Lesson 1: Heart of the Wave
This opening class reconnects you with the quiet intelligence of the lower belly.
Gentle movements and steady breath anchor attention in the abdomen and diaphragm, where digestion and vitality begin.
The sequence moves through spirals, waves of the spine, and resting shapes that restore natural rhythm in the core. Breath and movement combine to mobilize the diaphragm, release stagnation, and support flow through the whole system.
-
Theme: Stillness & Subtle Strength
Focus: Cultivating felt awareness in the abdomen and diaphragm through simple movement and rhythmic breath.
🌬️ Seated Breath & Awakening
Seated belly breathing
Seated sufi grind (two variations)
🐚 Spinal Wave & Grounding
Cat-cow with hands on blocks
Child’s pose with arms back, hands near feet
🌊 Support & Flow
Cat-cow with forearms on blocks
Child’s pose with arms extended, hands on blocks
🔁 Rhythm & Release
Pulsing cat-cow with hips rocking forward and back (hands on blocks)
🌎 Integration & Rest
Lie on the belly, hands stacked, forehead resting on palms
-
Just for today, can you rest for 2-3 minutes with your hands on your ribs and feel how your body responds to intentional breathing? You can be seated, standing, or lying down.
Do you focus more on the inhalation or exhalation when you breathe? Can you spend one minute elongating the inhale, and then one minute elongating the exhale?
Close your eyes and envision your breath moving to the back of the lungs—you can put your hands on your lower back (where your kidneys reside) and breathe into your palms. What do you feel as you breathe? How do you feel after a few breaths?
-
Scientists are cautiously beginning to question the view that the brain is the sole and absolute ruler over the body. The gut not only possesses an unimaginable number of nerves, those nerves are also unimaginably different from those of the rest of the body. The gut commands an entire fleet of signaling substances, nerve-insulation materials, and mechanisms of communication. There is only one other organ in the body that can compete with the gut for diversity—the brain. The gut’s network of nerves is called the “gut brain” because it is just as large and chemically complex as the gray matter in our heads. Were the gut solely responsible for transporting food and producing the occasional burp, such a sophisticated nervous system would be an odd waste of energy. Nobody would create such a neural network just to enable us to break wind. There must be more to it than that.
― Giulia Enders, Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Underrated Organ