Start close in. Don't take the second step or the third. Start with the first
thing. Close in. The step you don't want to take. David White.
Hello and welcome to episode number 346 of Yoga with Melissa. Thank you for
welcoming me into your home for the next hour as we journey into our innermost
home. Today we took a drive up the Malahat and came to beautiful Spectacle Lake
here and we are excited to be here. There are some other children here swimming
today. It's one of the hottest days of the summer here so they are also excited
to be here. You may hear them swimming today and laughing and screaming in the
background. Thank you to Dusky Leaf for my props. Today you are going to need your
blocks and a strap and your mat. I'm going to get you started in supported
bridge pose to begin so you will need a block for that. So for supported bridge
pose you're going to lie on your back with your knees bent and your feet flat on
the floor and you'll press your feet into the ground and lift your buttocks and
place the block underneath your pelvis and you're going to stay here while I
introduce the rest of our class for today. If you're menstruating you wouldn't
want your pelvis inverted. You could do recline bound angle instead with your
soles of your feet together and your knees open and then you could use your
second block to support your knees. Thank you to Squeezed Yoga Clothing for my
clothes. Today I'm wearing long red laying eggs with the Om Mani Padme Om
around the ankle and I'm wearing a purple tank that says yoga makes
everything better. We will begin by coming together as student-in-teacher
with our peace mantra.
Om Shanti Shanti Shanti. The mantra means protect us together student and
teacher. May our studies nourish us together. May we work together for the
union of the good for all. May our learning be luminous and purposeful.
May we live in harmony. Peace, peace, peace be unto all. For today's testimonial I
have a beautiful blog post or part of a blog post by Brenda and I'll put in the
show notes where you can find the link to it. It's from her blog is Enlightened
Enlightenment under the chandelier.com. Brenda says after spending
most of the last five years sleeping or lying down feeling too tired from
depression or having a headache to do much of anything else, approximately three
months ago I decided I needed to get up and start exercising my body and trying
to get some consistent peace and tranquility into my mind. I found my
yoga teacher Dr. Melissa West on YouTube with Yoga with Melissa. To say
she is awesome is selling her short. She is one of the most incredible human
beings I've ever encountered in my life journey. She teaches several yoga classes
each week. She hikes, she camps, she cooks, she paints beautiful artwork and
equally beautiful backdrop paper for collages. She makes soap, she creates
juicing and smoothie recipes for various ailments. She's a mom, she's a wife, she
bites poetry and while you get the picture she's phenomenal. So when I
received this at first I was like wow that's really crazy and well I don't do
all these things at once at different points in my life I have done all these
things. She says I'm blessed to have found her. She posts a free yoga with
Melissa class on YouTube every Friday. Her free classes are an hour long and
they are wonderful. She also has a yoga membership community for those who are
interested and more in-depth practice. She offers something for everyone. I
practice a yoga with Melissa class three to four times a week and I love it. In
the beginning my muscles were so sore I could barely move the next day. Even now
when the class is harder than usual I usually experience some soreness but
it's all good. I have been practicing yoga with Melissa for approximately three
months. So thank you Brenda for that beautiful testimonial and I'm sure
everybody who's doing this class joins me in applauding you for getting up and
getting moving because that is something that makes an incredible
difference to headaches and also depression and so we're all incredibly
proud of you and the changes that you're making in your life. Thanks to all of you
who take the time to let me know and all of us know how yoga is making a
difference in your life and you can do that on my website on Facebook, YouTube,
Instagram, iTunes, SpeakPipe and of course always as always the most in-depth
conversations happen in our membership community. So today is our last poetry in
motion class and we're transitioning from this class. It's a nice transition
because after this we're gonna do a back-to-basics. After we're into
September after this it's back to school so we're gonna do a back-to-basics, back
to school, kind of more beginner focused classes as everybody will be coming back
to yoga after summer holidays. So this this is a nice way to close out the
poetry and motion series and also to take that first step as we go back to
basics. So the poem is called Start Close In by David White. Start close in.
Don't take the second step or the third. Start with the first thing, close in. The
step you don't want to take. Start with the ground you know, the pale ground
beneath your feet. Your own way to begin the conversation. Start with your own
question. Give up on other people's questions. Don't let them smother
something simple. To hear another's voice follow your own voice. Wait until that
voice becomes an intimate private ear that can really listen to another. Start
right now. Take a small step. You can call your own. Don't follow someone else's
heroics. Be humble and focused. Start close in. Don't mistake that other for
your own. Start close in. Don't take the second step or the third. Start with the
first thing close in. The step you don't want to take. Okay so let that poem sink
in. We're going to come off the block so you can press into your feet. Lift your
pelvis and come back down onto the ground and we're going to lie on your back
with your knees bent in your feet flat on the floor and cross your right ankle
over your left thigh. Open your right knee out to the side. Draw your left leg
in. Reach through the keyhole here. Hold on on the back of your left leg and if
you can't reach you could use your strap here and draw your leg in. Feel
something happening in the outside of your thigh and into your glutes.
Then you're going to release your right leg and cross your right leg and we'll
switch sides. So cross your left ankle over the top of your right thigh. Open
up your left knee. Draw your right leg in. Reach your hands through. Hold on on
the back of your right leg. Fully bend your right leg. Open your leg wide.
Relax your shoulders.
Space between your teeth. Relax the space between your eyebrows.
Shoulder is heavy on the ground here.
And then take your arms and legs in the air. Just give them a shake. Relax your
hips and your hip joints and then hold on to the outside of your feet. Draw your
knees in towards your chest for happy baby pose.
Pocket of your pelvis is heavy on the ground here.
And then release that down. From here you're going to, I'm just stretching
here in the car for quite a while, we're going to roll up and come up onto all
fours. So that happy baby pose is just going to prepare you for the crawling
that we're going to do now. So you're going to come on to all fours. The
crawling is all about taking the first step. So before you can walk and take
your first step you have to crawl and take your first step. Okay let's see. So
you're going to start at the back of your mat. Bring your left hand back to your
left knee and your right hand forward and then you're going to take your left
hand forward and your right hand forward. So you're going to crawl forward and
then you're going to crawl back. So you guys can go off your yoga mats. I'm not
going to here just because you can see there's rocks around me and also it's
very dusty so my clothes would get really dirty but if you're on grass you
could go off your mats and if you're at home you could definitely go off your
yoga mats and crawl all around your space. So when you're crawling you want
to crawl so that it's opposite hand and knee going forward. Keep your shoulders
and neck relaxed. Okay and then come back and we're going to do some steps now
from lunge pose. You're gonna walk your hands back to your knees and stand up on
your knees. You may want to have a chair close by for this if balance is a bit of
a challenge for you but this is also going to work on your balance. It's
important aspect to work on as well and improve. So you're going to walk your
left leg forward so you're in lunge pose and then you're going to step forward
and up. Take a step forward and up and then you're going to come back and down
and then you're going to step here right foot forward into lunge pose and you're
going to come forward and take that first step and then you're going to come
back and down. So if you do this with your hands on your hips it will probably
be a little easier so we're doing at the left foot again and then we're going to
come down and then the right foot lean forward and step up and then the right
foot comes down. So you're going to step forward with the right foot so you're in
lunge pose and then you're going to step up and then you're going to step that
right foot back come back into lunge and step back and then you're going to step
forward with your left foot and you're going to step all the way up to standing
and you're going to step back with your left foot and come down. So you may want
to have extra padding underneath your knees as well if knees are an issue and
let's do that one more time on each side right foot comes forward and up right
knee comes back and down and then we'll do the left foot one more time left
foot comes forward and up and left knee comes back and down and you'll probably
notice just in that short bit of time that that movement pattern improves and
it really helps to improve your balance and coming up from the ground up and
down so these are important movement patterns to practice. The next thing
that I want to do and I'm going to sit with my head at this side because it's
downward sloping this way is a foot series to help you prepare for taking the
first step. Okay so for the foot series you might want to place your hands by
your side in Dandasana and staff pose just to support yourself and you're just
going to start by curling your toes forward and back curl your toes forward
and back so our feet tend to be really weak and inactive just from being in
shoes all the time so we're just going to wake them up a bit and then you're
going to point your whole foot forward and draw your whole foot back and then
we're going to circle your feet and circle them the other way. Did you hear
that? There's people swimming just off here too which is my plan as soon as I'm
done filming here and then circle so your toes meet in the center and circle
so your toes meet the other way and then cross your left leg over your right leg
and circle your foot and circle the other way and then place your fingers
between your toes and you're going to bend your toes forward and back and side
to side. Okay and then you can release that foot down and feel the difference
between your two feet and bring cross your other foot over and just circle
that foot. I feel like it's been forever since we've done this foot series and
then place your fingers between your toes and bend your toes forward and back
and side to side and circle them, circle them the other way.
Okay great and then we're going to sit to hear the poem again and for the
teachings and I'll get you to sit with the Ganesh Mudra today for new
beginnings when when you take the first step it's common to invoke Ganesh so
I'll get you to take your left palm face it out hook your fingers and you just
pull par and you leave that at the level of your heart center and that's the
Ganesh Mudra and you'll close your eyes draw your shoulders over your hips your
ears over your shoulders allow yourself to focus inward and yet remain alert to
receive the poem and the teachings. The start close in by David White start
close in don't take the second step or the third start with the first thing
close in the step you don't want to take start with the ground you know the
pale ground beneath your feet your own way to begin the conversation start with
your own question give up on other people's questions don't let them
smother something simple to hear another's voice follow your own voice
wait until that voice becomes an intimate private ear that can really
listen to another start right now take a small step that you can call your own
don't follow someone else's heroics be humble and focused start close in don't
mistake that other for your own start close in don't take the second step or
the third start with the first thing close in the step you don't want to take
this poem reminds me of the quote don't compare your beginning to somebody else's
middle in the age of digital media it is natural to compare our own beginnings
with everybody else's middle when we decide to start something we cannot
expect to be a master at the beginning we cannot expect to skip all the steps
that our teachers have taken along the path to get to where they have gotten so
about a year ago I started drawing mandalas they're like circle shapes
with patterns in them and then this led to an interest in art more generally
speaking I live in a huge artist community here in Victoria BC and in an
age of digital media where there are loads of art teachers and artists online
as well I even had one of my yoga with Melissa's students an artist stepped
forward and offered to teach me art as I began my art journey it was of course
very difficult not to compare my rudimentary paintings to their
practiced works of art I had no experience with color shape values rules of
third perspectives and shadows at the beginning it was all quite overwhelming
however I took the first step every day I would practice some form of art painting
collage sketching drawing just something and I started to take art courses I
looked at art over time I learned more and my art improved I took the first step
I started close in I started with the steps that I didn't want to take and my
art wasn't very good at the beginning I made my own mistakes and I learned from
my mistakes and I keep trying and taking the next step the one closest in a
similar thing is happening now after two years of having a frozen shoulder I
almost have full range of motion back in my shoulder but I want to be able to do
everything that I was able to do before I had frozen shoulder again however my
arms have lost a lot of their mobility their strength and their endurance the
same principle is applied I'm not able to go from nothing back to being able to
do handstands and inversions and arm balances I had to take the next step the
one closest in and build my strength and mobility and endurance slowly following
the wisdom of my own body so reflect that those are two examples for me in my
life I want you to reflect on teaching these teachings and how they relate to
you maybe when have you wanted to be in the middle instead of the beginning
taking the first step so what's the first step that you can take now in your
life to begin to form an intention of what you would like to receive from the
rest of your yoga class what is it that you're crying trying to create sustain
let go of a rebirth in your life and how could your yoga practice help you to
best do this right now
and then when you're ready you can begin to wiggle and stretch out release the
Ganesh Mudra from your hands and we're going to make our way up to standing we
can do that through downward facing dog to stretch out your legs and your spine
your hands your back and your feet
okay we're going to do some short stance warrior ones in the style that I
learned at Esther Myers from the lineage of Vandaskara Valley these are the
reason I chose these is because they're about taking the first step they're
just you you only when I say short stance there there are just the the length
between the width between your feet is just the width that you would take if
you're taking a normal step so stand anywhere on your mat and you're just
going to take a step forward with your left foot like you're going to take a
normal step and that's the the width of the pose your hips are going to face
forward slight bend in your front knee and then you're going to bring your arms
up so that's the taking your first step in the short stance warrior one and feel
the strength in your legs and the thing that you'll probably really notice is
the mobility in your spine in this version of warrior one
and then let that out of your body and we'll do the short stance warrior one on
the other side so you'll just take a step forward with your right foot a normal
step lengthen your left leg your front leg is bent and then you'll bring float
your arms up and just feel that your spine just floating tailbone dropping
spine lengthening
okay and then let that fall out of your body and we're going to do shoulder
stand I think I'll do supported shoulder stand just because I don't have a wall
here so we'll use the block for that so I'm gonna lie down lie down again okay
you're gonna need a block you'll lie on your back and you're gonna place the
block underneath your pelvis again and you'll take your legs in the air so
you're in supported shoulder stand and here you're getting a stretch along the
back of your neck and through your shoulders keep your neck facing your
head facing straight up here and I chose this for the throat chakra here
because in the poem it says to hear another's voice follow your own voice
wait until that voice becomes an intimate private ear that can really
listen to another
and then you're gonna slowly lower down and lift the block out of the way and
we're gonna do fish pose I'll show you how to do a modified version of it first
with the blocks so you can take one block in place at high one block in place
at low and lie back over it here so that would be a modified version of it some
people get dizzy or don't like being on the tops of their heads so if this or
have issues with their neck in this pose there's a sort of a few reasons why
people avoid fish pose so if you avoid it then there's your modification for that
pose otherwise you can join us in fish pose it's a great pose to open up your
throat chakra and your heart chakra and I chose it for the same reason for those
same lines of the poem to hear another's voice follow your own voice wait
until that voice becomes an intimate private ear that can really listen to
another so it's really great for your throat so what you're going to do is
tuck your arms underneath your body so that your hands are underneath your your
legs I guess it depends on how long your arms are you're gonna press into your
elbows and your forearms lift your chest and rest on top of your head
then to come down you'll press into your forearms and your elbows tuck your
chin and slowly lower down lift your pelvis so you can get your arms out and
then hug your knees into your chest
okay
all right I am going to change my mind for the twist so I'll have to change my
show notes for you honey we're going to set up
and you're going to come into zigzag twist so have your right leg in front of
your left leg and you're going to twist one side and then you're gonna just lift
your legs and zigzag them to the other side so that your left leg is in front
of your right leg and twist the other way
and then come back to the center and we're going to do child's pose for our
forward fold so you're gonna sit back on your heels if this bothers you your
knees you can always hug your knees into your chest on your back and rest
forward start right now take a small step you can call your own don't follow
someone else's heroics be humble and focus start close in don't mistake that
other for your own
so take a deep breath in and then you're gonna slowly make your way out of
child's pose and onto your back into Shavasana
so in Shavasana you allow yourself to receive this class the poem your yoga
postures maybe even the whole poetry emotion series so you can rest back
here to receive your class and I'm gonna sit up and read you the poem one last
time
start close in my David White start close in don't take the second step or
the third start with the first thing close in the step you don't want to
take start with the ground you know the pale ground beneath your feet your own
way to begin the conversation start with your own question give up on other
people's questions don't let them smother something simple to hear another's voice
follow your own voice wait until that voice becomes an intimate private ear
that can really listen to another start right now take a small step you can call
your own don't follow someone else's heroics be humble and focused start close
in don't mistake that other for your own start close in don't take the second
step or the third start with the first thing close in the step you don't want
to take
so reflect back on this class and see what stands out to you what seems most
important and notice how that relates to you in your life
what's one small thing that you can take with you off your mat and into your
life
so gradually allow your breath to deepen wiggle your fingers and toes bend your
knees roll to your side and slowly make your way up to seated so thank you so
much for joining us for this episode 346 of yoga with Melissa our last
poetry and motion class if you liked this class in the poetry and motion
series please give it a thumbs up if you know somebody else who would like it
please feel free to share it with them and if you are new to our channel we
put out a new show every Friday please subscribe and then it will show up in
your feed I want to thank all of you who donated this week your donations help
us to fill up our gas tank so that we can drive up the Malahat into the
mountains to be here and find you beautiful locations like this even even
on our way up here we we were scouting out new locations so those are some of
the things some of the expenses that we have in creating this this these classes
for you is finding new locations and this was a beautiful location we didn't
have to stop once for airplane traffic which we have to do all the time in
Victoria it's nonstop sea planes there so that is the beauty of being able to
leave the city and come to these quieter places is that there's way less cuts
in filming so today's question to answer in the comments is what's your first
step what's your close-in step that you think you're going to take and if you
would like to join us in taking the first steps in the back to basics back to
school and back to yoga then we are going to be starting that next week be
sure to tune in for that next week and if you'd like an infographic of my top
three reasons for engaging in poetry then be sure to go to Melissa West comm
slash 346 scroll down go into the opt-in box put your email in that's the last
time you're going to be able to get that that's not going to be available
anymore and I'll send you that the top three reasons for engaging in poetry
today we focused on for taking the first step and the first step is with your
feet using your feet and we have a lot of classes in our membership community
that will support you in building a solid foundation with your feet and I'll
put the classes with your feet in the show notes but we have loads of classes
for your feet the yoga for anxiety class has a strong focus on your feet
there's an intro to the connective tissue class for your feet that uses a soft
squash ball that's amazing if you want to feel big differences in your body the
connective tissue classes are amazing there's a feet first class there's a
toes class it's not just for your toes it's just another name for a foot class
because I already had a foot class but I have two feet classes and they're
completely different yoga for grounding there's tons of stuff on feet in that
yoga for runners has loads of exercises movements for your feet and ankles and
all that is in the show notes and there's a link right here to become a
member as well so I am sending you much love from beautiful British Columbia may
your joy be as deep as our ocean may you be as rooted as the trees in your our
forest and may you be as grounded as our mountains Om Shanti Namaste
Melissa would love to hear your questions and thoughts please leave your
comments below the video thank you for your reviews on iTunes and YouTube your
reviews help us to share yoga and a yoga lifestyle with others around the world
if you have a question for Melissa you can leave a voice message at Melissa
West comm and Melissa may answer it in an upcoming blog
