An Article For Those Who Think Pilates Has To Be A Food Item
OK, so you are clueless as to what Pilates is, that is not all bad. Perhaps you have been a little busy lately and have not had a chance to tune in to the latest fitness crave news. Do not feel bad; we all lead busy lives nowadays. Pilates sounded like a foreign dish that someone would serve me in an expensive restaurant the first time I heard the word. Pilates is a series of mat exercises that were designed by Joe Pilates who was born in Germany and emigrated to the U.S. in 1923. He designed those first mat exercises to build abdominal strength and to be able to control bodily movements. His Pilates exercise program grew to include equipment and a growing collection of exercises. The equipment had a specific purpose and that was to replace the “spotter”. Eventually Pilates grew to include over 500 different well-designed exercises each with a goal to strengthen the body through purposeful movements.
The Pilates method as the exercises have been called are designed to strengthen our centers, which include lengthening the spin, building muscle tone, and increasing our awareness of our body and the flexibility that will result. Many have used Pilates as a rehabilitation system following back, hip, knee, or shoulder injuries and also for repetitive-stress injuries. Pilates can also be used to address any asymmetrical or chronically weaknesses in the body in order to prevent injury or reinjury by bringing the body back into harmonious balance.
Pilates can be worked by using mat exercises, equipment exercises or a combination of both. It is recommended that you understand first the concepts behind Pilates when you first begin to use the Pilates method. The concepts you learn can be applied to not only the exercises you will learn in the beginning but also the exercises that are to follow as you advance through the 500 some exercises. As you progress through the method you will of course experience longer and harder workouts. The advanced levels of Pilates include some exercises that are strikingly similar to the ones you learned as a beginner but with more difficult twists or versions of them.
As you learn the Pilates method you will be exposed to the eight great principles of Pilates. These eight principals were first introduced to the public in a book that Joseph Pilates, wrote in a book called Return to Life. These principals help those who practice Pilates to have a “mental focus” when performing the exercises that make up the Pilates method. Unlike other exercise methods if you apply the principals while doing the exercises you will experience a transformation that will propel you to continue to do the method year after year unlike other exercise programs that tend to be lucky if they survive a few days or weeks. The eight principals include having control, breathing with purpose, having movement that flows, doing movement with precision, establish the ability to recognize centering, achieving stability, having flexibility and motion and lastly being able to understand opposition as you complete the Pilates movements.
Bet you don’t think Pilates is a food item anymore!
