Standing Gentle Mobility Workout | Low Impact Movement for Stiffness, Tension & Energy (All Levels!)

Hey everybody, I'm Amy from BodyFit by Amy, and this is your standing gentle mobility workout. So this is an all body weight, all standing workout where we're going to get some mobility moves. So we'll be moving through some gentle cardio and strength and ways to really get your body feeling mobile, flexible, and strong. With all of this, I will give you different options to work to your fitness level. Are you ready? Let's do it. Let's start just by taking a minute to get centered in our bodies. So we're standing nice and tall, and I want you first to take stock of where you may be feeling tension in your body. For a lot of us, it's in our shoulders or our back. Maybe we're pushing our hips forward. Maybe we're feeling pulled forward because of what we do all day, sitting at our desk, looking at our phones, driving. Maybe it is in our glutes or our pelvic floor. And let's just try to release that. Can do a few deep breaths to do that, just really letting it be loose and relaxed. And now let's try to get our body in alignment. So still without tension, but we want to be aware of those muscles. So we're going to stack our ears over our shoulders. Are you one of those forward head posture? Many of us are from the computer screen. You ears over shoulders, shoulders over rib cage, rib cage over your pelvis, over those hip bones. So really pay close attention to that. And then your hips over your knees and your ankles. So can you do that and imagine that there's a string coming up at the top of your head lifting you up, that your shoulders, your chest is open, but you're not pushing that chest forward, not letting yourself round here, you're not pushing the hips forward or back. And again, release that tension, especially in your pelvic floor, glutes, core area. All right, now that we've done that, let's go ahead and get moving. So we're just going to start with just a gentle march. So everything that we do today is going to be low impact. Our goal is mobility, right? So maybe you've been told that you need more mobility, you want to move and feel a little bit better, and you're not sure what that is. We're going to keep it gentle today. We're going to keep it all standing. If you need some extra balance, you can grab onto a countertop, a sturdy chair, the back of the couch, something like that. That can be really helpful. Otherwise, just move to a level that is good for you. Our goal is not to get into super deep stretches today. It is mobility, so movement in and out all the different planes of motion and getting moving through ways that maybe we don't get enough of in our daily life. So as we're marching, let's roll those shoulders. Start small, forward, up, and back. You're rounding in those circles, and then you can take them, make them a little bit bigger. So You're opening up the arms, and this is just getting the blood flowing. I think you're going to feel a little bit of this will feel like gentle cardio, cardiovascular, right? Getting the heart pumping. You'll feel a little bit of strength, you'll feel those muscles working, but mostly I hope that you will leave feeling mobile, energized, and like you've also released some tension. So let's reverse our direction. Let's take them forward, back, up, and forward. And then you can make those a little bit bigger. We won't really overdo it on this one cuz again, most of us get pulled forward by our activities of daily living. Do you feel that in your shoulders? I know I do. And you can keep that march. Can you march and just bring those knees up a little bit more? Whatever feels good for you. If you need just to keep it grounded, you can be here, but let's bring those knees up again, opening up the hips and the hip flexors right through here. And then can we keep that but take the opposite arm and opposite knee up? Again, you don't have to get up as high as me if you just want to keep that again with a tap, or if you want to just do one or the other, just the arms or just the knees like we were doing. If you can coordinate them, this is what we call cross body movement, working both sides of our brain. And really good to help us engage our core for balance, right? So now let's keep those knees going, and we're going to rotate our torso towards it. So it can be small. Again, some of us get a little tight through our back. And again, if you just want to keep your feet down, you can go here. But if you can bring it up here, movement through the back, through the torso. Can you bring the hands behind the head? Keep it grounded if you need to. Keep it small. You don't have to twist super far. If you can, bring those knees up and rotate. And again, maybe you want to do this with a little bit of balance. You're still holding on to something, but— or you have the countertop or something in front of you. If you can, anytime we can bring those hands behind our head, we're automatically going to get that chest opener that we all need right through here. All right, now we're going to give our hip flexors a break, which are these right here, and we're just going to do little tap backs. So here, so now we're opening up this way and I'm just going to push my arms back. I'm going to open up my palms. Let's keep it like this. Do we want to make it a little bit bigger? Right through here. And you can go slower than me, you can go faster than me, as long as you are getting that mobility in. And of course, if you need a break, we will take some breaks and grab some water, but if you need more, feel free to get it on your own. So back to just the legs, we're tapping back, we're pushing back gently. Can you bring the foot up? Looks like this from the side. And again, that's going to open up these hip flexors that again get pretty tight because we spend a lot of time in this position, right? So you can keep the hip flexors, the hamstring curls, also strengthening the back of the legs. You feel that? So usually when we're strengthening something, we're stretching the other, right? So we're strengthening our hamstring, we're stretching our hip flexors. Arms can come up again right through here, and you can even cross That feels good, right? Big stretch. We'll go 4, 3, 2, 1. Now that we stretch those hamstrings, can we get a little kick forward? Flex your foot. You don't have to get super high. And again, if you want to just keep it grounded, you can keep your heels on, but I'm going to bring my foot to here. I want you to feel safe. I want you to challenge yourself through these moves, but I always want you to feel safe and secure. So again, if you need to hold on to something, you can just do the little kicks, or just do the arms, or get them both. If you can get that leg a little higher, it's going to feel good, right? Right through here. Big arms going all the way through. 4, 3, 2, and 1. So go ahead and march that out. Maybe you're feeling your heart rate get up a little bit. I know I am, just a bit, nothing too crazy. And let's grab a quick sip of water. We're going to again keep it standing, but we're going to move through some more dynamic movement patterns as we do, so So, all right, let's take it back. So we're here, and let's take our arms up to keep working shoulder mobility. And we're going to take them up to an I, bring them down by your side, up to a Y, and then out to a T. So our goal is to keep our torso in place, not arching the back to do it, right, or bringing the hips forward. And here our core stays engaged, everything is pulled in, but we're going up. I's, Y's, and T's. Big chest opener. Again, one more just like this, and then we're going to add a little hinge to it. So what do I mean by that? We're going to take it up to the I. Take your feet a little wider. Push the hips to the back. Notice how my back is flat, getting that stretch all the way through. Her— up to the Y, hips to the back, out to the T. You don't have to get as low as me, but what I want to try to avoid is that rounding of your back or letting your head drop down. So really trying to keep your eyes up. I hinge, feel the stretch, Y, and you really are pushing your booty back, right? I'm not just folding forward. Let's keep it going. I hinge for the stretch, Y hinge, and T. And let's get one more, bring it up. I, Y, and T. Arms get a little breather, and let's get a little circle of the hips. So I'm going to start slow where I'm just barely kind of making a circle with my toes right through here. And you can keep it with that, maybe that's what feels good for you. If you can, we're going to bring it a little higher off the ground, little hip rolls. Again, we usually get pretty tight through here. You do you if you want to keep it slow and low, or A little bit bigger right through here, just like that. And can we add a little half squat to it? We don't have to get super low, but we're going to drop it down, reach it up, roll through the hip, drop it down, knees open. Reach it up. If you can't get that low, that's okay. Again, we just want the movement, building a little strength. Strength is mobility, mobility is strength. You got to have them both. Down and reach right here. Let's get 2 more, 1 more each side. And last one. And right through here, bring those arms in. We're going to pull the elbows down, we're going to press those hands up. So looks like this. Bring them down and in, bring them up again. You probably are feeling your shoulders and your back working through the strength, the muscles, as well as getting that mobility. For some of this might— this might be hard, especially especially again if we— if our work brings us forward or life brings us forward, to really open it up here. Press, push and pull right through here. Push and pull. Let's get 2 more. Last one. Now we're going to take— I'm going to turn to the side so you can see. We're going to do a little hinge. So my hands are going to go right down the front of the legs. Pushing the hips to the back, flat back. Again, I want to look at a diagonal in front, so I don't want to see the tops of my legs or even my feet. I want to look out. That's going to help keep that straight line. Can you go just past your knees and then bring it up? So hinge to feel that stretch. You can keep a soft bend in the knees, you don't have to be straight. You can even bend a little bit more if you need to, and then bring it up. Down, push back. And then we'll add the arms with it and take it down. Can you get a little further? Can you take your feet a little wider? You can experiment a little bit and see what works for you. Let's get 2 more. Hips to the back. Nice, good stretch. Last one. And this time I want you to try to hold it. So if you want to put your hands right on top of the legs, or again if you want to balance on something, flat back. And just like we do— if you've ever done yoga and you've done that cat-cow where we round through, cat to cow, sometimes called cat to dog— you can sit a little bit deeper, bend the knees knees a little more, but I want you to roll all the way through the spine as best you can, from the tailbone all the way to that neck. So what I'm trying not to do is come out of my legs and try to keep it in the spine. And roll through. Let's get 2 more. Last one, and roll it all the way up. Take your time, head and neck coming up last. Let's take the feet out wide right through here, and let's just do a little taps. So tap, turn the hips, opening that up, and we'll bring our hands here so we can just get a little bit of a turn of the torso. Our whole— like to think of our hip bones as headlights, right? So we're not necessarily twisting through the back, we're getting full body rotation. And then to get a little stretch to the arms, reach across. You often, if you do my other workouts, will see me do this in a warm-up cuz it's a really good way to lengthen and loosen, right? Stretch, stretch. And you can keep it little taps. If you want to add a little more movement, step out, step out to get more of that stretch. If you want to add a little more cardio, you can pick up your pace. You do you. This workout is what you need today. Reach, reach. Now can you keep that? Let's go back to just the taps and the turns and reach it over. Right here, over your head. You can keep your taps if you want to reach out more. Reach out more. Right there, big stretch. You can pick up your pace if you want. 4, 3, 2, 1, and relax. Ah, yes! Let's take our feet nice and wide. So since we're talking about our hips here, let's shift our weight. So shifting a little bit to the right, side lunge, push through. So yes, a little bit of strength. It is a side lunge, just an exercise that we do, but also thinking of opening up through the hips. You don't have to get that low, just think hips to the back, shift your weight, open it up. If you want, you can reach down and up, that gives you a little stretch, or even just here or here. You decide how low you want to get and how much movement you want to get. One of my shoulders really does not want to open up as much as the other. And that's okay. Good. One more. So bring your feet in. So you can do that or step out into it and bring it back up. Step out, bring it back up. So really good mobility through the hips. Again, you can turn your body a bit into it if you want. And up. Right there. If you want to add the arms, you can reach. Let's get 4, and breathe. 3, 2, and 1. Little heel taps in front. So we got them behind, now we're tapping the heels in front. Just get that stretch through the back of the leg. And again, you can open up. Almost looks like a little dance move, right? But heels. So all movement is good movement as long as you're safe and you're doing something effectively. But that can look different for everybody. I don't want you to worry about anything having to look exactly like me or anybody else. How your body moves, as long as you're doing it safely, is the right way. And a lot of times, just these simple movements like this can really go a long way in energizing us. Maybe you've been sitting at your desk working for a long time. Maybe you just need a little quick energy boost, or you just need— now let's tap them back again. Or you just need to get— be less stiff, right? To loosen up, to relax, to let go of some tension. Just move your body in a way that feels good for you. All right, so we're going to go— we're almost done. If you have something to balance on, so I'm going to use my weight rack here. It might be, again, a countertop, a couch, a sturdy chair, something like that. If you don't have that, that's okay. And we're just going to come here, we're going to tap back. So one leg goes back, one leg stays forward. So start very grounded right through here, and here. And then if it feels good, you can drop it into a little bit of a lunge. You'll open up that hip flexor, but that may not be right for everybody. I know lunges aren't always the most comfortable, so you can also just tap it back, but make sure you're opening up the hip And then let's hold this here if you can. You can either be here, you can be here. And can you reach that arm over? So I'm going to show you from the front just to get a little stretch. You can hold it there and then reach. And then let's switch sides. So other foot, tap it back to get the hip opener. Again, I know a lot of times we think, oh, I can't do lunges. This counts, this is a lunge. We want to open up the hips, we want that front leg to do the work. If you can get low like I just did, that helps us build a little more strength, build a little more mobility, but not required, right? I want you to try to work your way into that for your overall joint and muscle health, but I don't want you to be deterred by thinking thinking you can't do lunges because you can't get all the way down. So speaking of, hold it here or hold it here. Reach that arm over, get that nice good stretch, whatever feels good for you. And then go ahead and step it in. Let's take those knees out. I'm just going to do a little reach over. Almost done. I have tons more mobility workouts, including some Mobility Fusion where we work in a little core, we work in more cardio, we work in more stretch. Let's hold it here, big stretch over. So please check those out. Leave me a comment, let me know how this felt for you. Take your arms here Quick little stretch right through here, and then bookmark this workout. Come back to it when you just need a quick little, again, energy boost, but gentle, nothing high impact, all body weight, all standing, but hopefully helped you feel loose and energized and mobile in your body. Let's get one big deep breath in and out. You did it! That was your standing gentle mobility workout. Great job, everybody.