Pilates at FLOW

About Pilates

Pilates offers an approach to strength and flexibility training with exercises created to strengthen abdominal and back muscles while developing pelvic stability and abdominal control. A great compliment to any yoga practice, it promotes ease and efficiency of movement through focused, slow, careful and controlled exercise. The mind/body awareness developed in Pilates will improve your posture and form in all areas of your fitness program.

I must be right. Never an aspirin. Never injured a day in my life. The whole country, the whole world, should be doing my exercises. They'd be happier."- Joseph Hubertus Pilates, in 1965, age 86

Joseph Pilates wasn’t always the picture of health, though.  He was a sickly, scrawny child who was drawn to physical fitness to deal with asthma and other medical conditions.  During the first World War, Joseph Pilates was placed in an internment camp in England.  There, he began devising exercises to help the other camp members maintain health.  These exercises were rooted in ancient Greek and Roman physical activities as well as yoga, and became the basis of “Contrology.”

When Pilates was transferred to another camp, he became a nurse to several internees who were injured during the war.  It was here that he developed some of the crazy-looking machines used in pilates as a way to help the bedridden with movement.  The first machines were actually constructed on the hospital beds themselves, using springs from the mattresses.  Today, pilates is not only an excellent fitness activity, it is also an important component of athletic training and physical rehabilitation.  Thousands of people annually are sent to pilates by their doctors and physical therapists.  Pilates offers strength, flexibility and coordination – both mental and physical.

Exercises are usually done in 5-10 repetitions, and move around the core of the body, working the front abdominals, the obliques, the hips and the lower back.  ?  So just when you think you’re about to die in one exercise, you move onto something else. The results are fast and profound.  People stand taller after pilates as their vertebrae are supported by a girdle of muscle.  Long, lean muscle mass is created and functional fitness is improved.

Pilates appeals to gym people because you “feel the burn.”  It appeals to yogis because you quiet the mind.  It is taught at Flow Yoga Center because it is a wonderful compliment to a yoga practice.  The pilates practice of “scooping the abs” can be likened to engaging the bandhas in yoga.  And the core strength that pilates brings is invaluable in navasana and arm balances.  And for the practitioner, there is Joseph Pilates’ promise.  You feel different after 10 sessions.  You look different after 20.  After 30, you’re a whole new you. 

-Mariska Breland, Certified Pilates Instructor