Kit_L

We all are, and if you're lucky, it never stops! Working on the stretching twice a week will work in well with the relaxation, you'll find.

Definitely the best book on the subject, but if you can, try to get one of the earliest additions – he sanitised many of the scripts because the image of a burning body floating down the Ganges River was considered to confronting for most western students. For him of course, watching these Riverville would've been a daily occurrence if he was in that area. With regards to point 1 – you most definitely do not need to do a guided practice. My recommendation is to do breath counting practice instead and I think I've written about this elsewhere. If I haven't, I can give you a quick primer on it. Then, once that practice has been embodied and you can get to at least 108 breath counts without losing your concentration, then it's perfectly okay to do the practice without "doing" anything except being aware of what's happening now. The only potential downside of this is if you're not well rested the likelihood of you falling asleep is quite a bit more likely! With regard to point 2, you have to embed part of your awareness in your body so that as you feel yourself tightening up in relation to what's going on around you, you take a breath and as you breathe out, let your tummy go completely soft, and simply allow yourself to relax. No one around you will notice anything changing, but you'll feel very different though. I don't know if you are doing any particular stretching exercise practice presently, but the reason we recommend these (lying relaxation, and regular stretching) being done together is that the more accomplished you become at the stretching part, the more quickly you become aware that you're tightening up in the moment at work. Each works with the other extremely well.

Those four will keep you going for a while—in the advanced class, we did the partner hip flexor stretch every Tuesday night for a year before everyone started to get really flexible in this line. It's tremendously important and it certainly worth repeating the same exercise a couple of times each session and that'll take you 20 or 30 minutes. Usually, you will get much deeper in the second iteration.

Rather that lying face up with your straight arms by your sides (and palm up, if you can do that), try opening up your elbows to 90°, and place the palms flat on the floor. The possible problem with putting the hands on the hips is that they can go to sleep (blood flows from the fingertips to the elbow under garity's force. OTOH, if you can lie with your fingers on your size as you describe without your hand dangerous to sleep, by all means try that. The real requirement, the deep requirement, is that you can relax the body completely, so any arm position that will allow that is fine.

Embodiment in process. Thumbs up.

Isn't it. Thanks for reporting!

Not really WRT the ball of foot bounces we're talking about; I can't get into the deep physiology today, but plyometrics are more about stored tendon energy (in short fractions of time; up to a few tenths of a second) than about fast twitch fibres; and a great deal more happens too. However it works, definitely good to wake the system up and prepare it for the stresses coming.

By definition, yes. Anything with a bounce is plyometric.

It all depends... At your stage in the journey, I suggest you stretch to make the body feel comfortable, relaxed, and to help you sleep and recover. Adaptation happens after whatever the stimulus is – right? I don't know whether you're doing the lying relaxations or not, but that will also help you to be more relaxed as you're running, once that new state sets in the body. As well, you can (of course) use stretching to improve the range of motion of anything that you feel is holding you back while you run. Last for today, I recommend that you do dynamic warmups not static ones – because I don't know what your warmup consists of. So, for example, bouncing on the balls of your feet to wake up your calf muscles and then giving them a quick stretch is a good thing, and same with the standing lunge (bounce up and down, and alternate legs—say, after five reps on the one side, going a bit deeper each rep. I strongly recommend dynamic warmups, and no static stretching – and the reason is we're trying to wake up the neural system and make sure that we have enough range of movement for whatever it is that we're doing. Always keep in mind that stretching works in the opposite way – it calms the neural system down – and you don't want that before an event. Running doesn't require much range of movement. On the other hand, following any event or after any practice sessions, that's when you sit down and stretch properly to pull the kinks out. And all the mobility movements that we use can be done in this dynamic way as well as part of your warmup if you want to. You just need to make sure the body is ready to start running slowly, and then increase the speed as you warm up. Many times in the past I have found after half a mile or so, I needed to stretch something to make Body feel comfortable so I'd stop and do that, but not holding them for any length of time, and then keep going.

Begin with the Starter course. If you want to learn the system, that's the best way in. Much more sensory information is available to you – information from the body – when you are feeling stretches that you are actually loose enough to do. As well, just enough of the reasoning behind the system (the why we do what we do part) is given in this course. This info is not really available from the other courses (especially the Mastery Course). WRT strength training: some experimenting can be instructive here – for example, in my own body having done this sort of thing for a very long time now maximum intensity is what it needs to signal to let go. But in the beginning this may not be the case. You have to try a different intensities and see which one speaks to the body most clearly. In any case, always do strength training before stretching. It is the best possible warmup, for the strongest stretches in particular.

It's possible, but then again, the mancold... Seriously, though, this will pass. Re. what to do stretching-wise, you've got the Mastery course; it is more difficult to pick the useful bits from this than the Starter Course, which is whole-body and follow-along. Very likely.

Consistency, not going too hard, and doing the relaxation exercises daily as well are the keys. Welcome!

Yes, but opening up the stride pattern is not without its own potential problems (it changes foot strike, for example). But loosening the quads and hip flexors the way you suggest will definitely make the process easier. Take you time doing this!

To answer that question ("what kinds of poses would be good to record?") depends on where you feel the most restrictions. If you advise, we may be able to offer suggestions.

Try bending the straight leg a little; you'll be able to get much closer to the leg. And once in a stretching sensation position, try two dynamic moves: straight trunk to thigh, and separately used the quad on the leg you're bending over to try to straighten the leg. One of my favourites.

Very nice graphic presentation, @Jim Pickles. WRT Claudia, I see this and the first thing that pops into my mind is, 'not in this lifetime'. Excellent, too.

The recipe for happiness, right there!

Matt, I would be concentrating on strengthening that tendinous intersection, and the single-leg RDLs I recommend for this are the perfect warm-up for stretching. And, speaking more generally now, it's absolutely no drama at all to take a month or two off from stretching if you've got good reason to, which you have had. Because you've been doing this for 18 months now, you'll find whatever flexibility you've lost will come back very quickly. But I still recommend concentrating on the strengthening dimension first. When I say "first", I mean do the strengthening exercise at a low intensity first before doing any stretching.

Puuuurrrrr-fect (we love cats; cats really don't care about what you thinking!). I wrote, "the root of all suffering is the deep wish that reality be something different to what it is". This is not a recommendation to be passive, either. We recommend "skilful means": this means explore all options that might bring about the state you will be comfortable in. There are alway infinite options, but we are all conditioned to see options as "this" or "that". This is seeing clearly; this is one of the goals. Keep going. Reading your comment today created a little burst of joy!

Not that we have a choice! But embracing this reality changes everything. And very nice progress on the chins, too.

Chip time? Meaning? In any case, congratulations are in order, no? That's definitely a PB.

Best to have no expectations with respect to this activity. The is no such thing as a "bad" relaxation or meditation session (or a "good" one, for that matter): there is only the noticing of what happens in the process. There will be distractions; that is what is happening, and not good, not bad. This is meditation, and relaxation practise. Before you begin next time, say to yourself, "suspend all judgements". I hope this doesn't sound too cryptic, but the root of all suffering is the deep wish that reality be something different to what it is. Breathe, and relax.

My suggestion is to be careful with your split times, run as relaxedly as you can, and see what happens. Expectations are a mother&^%er. No expectations means no disappointments. Let's see what happens. —support squad.

What I'm hoping for too. What I know for sure is if I do nothing, no problem ever goes away. And pausing in the top position of chinups (and trying to pull the bar closer to the throat at the same time) is excellent isometric work (and perfect for people like me who are weakest in that position).

Cue yourself to flex the lats hard first (so pull them down to the hips before pressing yourself off the floor); this can make them do more work (and you could feel a bit less in the triceps).