Hey there - let's move!

Hi, Theresa Byrne, Master Tea here. If you are in a place where you want to get some movement in, maybe you need to warm up or maybe you need to cool down, I don't know. So join me if you've got the space and you've got the desire and you got the attitude. I'd love to have you in. Starting with arm circles, nice and easy, starting with your bent elbows. If your arms don't bother you and you've got strong shoulders and they're not impinged, then you can open up your arms. Always start with the easy and then go to the more difficult. Kind of like rule of life, right? Like, start with what's easy and then make it more difficult. I don't know, I tend to go with what's harder first. And cross in front, reach back. I need to follow my own directions on that instead of getting overwhelmed by the thing that I'm doing. Ah, all right, arms up and down. Still working your shoulders. Breathing in, breathing out. Breath is the antidote to stress, the antidote to adrenaline. It's why we hyperventilate. It's why we have a hard time breathing or getting a full breath when we're stretched— I'm stressed—

stretched.

All right, now arms rotating like this. Good, nice and relaxed. I'm going to turn down my tunes a little bit. It got a little louder than I was thinking, and I don't know if you can hear them or not. This is actually— what I'm doing right now is a really good reset too. If you're ever stressed out or you need a brain break, this is a nice reset, and I'll show you another one too. 3, 2, 1. Here's another good brain reset. You just kind of bounce on your feet and you bounce side to side.

Single.

And even just like 15 or 20 bounces or 15 or 20 arm swings helps to reset your brain. And it allows you to get back into that part of yourself that you like, that you really feel good in. So we're going to start punching because why not? And we'll do some lower body warm-up as we're doing it, rotating. We're going to do a combination today with hooks and uppercuts. I love both punches. And the punches that I'm doing right now are kind of a jab and/or a cross, depending, across your body. But these hooks and uppercuts, they are like right angles, and they are much more of a close combat kind of move, because to be able to get your fist in there, you've got to be able to move in closer to whatever you're punching or whomever. We only use these for defense. Right? Pinky swear? So these are called hook punches, and in Muay Thai we call it sitting on the hook. Since I'm in a centered stance, it's harder to show, but sitting on a hook would look like that with your front hand. I'll show you a little bit later. Good. Move to uppercut. Also one of my favorite exercises to warm up your core and your abs, arms. And a little bit on the legs. The uppercut. And if you like uppercuts, you can actually sink into it and do a nice amount of work for your abs. Now we're going to put those uppercuts and hooks together.

Hook, hook, up, up. Hook, hook, up, up.

Good.

Hook, hook, up, up. Hook, hook, Up, up.

Nice. Keep breathing. Feel your body moving and celebrate yourself if you're doing this. If you're doing some kind of movement, yay! Freaking yay! Celebrate you. All right, now we're going to warm up our lower body. My favorite, if you've done these before, is a knee tap. If you're feeling pretty flexible, you want to tap with your forearm, that's okay. And we're going to work a little balance too, because balance is something that we don't often train and we need to. One of the things as a martial artist that we do is we do a lot of balance kicking, and it helps to give our bodies that proprioception, knowing where we are in space so that we can balance. And when you balance, you have to tighten your core and you have to use other muscles. 3, 2, and time. Good. Let's do some front kicks. So balance, strength or resistance training, cardiovascular work. And cardiovascular work can be like high intensity, which is go high, rest, high, rest. Or it can be lower intensity for a longer period of time. Or it could be middle intensity where you are out of breath and then you up it. And then you lower it. There's so many different kinds. You do little side kicks. So again, you're picking up your heel, kicking to the side. And brain training. To me, all of this is brain training, but there are specifically moves that we do that are contralateral, where we cross the midline of the brain— of the body. And if we can engage and touch that side, it also sends a message to the brain That we're okay and that we know we can move different sides of our body. 3, 2, 1. Good. All right, go ahead and put your right leg in front.

Hook, hook, up, up. Hook, hook, up, up. Hook, hook, up, up.

Now you can stay at this tempo if you'd like. Or speed it up. Last time slow.

Hook, hook, up, up.

And you're still on the ball of your feet, the balls of your feet, rolling it. Tighten your core because you're getting some ab work in too. Arms and abs, arms and abs.

Nice.

4 more. 3, 2. Last ones. Now we're going to add 2 knees.

Hook, hook, up, up, knee, knee.

Hook, hook, up, up.

I reach, knee. The longer the lever, the harder you work. So if it's hard, you can just do this, or if you want to intensify it, you can elongate and reach. So we're going to speed it up. This is the last time slow. Ready? Here we go.

Now hook, hook, Up, up, knee, knee. 1, 2, up, up, knee, knee.

Yeah!

1, 2, up, up, knee, knee. 1, 2, up, up, knee, knee.

Good!

Knee, knee.

Couple more.

Knee, knee.

Knee. Nice, good job.

All right, we're gonna go to the other side.

Hook, hook, up, up.

I do like that combo with a kick also, a knee and a kick. Depending on how much time we have, we might go back. And same as the other side, if you want to speed up these punches, go for it. You do you. Breathing in.

Breathing out.

And did you know that when I did my TED Talk, I focused on the exhale? Because you're automatically going to breathe in anytime you exhale. Your brain, your body, you have your autonomic system will automatically have you breathe in. So oftentimes you'll see in fitness we concentrate on that exhale. Because we're going to breathe in naturally. All right, we're going to add those knees. Hook, hook, uppercut, uppercut, knee, knee.

Hook, hook, up, up, knee, knee. Hook, hook, up, up, knee, knee. Hook, hook, up, up, knee, knee.

I was ready to go.

4.

The knees too early. And we're gonna speed it up. You can keep it that rhythm that we were just at, or you can speed it up. It's entirely up to you. Today might be one of those days where it's easier to go slower. Today might be one of those days where you want to go faster. I don't know. You get to kind of determine for you what works best.

Knee, knee.

Good.

Hook, hook. Up, up.

Up, knee, knee. Up, up, knee, knee.

Couple more.

Up, up, knee, knee.

Last one.

Up, knee, knee.

Nice. Hands on your hips. Let's do some hip rotations. Oh, working in the muscles, the joints. Switch direction. We're not quite done yet. Oh yeah, that's awesome. So there's 3 different stances. Actually, there's probably way more, more stances. But we do a lot of things. And now push side to side. We do a lot of things in a centered stance because it's easier for me to teach you from that positioning. And that way you don't have to have one leg in front or another leg in front. But from a centered stance, I'm going to have you do an elbow, elbow, elbow, elbow.

What? Elbow, elbow, elbow, elbow.

Back, back, side, side, back, back.

What?

Side, side, back, back.

These would also be excellent dance moves. I'm just saying.

Back, back.

And couple more.

And they're so good for your shoulders. Good. And shake it out. Shake out any tension that you've got and think about whatever you want to accomplish with the rest of your day. Imagine that it is going to go with ease. Celebrate yourself even when you take that first step to start.

Breathe in.

Thank you for taking the time and thanks for taking care of your body and your mind. Get some water, get some rest, and move some more if it feels right.