale down. Let go the back of that band. And let's do that on the other side. So taking that band all the way up, release it down your back, elbow towards the ceiling. Other hand swoops around here, grabbing on to the opposite side. Sit up nice and tall. Don't forget. Elbow to the ceiling. Other elbow is out to the side, pushing that shoulder down. Big inhale. Exhale. Maybe walk those fingers a little closer together. So good. This is a beautiful exercise for our posture. Inhale. Exhale. And last time, grow taller. Inhale. Exhale down. Release with the left arm and relax both of them down. Coming into a quad stretch, we're going to take that band on top of the shin. Hold it with that left hand. And scooching again a little bit to the side of your chair, we're going to bring the heel back and drop that knee down. So hold on to the side of your chair and then try to bring the heel up towards your bum. And you don't have to drop that knee. You can hold it here, but I want you to feel stretching that quad on top of the leg. If you're flexible enough, or you just want to grab onto your pant leg or your ankle, you can do that. Toes are pointed towards the back. Bigger stretch. You can drop that knee back. Your strap is there to help you make sure your spine is nice and straight. Hold. Big inhale. And exhale. Inhale again. Exhale. Last time. Exhale. Help yourself down. Let's release that and go towards the other side. The hand is there if you need it. Scooch slightly to the side of your chair. Lift that foot off the floor. And then again, ankle comes up towards your bum. If this is enough for you here, keep it there. Relax that shoulder down. Try not to hold all the weight. And again, if you like, you can grab the ankle or if you can reach it, maybe even drop that knee down. Again, just so you're feeling a beautiful stretch in the front of the leg. Okay, to support yourself, holding on to the other side of your chair. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Release the top of that thigh. Last time. Big inhale. Exhale. Release that band. Gently let your leg go. We're done with the band. You can put that to the side. Coming again all the way to the edge of your chair. And then open up your legs about three quarters. Turn slightly out to the side. Knees in line with those toes. Lengthen again as much as you can. Sit up nice and tall. We're going to hinge forward with a nice proud chest without rounding the back. So hands on top of those thighs. Hinge, hinge, hinge until you feel like you can't go anymore without rounding your back. That's the spot we're trying to get to. And then palms are going to face me and you're going to wrap it around. This is a seated happy baby. So as low as you can go. So maybe your hands are just, you know, wrapping here. If you're able to, to go from the inside and wrap them out. You're just looking a few feet in front of you, keeping your spine, your neck in line with the spine. So big, nice proud chest. We hold it here. Inhale and exhale. Can you go one inch deeper? Again, this is really good for our spine. Don't push yourself and stay rooted in those feet so you don't fall off your chair. Big inhale, exhale. And last time, inhale, exhale. Guide those hands back up your thighs and toe heel in. Relax one arm down to the side. Inhale, one arm comes up. Reach nice and tall. Side bend all the way over and release it down. Inhale, side bend all the way over. Release it down. Again, inhale, right arm up. Reach nice and high. Bend over. That should feel really nice on that side body and maybe even on the lower back, releasing that tension. Inhale, over and down. We're almost done, you guys. Inhale, exhale. Final exercises here to complete our practice. Inhale, exhale, side bend over and release it down. We're going to go the opposite way from which we started. Palms are facing down on our big inhale, so face me. We inhale, arms come up, and exhale, put the palms together and come down to prayer. Let's do that again. Inhale, arms down and up. Exhale, down to prayer. Last time, hands down, inhale, reach up nice and tall. Exhale, down to prayer. Final breath. Set that posture. We're going to relax our hands, palms up this time on top of those thighs. Roll those shoulders down and back and grow one inch taller. Feel free to close your eyes for our final three deep breaths. Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. And this last one, try to slow your breath. Open your eyes, relax your hands, give yourself a hand. Thank you for joining me today. I hope you loved this new yoga workout. Let me know what you think in the comments. Give it a like, share with your friends. Thanks for working out with me, and I'll see you next time.