Pilates key principles: Concentration

In a world of attention grabbing, Pilates is a 55 minute window of calm. As a teacher of small group and solo Pilates I can tell if my clients are having a busy mind day. When the mind is elsewhere, movements are not as exact and clients ability to complete a challenging move is compromised. It is OK to have a busy mind, we are not robots, however letting go of your thoughts and concentrating on the movements your body is making will help your Pilate practice to develop.

These are my top tips for concentration:

1) Be present, use the repetitive nature of the warm up to connect with every part of your body. Try to visualize each part of your body, be selfish and only focus on yourself.

2) Pay attention to the alignment of your body. The beautiful line from your toe, through your ankle, knee and then into your hip. Maintaining correct alignment will increase the difficulty of an exercise. Why not challenge yourself to completing level 1 exercises with perfect alignment. Difficulty can be found in many aspects of Pilates.

3) Keep stable and engage those core muscles. Use your clear mind and concentrate on everything you should be doing. Pilates is more than moving a limb. It is keeping your core stable, breathing well, concentrating, moving with flow and precision. It is often more difficult to make a small movement with greater stabilization then to wave your leg around.

4) Practice the minds connection with the body. When other thoughts pop into your head dismiss them and take you mind back to the movement and your body.

I feel an enormous sense of lightness when I have finished attending a Pilates lesson. Not only do I feel the physical benefits of felling up right, connected, worked and stretched. I have an empty mind and a feeling of calm. I hope you too are able to benefit from Pilates in this way.

Comments

Tight hip flexors from sitting at my computer all day! How to release this feeling at home.

At home there are a number of ways to release tight hip flexors. Think about the main hip flexor the Iliopsoas for a moment. It originates in the lumbar spine attaching to the vertebra at the bottom of your back, it then attaches to the inside of the pelvis (illiac crest the bony bit you feel at your waist) and then passes through the pelvis and connects to a nobly bit of the leg bone your can't feel at the top of your inner thigh (the lesser trochanter of the femur). Its helped by some other muscles, but to keep it simple we are going to only think about the Iliopsoas. Now think about being sat down, The front of your body is scrunched up. Your legs are brought closer to your lumbar spine (the bottom of your back) and the Iliopsoas is contracted or squashed in size. Now think about being sat for 3 hours. Upon standing up you might feel tightness along the front of your legs/pelvis. This tightness is from you hip flexors. Humans are ...

When I stretch my hip flexor muscles I feel it in the front of my thighs. Is this right?

The short answer is yes! In my first post I talked about the movement of hip flexion and listed the hip flexors. We have already covered the iliopsoas the main flexor of the hip. Today I am going to talk about the rectus femoris muscle which also assist with hip flexion. The rectus femoris is the large muscles at the front of your upper thigh. If you sit down with a tray on your lap, the tray would be resting on your rectus femoris. It is part of the quadriceps, four muscles on the front of the leg between the pelvis and the knee. Rectus femoris is the only quadricep that reaches over the hip joint as it originates on the front of the pelvis. In class I often reference your ASIS ( A nterior S uperior I lliac S pine), you have two and they are the nobly bones you can feel through your skin at the front of your pelvis. Well you also have two AIIS ( A nterior I nferior I lliac S pine) this is another nobly part of the pelvic bon...

Flex, rotate, extend and articulate your spine.

Articulate your spine! How many times have you been asked to do this in a Pilates lesson? If you come to one of mine, probably lots. The cue, "articulate your spine" is used in the large pelvic tilt exercise and is used to promote movement between each individual vertebra. In a large pelvic tilt you start in the Pilates relaxation position. Firstly you tilt your pelvis so that your lower back moves closer to your mat and your pubic bone rises (a small pelvic tilt). Then leading from your pubic bone you peel your spine from the mat one vertebra at a time, until you reach a bridge position. To come back down, I like to think I am trying to imprint my spine into sand. So to make a really good spine print I have to get each vertebra to touch down individually finishing with my tail bone. Naturally I am engaging my core throughout the whole exercise. So what do we achieve by articulating our spines? We have lots of muscl...

Katie Leaver Pilates

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