Make Your Balance Better

I try to have a theme for Pilates sessions in the studio, and right now our theme is “balance”. We are focusing on the balance that keeps you from falling over and correcting strength and control imbalances within the body. There are many ways we work on balance in Pilates and in functional strength workouts, to keep you moving through life safely and without injury. 

Your Balance Declines with Age

When we’re young, we don’t think about our balance all that much. We could walk across logs at the beach or balance on a curb without hesitation. If you think about it, every step you take is a mini-balance, where you’re on one foot or the other for a few seconds at a time. Unfortunately, your balance gets worse with age – usually around age fifty. Many elderly people have trouble with stairs and may need a walker or cane to help them stay balanced. Whatever your age, most of us notice it’s easier to balance on one leg or another (which is an imbalance of strength and control!); so what can you do to improve? 

Read More: Improve Your Balance with Socks

Strengthen Your Core For Better Balance

Strong core muscles are essential for controlling your balance – and this includes much more than just your abs! Your core is made up of your abdominals, back, hip, butt, and pelvic floor muscles. By design, both functional strength training and Pilates will help strengthen your core.

With Pilates

In Pilates, there is always movement happening, which helps you become more controlled and balanced over time. This then spills over into daily life activities and movements that we make all of the time. I love when a client tells me that they’ve realized that they can do something they hadn’t been able to do for years, or something is easier than it used to be.

A great example of building core strength with Pilates is the exercise “the hundred”. In the hundred, you have to maintain a flexed spine while holding up your legs using your glutes, lower abs, and hip flexors. The breathing pattern also activates deeper muscles like your diaphragm and the intercostals between your ribs. In rolling exercises like rolling like a ball, open leg rocker, and crab, you have to use your core to control your roll. The goal is to not roll so far back that your head touches the ground and to roll back up to a stop without letting your feet touch the ground. Other core-strengthening movements include plank-type exercises, side balances, and exercises on one foot. It’s no wonder Pilates is known for its core-building abilities!

With Functional Strength Training

On the functional strength side of things, I love to teach clients how to use free weights, sandbags, kettlebells, and TRX because it requires you to use your body weight in conjunction with the equipment. For example, you could sit on a leg press machine, where your body is fully supported. Alternatively, you could do a goblet squat with a kettlebell where your body needs to support itself through the movement, using more muscles (like your core). You could progress this exercise and add instability by using a staggered stance, or adding an overhead press to make it more of a full-body exercise. 

Exercises that use momentum and/or multiplanar movements are also excellent for working your core. Kettlebell swings, sandbag cleans, or sandbag max-lunges are all examples that could knock you off balance, which requires your core to engage to keep you from falling. 

Exercises like these get you using so many more muscles throughout your core and body while also testing your balance. Learning controlled movements like these takes practice, but I love them. Heavy lifting is a great addition to your Pilates practice, as well. 

Balancing Your Imbalances

It’s very common to have imbalances in the body. We all have a dominant side and may have jobs or hobbies that use one side or part of the body more than the other. Sometimes we love a sport so much that we create even bigger imbalances through repetition. For instance, a runner may be very quad-dominant and not super strong in their glutes and hamstrings.  The more they run the more the more imbalance there can be, if nothing is done about it. 

Imbalances between each side of the body or from the front to back can eventually lead to injury. To avoid getting hurt, it’s important to include exercise that strengthens us in a balanced way. This is where Pilates and functional strength training will help. I know that it’s fun to play golf, run, garden, or whatever your “thing” is, but to keep doing them you need to stay strong and mobile. Who knows, you may surprise yourself and discover a love for the foundational work as much as the main event, as I do now. 

Improve Your Balance For Longevity

Better balance for a longer life? Maybe! Falls can be terrible for anyone, but especially those in their more senior years. It doesn’t take much to break a hip, and maintaining good balance and strength can help prevent accidents like a fall. Even if you’re not in your golden years yet, good balance will help you keep doing the things you love for a lot longer. It makes me sad when I hear someone has given up their hobby due to physical limitations or injury, because I know that with the right balance in training, a balanced body composition (strength, flexibility, and mobility), and a strong core to keep you physically balanced, you don’t have to! By adding strength training and Pilates to what you already do (two to four times a week), you’ll be moving well far into the future.