Classes and Pricing

Make Your Brain Your Body’s Best Friend!

When developing his method of “Contrology”, Joseph Pilates drew on teachings from Eastern philosophies and echoed their emphasis on the harmonious balance between mind and body, making them one. He really understood the importance of body awareness in movement and stressed that any practitioner of his exercises must “Be certain that you have your body under complete control”.

How many of us can say we have complete, conscious control of our body whenever we move? Can you think of the last time you walked into a door frame, tripped whilst out running or over-twisted whilst gardening? The aim of Pilates practice is to develop our body awareness so that we can bring it into our everyday lives, helping us to avoid the kind of accidents, conditions and injuries that result from repetitive poor posture, alignment and movement patterns.

The importance of our conscious awareness in developing a skill, whether that be playing a sport, musical instrument or simply digging a hole is also highlighted in Matthew Syed’s book, “Bounce”. Syed identifies one of the characteristics key to sporting success as the quality of “purposeful practice”, paying close attention to practicing a skill, particularly those skills we don’t find easy. Purposeful practice is inherent in every Pilates exercise as the demands of each movement make you highly aware of your control, or lack of it, over your movement. Classical Pilates is practiced without external distractions like music or the need to copy an instructor in order to help the individual keep their mind focused on their own body. Once learned you can use this skill to improve your performance in any physical activity from gardening to swimming.

Heightened awareness of your body’s movements gives you the ability to coach yourself to improved performance of any activity even when your Pilates teacher is not with you. When paying dedicated attention to your movement you can identify those movement patterns that don’t serve you well or feel like they could lead to injury. A good Pilates teacher helps this process by continually bringing your attention to different aspects of your movement or encouraging you to ask yourself questions about it. This helps you scan your whole body throughout your workout to understand what is moving well and what isn’t. Whilst your Pilates teacher may facilitate this in a class this is certainly a skill you can practice on your own, thereby building your self-awareness and responsibility for improving your own performance.

It is well documented that our mental health can be greatly improved by both exercise and meditation, where our focus is firmly on the present moment. A Classical Pilates session can bring together both of these benefits by ensuring your mind is totally focused on controlling your body’s movements, to the exclusion of all other thoughts. The mental focus required means leaving all other worries and stresses at the door for a while, giving both your body and your mind time to recuperate from the stresses and strains of daily life. This is probably more important now than ever in such testing times. After every Pilates session you will find you leave feeling re-energised, rejuvenated and ready for whatever is your next challenge.

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