Stress/Anxiety
These practices have been specifically created and sequenced for watching online on Movement for Modern Life to reduce stress and anxiety you may feel in your life.
Within our anti-stress and anxiety series, we have a range of practices which include:
Yin-yoga
which cultivates a deep sense of awareness.The perfect antidote to urban life, Yin focuses on releasing and letting go via the deep musculature of the body and connective tissues, aiding physical, energetic, mental and emotional flexibility.
Restorative Yoga
is passive, designed to adjust the nervous system and rest the adrenal glands, enabling the body to move towards balance.
All of the practices on this site are designed to increase your awareness on the breath and movement, which will intrinsicly help you deal with any stress/anxiety you may feel in everyday life.
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20:00Beginners 4: Twist to unwind
Twists help you feel yourself again. So whether you’re stiff, stressed-out, sluggish, or plain out of sorts, Clare’s simple twist practice will leave you feeling grounded and re-energised. Perfect for morning or evening. The class ends on a savasana, so feel free to lay down and soak up the practice for as long as you need.
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40:00Yoga for Stress Relief: Neck Release
When the muscles of our neck are chronically tight we are more likely to maintain our nervous system in a state of stress. On the contrary, when we allow them to soften, our body and mind can more easily shift into a calm state. This floor-based yoga flow is specifically designed to help you release tension from your neck and shoulders, so you can feel more spacious and relaxed. This class is perfect for when you're busy at work, when you're feeling overwhelmed, when you've been driving a lot or are feeling stressed. This calming yoga practice will help you create more space and relaxation in your neck and stabilise your shoulders as you move.
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12:15Mindful Movement to Unwind & De-Stress
This is a short, calming mindful movement and breath work class to help you find a settled, but grounded posture and a focused mind. The emphasis is on breathing and using a gentle moving meditation to really be in the moment. This class is perfect if you're low on energy and need a quick energy re-set, perhaps to calm you after a full-on day at work, if you are struggling with anxiety or you are recovering from illness or injury and you want to be gently reminded what it’s like to be back in the body.
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41:44Restorative Yoga for Pregnancy
Support and soothe your pregnant body with this peaceful restorative pregnancy yoga class. Find deep rest with relaxing and nourishing postures (supported sukhasana, legs up the wall, supported twist, reclining savasana). With restorative yoga, less is more. Spending extended time in each posture carries lots of physiological benefits. Beyond the physical, we can use the stillness as an opportunity to really be present with baby. You will need a bolster, yoga bricks if you have them, and access to a wall.
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36:53Yoga Step by Step 1
This is the first class in a series for those of starting, or coming back to yoga, or for those who simply want to move with grace and ease. Use this simple yoga sequence to create a spacious body and a mind free from anxiety with simple postures. It is suitable for most bodies. Start lying down with gentle hamstring stretches and hip openers, perfect for combating tight hips resulting from a sedentary lifestyle. Then gently mobilise the spine and learn the basic standing postures, building strength slowly and gently. Finish with seated forward bends and twists and a beautiful savasana. This class is perfect for beginners, but all of us will benefit from the ease of movement and depth of breath from these hatha yoga poses.
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15:21Breath Work: Break Down and Breakthrough
A breath break down/breakthrough. This yoga class is a breath work tutorial to feel the breath and discover more about how we breathe. It is semi meditation and semi instructional, with practical tips which could change your life by helping control anxiety or simply staying calm and present. It could be done sitting on a chair or on the floor, at work, at home, or wherever you find yourself today. A great class for breathing and feeling, to ground and to be in the present moment.
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48:54Yoga Flow: How To be Here Now
This yoga class is beautifully sequenced and mindfully paced, with a focus on how to tune into being here now and bringing extra presence to our yoga practice. If we feel anxious in our lives, it's because we're not connected to the present moment. This is the perfect class to slow down an overthinking mind and tune into how your body feels when you move. Learn quick tools you can use to be in the moment, and have some fun. This yoga class is a well rounded, accessible yoga sequence for the whole body, perfect to start each day. One to save!
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01:00:23Your Difficult Emotions Practice
A beautiful hatha yoga class to give you permission to feel all the things you're feeling, along with a safe space to process difficult or strong emotions. This class begins with a meditation and a breath-oriented slow yoga flow bringing space and warmth all around your heart along with many opportunities for self-soothing and embrace. Then we will take advantage of this compassionate environment and allow plenty of time for rest, processing, and healing in a few restorative shapes. You will need a strap, bolster, a blanket, and a couple bricks, although you can improvise with whatever you have at home.
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22:41Restorative Yoga for Gut Health: Find Calm
Taking a moment in our busy lives to find calm and be present with ourselves is so important for overall health and wellbeing. In this calming and restorative class Gabriella guides us through a self-massage and breath practice to help relax the abdominal area and deepen our ability to listen to our bodies. Props: one bolster, two blankets and one block
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35:41Your Calming Yoga Practice
This yoga class helps to ground and calm an anxious body or mind and bring us back to the present moment. Start with some grounding self-massage, then move gently with simple, repetitive, and breath-led movements to stabilise the nervous system. Additionally, we will pay particular attention to releasing tension in the head, neck, and shoulders to bring about a profound sense of relaxation and ease. This class is perfect after a long day or when we're overwhelmed. You will need a narrow block or a folded blanket and a brick.
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44:08Flow and Restore 2
This nourishing yoga class starts with a gentle warm up, followed by vinyasa yoga flow to stretch, strengthen and move the body in order to prepare for stillness. The second part of the class is very nourishing and supportive restorative yoga. This yoga class is a wonderful opportunity to strike balance between movement and stillness, challenge and softness, effort and effortlessness. Check out Clive’s first Flow & Restore class.
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12:46Meditation: Befriending your Whole Self
In this short meditation class, be guided through an embodied enquiry of the layers of your body (physical, mental, emotional, energetic, spiritual) as a way of tuning into, welcoming and befriending your body. When we take time to listen and connect to our body we make room to welcome the full spectrum of our human experience – from the comfortable to the not so comfortable. Befriending the body in this way widens the circle of compassion and acceptance of this moment allowing you to tap into the inherent wisdom that resides within. This is a really useful short practice to connect to yourself at the start of your day, before any yoga class and when you are experiencing feelings of anxiety, stress or overwhelm.
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42:05Anatomy of Breathing
You can hardly get through five minutes of any good yoga class without being reminded to breathe. Of course, all of us breathe every second of every day, we do it instinctively. However, how much do we all know about the mechanics of breathing and how we can optimise our breathing for our health and wellbeing? This yoga anatomy video offers an invaluable insight into the anatomy of your breath and how to use your breath on and off your yoga mat to help you feel good both physically as well as mentally. Please note that all advice and recommendations in this film are given generally and do not constitute any form of an individual diagnosis or treatment plan. A consultation with a medical practitioner or registered physical therapist is recommended.
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11:06Gentle Movement Pick Me Up
This is a somatic movement class for when you're slightly low on energy, feeling anxious, you need a gentle work break or are looking for a warm up class. Drawing on Amy’s contemporary dance background as well as her love for Qigong and Tai Chi, this sequence helps us to feel grounded, connected, composed and calm. Also perfect as a Barre cool down class.
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08:04Three Yoga Poses to Support Digestion
It might not be easy to find time to move our bodies or practice a yoga flow in our busy lives, but it is important to aid our bodies and help support our digestive system throughout the day. In this quick yoga class, Gabriella will guide you through her top three poses which can help support our digestive systems along with a diaphragmatic breath technique to help create calm. These will only take a few minutes and can all be done at your desk!
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22:19Gentle Yoga for Gut Health: Aid Digestion
This gentle yoga class begins with slow moving twists, side stretches and poses all designed to gently help support your digestive system. The class finishes with a seated practice to encourage strong posture and uses breath awareness to support digestive balance. Props: one chair, one pillow or bolster.
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47:48Open to Your Heart’s Desire
This heart-centred gentle yoga class is designed to help you connect to your heart's desire, to your inner wisdom and to feel more love for oneself and one another. It includes opening to self love through embodied enquiry, gentle stretching and movement, finishing with yin postures and a guided visualisation to connect deeply to your heart’s desire and its expression in the world.
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38:02Yoga to Rest & Digest: The Vagus Nerve
This yoga class uses simple practices to resource and reset the nervous system using breath, sound, gentle movement and massage to stimulate the vagus nerve and encourage deep relaxation. Either follow the class in full or learn the practices which resonate with you to be done in your own time. The vagus nerve acts as a “super information highway” communicating between the brain and our body’s systems regulating our mood, digestion, heart rate and hormones. The vagus nerve balances our nervous system by switching on our parasympathetic 'rest and digest' mode and influences how we connect and feel safe with others. You will need a bolster, blanket, tennis ball and/or soft pilates ball. Gabriella uses a Yoga Tune Up Coregeous Ball.