Pilates is a systemised form of exercise that focuses on core strengthening, which includes our abdominal and our back muscles. Pilates can seem very intimidating for someone who hasn’t done it before, but it’s really a sequential safe way in which one focuses their concentration on each movement and pattern that is precise. It also includes a steady and controlled form of breathing. So, pilates can be done on an apparatus that works with spring, tension and resistance, called a reformer, or it can be done on a mat with the help of your own body weight.
Pilates is now widely practised as an injury rehabilitation method on a global scale to restore imbalances in injured muscles. By evaluating a person’s state, strength, targets and range of movement, a pilates personal training approach can be designed to facilitate injury rehabilitation of your muscles. It is a great tool to assist or even enhance a physiotherapy programme when someone is recovering from an injury. By strengthening the deepest muscles of the core, optimising alignment, and creating correct movement patterns, we can also help to prevent the reaggravation of those injuries and the development of new ones. So, it is safe to say that it is a viable and effective method of movement re-education and an answer to physical limitation.
Pilates for chronic fatigue
Chronic fatigue can cause pain or aches in the muscles and joints. Exercising with chronic fatigue might seem impossible at times but it can be achieved. Pilates can be helpful as it is a low impact exercise designed to strengthen key muscle groups without causing full-body fatigue. Pilates is a great form of workout because it’s a combination of cardio and strength training. Trainers can also customise your exercise routine to a level that your body can tolerate without too much of exertion.
For a mind & body connect
Studies have shown that pilates improves the quality of life by having a positive effect on depression and pain, most notably decreasing back pain. Pilates helps one become attuned to their body and teaches them how to really control movement through proper breathing, correct pelvic and spinal alignment. This is how it automatically helps in the reduction of pain because while performing these exercises breathing plays a very important role. Proper breathing not only allows you to execute each and every movement efficiently, but it also helps in the reduction and management of stress at the same time. When your oxygen levels are good, you feel better and breathing also simultaneously helps in the recovery of muscles.
Improves balance
Many injuries are caused by muscular imbalances within our bodies. Most of us move incorrectly in some way or the other, which puts too much pressure on some muscles and weakens the others, causing an imbalance. Pilates helps to coordinate the muscles of your arms and legs with your core, which as a result helps to improve body balance. If one starts building their core muscles through a tailored and customised programme, it can do wonders for one’s body. Continuing from the benefit of body awareness, the inward focus and use of breath from pilates can down-regulate the nervous system. This, in turn, can take you out of fight-or-flight mode, lower cortisol, and decrease stress over time. Pilates not only improves body balance by strengthening the core but because of its focus on alignment and whole-body exercises, helps in the release of hormones such as endorphins, which makes one feel more energised. Endorphins are a “feel-good” compound that triggers the mind into a positive place. Pilates is not only limited to a setting, it can be done anywhere, right from the comfort of your home to doing it in an aerobic zone (as long as we have the right trainer guiding us throughout), which is very effective in increasing the levels of oxygen in our bloodstream and as a result, it helps us feel more energised. Pilates is a challenging low impact exercise method that balances strength with mobility, aligns the body, fine-tunes movement patterns, and strengthens the deeper muscles of the core.
Pilates is used by physiotherapists all over the world, to increase postural awareness and to alter faulty patterns of movement by addressing muscle imbalances. It gives you greater control in your spinal stability, pelvic stability and mobility, enabling anyone to improve their posture, inner strength and balance leading to an overall healthy movement, minimising stress to the joints during everyday activities.
(The author is a fitness &
wellness expert.)