Mid-Day Mood

We've all been there. It's the middle of the afternoon, and suddenly you feel so sleepy. For some reason, even the most exciting and important moments aren't immune to the afternoon slump. Hi friends, it's Jen. Today we're gonna practice mindful movement to give our body and brain a much needed midday boost. You can do these practices sitting down wherever you are. We all have an internal clock, a sleep and wake cycle called circadian rhythms that heavily influence our energy levels throughout the day. For most of us, the strongest urges to sleep come between two to 4:00 AM and one to 3:00 PM Since our mid-afternoon responsibilities probably aren't going away anytime soon. The good news is there are few science back suggestions to help bring ourselves back up to peak performance. Let's move and breathe together. Close your eyes or you can just soften your gaze a little. Let's take a deep breath in and a deep breath out. Again, a deep breath in and a deep breath out. One more time. Deep breath in and deep breath out. The breath literally brings life into the body. So the more attention we place on our breathing, the more alive and alert we feel. We're going to keep breathing very intentionally, and we're gonna sync our breath with some simple energizing movement to increase circulation in our body. Let's blink the eyes open. If possible, you can stay standing here, but again, you can also do this practice sitting down. Your arms are hanging alongside of you. Let the palms face forward. As you inhale, sweep your arms all the way overhead, so your fingertips reach up high towards the ceiling. As you exhale, flip the palms to face down and slowly lower your arms. And this exercise is called rising mist, falling rain and Buddhist monks use it after they've been sitting in meditation for hours to wake their bodies back up. Palms facing forward. As you inhale, sweeping the arms all the way up, overhead, fingertips reaching towards the ceiling. Exhale, flip the palms down and slowly lower your arms again. And as you inhale raising your arms up, let the movement ride your breath and exhale. Lowering the arms all the way down. Return to normal breathing for just a few moments. Now mindfully move any part of the lower body, linking it with your breath. You might inhale and flex your toes back, and then exhale and point your toes. Inhale, flex the toes. Exhale, point, inhale, flex, exhale, point once more. Inhale, flex, and exhale Point. Sitting for long periods of time can constrict our blood flow in the lower body leading to fatigue and brain fog. So this exercise we just did gets things moving. Again. Here's the final mindful movement. Take your fingertips to the tops of the shoulders, the elbows point straight out to the sides. In just a few moments, we're going to be twisting pretty quickly, the...