- Hello, I'm Cassy, and you found the best place for aging well.

We call it Quick Fit .

Just a few minutes each day to stretch and strengthen, with the goal being to reduce pain so you can keep doing all the things you love.

Today's focus is balance, so have a chair handy, remove your shoes, and we'll get started.

[gentle music] We remove our shoes so the sense receptors in your feet can efficiently communicate with your brain.

And keep in mind, thick mats feel good, but they make balancing a bit more challenging.

Let's just begin with some nice, wide arms and your feet about shoulder-width apart, slowly shifting your weight into your left leg, extending the other one out to the side.

[inhales] Find something to focus on that's not moving and let's just start dragging that left leg a little closer, nice and slow, decreasing the size of your base, which makes it a bit more challenging for your standing leg.

[inhales] All right, put that foot back out.

Shift your weight to the other leg, okay?

When you're stable, start putting more and more of your weight into your standing leg and dragging the other one closer, slow as you need to.

And if you find you keep putting all your weight on two legs quite frequently, like 75% of the time, then you need to stop wherever you can control it better.

All right, shift your weight over onto the other leg, okay?

[inhales] And slowly start making your base of support smaller and smaller with the focus to train the standing leg.

It's the joints, your hip, knee, and ankles that we're training mostly, as well as the receptors in your feet.

Okay, and we're allowing all that communication to occur between your brain and your muscles.

And it just happens so swiftly, but we need to practice.

Very good, all right.

Let's go ahead and lower the arms and turn.

Now, if you really struggle with balance, have a chair handy and feel free to complete the movements in place.

Just don't have a death grip on the chair.

Consider a light touch.

All right, you can have your arms wherever they feel comfortable, and we'll just do some forward steps.

So in line, toe to heel.

There you go.

Moving forward nice and slow, making sure you're stable before you try another step, okay?

Reach and down.

Good, so hold it here.

Make sure you're stable and slowly, as you need to do, twist one way.

If you think you're gonna have to put your feet down wide, just pause and let your brain and your muscles communicate.

Okay, go the other way.

And go backwards now, nice and slow.

Reach back with those toes, shift your weight back, and when you're ready, switching legs.

Very good.

All right, face it forward now.

And we're going to do some curtsy lunges.

So nice and slow, I'd like you to take your right leg and cross it behind you.

Find those toes and now bend your front knee, doing your best to keep it right in line with the top of your foot, okay?

And come out, [inhales] other way.

Put that leg behind and lowering yourself with small knee bends.

It doesn't have to be very big.

And then out, [inhales] switch, [exhales] reaching a little lower as you warm up, and out.

[inhales] Last one.

Good job.

All right, turn, so we can do the same thing, just traveling, all right?

Let's take your right leg and then reach it across your body, and then do that curtsy, reaching towards that ankle.

Now take that back leg, bring it out to the side and across your front, okay?

Bending those knees as far as you can control, back leg out to the side, and across the front.

Exhale, [exhales] dip it down.

And last one, out, across, stabilize before you come down.

Good job, all right.

Standing facing forward.

Now, what we're going to do is we're going to start with a stance with our feet about hip-width apart.

I'd like you to take your left leg and move it forward just about a foot length, and we'll start shifting your weight forward and back.

So we have a fairly wide stance, shifting your weight forward and back, making sure you're stabilizing.

Okay, now split the distance, in other words, bring your feet a little closer together.

Shifting your weight again, forward and back.

Making sure you can control it.

And now, if you can, get your feet right in line.

Shifting forward and back, and if that's too much, you know, do a little toe out, or just bring your feet about this far apart instead of right in line.

All right, now let's switch the forward foot, they're hip-width apart.

One's forward, one's back, and shifting your weight forward and back.

Have your arms wherever you feel comfortable.

Forward and back.

And now bring them a little, so if they were this wide, bring them about this wide now.

And of course they're staggered, right?

Forward and back.

All right, last one.

Let's put those feet in line, one in front of the other, if you can, if you're ready.

If not, keep doing this class, and in a few weeks, this will become easier for you.

Forward and back.

Always something to strive for.

Okay, so let's bring that front foot next to your other ankle and just have your toes down.

We'll start working on a tree pose.

So once again, find something to just focus on.

Arms are low at your sides; you're standing nice and tall.

You're putting as much weight as possible on your standing leg.

So if you're mirroring me, it would be your left leg, okay?

And not lifting the bent leg, unless it's very easy for you to do so.

In fact, usually, when your standing leg is strong enough and stable enough, your other leg will come up without you having to force it or push it too soon, okay?

The point, though, is to have as small a base as possible to make your standing leg get more conditioned to the job.

And back down slowly.

If at any point you need to put your foot all the way down, maybe just pause, freeze, [inhales] and give your brain and your muscles time to figure it out.

Okay, now, I know you can feel the muscles in your hips and your knees are starting to maybe burn a little because they're being challenged, and that's okay.

Let's switch legs now and put all your weight on that right leg.

[inhales] Go as slow as you need to, making that base teeny tiny.

You can have your toes down and then start lifting the arms when you feel ready and stable.

Just focus on something that's not moving, pausing when you need to.

[exhales] You guys are doing great; hang in there.

And don't get frustrated with yourself.

Stop at a level that is just challenging, but not too difficult.

Repeating, like I said, these classes over and over and it will get better.

But if you jump too far too fast, you won't improve as quickly.

And that's it.

Great job, everyone.

This was not one of the easiest balance classes.

So if you'd like to improve your balance, please visit pbswisconsin.org/quickfit and make sure you complete a balance class each day, along with another stretching, strengthening class.

That way, you'll get a very well-rounded fitness routine to help you age well and keep you doing all the things you love.

Until tomorrow, keep on moving.

- Announcer: Funding for Quick Fit with Cassy is provided by Greg and Carol Griffin, founders of ElderSpan Management, Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programming, and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.