February 3, 2025

Hi, Theresa Byrne, Master T here. If you want to move your body, I would love to invite you in to join for some movement. Each of us has a particular kind of movement or movements that feel good to our bodies. Sometimes we like to go fast, or what I call turbo. Some of us like slower or more endurance things. Some of us like something in between, both. Some of us like intervals. Some of us like, oh, I don't know, push it and do it for a long period of time. Which, by the way, an interval is 90 seconds or less. That's the anaerobic capacity of our body. So you don't want to push an interval, a high interval, past 90 seconds. But anyway, whatever movement style you've got, I invite you to join in. So we're going to start warming up nice and light. Maybe you like yoga or tai chi or qigong. Those are also great forms of movement. Running, lifting, We all have different things, kinds of movements that feel good to our bodies. Cross-training is also important. So I love to go fast, I'm a turbo person, and part of my cross-training is doing things more slowly. When I lift weights, I have to do them slowly, or I force myself actually to do them slowly and feel into the muscle. Take your punches up higher. And always making sure whenever you punch, you never stick your neck out and you never lean forward. Your body is nice and straight. One of the first things I teach people in self-defense is when we get nervous or upset, we hunch over. Take your punches over to the side. And that hunching, uh, doesn't get us the oxygen flow in our body that we want, and it kind of pushes our brain further into fight-flight. Or freeze, but usually fight or flight, depending. And breath is the antidote to stress. It's also the antidote to adrenaline. This is what you want. Breathing. Good. We're going to turn these into uppercut punches. So your arm is at right angle, kind of, sort of like a 75, and you're going to come across your body, still rotating your hips. These are great core exercises. And we're just here for about 10 minutes, right? Just getting your body warm, getting your body moving, getting all your joints a little bit of love and synovial fluid. 3, 2, 1. Good. Now we're gonna tap, and I want to work on balance, so I often have people that are doing these videos tap, right? I want you to go double tap. Tap, tap. That way you're getting a little bit of secret balance. What do I mean by secret balance? Well, if you focus solely on one thing, you also focus on how you're not good at it, how you're not doing it. When I do balance work, people are like, oh no, I suck, not good at it. Yeah, but if I just have you do this twice, look, you're building your balance and you didn't even know it. Last one. Awesome. Let's do some front kicks. And breathing in. Good. So what is your movement? What is your preferred movement? What do you like to do? Let's go and take our knees out. What's the thing that you like doing? I remember people always talked about running, and I was never a runner. Turns out when I was younger I had exercise-induced asthma and didn't know it. I was like, man, how do you guys do this? When I finally found a pace that worked for me, it wasn't as fast as anyone else, I didn't hate it. I kind of was like, okay, I get this running thing. It can be meditative. But until then, I was just trying to push it. In any sprint, I wouldn't be able to breathe, and I thought I was just lazy, or out of shape, or whatever the case may be. Okay, you're going to take your knee from the outside to the inside, and then Step back. Outside, in. Outside, in. And in martial arts, this is an inside crescent kick. I'm going slow, but you're just going to do your knee. 2. Last one here. And last one here. Good. Go ahead and make arm circles. Start with bent arms, and if that feels comfortable and you don't hit anything or anyone, you can extend. 1. Now go backwards. Or we'll take your arms backwards. Start with the elbows, and then extend. Good. Next one, cross in front, reaching back. Open up the chest. 3, 2, 1. Now I want you to open, and close. Open. Open. Open. 1, 2, 3. Open, open. Good. Now rotate. The view is really weird today. It's very close up. I didn't hit any weird buttons, I promise, because it usually could be me hitting weird buttons. Exactly. All right, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out. We're gonna do a little squat. What do I mean by a little squat? So squat is you bend, but you want to keep your chest up, and you want to bend From here, and you can go down to a 90-degree squat. You can go lower if you've trained for it, but you want to come up. And this is a half squat. Still a squat. So I want you to pick a leg. I'm going to sink on my left leg, and I'm going to take my right leg out. 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Now switch. Sink that right leg. 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Switch legs. This time you're going to take that squat, light squat, heel out. 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Good. Switch. Weight goes down. 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Good. Make sure your knee is never going in front of your toes. Sink that left side again, and you're gonna bring that leg back. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Also working balance. Sink the right leg, take the other leg back. 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, And 1. Nice! Stand up, shake your legs out. I like those little exercises. We're gonna do 1 more. You're gonna sink 1 leg, and you're gonna go forward, side, back with the other leg. You ready? Pick your leg, pick your sinking leg, your squat leg. And 1, 2, 3. 1, 2, 3. 2, 3. 1, 2, 3. Couple more. Last one. Woo! Oh, I need some balance work on that leg. All right, same thing on the other side. 1, 2, 3, forward, side, back, forward, side, back, forward, side, back. Last one. Nice, you did it! All right, let's do some arm work. One of my favorite arm exercises, or strikes, because honestly, my movement style, I like to do things that can apply to real life. And it's one of the things I love about Boxing, kickboxing, and martial arts is that these moves could apply to real life if I ever needed them to. So hammer fist is this part of your fist, almost like you're bringing a hammer down, but you're bringing it back behind you like this. Good. Now we're going to sink into a lunge and stay on one side for a set of 10. So pick your lunge, and 1, 2, 3, 4, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Good. Switch other side, other leg. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Nice. Now a little squat, low squat. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10. Nice. Aye, shake it out. All right, we're gonna do a combination of moves. So it's a knee with your front leg, step back with your other leg. And you can do uppercuts when you step back. Knee, step, knee, step, knee, step, knee, step, knee, step, knee, step, knee. Good. Now we're going to turn that knee into a front kick. Kick, step, kick, step. Step, kick, and you go as slow or as fast as your body says yes to. You don't ever have to go anyone else's speed. 2, 1, nice. Switch to the other leg. Knee up, step back, knee, step. Good, and the arms are optional. Sometimes my students will say, Master T, it's a lot of things and parts moving at one time. I get it. So maybe just, if you want to, you can just do the knee. Or if you're feeling sassy and you want to put those arms in there too. And let's go with that kick. Good. Kick, step, kick, step, kick. And how high do you want to kick? Yes. Whatever is comfortable for your body. You can always push it a few times and then go back to what's comfortable. And then start eking outside your comfort zone. 3, 2, last one. Nice, good work. All right, you did 10 minutes of movement. You got range of motion in most of your body parts and a lot of your joints. So whatever you do from here on out, thank you for joining me, and I hope you got something valuable out of it. And go make the world a better place.