Kim Vopni (00:01.1)
Welcome, Leah. Thank you so much for joining us. I'm excited to hear about your background and also the work that you do within pelvic health. It's actually funny. I just signed up for my first yoga certification. It's not something... I've practiced yoga for a really long time, but I just signed up for a certification with a teacher who was my first teacher, and I've been following him for 20, probably almost 30 years, a long time.
Leah Wrobel (00:30.185)
around.
Kim Vopni (00:31.066)
And but there's not there's not a ton of people who are doing pelvic health as it relates specifically to yoga. So I'm interested in hearing your background. So can you start out telling us who you are, what brought you to the world of yoga, but also then down the path of pelvic health as well?
Leah Wrobel (00:50.333)
Yes, for sure. So I've been teaching yoga for almost 22 years now, 23. And when I came into the world of trying to solve my own pelvic floor issues, especially after having my second child, I tried all the methods, tried reading, tried kind of...
drawing from other modalities and seeking pelvic floor therapists, physical therapists, which there weren't many back then. So I felt very isolated until I had to draw on being a yoga teacher and just saying, you know what, wait, I have this amazing language and amazing lens in which I could kind of look at everything.
So my journey started with yoga. That's many, years ago. It was really about soothing the soul. I was a professional dancer, actually, and that's why I felt such a deep connection to my body in so many ways and had studied so many modalities, like somatic work, Feldenkrais, pilates, modern dance, classical, but so much range.
And I really looked for that interception in yoga. I was really seeking that and not performing, but moving inwards. And I think that even enhanced the feeling of a gap when things weren't working as they should be or as I felt they should be. With my pelvic floor, that gap of awareness and knowledge, that's what really just came as a shock.
Why am I jumping and peeing and I can't even feel the pee coming out? How could that be? How can I have so much connection to my body and so much understanding and the pelvic floor is just, you know, felt like there was nothing there and felt like I couldn't get the answers?
Leah Wrobel (02:58.043)
and was very dismissed because I was strong and young and flexible, just didn't fit anybody's category. So you're fine, you know, just everyone kept saying I was fine. But I just knew that there was so much more awareness to be found and that I have eventually I was like, okay, have all the tools to use yoga.
And that's where also all the beauty of yoga I think shines with the mental piece, the emotional piece, how to look at the body and understand it's not just exercise. So I can learn, I can learn the exercises, I can find on YouTube a exercise to do, but it is the way in which we practice that really...
brings that to deep healing. And that's another thing. I never thought of myself that I needed healing. I just thought, I'm great, I'm doing fine. I just need to strengthen my pelvic floor. But when you are like, I don't know where that is. I don't know how that feels like. I mean, I can read a lot of books, but actually, how does that feel? Then suddenly, self-compassion is really important. All these tools from yoga.
came in. So I'm so happy you're doing a yoga training. I think it is a really powerful way to approach pelvic health.
Kim Vopni (04:30.807)
Sorry, I was on mute, I don't view, like my purpose for taking the certification was not necessarily because I want to become a yoga teacher. I teach movement and I bring in influences from many different types of movement. So it will deepen my knowledge, my awareness of my body and how I teach for sure. It's also watching my parents age and watching how important mobility is and
the importance of moving in a diverse diversity of ways. it's just I've always been curious. I've always practiced but I want to go deeper in my knowledge and and it'll be interesting. What if anything shifts from how I teach? Like pelvic floor stuff. So that's kind of where I want to go next with you is
So you mentioned like stress urinary incontinence seems to be what you were struggling with. Did you have any other pelvic health struggles as well?
Leah Wrobel (05:33.193)
So for me that was the big thing, stress urinary contents. And when I came into this world I was very naive about it. I thought, okay, well, what can be a problem? And then I was very, very serious about this and I immediately reached to PTs, to sex therapists in town and I just, I made the phone calls. I was so nervous, but I really wanted to do it well and with all the knowledge that I could gather. And...
Kim Vopni (05:41.793)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (06:01.12)
the physical therapist I talked to, which I write about in my book too, Lisa Whiting, who's so wonderful. She just was so happy when I called and she said, finally, I can send all my pain patients to someone. So what would I, and I was like, what? What do you mean? But what I discovered all through these years is, you know, I thought, okay, here I am.
with moms who had babies, but it is so far from... It is such a little part of what I do because there's such a huge group of women who... Sometimes the postpartum I do is 25 years after. just had a woman...
contact meets, 26 years postpartum, living with so much pain and sorrow and shame. It is so many things, and as you know, and I follow you, and I follow the movement we do, and the breath you do, and what you call core breath, I sometimes call pelvic breath, and there's so many similarities, so I'm also curious where the yoga journey will take you and how that will layer. But it's really that approach to the whole person, because people...
Kim Vopni (07:04.141)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (07:11.258)
It's so layered. I find that it's never just, let's do these five exercises. It's...
That's just the gateway. Sometimes it's the saying, the body keeps the score, of course, the book, and then the issues are in the tissues and all of that. When you look at people's bodies, suddenly you see, I don't know, deep sadness seated in the ribs cage or what's happening on the side and the obliques and what's happening in the neck and what's happening with the feet. I find that there are these places in the body that sometimes someone can come and say, want to work on stress and content.
Kim Vopni (07:26.423)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (07:50.179)
Then you discover there's some sexual trauma. Then we need to spend two sessions working on the power of the feet, the grounding, the rooting, how that walk comes up the legs, what's happening with the pelvis, the positioning of the pelvis. So that physical approach, which I love, and it's just one part of this whole body.
Kim Vopni (08:12.013)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (08:13.444)
mental, emotional way of looking at the body. And that's what I wanted to say before. I would never think about myself needing healing. And when I named my book, was, you it's just strength. But then I really got to understand that for me to find even the awareness of the body, that's the magic of yoga for me is about mending the pieces and or and creating links in the body and deepening connection. And
that and the word healing suddenly sit so well. So I know a lot of people just they hear, healing. Yeah, I don't need that. I just need to be stronger. And now I have to remind myself that's where I was as well. I'm, Healing is for someone sick. But I'm like, no, healing is for all of us all the time. And when we are seeking deeper connection, it's just every day.
Kim Vopni (08:48.535)
Yes.
Kim Vopni (08:55.411)
Yeah, interesting.
Kim Vopni (09:00.49)
Yeah.
Yeah, and that's the two words deeper connection, I think is what really resonates with me. You said in the previous notes when you were exploring chatting together, you've got two terms here. Is it ahimsa? Is that how you pronounce that? Ahimsa and satya. So ahimsa is self-compassion and satya is truthfulness.
Leah Wrobel (09:20.028)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (09:27.565)
So you've already mentioned in what you were just saying that the self compassion piece a little bit, can you expand on those two and why those are? Because let me just back up. Somebody coming to you for stress incontinence or urgency or doesn't like they could come with 15 people could come with the same physical problem, but how you would approach it.
Leah Wrobel (09:32.029)
Yeah.
Leah Wrobel (09:45.798)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (09:51.454)
And where you would start with that person could potentially be different. I'm making an assumption here based on where is their level of self-compassion? What is their truth or what do they identify with as the truth from their body or their experiences? Is that accurate to say?
Leah Wrobel (09:57.192)
Yeah.
Leah Wrobel (10:07.307)
Yeah, it's accurate. And I do one on ones and I also offer group classes, which are always so interesting.
And I also find that it's never really 15 people with exactly the same thing because we all have a different history here. I'm just sitting now and my left leg is over my right, so I have my habits and the way I align and you know all the habitual way of being and standing that affects us and our history and maybe you fell off a bike when you were a kid and all the ways in which you are. teaching Ahimsa, Ahimsa in Sanskrit the translation maybe would be more non-physical.
But you can also translate it into a more active compassion. You learn it in the Yamas of the Yamas. It's the basis of our yoga practice before we practice Asana, before we practice the movement. And that non-harming in the approach, I think it's more important than we realize. It seems obvious. But even...
me with all the skill and years of practice. Okay, let's just do five more repetitions. And I think that's where that that sheet, like do 200 Kegels that I got that frustrated me so much and didn't yield any results for me was because there was just no compassion. It didn't feel good in my body. I was just squeezing everything and it was it wasn't from this soft tender place of really feeling oneself back to connection. So non-harming.
Kim Vopni (11:12.151)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (11:37.464)
is to everyone, but also the voices in your own head. How are you talking to yourself again with this annoying body, or this is my bad side? I can hear immediately with the student who comes how they speak about themselves or their body parts, and I think that's what becomes really beautiful and interesting. It's like, how do you rest your hand on your belly to breathe, to do those core breaths you do? What is the quality of touch? When you are trying to engage your pelvic floor, how angry are
Kim Vopni (11:56.141)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (12:07.337)
you are to yourself if you can't execute that and for me I realized I had to back up so much to find that tender ahimsa language and truthful to if I conceive myself as strong and flexible and I look what I could do with my body and I can do all these abdominal exercises and yet I know inside that my pelvic floor is not doing anything it's not collaborating it's not there's no coordination there and so being willing to be vulnerable and back up and
and be truthful and honest with yourself and just say, you know what, this is so hard, I have to really just start that the first piece is just visualize what I'm going to do, imagine that, where are my two sitting bones, how do I draw them in towards each other? I had to learn that really in my own body. was my first...
time where I felt I really had to learn yoga in the realest way because I could not power through it. There was no amount of squeezing I could do that would yield a better result. I had to back off and find what an engagement of the pelvic floor is and the nuances of that.
Kim Vopni (13:05.357)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (13:19.405)
It's interesting because i hear that a lot like just listen to what you're saying there's there's a lot of people who. Will get so frustrated right at the beginning because the core breath which is kind of the within my realm the foundation exercise and it allows us to connect to give us the relationship of the breath. But many people find that very challenging and very difficult and so they get frustrated and they think well can't i just do it the way that i did it before.
And is this really that important? And you can see they have this resistance and there it's kind of about it's from what I do. It's it's teaching patience. It's teaching giving yourself grace that in recognizing as you just said, this is hard and that's okay. Things can be hard. We aren't going to be masters at everything right at the beginning and that's okay. And if anything, that's a good thing because that's how we get stronger. That's how we build resilience. That's how we
how we're constantly adapting. That's what we should be doing.
Leah Wrobel (14:20.421)
Yeah, exactly. then...
Yeah, that patience piece, that's hard. And then people ask me, why did you start doing yoga? Well, was neurotic and not patient and I needed to, and had some emotional healing to do so. Of course I was drawn to yoga and some things were best teaching what was most challenging for us. And so for me, it needed to be interesting. So suddenly the core breath, to say to a student what you call core breath.
Kim Vopni (14:25.837)
Yeah.
Kim Vopni (14:31.245)
Hahaha
Kim Vopni (14:42.209)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (14:50.585)
It's very advanced. And sometimes I start with just breaking that down apart because to help people feel good about themselves. maybe for someone, if they put their hand on their tailbone and they just imagine or visualize the tailbone coming just gently forward with exhalation, moving back with inhalation, you tell them it's okay to just imagine that one day your muscles will, when the mind-body connection with that happens, you will engage your muscles.
Or if I tell a student, imagine like a golden thread between your two sitting bones and you kind of pulling them gently in together with exhalation, which is hard for people because that's a reverse breath. And they ask me, just like they ask you, is this so important? And you're like, yes, please try this. You explain, educate, the diaphragm, all that. And when you inhale, just imagine breathing the sitting bones apart softly. And already here, you can get a lot of information
Kim Vopni (15:33.303)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (15:50.617)
from where I can get a lot of information with a person. Let's say it's very easy for them to access the right side. They're like, I can really feel my right sitting bone move, but I really don't feel the left. That's a lot of information or that is so easy for me, but to imagine my tailbone move is really hard for me. Maybe there's an injury there or numbness. Same with the front of the pelvic floor. So when we start breaking things apart where the core breath can be...
Kim Vopni (16:03.351)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (16:18.246)
just curated in dozens of different creative ways.
then suddenly students can feel stronger or changing planes. Suddenly it's not just the core breath that's challenging, but it's much easier for me laying on my left side and focusing on my right sitting bone or whatever it is. So we just kind of dive much, much more deeper. It's so geeky. I love it. But it's really, really geeky. But it's very empowering because you don't know where or I don't know where a person's connection is. I can't know. I can't guide.
Kim Vopni (16:43.189)
Yeah
Leah Wrobel (16:53.552)
them, we can try different things, we can try different imagery, but I really don't know where they have their power and where they will find the core breath where it will make sense in their body.
They will feel that safety when your core is wrapping in and your transverse abramas muscle and the diaphragm lifts and your pelvic floor. All of that comes together, it's magic. And then if you add another piece of yoga and you put your hand on the heart center, which is like the Anahata chakra, the heart center.
Kim Vopni (17:16.855)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (17:26.894)
and you suddenly connect the pelvic floor to the heart, it's just really, really magical and can be very deeply emotional and release.
Kim Vopni (17:30.561)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (17:36.204)
Yeah. And that that have you seen that happen where, you know, you've you hear people can be in a yoga class or making, working one on one with a yoga practitioner and they will all of sudden just be flooded with tears and they don't necessarily know why. but there's this, it unlocks stuff that is stuck sometimes. Have you seen that? Have you witnessed that happen?
Leah Wrobel (18:02.918)
all the time. That's a great question. Every session.
Kim Vopni (18:08.491)
Yeah.
Leah Wrobel (18:09.068)
It's so much fun because it is such a good, there's such good tears. And I'm sure people who also do your exercises have those at home. You just don't witness them, maybe if they're not doing it in front of you. But it is so magical. I remember specifically a woman who came for stress incontinence and she was all about just like type A woman and I need to strengthen. And she was doing my Zoom class. I actually wasn't seeing her, but then she called me and she said,
when we're trying to just contract, contract, contract and we are never releasing, we, like it's stuck, right? So when we start feeling that range, sometimes even someone wants to release, they just maybe need to release a little bit more and visualization really helps in order to then lift. And suddenly she just realized that even though she was frustrated because she was sure she needs to strengthen the pelvic floor, she called me and she said,
Kim Vopni (18:46.914)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (19:06.598)
I hold so much tension in my vagina and it just brought so much tears, which was just a truthful moment for her back to that Satya and back to suddenly self-compassion. Oh my gosh, why is this?
Kim Vopni (19:09.889)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (19:16.14)
Yeah.
Leah Wrobel (19:22.466)
woman, which is me, why am I holding so much tension in the center of my body, in the pelvic floor? It's just really... and genitalia, it's... yeah, it's very emotional. So people have those releases, some people can have it in a side plank, suddenly their abdomen, you know, they're like, when you... when they have to build more heat, a fire of those muscles awaken them in a... again, in a very nice way with yourself.
Kim Vopni (19:32.311)
Yeah, yeah.
Kim Vopni (19:49.079)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (19:51.556)
then yeah, sadness can come and release and it's beautiful.
Kim Vopni (19:53.741)
Interesting. Yeah.
You talked in the notes that we shared earlier, you talk about creating a nuanced pelvic map. Is this, and maybe it's both, is it visualizing the pelvis and the parts? Is it touching the pelvis and the parts? Is it a combination of the two or can you expand a little bit on what you mean by that and how that can be beneficial for people?
Leah Wrobel (20:22.081)
Yes, sure. I feel that...
Touching is great at home because I'm a yoga teacher and we're in a classroom where it's okay. Sometimes I guide to touch the sitting bones, the pubic bone, the tailbone, even the perineum if everyone is comfortable, but it's not more than that. So that self-exploration of touching and looking with a mirror, that's so important and I definitely encourage women to do that. But I think the beauty and challenge in yoga is that mental peace. And that's why sometimes people say, why don't you want to be
Kim Vopni (20:28.535)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (20:38.391)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (20:43.789)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (20:55.537)
pelvic floor physical therapist and like there are amazing people who do that. So that's where they are putting their hands in and sometimes not always and they can really have feedback with their patient. But for me, it's really guiding people to draw that map and understand that it's individual. So that's...
Kim Vopni (21:14.679)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (21:18.105)
Like I already started talking about the sitting bones for example. So of course you and I know that maybe it's the transverse perineal body. They don't have to know the names of all the muscles, that it's the levator a and i, but when we start...
Kim Vopni (21:27.618)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (21:34.726)
feeling, first I call it the diamond, from the pubic bone to the two sitting bones and tail, the diamond shape. And then I will sometimes place in the center of the diamond a flower and they can visualize that, is, a flower is so cliche, it took me years to accept it. And now I'm like, it's amazing, it works. Just let those petals open and then suction it in and draw it. And then I will ask, I will stop and ask students, they don't have to answer.
Kim Vopni (21:37.271)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (21:53.344)
Yeah
Yeah, yeah.
Leah Wrobel (22:04.739)
out loud, they say, what color is your flower? Because it really makes a difference. And that's where it starts to be very nuanced. Now, can you draw that flower? Let's say Kim, you said it's a white small flower. say, so could you...
pick it up a little bit to the front, like towards the navel, or can you drive back towards the, like you want to kiss the sacrum from the inside. And every movement like that and every imagery like that yields a very different sensation of the body. it stops being a contraction of the pelvic floor, squeezing on the pelvic floor. is so much richer and feels good. And what's really nice to see is those smiles on students' face when they're doing them, because I don't think
When I was told to do kegels, they didn't feel good because I think it's a misunderstanding. It's just people kind of ball bunch up their muscles as hard as they can. And it is not this nuanced.
Because when I say gentle, it can be misleading, because it sounds maybe like less power. But if you go a little gentler and you start understanding your own map and where you're stronger and where you need to encourage more strength, maybe it's deeper, maybe it's the front triangle or the back triangle or deeper inside, then you actually can yield way more power.
Kim Vopni (23:06.061)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (23:22.789)
and be aware of the areas that feel weaker in the pelvic floor. Because when I hear yoga teachers say after 20 years of teaching yoga, the pelvic floor muscle, like it's one muscle, just drives me nuts. Or, Lea, did you know that the deeper layer of the abdominal is connected? I'm like, yes, everyone should know this. So it's interesting, yeah. And then of course...
Kim Vopni (23:27.213)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (23:34.037)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (23:42.081)
Yeah
Leah Wrobel (23:49.026)
all the body parts are connected. So then it's interesting to teach a workshop and suddenly someone after an hour of different nuanced pelvic forward activation be like, my inner knee is sore. And you're like, yeah, because there's a muscle that runs from there and all the way up to the inner thigh and up to the labia. it's just the body is so magical and all those connections exist. So, yeah.
Kim Vopni (24:09.069)
Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah, I love that. And as you're talking, I'm thinking part of part of my own, you know, curiosity for yoga is is also, you know, you said you were this you kind of neurotic and busy and and I feel like that's myself as well. And I've always been I've been a personal trainer for a really long time and I've always been I like hard intense fitness and weightlifting and there's been
There's a hesitancy on my side for anything ultra feminine and there's I think a desire for me to now start to accept and allow that and pursue things where I feel more of the and embrace more of the softening and and I use the term blossom. use flowers. I use feminine things, but I feel like I as you're talking it. That's a part of my
Leah Wrobel (24:44.549)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (24:59.469)
Yeah, I heard, yeah.
Kim Vopni (25:07.233)
My path right now is also the softening component. I teach it all the time about how important lengthening and softening and releasing is so that we can generate power, so that we can build strength. But I feel like myself embodying the softness is part of what I'm pursuing.
Leah Wrobel (25:27.491)
Yeah, it's an interesting path and I'm like you, I started, was very resistant to being, when women would say it's in the womb and everything is in the womb, I was like, no it's not, I have a lot of body parts and they're all awesome. And it took me, yeah, this kind of windy road to accept that.
flowers is a gorgeous image. In my book I actually use the word pebble and I also I'm thinking about a smooth river pebble and I like that too because it adds a little bit of weight and when I wrote the book I actually did want men to be able to read it too and incorporated some stories of men and try to yeah because everyone has pelvic floors and
Kim Vopni (25:50.189)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (26:05.037)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (26:07.588)
the feeling of the weight of a pebble related to me more. But again, like you're saying, we're also changing and shifting and aging and we need different things and we accept them. Yeah.
In different realities of our life, it's like in sexuality, sometimes you're like, it's the softness, it actually may be a softness or a tenderness, or it's maybe a listening, a listening to the body that is of different quality. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (26:34.573)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (26:37.985)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. What does it look like from a group class? I know that teaching groups can be a bit more challenging. Obviously, you don't know who's going to show up. Everybody brings their own stuff with them. And sometimes being an instructor looking, you might see something that you wouldn't consider great form, or you would want to go and change and do something. And I know myself that I have become
much less militant about perfect form than when I first started and just the person's moving and letting them explore it and giving them just cues as to try something. What if you did it this way? What would happen? What would that feel like in your body? So my question to you is when you're teaching a group, what does a group yoga class where you are incorporating pelvic floor? I guess I have two parts to this question.
Are people coming to you knowing that pelvic floor will be part of the conversation or do you just bring it in to and whoever shows up is going to hear about pelvic floor?
Leah Wrobel (27:45.559)
Okay, so I have maybe a few answers because just like... yeah, exactly. So, I...
Kim Vopni (27:49.069)
There was a few questions.
Leah Wrobel (27:56.773)
I am who am. It's like when I started the journey of the pelvic floor and some friends told me, don't say you're a yoga teacher. People want to strengthen their pelvic floor. They don't want to know that it's yoga. Create your own method. And at the end of the day, was like, I am a yoga teacher in my heart. This is my schooling. This is my study. And I did so much studies. so that comes everywhere. And so I have regular, I'm going to say quote unquote, regular group classes where I am who I am. I'm a yoga teacher.
Kim Vopni (28:14.999)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (28:26.826)
very aware of the pelvic floor, so I can't stop being aware of the pelvic floor. So even if I'm teaching an advanced arm balance, I will have to incorporate because it's all about the core system, right? So the pelvic floor also stops being this... I know I talked about this map.
and this nuanced map, but I started also trying to point to the inner thighs and the abdominals. in the end, you start starting to see how the whole system works. And I don't even understand anymore how we can do very advanced postures or back bends without understanding deeply the core system that includes the pelvic floor. So that's one answer. then...
Kim Vopni (28:58.765)
thousand percent.
Leah Wrobel (29:04.438)
The other part is that I do specifically pelvic floor classes. So I love doing my one on ones, but I'm also aware that not everyone can afford it. And I really want to make it as accessible as possible. So I hold both on Zoom a weekly class where that's I'm practicing with and it's changing and it's dynamic. I kind of at some point I told my students, even if nobody shows up, I'll do this every week because it just keeps my creativity. And I love it. Just diving deep into that.
Kim Vopni (29:29.357)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (29:34.295)
the hips, the pelvis, all the connections. And I also have in the studio a class that's actually, it's a trauma-informed pelvic floor health class in which people have to sign up in advance for a number of classes. So it's not a surprise for me who comes and then I give them a questionnaire, same with the Zoom. I know who's showing up, I know their challenges.
I think just like with what you do, it's skills. So over the years I can teach, I can have 10 different people in the class with different, completely different challenges and have the ability and the awareness to...
guide through an exercise and pay attention to maybe an alignment for one person, make eye contact with another person and tell them back off, you're pushing too hard if I know that this can cause them inflammation. So, you know, someone works on their peer performance a bit too much and the next day they can't walk and you just kind of learn to be able to see many bodies at the same time and if you know their background and if you know a little bit their language going back to compassion, if they're pushing themselves too much.
if they're softer, I kind of know to say to you can do more, can ground your feet and sit in a deeper squat and I can see... You develop the skill of seeing the pelvic floor, not really with your eyes, but actually really being able to sense what's happening in the person's body.
Kim Vopni (31:00.45)
Yeah.
Kim Vopni (31:05.291)
Yeah, you know, it's I'm still amazed and and still hopefully one point in my lifetime that this changes. But I'm a personal trainer. I've done oodles and oodles of different certifications and never was the pelvic floor ever talked about in there. And as you were saying, you you can't teach like I just I just naturally teach because it's how can you not teach without talking about the pelvic floor? We talk about the core. We talk about
Leah Wrobel (31:22.369)
It is amazing.
Kim Vopni (31:33.835)
all the other parts of our body, why are we not talking about this deep part of our core that is going to help us in so many of the movements that we're doing? So I love that you're just like, I just talk about it, just teach it.
Leah Wrobel (31:46.612)
Yeah, it's for the life of me I don't understand why it's not talked about, but I offer pelvic floor teacher trainings. I do 30 hours yoga alliance continuing education programs because, you know, can be also osteopaths take my classes or chiropractors, you know, it's really fun because sometimes I had a chiropractor who said I just need to help a truck driver who doesn't want to hear the pelvic floor words ever.
Kim Vopni (31:50.743)
Yeah.
Kim Vopni (32:13.996)
Yeah.
Leah Wrobel (32:15.251)
Activate the pelvic floor I need the tools and someone else comes to me because they want you know deep learning and investigation into their own body and Take their students into feeling Kundalini, which is this rising of energy from the tailbone? So it's all it's all there and so yeah I don't know why it's not why didn't exist but I'm definitely on a mission to making it more popular and I offer 30-hour courses, so it's Yeah, so to just really have the space for it and understand them
Kim Vopni (32:39.138)
Yeah.
Leah Wrobel (32:45.205)
magnitude and the importance of it.
Kim Vopni (32:48.414)
Mm What are some of your favorite cues and imagery for the pelvic floor within maybe it's within specific poses within yoga or even if it's just in like, I know in Shavasana, we don't you don't do anything. But even if somebody was just lying down on the mat, what are some of the ways that you have found to be effective for activating and releasing and relaxing the pelvic floor?
Leah Wrobel (33:13.984)
it's
It's a really kind of open question. I've been doing it for so many years and sometimes in a class, the certain energy I'm picking up from someone I have suddenly a new image I've never used before and it's always just so fun. But lately I've even thinking about gliding lights, like little gliding lights, really imagining again going back to the sitting bones because it is such an easy entry point. People can really touch their sitting bones over and over again.
Kim Vopni (33:27.511)
I love it.
Kim Vopni (33:34.254)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (33:45.942)
different ways. You can touch sitting, can rock from side to side, you can lean on the wall and feel your sitting bones on the wall and rock from side to side while you do a hamstring stretch. So there are endless ways and having this imagery of
a light, a little light on each of them gliding towards each other and out. I love the image of fabric, of silk. So if people can sit up, maybe that's more helpful and think that a silk or beautiful fabric is draped at the superficial layer of the pelvic floor just to start accessing.
Kim Vopni (34:08.557)
Mmm.
Leah Wrobel (34:21.643)
that part before we go deeper, before any lift to just imagine like little crinkling at the the base. Like when you exhale do little visualize little crinkles there at the silk at that diamond shape.
Kim Vopni (34:22.669)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (34:35.939)
And when you inhale, can you allow that fabric to smooth out, like really feel the breath landing as your diaphragm moves down and your belly expands? Can you feel the breath with its gentle weight land at the base of the pelvis and smooth out the silk? And sometimes images like that can really help people, yeah, there's that in the left back corner of my pelvic form actually not relaxing. And this image of smoothing the silk out can help.
them do that. And for example, if that becomes more familiar, we could start gently lifting that piece of fabric upwards softly and when we inhale we can let it come down again. And understanding that the range is important, that elasticity is important, that it's not strong or relaxed, but it's all of that all the time and in every asana. So what are we doing? Are we doing a pose? we Navasana? It's a boat pose. It's a very strong abdominal
Kim Vopni (35:27.308)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (35:35.765)
muscles, different level of engagement of how much you need to recruit your core than if you're doing a pigeon pose or you're stretching.
Kim Vopni (35:36.161)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (35:41.772)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (35:46.285)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (35:48.435)
So that's also really important to teach. It's not, I feel like, I take it with classes and people say, teachers say, mula bandha, squeeze your pelvic floor. And that's where my journey started. And I was like, no, no, that does not, my body really does not want to squeeze my pelvic for an hour and a half. And why should I squeeze the pelvic floor when I do a cheer pose, when I do an arm balance or when I'm stretching or when I'm doing Shavasana? So it's, yeah, it's, it's.
Kim Vopni (36:09.291)
Yep.
Leah Wrobel (36:17.91)
Just every time can be different. The beauty is that you can really guide differently. You can kind of feel the mood and feel and...
Kim Vopni (36:26.733)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (36:27.732)
It's all connected to the outer hips, the inner thighs, your abdomen, your back. It's the whole body. yeah, all connected. One of my favorite images is if you imagine doing like a lunge. Think about a lunge on your fingers or your hands on the floor. And I know a lot of teachers have told me that they now use that image. So if I'm in a lunge and my hands are on the floor, and then I imagine that I have skates on my feet, like my feet are on skates. And when I breathe out, I'm going to think of sliding the feet towards each other while I do like a
Kim Vopni (36:32.597)
All connected, yep.
Leah Wrobel (36:57.646)
like a hissing sound, like a ssss. So I'm sliding the feet towards each other, ssss, and then naturally people will feel their feet are active, now their hips, and they're doing this diaphragm stretch, so their pelvic floor will engage, and then you can kind of...
Kim Vopni (37:09.089)
Mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (37:16.288)
point it out to them, you're feeling your pelvic floor, you're stabilizing yourself from the deepest place. Now when you come up to Warrior One or Warrior Two, you have this sense of stability from your center.
Kim Vopni (37:27.455)
I love that. I love it. Yeah, it's so much more than squeezing the squeezing your vagina, which is the kind of the vision that people have and tighten your vagina, right? Yeah, that's amazing. Where? Yeah. Yes, yes, yes. Yes, I love it. Yeah, I love the that you're following your intuition and the energy in the room and the people and what you're seeing. And that's how, you know,
Leah Wrobel (37:36.114)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or the anus, which is in yoga a lot because it's men who wrote the books. Squeeze your anus. And it's like, wait a second.
Kim Vopni (37:56.916)
I have a whole list of different cues that I don't use with everybody and I, the cue list gets bigger, the more people that you work with because something will come out of that session and, maybe I can remember a person, I had been trying all these cues with her and nothing was really landing. And she said, you know what I imagine? I imagine a fishnet casting a fishnet and then gathering the fishnet in. was like, there you go. Like, and, that was, that was best for her. And right. So yeah, super fascinating.
Leah Wrobel (38:19.794)
I love that. I love that. Amazing. Yeah, and I think that when it comes to the pelvic floor where people are trying to lift, so they're lifting their ribs and you really, have to explain to them...
educationally listen you're stretching out your abs now because you're lifting from your chest and you're also asking your abdominal to be able to recrute in the strongest way so you're there's a contradiction there but then there's different ways i can explain that technically and then i can also have them put a hand on their heart and their ribs soften and just relax in so another favorite cue for me is when i see someone tensing because they're trying to engage i would i maybe i'll put a hand in them and say imagine you're just sitting with your best friend
Kim Vopni (38:52.247)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Leah Wrobel (39:04.928)
right now and you can sigh with relief you're just going like and now your ribs are in place so now engage your pelvic floor and lift the ribs so all the extra trying and the that trying trying instead of landing down into a feet and starting it from there so yeah i think it's it's endless and beautiful a beautiful exploration
Kim Vopni (39:08.737)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (39:17.451)
Yeah, gets in the way.
Kim Vopni (39:25.133)
of it.
Yeah. What's the name of your book and where can people find you and learn more and potentially join your Zoom classes or maybe even in person?
Leah Wrobel (39:38.274)
My book is called Yoga for Pelvic Floor Health, A Whole Body Approach to Strengthening and Healing. It's a long name and my editors, I wanted something spiritual to convey the spirituality of all of this. Or the deep emotional release, which is like no layout. You just need to let people know what's in the book. And I'm happy.
Kim Vopni (39:56.429)
Tell them what it is.
Leah Wrobel (40:00.286)
she did it I'm happy that you know she fought with me on that point because it really is yoga for pelvic floor health and it really is a whole body approach and so and you can find it on Amazon and I have a
website, that's my name leahrobel.com and I have an online course, have, if you go to my website you can find my classes, one on ones, I do them online and in studio and teacher trainings, I have one online and one in the studio in person in Copenhagen, so it's quite far from you, I'm talking from Denmark.
Kim Vopni (40:31.49)
Ooh.
I'll be down with coming. I love Copenhagen. It's one of my favorite cities. Yeah. Yeah, I'd love to. Okay, I'll get my certification first and then I'm going to need to do CEC. So, you know, there's my excuse to be able to come to Copenhagen. Yeah. Thank you so much for your amazing work and for writing your book and for joining us here today. I'll have all the links in the show notes so people can find you. And yeah, I look forward to learning from you in the future as well.
Leah Wrobel (40:37.415)
please, do come!
Leah Wrobel (40:44.948)
Yeah, yeah, exactly the continuing eds. Yeah, that would be awesome.
Leah Wrobel (41:00.78)
Thank you so much, Kim. And I love your podcast and all that you do. So thank you so much.
Kim Vopni (41:06.03)
Thank you.
