Yoga with Melissa

Beginner Yoga Routine

Day 8 of our 30 Day Beginner Yoga Challenge is a wrist Free, Hand Free, kneeling free, inversion free, and prop free yoga routine for beginners. We will begin by centering with a breathing exercise to sense your own vitality. From there we will do some modified side planks and then come up to standing and continue to open up your side body with palm tree sways. Continuing standing we will do a little flow from side angle to reverse warrior. Our backbend today is bow pose which will stimulate your adrenals and kidneys for energy. We will finish with a reclined twist to massage your spine and release your back and a poem in savasana. Our poem today is Hum by Mary Oliver.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Full Body Stretch

Day 7 of our 30 Day Beginner Yoga Challenge is a hand free, wrist free, kneeling free, inversion free, and prop free yoga class. It is a full body stretch that will start with some centering to connect with your breath, body and the earth. Our first stretch will be for your hamstrings and then your hips and glutes. Next up will be your low back with knees to chest and a twist. When we come to standing we will do some stretches to release your upper back, followed by some additional stretches for the front of your hips and quadriceps. We will finish with butterfly pose for your inner thighs and a poem in savasana by Jeff Foster called: The Promise.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Yoga in the Morning

Day 6 of our beginner yoga challenge is an inversion free and prop free class that is a perfect way for you to practice in the morning. This beginner yoga class for the morning starts with a breath practice to energize your morning. There is some shoulder release to wake up your shoulder joints. Bridge pose will strengthen your glutes and open up your hips. We will open up your side body and breathing with some gate variations. When we come up to standing we will practice breath of joy which is incredibly energizing and Goddess Victory Squat with some rotations to release your spine and back. We will finish in savasana with a poem by Mary Oliver.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Yoga for Hip Pain

Day 5 of our beginner yoga challenge is a basic yoga for beginners. This is a hands free, wrist free, kneeling free, prop freYoga for Hip Pain, and inversion free yoga class. We will begin our beginner yoga class today with some pelvic mobility rocking our hips front and back and side to side, followed by some knee sways. Keyhole stretch will stretch your outer thighs and glutes. When we come to standing we will open up your psoas/hip flexor muscle. Our final beginner yoga pose is bound angle pose to get into the groin for today’s beginner yoga class. The poem today is by John O’Donohue.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Basic Yoga

Day 4 of our beginner yoga challenge is a basic yoga for beginners. This is a hands free, wrist free, kneeling free, prop free, and inversion free yoga class. This class contains simple yoga poses for beginners, beginning with knee to chest pose to release your low back and keyhole stretch to release your hips. Boat pose will strengthen your core and the variation we practice in this class will connect you with your heart. Tree pose is a balancing pose we practice today, with lots of options if balancing poses are challenging for you. We finish with a reclined twist to release your spine and your back and tune into your breathing. Our poem in savasana today is by Mark Nepo.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Increase Flexibility

This short 10 minute beginner yoga to increase flexibility will focus on releasing stiffness in your neck, shoulders, upper and lower back, hips and legs. It is a wrist free, inversion free, and prop free class. When we are flexible in our bodies we are flexible in our minds, our emotions can move freely through us. We are not rigid with our thoughts, we can find new solutions to problems.

We begin our class with knee to chest pose combined with a neck release to release our low back. In lunge pose we create a flow to release not only our hip flexors, but also your hamstrings and back muscles. When we come up to standing we move in a flow from tadasana to release your neck, shoulders and upper back. I offer a wrist-free backbend to open your chest, strengthen your back and release your neck. We finish in savasana with a Mary Oliver poem.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Yoga to Do At Home

Day 2 of our 30 Day Beginner Yoga Challenge is another 10 minute video that you can do at home. This short 10 minute yoga class is hands free, wrist free, kneeling free, prop free, and inversion free. We will begin our yoga class by releasing tension and pain from your shoulders. Then we will strengthen your legs and glutes and open your chest. There are some core stabilization yoga poses to strengthen your obliques and abs. When we come to standing we will increase the flexibility of your spine and release back pain with twists and side bends. We will continue to strengthen your legs with Goddess Victory Squat. This class ends in savasana with a beautiful poem by John O’Donohue.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Full Body Beginner Yoga

Day 1 of our 30 Day Beginner Yoga Challenge is a 10 minute Complete Full Body Beginner Yoga Class. It is a prop free and a wrist free class. These short 10 minute beginner yoga classes begin with centering to feel the support of the earth, release tension from your body and to connect with your breath. This class includes beginner yoga poses to release stiffness and pain in your hips. Cat pose will help you to find your center and be more flexible in your spine. Warrior One with chest opening arms will improve your posture, open your heart, open you to your life, open your hips and strengthen your legs. A standing forward fold will help you to surrender, release and let go. A seated twist will help you to release back pain, massage your internal organs, and release any stagnant energy. We will end with a short savasana and a poem.

You can do this class if you have never done a yoga class before in your life. I will give you slow, easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and tell you exactly how to get in and out of each and every pose. Detailed instructions will be given for even the most basic poses and how to breathe. You will be given lots of cues of how to pay attention to your body and where to feel the effects of the yoga poses. You do not have to be athletic, flexible, strong, balanced, skinny or coordinated to do this class. The slow, step-by-step instructions will give you the confidence to let go of your self-judgment and stay focused with commitment and motivation.

Sign up for the 30 day beginner yoga challenge: Click Here

Remember Members Receive an Ad-Free Version of this 30 Day Challenge

Thank you for Subscribing and Sharing to Help us Reach our Goal of 100K Subscribers by our 11 year anniversary on YouTube.

Beginner Yoga Challenge

Welcome to our 30 day beginner yoga challenge. This challenge is designed to get you in the habit of practicing yoga over the next 30 days.

I have been hearing from a lot of people who are working from home who are starting yoga for the first time. I am hearing from my students that they are working from home and they need 10 minute yoga breaks throughout their day. This 30 day beginner yoga challenge will get you in the habit of moving your body every day after you wake up, as a 10 minute break in your work day or before bed.

We are living in stressful times and our autonomic nervous system naturally releases stress hormones that help us to deal with this stress - to fight the tiger or run away from the tiger so to speak. If we do not move these stress hormones through our body we are going to feel more and more stressed and anxious. These 10 minute yoga breaks will support you in releasing stress and anxiety.

I have made sure to include all the best components of my regular yoga with Melissa classes. We will start with a short centering to release tension from your body, connect with your breath and feel the support of the earth. We will move for about 8 minutes and then we will come back to the earth for the best pose, savasana. During savasana I will read you a poem not to analyse, but to immerse yourself in the poem’s atmosphere, tones and textures, sounds, images, rhythms, to move you emotionally, energetically and spiritually.

My intention with this 30 day beginner yoga challenge is to give us time away from our computers, social media, and news to tune into our bodies, to notice how you are feeling and to see what you need physically, mentally, emotionally and energetically. This doesn’t have to take a long time, I believe we can do this in just 10 minutes.

The classes are designed to connect you with your body and your breath. To allow you to find your center and your ground. To help you find strength and balance. When you create flexibility in your body you will have flexibility in your emotions and your mind as well.

As much as possible I have tried to keep the classes prop free, wrist free, hand free and knee free.

If you are new here, you may be wondering who I am? My name is Melissa, I have been teaching yoga since 2002, here on YouTube since 2009 and in my membership community since 2011.

I have been recommended as having the best free yoga videos for beginners by Greatist

Go HERE to sign up for the challenge

Members, we will be populating our video library with ad free versions of these videos in the beginner section.

Help me reach 100K subscribers by subscribing to my channel, doing the 30 day challenge, and sharing the challenge with your friends. Thank you so much!

Namaste, Melissa

Hatha Flow Yoga

This root chakra qigong inspired hatha yoga flow class will release the energy of fear from your body. Through qigong and hatha yoga fusion poses, we are going to focus on releasing the energy of fear. Instead of going into analysis of fear or all the stories of fear we are going to stay with the energy of the fear and focus on moving it down through our root chakra, into the earth to be transformed and transmuted.

With the global pandemic of covid-19 right now many of you have requested classes for the fear of the unknown, fear of uncertainty, grounding and inner alignment. When we can release the frenetic, unconscious, mindless, scattered energy that accompanies fear, we can find the grounding and centering energy that is always available to us in our root chakras and through the earth. This inner stability will balance us and bring us a sense of inner peace. May this class be an energetic purge and detox and provide a gathering of inner strength that may be of benefit to all beings at this time.

Namaste, Melissa