As you exercise, focus on each part of your body. How does it feel? With each exercise try to perceive a specific picture. If you are trying to see yourself on a sandy beach, focus clearly on how this feels. Do your feet feel relaxed? Are your arms hanging loosely by your sides? Think of images that will help you to get into exactly the right position.
Invite each image to emerge with as much intensity as possible, so that you can almost feel it. Once you have created a familiar picture, eventually all you will have to do is focus on it and your body will automatically respond.
The aim of Pilates is to bring about permanent changes. You can hasten this process by using visualization techniques when you are not exercising. These will automatically help you to walk, stand and sit in the correct way.
CHAPTER 2
Pilates is a very precise system of exercise. It is different from other regimes in that it requires a bit of groundwork before you start. In order to understand fully what you are doing it is important that you first become acquainted with the basic principles. There are six essential guidelines to remember.
1. BREATHING
Pilates differs from conventional forms of exercise in that it concentrates on the correct use of breathing for each and every exercise. Breath nourishes the body and the brain. People tend to breathe shallowly into their upper bodies when they inhale, into the upper chest and not right down into their lower lobes. If you are breathing deeply, you’re working from the inside out. You are energizing and replenishing large areas of your body. It is as much a spiritual as a physical idea.
For most of the exercises in this book, you will breathe out on the point of effort. During the exercises think about oxygen as a rejuvenating life-force. Always exhale on the point of effort. If you have a tight area, try and breathe into that – breath is another form of liberation, working from the inside out.
2. CONTROL
All the exercises in Pilates are controlled. In this particular instance the word ‘controlled’ means that the correct body parts are being used. Many people, for example, thinking that they are using their abdominals during an exercise, are in fact using their bones or hip flexors. Thus, the muscles that should be targeted are not being worked in an efficient way.
Control and precision go together. All these exercises are done slowly, in a meditative fashion. You focus the mind on what you’re doing, and don’t allow it to wander. You use breath, coordination, control and precision to do a limited number of repetitions well.
You minimize the stress and involvement of other parts of the body. It’s preferable to do even five repetitions in a slow and regulated way, than to go through hundreds of motions, during which time nothing effective has happened. In the pelvic tilts, you should be able to feel, literally, one vertebra at a time. The fact that you do 10 repetitions well is better than doing many repetitions badly.
3. CENTRING
The main principle of the Pilates technique is to recognize that there is one strong, core area that controls the rest of the body. This is located in that part of your body which forms a continuous band at the back and front, between the bottom of your rib-cage and across the line of your hipbones. This is called the centre. This is the area in which the muscles in your stomach and back are – at the centre of your body. These muscles support the internal organs and keep you upright. If you have a strong centre you have a strong back, which means you can walk, stand and run without discomfort or pain. Your arms and legs are extensions of this part of your body. If you have a bad back this is an indication that the centre is not strong enough. Originally human beings were not designed to stand upright. The only reason we stand at all is due to these specific muscles.
We are constantly fighting gravity, which pulls us forward. This explains why so many people have all sorts of problems with those muscles affiliated with the shoulders and neck. We are basically defying nature, gravity and our initial body type.
4. FLOW
Each movement in Pilates is designed to be performed in a smooth, flowing, undulating way. There is no room within this regime for any sharp, jarring movements or quick, jerky actions – these are the total antithesis of everything you are trying to achieve. If a movement ever feels like this, you can be sure that you are doing it wrong. Every motion originates from a strong centre and flows in a slow, gentle, controlled fashion. This warms the muscles, causing them to lengthen and open up the spaces between each vertebra in the spine so that the body expands to create a longer, leaner shape.
5. PRECISION
In order to be effective, all Pilates exercises have to be performed with exact precision. This attention to detail is important as it ensures that each movement is working the body in the correct manner. Before you start an exercise sequence, read the instructions carefully. Pay full attention to proper alignment and check what the ‘watchpoints’ have to say. This will ensure that you do not expend excess energy doing an exercise incorrectly.
6. COORDINATION
Children run naturally, but for most adults basic coordination is a major problem. Many people, when starting these exercises, complain to me, ‘I can’t coordinate my breath and the movement. It’s too much. I’ve got to concentrate too hard. I can’t do it.’ Most of us have lost the ability to coordinate the mind and body into a working machine. We no longer have the sense of our feet being in contact with the earth. We’ve lost the feeling of the way the breath moves naturally through the body. The aim is to retrain the neuromuscular connection between the brain and the body.
This is best illustrated when I try and teach foot exercises to people. I sometimes joke that the feet are very far from the brain and they won’t obey, as they haven’t been asked to do anything for a long time. Observe people who have lost the use of their hands. They can do the same things with their feet that we can do with our hands. We all have that capability, but we don’t employ it. If you don’t avail yourself of something it atrophies. Therefore, if you don’t use coordination in the physical sense you lose the ability. In Pilates, we try to re-create your body as a coordinated whole, rather than thinking ‘I am exercising an arm or leg or the stomach.’ Coordination is paramount to the way the exercises flow.
KEY TERMS
In Pilates there are certain key terms that are referred to over and over again. It helps if you understand these before you begin. Also take note of the specific guidance on the feet and the neck.
RELAXING
Pilates frequently refers to keeping an area relaxed. This isn’t necessarily what you might think. Most people associate relaxation with a feeling of ‘letting go’, of allowing muscles to slump. In this case, to relax means to release tension in an area while still managing to maintain tone and control. This should feel comfortable and natural.
NEUTRAL SPINE
Some of the positions you will be assuming require your spine to remain in neutral. This means that you maintain the natural curve in your back. Thus, when you are lying down, do not press your back so hard into the floor that you lose your natural curve. Neither must you allow your back to arch so that your lower back comes off the floor. Just lie there, breathe in and out naturally and allow your back to relax into the floor without pressing it in. This will permit your back to relax into its natural, neutral position – which is slightly different for everybody.
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