Pilates...

Last night I thought I was going to yoga, but I misread the schedule and ended up going to pilates and really enjoyed the class so I thought I would devote a post to the benefits of it!


Many types of people, at many levels of fitness, who have begun doing Pilates exercises say they've seen improvements in range of motion, flexibility, circulation, posture, and abdominal strength. Decreases in back, neck and joint pain were also reported.

Body awareness is something I saw as a major benefit. It shows you how to pull your tummy in and bring your shoulders down and this can correlate to daily activity such as walking, sitting, and brushing your teeth. There is an attention that is required that changes your general awareness.  It can help make you aware of that chronic tweak in the neck you get from sitting at the computer all day with rounded shoulders and a phone cradled between ear and shoulder, or of a past sports injury. For me it was my left knee. I tore my ACL about five years ago and it still twinges, but after the pilates class it felt truly worked out in a good way.

Think of a tree, Pilates experts say. Does it have all its strength in its limbs? No. The tree is only as strong as its trunk and roots. Without a strong trunk, the tree would topple over.It's the same for human bodies, say Pilates experts. If we don't concentrate on building a good foundation and a strong trunk or core, we'll end up tight in some places and weak in others, injury-prone and susceptible to the pitfalls of our occupation or chosen form of exercise.

Galliano, who has sculpted the bodies of Madonna, Cameron Diaz, Sting, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Uma Thurman, says Pilates works because it teaches you how to move.

"Unless you are taught how to move and discover with your teacher what is blocking you (for example, keeping your shoulders up too high), you will never achieve body symmetry," Galliano says. "When you start getting control of your body, it gives you a great degree of satisfaction."

The discipline was created by German-born Joseph H. Pilates a century ago. A sickly child plagued with asthma and rickets, he grew up to be obsessed about the perfect body. He sought a discipline to combine the physique of the ancient Greeks with the meditative strength of the East.