Too many think Pilates is just for women. Not sure. It is for everyone including men. Joseph Pilates was a man! That’s not a reason to do Pilates but it is nice to know!
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What are the benefits of Pilates, if any, over other forms of exercise?
Are there other benefits to a pilates practice besides the “strong abs”? A good question to ask and even better answer which also answers, “Why do pilates?” at all.
Read moreWhy do so many people quit exercising?
Why do some many quit exercises? Not exactly a reason why do pilates but understanding why people don’t exercises may help us develop new reason to do pilates!
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Besides Joseph Pilates, has anyone else been influential in the Pilates world?
Learn about some of the influential members and leaders of pilates, also known as the Pilates elders.
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THE GOLDEN YEARS
Learn more about Joseph Pilates and his life.
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WAR YEARS
In the last issue Joseph Pilates and other German nationalists were interned in a “camp” for enemy aliens in Lancaster, England. During this time, he taught wrestling and self-defence and boasted that his students would leave the camp stronger than they were before they were interned. Here is where he started devising his system of original…
Read moreMindfulness for the body, is that a thing?
While your mind is busy working all day, your mind isn’t always considering the needs of body sitting there, constrained, or standing all day a counter serving customers, walking around serving customers, hunched over on a roof replacing shingles and many other work place roles where we just take for granted our body has to do what it has to do to get the job done. Learning to listen to your body, being mindful of your body’s needs can only help with productivity. Think about it…mindfulness for your mind help minimize stress and anxiety in your thoughts; mindfulness / awareness of your body’s “stresses” will help minimize the stress and anxiety your body has in it.
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Where did Pilates come from? – The Beginning
Joseph Pilates was born in Germany in 1880. His father was a gymnast of Greek origin and his mother German and a naturopath. Naturopaths believe in stimulating the body to heal itself. His mother’s healing philosophy probably influenced his view on and approach to exercise as we will see. In time Joseph came to believe that modern day life-style, poor posture and inefficient breathing were the root causes of poor health. He decided to answer these problems with a series of physical exercises to enhance and help correct muscular imbalances thus improving posture, coordination, balance, strength, flexibility and increase breathing capacity and organ function. In essence, restore the body to its original, healthy state.
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Why is head and neck or cervical placement so important in Pilates?
Many of us out there have experienced tension and strain in our neck and shoulders while doing crunches or sit ups. This pain in the neck is usually due to using the muscles in the neck and shoulders to pull the head and shoulders up rather than using the abdominal muscles to flex the spine. The natural curve of the cervical spine is said to be anterior convex.
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What is the purpose of stabilizing your scapulae?
Our shoulder blades are flat bones that lie on the back of our ribcage and are very mobile. Why are they so mobile? The shoulder blades are not attached to the vertebrae in any way. The only bony attachment shoulder blades have to our skeleton is to our clavicle (collar bone) by means of our acromium process (the bony bits on top of each of your shoulders.) As a result our shoulder blades are very mobile.
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