I recently wrote a BLOG about Stacey’s Pilates Story and had asked her to tell me her favourite Pilates exercise.
As I thought about answering that question for myself, I realized that I have a hard time deciding on one exercise.
When I first started Pilates I attended mat classes at the gym I worked at. I obviously liked it, as I kept going back, but I really did not know what Pilates was.
I couldn’t have told you if the instructor was teaching a sequence of exercises or what any of the exercise names where.
I do know that I like anything that made my abs feel like they were on fire. I also know, that back then, there where many exercises that really make no sense to me what so ever, nor did I feel like they were doing anything much for my body.
I liked it enough to take a teacher training course in mat Pilates.
My favourite exercise after taking that training was definitely Teaser. Why? Because it is hard and I could do it!!
As I continued my teacher training, I was simply in love with everything about reformer. I didn’t want anything to do with the mat anymore.
I will always remember doing short spine for the first time, my back felt so amazing.
I went home and tried to explain the whole set up and routine to my husband. He acted excited for me but I know that he really didn’t understand how this one exercise could be so amazing.
Side note: He gets it now.
He’s been doing my Pilates for Men’s class consistently for a few months and a couple weeks ago short spine won his heart. He says that he wants to go into the studio and do short spine 90 times daily…we are working on the less is more idea still!
The more I learned about the apparatus the more favourites I had.
The leg circles on the tower, the foot/ankle on the chair, teaser EVERYWHERE…
I continued to love the apparatus more than the mat for a few years. I preferred to work out on and teach the apparatus.
I saw it as a workout. I was still learning the method, slowly but surely getting a deeper understanding of the how to feel and teach the exercises.
It was when I attended my first PMA (Pilates Method Alliance) Conference in 2011 that I gained a new appreciation for the mat. It kicked my butt and the exercises where all starting to make a whole lot of sense to me. I was still in love with Teaser and open l leg rocker was becoming a close 2nd.
More practice, more education, more teaching and this thing called Pilates was making more and more sense to me. To say that I have one favourite exercise is pretty hard for me nowadays because I love so many of them. I appreciate the ones that are a challenge for me and want to get better at them. When I thinking about it, what it comes down to its that I have evolved from seeing Pilates as a bunch of separate exercises to seeing Pilates as a system of exercise, with each individual exercise complimenting the next and each apparatus and the mat also complimenting one another.
Pilates is a process.
Little by little, with the commitment to practicing and an open mind, you will get better at your favourite exercises, as well as at your not so favourite exercises, maybe even to the point of those exercises becoming favourites! At b.PILATES & FITNESS we’d love to start you on you Pilates journey.