• Questions, Insights & Dialogue

    Posted March 28, 2012 By in Mentoring Forum With | 12 Comments

    So, here we are. This is the beginning of our first on-going conversation stream where all of you can add your thoughts and comments. Please remember to be specific about whether or not you want or are asking for feedback and if so what are you looking/asking for. This will help with the flow of the conversation and to make sure it stays on-topic and useful.

    Please also feel free to share your triumphs, big and small, as well as your questions big and small.

    To get us started, I am going to put up some days and times that you all have suggested or a group workout session:

    Tuesday or Friday 1-3 (Centa)
    Monday or Wednesday most times (Centa)
    Tuesdays after 4 (Francis)
    Mondays anytime (Francis)
    Mondays anytime (Juliana)
    Tuesdays anytime (Juliana)
    Saturdays (Juliana)

    Please respond and let us know when you can get together for group study/practice. My suggestion would be to also take advantage of the Open Studio times in the studio to gather and practice.

    I will be making a separate post with the Communications Handout and some follow-up thoughts from the meeting.

    – c

  • Student Recognitions & Upper Body Strength Month

    Posted By in Blog, Special Topics, Student Forum, Student/Teacher Forum, Studio Forum With | 1 Comment

    We had a fantastic day of celebrating on March 24th and we wanted to share with you a slice of the day. Watch the video below to see the student recognitions we made.

    For the next 3 weeks we are going to continue to recognize students and teachers for their contributions and achievements. Use the form below to submit your recognition today! We will post it here on the blog for everyone to appreciate too!

    3. (required)
    4. (valid email required)
     

    cforms contact form by delicious:days

     

    Upper Body Strength Month

    Join us to continue the celebration as we focus on building upper body health and strength from now till April 21st. Watch this short video from Kristen to learn how you can participate and work on strength when you are not in the studio.

  • Movement Meditation Class 3 & 4

    Posted March 19, 2012 By in Blog, Student Forum, Studio Forum With | No Comments

    Class #3:

    Reflecting on Last Week
    1. How was your week focusing on labeling sensations? Were you able to spend time distinguishing between pleasant, unpleasant and neutral sensations in your body? When were you most aware of the sensations in your body? Were you more aware of pleasant versus unpleasant or neutral?
    2. Did you notice stories or judgements that were associated with your noticing the quality of your sensations?
    3. If so, were they strong?
    4. Were you able to notice them and come back to the sensation simply as it was?
    5. Where were your greatest successes or challenges in this regard?

    This Week’s Focus: Breath
    The breath is a classic point of focus in meditation. It is also an integral part of Pilates as a movement practice. We are coordinating, controlling, synchronizing and connecting with the breath throughout our practice in order to improve the physiological act of respiration, and to enhance the relaxation quality in the body and balance the nervous system (NS).

    It is our goal in movement meditation to not only connect with our breath, but let it become a tool for insight, the motivation for movement rather than just something we do absent-mindedly.

    Reflection Questions
    1. What is your relationship with your breath?
    2. Is it calming and easy or challenging and distracting?
    3. What do you notice about your breath when you are moving, exercising or exerting effort? Is it a hinderance or a help?
    4. What other observations do you have about your breath: quality, pace, historic relationship (trauma, joy), how much are you aware of it daily?

    Your Homework
    In you movement practices during the coming week to 10 days make your breathing the primary focus of your attention. See if you can allow the breath to motivate and dictate when, where and how you move. Can you allow your breath to guide you rather than you guiding it. When you loose your focus on the breath simply bring it back as you would do in seated meditation.
    Practice using the breath in different ways or to insight different qualities. For instance, what happens if you focus on the exhale only or the inhale only? What does it feel like to breath into the areas of the body you are moving? Can you use the breath as a grounding force, something to keep you coming back into your body over and over again?

    Enjoy!

    Class #4

    Reflecting on Last Week
    1. Think back over the course of the past 1 (or 2 since we had a break) and write down anything notable about how you were in relationship with your body. Was there any experience or situation that brought you more or less into your body? Were there moments of heightened awareness or observation? When or why do you think that may be true?
    2. What has your relationship to your breath been like? Have you been more aware of it, its effect on your physical or emotional state?
    3. How have you used the breath to insight awareness or evoke desired quality such as ease or relaxation?

    This Week’s Focus: Connecting Mind & Body
    This week we were exploring how the thoughts we hold in our mind are almost always reflected back in our bodies. When we hold an angry or tense thought, our bodies feel tense and hard. When we hold a joyful or happy thought, our bodies feel easy, light or grounded. If that’s true then think about how when we are agitated or lost in stressful thoughts our bodies pay the price. Our movements are affected in a variety of ways from subtle to severe.
    We may disconnect from them in order to not feel the associated discomfort or tension, which can put us in danger of injury from lack of attention and awareness. We may be stiff and resistant, which in turn makes every movement or exercise that much more effortful, which in turn perpetuates a sense of dis-ease or discomfort. In this case we can get caught in a never-ending cycle.
    But if we are aware of how our thoughts influence our bodies we can gradually become more responsive to what our mental, emotional and physical needs are and bring all three elements into greater harmony.

    Reflection Questions
    1. Are you aware of how your thoughts and how or what you hold in your attention affects your physical state? Can you think of any specific incidents?
    2. Are you more aware of how unpleasant thoughts or points of focus affect you or pleasant ones? What’s the difference in your body specifically?
    3. How does this relationship change how you use your body?

    Homework
    Part one: Continue to notice, and even jot down, when you notice your thoughts are influencing your body or vise versa. Notice when or if there are moments when your thoughts may be neutral but your body distinctly not neutral or the other way around. What is this like and in relationship to what kinds of thoughts or sensations?

    Part two: Working with Metta or Loving Kindness Meditation practice using the words as a way of positively influencing your thoughts and therefore your body. Because, in the beginning, Metta is directed inward it is a powerful tool for generating self-compassion, tenderness, openness and love toward ones self and the body. I recommend sitting for 5-10 minutes repeating the phrases below then begin a simple movement practice, one where you can go slow and allow the words to infuse how you are moving.

    Metta Meditation
    May I be filled with loving kindness.  May I be well. May I be free from all internal and external dangers. May I be happy and truly free.

    Progression
    After working with the “I” statement, you can choose someone else to direct loving kindness toward. Then you move on to someone who is neutral like the kid a the movie theater. Eventually the meditation can be directed toward someone you have negative feelings for.

    For more resources on Metta Meditation:
    Instructions
    Guided Metta – Sharon Salzberg
    Meditation on Loving Kindness – Jack Kornfield

    Meditation

  • Hypermobility: How it effects our Pilates work

    Posted By in Anatomy Forum With | No Comments

    What is it and how do we work with it in Pilates?

    This is really such a great topic to jump into because the word hypermobility is one of the ambiguous terms we end up hearing a lot in our work, and one that bares exploring so that we are able to better to deliver safe and effective movement learning to our students.

    First let’s review the concepts of compression and tension as described by anatomist Paul Grilley. Both concepts refer to limitations in range of motion.

    Compression relates to range of motion in a joint being restricted by the skeleton. Essentially it is when, in a joint, the movement is inhibited because the bones of the joint are such that the bones are actually hitting each other or being blocked by one another.
    This can be due to the formation of the bones or the shallowness or shape of a joint socket.

    Tension on the other hand relates to range of motion being limited by the tissue, by tension, tightness or other restriction in the soft tissue. Most often we can assume that muscles, fascia, tendon or ligaments are contributing to this limitation. In most cases, tension is something we can effect enough change upon to increase or improve range of motion. That is not the case with compression. We, as movement teachers, cannot effect change on the bones themselves.

    Hypermobility as described by leading resources, including the Mayo Clinic, is a benign syndrome that effects people in various joints, but not necessarily in all joints. Benign Hypermobility Syndrome essentially denotes a genetic occurrence that effects the quality or amount of collegen that is produced in certain connective tissue that would make the tissue looser than normal. This loose tissue then creates a joint that is also loose and potentially weak.

    And this is where movement and strengthening practices such as Pilates comes in. In order to stabilize a joint and help prevent injury or pain over the long run (pain and injury from hypermobility often doesn’t show up until later in life) we must build strength in the muscles surrounding the joint and encourage a modified range of motion in most cases.

    This becomes increasingly important when joints are loaded or weight bearing such as when lifting heavy objects or bearing greater weight. In these scenarios joints need extra muscular support because the joints themselves cannot offer the support and will be more prone to injury should the joint be forced too far or loaded excessively. (Think plank on the mat or almost any Reformer exercises…or even any strenuous standing pose in yoga).

    What are the effects?

    My experience with hypermobile bodies is that their joints that exhibit excess range of motion will feel achy and the surrounding muscle and joint structures often cause them pain. This is because other areas near the hypermobile joint are compensating for a lack of stability. Without shoring up range in the hypermobile joint, building strength and awareness, chronic pain and patterns can continue to cause overall alignment concerns and possibly greater pain and discomfort over the long run.

    The caveat is that this doesn’t happen to everyone with hypermobile joints. It depends on the joint and the person’s habits and patterns. Common dis-ease will come with hypermobility in the knees and shoulders as these joints are imperative to our gait and standing/sitting posture.

    Some extreme hypermobility can be an indicator of other, more complex disorders such as Ehlers-Danlos syndrome or Marfan syndrome. *For more on these: Ehlers & Marfan.*

    What can we do?

    As Pilates and yoga teachers what we can do is be aware of when a student/body is not using proper muscle tone to move or stabilize a joint and encourage modifications that build strength in standing and loaded positions. Using resistance bands and Pilates equipment is particularly beneficial for this because it gives the student feedback and something to push or pull against that will help them identify healthier ranges of motion.

    There is often the urge to open and stretch in areas that are hypermobile because it opens up chronic or conditioned tissue surrounding a hypermobile joint. What I would suggest is stretching gently or using a body therapy tool of some kind to address surrounding areas, but to limit/modify stretching in the already hypermobile areas.

    References and Resources:

    Mayo Clinic
    Medicinenet
    HMSA – Syndrome Association

    Additional Articles

    Live Strong: Joint Syndrome and Yoga & Pilates
    Living with Syndrome
    Basi (Body Arts & Sciences Institute) Dealing with

  • Celebration Time – 6 Year Anniversary March 24th

    Posted March 14, 2012 By in Blog, Events With | No Comments

    Celebration 150x150 Celebration Time 6 Year Anniversary March 24th

    Celebration Saturday, March 24th

    Join us from 9 am – 4 pm for a fantastic celebration of Pilates, the studio and you!

    And find out the punchline to this joke:

    How many Pilates teachers does it take to screw in a light bulb?
    Don’t you wish you knew…

    Well, you can find out. Come and visit us on the 24th for any of our $5 classes or our traditional Champagne Open House from 2- 4 pm!

    In celebration of our community:

    Community Day Classes 9 am – 2 pm
    $5 each
    See Schedule - Look for Community Day Classes and Register now!

    In celebration of our students:

    Champagne Open House 2 – 4 pm
    Student Acknowledgements and Recognitions!
    We will be giving out special awards to our students. If you’d like to nominate a fellow student for recognition, please submit your choice below:

    3. (required)
    4. (valid email required)
     

    cforms contact form by delicious:days

     

    All submission will be recognized because we are just that awesome and so are you!

    In celebration of Pilates:

    March 24th will kick-off our month of Upper Body Magic!
    All month our classes and sessions (where it’s appropriate) will be geared toward building healthy strength and mobility in the arms, neck and shoulders.

    We will kick off the 4 weeks of Upper Body Magic with a push-up/plank check-in self-assesment at the anniversary. Anyone who wants to track their progress can do a simple status check any time during the day with one of the teachers. We will keep your forms and help you track your progress throughout the month.
    Then at the end of the 4 weeks you will do another check-in with any of your teachers to see how you’ve progressed. This is just about you, no one else. See what kind of progress you can make in 4 weeks.

    Impress yourself!

    And even more celebrating…

    March 24th is also going to be the kick-off of our new student rewards program. We now have an easy and awesome way of rewarding you for your referrals! We can’t wait to tell you all about it.

    Wait for it…

     

    Celebration

  • Anatomy Forum March 2012

    Posted March 13, 2012 By in Anatomy Forum With | No Comments

    Greetings all!

    This is where we can continue our beautiful and brilliant anatomical conversations! I know you may not be ready to jump back in quite yet, but I wanted to make sure there was something here to greet you.

    First let me say that you all were totally awesome this weekend. I was just telling my husband that I think this was the best anatomy course I’ve taught in 4 years! And that has hugely to do with you, your attentiveness, willingness and engaging participation. So, thank you for making this a success! I look forward to continuing to explore the world of movement with you.

    In the next week I will be posting some of your questions from the course and will answer anything that didn’t get explored or addressed. One of the first topics we’ll look at is what is hypermobility. I will post some thoughts and provide links for further study.

    If you have any other questions that have come up or come up as you continue to digest the material, please submit them here. I will be happy to answer them for everyone to see.

    **Also, please explore the previous post from our last anatomy class. I think you’ll find some interesting stuff there as well.

    Hope you are enjoying this rainy weather.

    Chantill

  • Discipline as Delight?

    Posted March 1, 2012 By in Mentoring Forum With | 12 Comments
    How do you approach discipline? With delight or disdain?

    When you look at yourself in the mirror you can appreciate what you see, without worrying about whether what you see is what should be. You can pick up on the possibilities of basic goodness and cheer yourself up, if you just relax with yourself. You can have that much trust in yourself, and that will allow you to practice discipline much more thoroughly than if you constantly worry and try to check back to see how you are doing. — Chogyam Trungpa

    Hi dear teachers!

    Let me first say how exciting it has been to see many of you in the studio practicing, taking classes, observing and  beginning to integrate into the wonderful universe of Pilates Collective. I am sincerely grateful for all of your contributions and participation thus far. And I wanted to introduce a homework assignment/follow-up from our last meeting to help you reconnect with your goals and intentions.

    First I want to talk a little about discipline and what that means. I think we have all likely formed a relationship to discipline; we have discovered something about ourselves from past experience and no doubt formed a judgment about how disciplined (we might also use the word dedicated)  we are or aren’t. My personal story about discipline is that I am not very good at it. I am too moody and fickle and don’t like to be “confined” by or  ”limited” by routine or repetition. (Obviously, such a crock!) Much of my relationship to being dedicated stems from the time-tested disciplinary arm of guilt I used to be handed as a kid. “NO quitting.” Period! No matter what I started I could not quit. Quitting meant shame, admitting laziness; it was an indication of not having that stick-to-it-ness that meant I was a winner, an achiever. Never quit. Never quit. And I never did. Instead I built a relationship with discipline and dedication that fosters resentment, rebelling, disdain even little shards of anger now and then. I don’t want to be told what to do…even when I am my own disciplinarian.

    So, my sense of dedication has been limitation and restriction. And yet, I have begun to sense that there is more to being disciplined than just avoiding the guilt of failing or quitting. Over the time I’ve been a teacher my relationship to discipline has changed a great deal. Because teaching, teaching movement, is so infinite — there is so much to learn — I have used my innate sense of curiosity to fuel my dedication. Instead of feeling chained to a process or practice I see it as an opportunity to be inquisitive, to honor the best in myself and cultivate not only knowledge but wisdom.

    Being a teacher and a parent has taught me this, time has taught me this: if I want to be the best of who I am, to know myself better, I need to be tempered, challenged, walk through the cool fire of discipline and allow my innate goodness to lead the way. Dedication and practice don’t have to be about what we “have” to do, but what we “can” do, what we have the great honor and pleasure of doing in order to better ourselves and those who come into relationship with us. This is particularly true in teaching.

    As you travel the teacher’s path you are called on to be a good example, to be a joyful expression of practice (because if you approach your practice from the qualities I described above, forget about your students following you down that rabbit hole — it’s no good). Gandhi said “We must be the change we wish to see in the world.” Well, in our little microcosm of teaching Pilates it is the same. We must be the change we wish to see in our students. Without cultivating a sense of discipline to our own learning and practice how will we be effective in transmuting that to our students? Ultimately, we won’t.

    So, I encourage you now and throughout your journey to take time to shift your attention to one of curiosity and joy for the discipline it takes to become….well, anything. Truly. With every tiny intention and every big action we are crafting ourselves. I hope you will allow your own basic goodness and delight to shine through and create the discipline that reflects your best self.

    Homework: Please respond in the comments section to the following questions:

    1. What 5 or 6 words describe your relationship to discipline (either positive or negative)?
    2. Can you see how your relationship to discipline affects your Pilates practice or making time for the study of Pilates?
    3. What one thing could you do to make your practice more disciplined in a way that is delightful and exciting (in other words sustainable)?

    Discipline

  • Movement Meditation Class 1 & 2

    Posted February 28, 2012 By in Blog, Student Forum With | 1 Comment

    Movement Meditation

    Welcome, students!

    Thank you to everyone who has been attending the Sunday Movement Meditation class! It’s been such a pleasure to explore this new format with you. I will post each week reiterating in-class questions/assignments, focus points and other insights or useful material to support your at-home practice. I encourage you to share your insights here on the blog. Your feedback will both facilitate changes in class format and focus and help to support each other along the way.

    Please feel to pose your own questions here as well.

    Course Objectives:
    To use movement as a vehicle for enhancing everyday awareness of ourselves in relationship to our environment, other people, situations and circumstances. To use mindfulness techniques to deepen our body awareness and better understand not only what our body needs, but how it facilitates our understanding and relationship to the rest of our lives. Our overall goal is to bring body and mind in line so we can find greater balance no matter what life sets on our door step. Movement meditation becomes a path of strengthening our ability to know our bodies and minds better.

    Tools: 
    Breath awareness practices, seated meditation, walking meditation, Feldenkrais, Pilates, yoga, roll and release techniques, mantra or word/sound repetition.

    Class #1:

    Reflection Questions
    1.What kind of relationship have you had with your body over the years? How aware of it have you been? What has provokes a deeper awareness or less awareness of your body? Have there been times when you have purposefully ignored or set your body aside?
    2.What is your experience of mindfulness in your body?
    3. What encourages attentiveness of the body? What interferes?
    4. How strong is you identification to your body?
    5. How might you extend more kindness to your body?

    Focus
    Understanding and exploring gross body awareness & sensations versus subtle body awareness & sensations.

    Gross body – Refers to the overall quality of the physical body. It is your sense of your muscles, joints, limbs, breath. It is your awareness of tension, softness, pain, fatigue, aching, the environment around you, where you are touching the floor, how the air feels etc. Primarily gross body refers to your physical form.

    Subtle body – Refers to what lies beneath the physical body, often reflecting your emotional or psychological state or energy. Sometimes the subtle body is also referred to as the energy body because it is more felt than seen. If you are quiet and notice the tingling or slight vibration of your body you are getting more in touch with your subtle body. You can think of the subtle body almost like electricity. How bright or dim is your subtle body? How aware of it are you? Are you aware of it all over of just in certain places?

    Your Homework
    Throughout the week, many times per day if possible, stop and check in to see how you can be aware of either the gross body or subtle body. When are you most aware of each of these bodies? Can your awareness of each of these inform how you move, your mood, how you make decision both in terms of moving your body and how you decide to speak and act. Beginning to cultivate a strong attunement to the overall qualities that reside in the body and using this awareness to foster greater balance and responsiveness.

    Class #2

    Reflection Questions
    1. How was your week working with gross and subtle body awareness?
    2. What did you notice in terms of these two points of view?
    3. What other insights or experiences did you have working with body awareness this week?

    Focus
    In seated meditation as well as movement how aware are you of judging the experience? We tend to judge everything about our interaction with the world whether with other people, ourselves or our environment. Even if we are not conscious of it we assign a judgment to that experience somewhere on the scale from pleasant to unpleasant.

    Your goal for the class is to begin to notice when a body sensation arises what quality you attach to it. Is it neutral, pleasant or unpleasant? What comes up more often? When unpleasant sensations arise notice if there is a story that follows. Do you hear your mother’s voice, your partner’s voice, the latest statistics about exercise? Does your mind spiral into planning or fear or resentment or pride?

    Your goal is to begin to simply notice the sensations/qualities that arise as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral without needing them to be different. This allows us to cultivate a sense of contentment with things just as they are. We begin to see that although something is unpleasant we don’t necessarily need to rush to change it. Instead we can just notice it and meet it with gentle curiosity. And when something is pleasant we don’t always need to grasp at it or begin to formulate a plan for holding on to it or recreating it for another “good” experience.

    Can you notice if there is a difference between the quality in your body and the quality in your mind? Do they agree or are they often different?

    Homework
    Throughout the week notice how often you are judging your experience with regard to your body and wanting it to be different or letting it take you down the rabbit hole of planning and future experiences.

    Notice if you can also be aware of your mind in this way. Is your mind neutral, pleasant or unpleasant. Does the experience in your body and mind line up? When, why and how?

    *I encourage you to either post your insights here or to be keeping an informal journal so that as these insights come you can capture them for future study and reflection.*
    Movement Meditation

    Movement Meditation

  • Body Brain Connect Teleclass February 15th

    Posted January 30, 2012 By in Uncategorized With | No Comments

    Body Brain Education Teleclass!

    Join us for a Skillful Teaching Seva Teleclass and get a preview of our upcoming Body Brain Foundations Series coming to the studio on Feb. 25th and 26th. This is a donation-only fee teleclass presented by Chantill Lopez and Ann Bishop.

    February 15th
    10am, PST

    Improving observation and imitation while learning movement: a neuroscience perspective

    Tele-class outline:

    • What are mirror neurons? How can they help you improve learning or teaching movement?
    • If you believe a movement is impossible can you “see” it?
    • Is it better to teach a beginner in the first or third person perspective?
    • Incorporating theory, research and practice

    Sign up now and get a taste of the cutting edge material defining our teaching profession!

    signupimage Body Brain Connect Teleclass February 15th

    Learn more about Ann Bishop and Body Brain Connect: BodyBrainConnect.com

     

  • And so it begins…

    Posted January 23, 2012 By in Mentoring Forum With | 13 Comments

    Julianna beat me too it …

    (For your homework assignment, please respond to this post. Juliana was quicker on the draw than me — because I am a dork — and her post can be found as a comment from the previous post “July Mentoring In-service”. Please make sure to read it below.)

    So, once again, thanks to all of you for your presence and willingness on Friday. I too, left feeling energized and excited. I always feel incredibly blessed to be here and now doing what I do and surrounded by all of you. You light the way for my journey just as I hope to be a light on yours. I hope that you will not forget what an integral part you are to the process and learning of every other teacher you come into contact with.

    We all have something unique and amazing to offer no matter where we are along the way. If we allow ourselves to both see and be seen we open up to all the wonderful gifts we each offer.

    I look forward to reading your thoughts and learning how I and we, as a group, can help make this journey rewarding and fulfilling for you.

    Be well and stay in touch. I will be posting occasionally as we go along and ask that you make at least an effort to comment to each post. Don’t worry it won’t be too often and it’s a nice way of us staying connected between workshops.

    c

     

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