You live in this!
Question: Strong or Weak?
Used? Unused?
Let's work it!
Jynene
3.25.2011
3.17.2011
Class Offerings...
Attire: comfy, soft, easy to move in – but not too loose and bare feet. Loose short-shorts not recommended. :o)
Please practice on an empty stomach, (a small protein snack is fine) and stay adequately hydrated.
Classic Pilates classes will be on the floor on a mat, but we can change it up for fun and variety by adding stability balls, small equipment, etc.
It is recommended that you practice Pilates twice per week for maximum benefit. You will be retraining muscles which have a memory, so consistency is key!
Have Mats? I’ll Travel! I will come to you if you have a group of friends/co-workers who are committed to working through a specific number of classes, including the Privates to begin. We’ll need a large open space, clean and comfy, distraction free and each participant will need a Pilates mat. Group rates will depend on numbers and mileage. I'm willing to travel approximately 30 miles from Salida, CO.
Instructor: Jynene Hartman, Certified in Mat, Reformer 1, 2, 3, Tower, Cadillac, Arc & Barrel. {After this weekend I'll be able to include Mat II -through Advanced - Balanced Body Univeristy, and Anatomy! Yay!**}
**I did it!** I'm getting there...
Approx. 475 hours practicing Pilates as a client, hundreds of observation/training hours and approx. 200 teaching hours. I will be continuing through certifications and education.
What is a Private?
The practice of true Pilates begins with systematic instruction in the key principles and movements of the method. These important steps are requisite to being able to perform true Pilates properly and with maximum benefit. Pilates Movements used in a gym setting or copied from a DVD are just that…Pilates Movements. This can be a waste of your time at best, and a dangerous source of injury at worst.
In Private sessions, after we’ve covered our agreement to work together, your health history as well as your personal needs and goals, …you’ll receive individualized, careful instruction as we work through a checklist of fundamentals, including the essential patterns of movement, breath work and basic exercises. When this checklist is completed {approximately 4 sessions} you’ll be prepared to safely join into the flow of a Beginning Mat Class. This series of sessions takes commitment and patience… & are the best beginning to your new practice of purposeful self-care; one you’ll carry through the rest of your life.
Joseph Pilates said of Contrology (now Pilates), ‘A few well-designed movements, properly performed in a balanced sequence, are worth hours of doing sloppy calisthenics or forced contortion.’
Work smarter! Not harder…
If you already have experience with Pilates, we’ll just need one session as we’ll be able to work very quickly through our checklists.
Some are such fans of Pilates Private Sessions that they prefer those to joining a class; some prefer frequent refresher sessions.
You’ll be investing in health and happiness.
'This is the equivalent of an "internal shower". As the spring freshness born of the heavy rains and vast masses of melting snows on mountains in the hinterlands cause rivers to swell and rush turbulently onward to the sea, so too will your blood flow with renewed vigor as the direct result of your faithfully performing the Contrology exercises.' -Pilates
In Private sessions, after we’ve covered our agreement to work together, your health history as well as your personal needs and goals, …you’ll receive individualized, careful instruction as we work through a checklist of fundamentals, including the essential patterns of movement, breath work and basic exercises. When this checklist is completed {approximately 4 sessions} you’ll be prepared to safely join into the flow of a Beginning Mat Class. This series of sessions takes commitment and patience… & are the best beginning to your new practice of purposeful self-care; one you’ll carry through the rest of your life.
Joseph Pilates said of Contrology (now Pilates), ‘A few well-designed movements, properly performed in a balanced sequence, are worth hours of doing sloppy calisthenics or forced contortion.’
Work smarter! Not harder…
If you already have experience with Pilates, we’ll just need one session as we’ll be able to work very quickly through our checklists.
Some are such fans of Pilates Private Sessions that they prefer those to joining a class; some prefer frequent refresher sessions.
You’ll be investing in health and happiness.
'This is the equivalent of an "internal shower". As the spring freshness born of the heavy rains and vast masses of melting snows on mountains in the hinterlands cause rivers to swell and rush turbulently onward to the sea, so too will your blood flow with renewed vigor as the direct result of your faithfully performing the Contrology exercises.' -Pilates
...sweet...
Spring has sprung... beautiful weather here, but windy. kites anyone?
going for 3 more days of certification. so exciting...
brainstorming a lot of ideas.
grateful, jynene
3.01.2011
...don't you just love a new beginning?
this morning...
spring in the fresh, crisp air
blossoms forming
somewhere
working on details here
opening this NEW tiny
little
Pilates workshop...
blooming.
excitement
in the air too...
2.24.2011
YHWY {breath}
And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. Genesis 2:7
In whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind. Job 12:10
For in him we live, and move, and have our being... Acts 17:28
“The letters of the name of God in Hebrew… are infrequently pronounced Yahweh. But in truth they are inutterable….
This word {YHWY} is the sound of breathing.
The holiest name in the world, the Name of Creator, is the sound of your own breathing. That these letters are unpronounceable is no accident. Just as it is no accident that they are also the root letters of the Hebrew verb ‘to be’… God’s name is name of Being itself.”
~Rabbi Lawrence Kushner
Hydration is KEY!
Molded Rivers...
The philosopher Novalis said,“Our bodies are molded rivers.”
The philosopher Novalis said,“Our bodies are molded rivers.”
How is your river?
Dehydrated can be described as depleted, parched, wilted, empty, exhausted, and is defined as: to have the moisture taken out of.
Our bodies are not meant to hold water, they are meant to be in a constant state of ‘flush’. Two-thirds of a healthy adult’s body weight is water, and throughout a normal day much of this internal moisture is used up by respiration, perspiration and excretion. Each day we need to replace 2.4 liters of water, under normal circumstances.
Approximately 10% of the body’s water flows through the blood stream and that blood is about 83% water. The lungs are about 90% water, the brain 70%. Lean muscle contains about 75% water by weight. Body fat contains 10% water. Bones, 22%! Each cell in our body is full of water; or would like to be…
Signs of dehydration include fatigue, weakness, joint pain, headache, poor digestion, feeling hungry, poor concentration and impaired short term memory, dry skin (dehydrated skin looks older), low back pain and inability to sweat which cools the body. Dehydration places great strain on even a healthy body. As you lose moisture, your heart must work much harder to pump thicker blood through your veins.
You can do this quick test to check your own body for dehydration: pinch the skin on the back of your hand while it is resting on a flat surface. When you release it, the skin should snap back into place. If it is slow in doing this, you are most likely dehydrated.
You may have heard that by the time you’re feeling thirsty, you’re already dehydrated. “Thirst kicks in when a person is approximately 1 percent dehydrated,”says Anne Grandjean, Ed.D., FACN. “At two percent hydration, thirst becomes more intense, and dry mouth occurs at three percent.” Three percent hydration is about 3 pounds for a 150-pound woman.
Add to this equation heat, high altitude (lower air pressure can cause evaporation of moisture from skin and lungs), vigorous exercise, our very arid climate; even mild illness such as altitude sickness, and the risks of dehydration multiply.
How much water is enough? There is much debate on this! We’ve all heard the 8 by 8 rule; ‘drink 8 eight ounce glasses daily’. According to the Institute of Medicine, most people require a total of roughly 11 to 15 cups of water daily. Another rule of thumb is to drink half of our body weight in ounces of water. If you weigh, for instance, 160 pounds, you need 80 ounces of water per day. To some, this sounds miserably impossible and they have visions of floating away or spending all day and night in the restroom.
The good news is that if we include water-rich fare in our daily food intake, we will help fill up our ‘well’ not only with water, but nutrient- and electrolyte-rich fluids. Fruits and veggies are 80-90% water by weight. Soups and stews are a great source of liquid. So in addition to the the benefits of just eating healthy, these foods provide about 20% of the fluid we need.
The bad news is that if you enjoy caffeinated or alcoholic drinks, you’ll need to add one more cup of water for each of those to maintain hydration.
Proper hydration leads to innumerable health benefits for your immune system, mood, and energy levels. Your blood pressure, heart rate and body temperature will be more easily managed. Water transports oxygen and nutrients to your cells, removes waste, protects your joints and organs by keeping them juicy, and may prevent and alleviate headaches. A glass of water will soothe hunger pangs between meals or when you’re craving that midnight snack.
If your diet is a healthy one it will provide the vitamins, mineral and electrolytes needed to help your body hold onto fluids. Excessive exercise and heat may require supplementation of these, and you can find numerous recipes for making your own healthy (and cheap!) sports drinks online -just by googling ‘make your own sports drinks.’
For a great explanation of electrolytes, http://health.howstuffworks.com/question565.htm is fun for kids – of all ages!
Enjoy the wonderful benefits of water! Challenge yourself to make hydration a habit and you just may find it to be the simple solution to many ailments.
Please join in and share your favorite tips for maintaining a healthy state of hydration in the comment section below...
How To Breathe
How to Breathe? Wait! Now we need to be taught how to breathe, too?
We’re breathing constantly. Oxygen is the most basic requirement for human life. Have you ever stopped to think about how significant the act of breathing is? Have you thought about how you breathe? Do you breathe short and shallow, high in the chest? Or do you use belly breath? It’s worth giving some attention to how your breath might be affecting you and your well-being.
Becoming aware of how you breathe and making even a few changes could have a great impact on your life. Learning to be conscious of and using your breath properly can greatly enhance your exercise efforts; retraining the muscles of your diaphragm, neck and shoulders, the intercostals of the chest and back and strengthening the lungs. Some of the greatest use of breath can help control anxiety and manage pain; for example – the Lamaze method of breathing as used during childbirth.
Proper breathing brings health to your body. “The simplest and most powerful technique for protecting your health is absolutely free – and literally right under your nose,” says Harvard Graduate Andrew Weil, MD.
There are a few health practices that actually teach a specific breathing pattern as part of the discipline. Yoga is a well-known practice; another is Pilates.
Joseph Pilates referred to breathing as the “shower of life.” Joe, born in 1880 in Germany, was sick with rickets, asthma, and rheumatic fever as a child and as a very young man challenged himself to devise a plan to reshape his sickly body into a healthy one. He accomplished this with great success. If only he could see the effects of his work on the world today!
The very first principle of the Pilates discipline is breath awareness and control. In fact, Joe said-
“Even if you follow no other instructions, learn to breathe correctly.”
Many readers will be commenting ‘under their breath’ that they exercise regularly and breathe plenty hard, thank you very much! You might be surprised though, to find that you may be able to make your time and use of energy much more effective! Engaging in exercise and sports doesn’t necessarily lead to optimal breathing. They can cause or aggravate existing breathing restrictions such as panting, holding of breath, gasping, asthma, etc.
Proper use of inhalation and exhalation sends a physiological message to your body to get ready for exertion. This, used in proper coordination with muscular engagement retrains the body, produces and balances your energy; flooding the body with just enough oxygen to perform the needed task.
It’s worth mentioning here that many of the ‘home exercise videos’ can be dangerous as they take us through a very rigorous routine, very quickly –and time is not taken to instruct in proper breathing, movement or muscular engagement; leading to painful discouragement and even injury.
Healthy breath awareness and training can lead to many wonderful and beneficial side effects, including relieving tense muscles, fatigue, light-headedness, edema, wrinkling of skin, easing strain on the heart by increasing oxygen and circulation, lowering cortisol levels in the body, stimulating the nervous, digestive and immune systems… mental stamina and clarity, deeper relaxation, improved sleep, the ability to recover quickly from trauma (such as an injury or surgery), stress and exertion, …just to name a few!
“He who breathes most air lives most life.” -Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Questions? Comments? Want to know more? Join the conversation here…
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