Principles of Pilates: Breathing

Last week I introduced the six principles of Pilates and shared a bit of the history of how they came to be. Next we’ll learn about each of them, starting with breathing. 

Pilates Breathing

I don’t know about you, but there have been times during a workout that I notice I’m holding my breath. I did this often while doing push-ups, and learning Pilates has helped me to be more aware of my breathing. 

In Pilates, we breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth. The goal is to breathe laterally. That is, to feel your ribs expanding in all directions. You can feel this by practicing on your mat. Lay on your back and place your hands on your ribs. As you inhale through your nose, try to fill up your lungs and expand your ribs. Your hands will feel your ribs expand to the sides and front, while they also push down into the mat. As you exhale, you will feel your ribs hug in around your lungs. 

The Connection Between Your Breath and Core

When you breathe in, your diaphragm drops down and your trunk, inner core, and pelvic floor muscles will automatically engage to support your torso. When you use this way of breathing during Pilates, there becomes no need to try and engage your abs. With proper breath, they are automatically engaged. 

To really feel this connection, sit or stand tall. Focus on squeezing or engaging your abs and then try to breathe deeply at the same time. It’s really difficult! Then try a different way: sit or stand tall, breathe in through your nose, and fill your lungs. Your ribcage expands, but you may also notice what’s happening with your core. It’s engaging to support you!

This isn’t an intuitive thing for most people, and some may not notice it all at first. This is where some of the other principles of Pilates come in, but those will come later. 

Breathing During Pilates

In Joseph Pilates’ book, The Return to Life Through Contrology, he has photos of each exercise along with the steps on how to do it – including how to breathe. While most exercises require you to use regular Pilates breathing, some have a very specific breath pattern. Here are some examples:

• The Hundred. You breathe slowly as you rise up into your curl, and then you pump your arms five times as you exhale and five times as you inhale. You do this ten times with ten breaths. 
• Rolling Like a Ball. You inhale while rolling back and exhale while coming back up. The exhale really helps you get back up into the balanced position. 
• Chest Expansion. The inhale happens while drawing the rolldown bar towards your hips. You hold your breath for a few seconds and then exhale as you control the bar away from your body.

There are many other exercises with breath patterns, and you’ll quickly find how much your breath influences and helps your movement. It can be fun to play with your breathing sometimes, too. For example, in a twisting exercise, try an inhale to prepare and an exhale while you twist. Then try it the other way. One way will definitely feel more natural. 

Finding Your Breath

Pilates breathing will become second nature the more you practice. You may even notice it spilling over into your other workouts. For me, it showed up in my running. When I’d notice I was rushing my breath, was out of breath, or over-exerting, I learned to slow my breath by breathing slowly in through my nose and out through my mouth. 

As a teacher, I try not to cue the breath too much because it can make things more complicated. There are times, though, when I’ll have a client who habitually breathes very shallowly. This is often due to high stress or they may have been through serious trauma.  These are times when I will spend a bit more time cueing their breathing. We may also take time at the start and end of the session to help these students become aware of their breath pattern, calm their nervous system, and get more focussed on the exercises. 

Other students may find it difficult to breathe into tighter areas of their body or aren’t breathing into certain areas at all. Within their workout, we can bring focus to those areas and use the breath to help find length, open up, and stretch out those tight spots. 

The Next Step

Clearly, breathing with awareness takes a lot of concentration. Concentration is also the next principle of Pilates that we’ll be looking at, to learn why it’s important and how to incorporate it into your own practice.