[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to Pilates Students' Manual, a podcast helping you get the most out of your Pilates classes. I'm Olivia, and I'll be your host. Join the conversation and share your thoughts on Instagram at @pilatesstudentsmanual. You can support the podcast by visiting buymeacoffee. com/OliviaPodcasts.
[00:00:29] Let's learn something new.
[00:00:47] Hello. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the podcast. Today we are talking about the secret ingredient that just might be missing from your Pilates practice, which is patience. [00:01:00] I am talking all about patience as it relates to the Pilates experience and that with all things, the best is yet to come. That the longer you do Pilates, the more benefits you can tap into and explore, but it does take a little bit of time. It doesn't happen after necessarily just one class and this "because it doesn't happen in just one class-" this is a tough selling point for Pilates because we live in a time right now where everything is pretty instant. We get instant gratification. We get notified every time someone likes something. We have, you know, we're attached to our phones, we're getting texts, we're getting emails, we're getting all of this stuff and it's, everything is happening very now, now, now. And in a time of, you know, fast workouts, you know, workout in two minutes, workout in five minutes, you know, do this every day for seven minutes and you know, like everything is very fast paced and [00:02:00] patience is difficult to sell to people who are used to getting things immediately.
[00:02:05] But patience is an important part of the Pilates practice. And that's what I want to talk about today. The stories I'm sharing are not, you know, research based. This was not studied in a lab, but it is what I've noticed from working with lots of different clients over various lengths of time. Um, and it's what I hear from them as they do Pilates, as they continue to do Pilates for even longer periods of time. And also what I know in my own body from having my own Pilates practice.
[00:02:40] So the way I see it is that there are short term midterm and long term rewards that you get when you do Pilates, um, and being patient and consistent in your Pilates practice is what is going to let you access the things that happen after, you know, several months of doing [00:03:00] Pilates or even several years of doing Pilates.
[00:03:03] So first things first, let's define our terms. I'm calling short term is maybe from your very first Pilates class up to maybe doing Pilates for three months. Midterm would be a few months of doing Pilates through maybe one year of doing Pilates and then long term is going to be doing Pilates over multiple years, like a very long connection to Pilates because there are benefits.
[00:03:31] We've talked about them on the podcast. There are benefits that you get from doing just one Pilates class. You know, if you think of your first class, it's very likely that maybe you laid down on the reformer and it was weird and wonderful and you loved it and you just knew right away. You were sold. So that feeling can definitely happen after just taking one class.
[00:03:52] So it could be that the short term goals, or you get that endorphin rush of feeling good when you exercise, [00:04:00] you know, a lot of people exercise and they feel beaten down and they feel horrible after they exercise and because Pilates is kind of structured differently, they might feel better when they're done doing Pilates than when they started. And that feels good. That's a nice positive feedback loop.
[00:04:18] You might feel invigorated. You might feel a greater sense of ease in your body, maybe more mobility, maybe some pleasant soreness from using muscles that you haven't used. You might have some mental clarity or improved focus. You might feel more grounded, like feel more in tune with your body.
[00:04:38] You might feel less stressed. You might fall asleep or sleep better. Doing exercise for any amount of time also helps keep the fluids moving our body, which can reduce inflammation. And that happens every time you exercise from that first class to your thousandth class doing Pilates once or just a few times [00:05:00] still counts as doing Pilates like I'm definitely making the sell for the long game here, but you do get benefits from exercising just one time.
[00:05:10] When you keep doing Pilates regularly and exercising over months of time, you'll start to notice even more things. Like this is a fun pyramid because you get all of the benefits that you had from doing just one class that I listed, but You also get to feel more familiar with the exercises you're doing.
[00:05:32] It's not the first time you've done it. You've done it many times. You spend less time maybe looking around the class to see if you're doing it right, because you have a greater sense of knowing what you're doing. Because you feel less lost in the class, you can focus on and refine more things as it relates to the exercises.
[00:05:54] As you've repeated these exercises multiple times, you will start to get stronger. You [00:06:00] might see yourself progressing in exercises. You might be able to do things that you weren't able to do before. Um, I had a client who, when she started doing reformer Pilates, she had her feet on the platform underneath the foot bar. So she was bridging with the feet lower because she would get really bad hamstring cramps when she was bridging. But she did Pilates for, she's coming up on, I think a year now, very close to a year. Now she can bridge with her feet on the foot bar. She's gotten so much stronger. She's just able to do something that when she started, she couldn't.
[00:06:33] So you may also find yourself doing more difficult versions of exercises. You might be changing the spring resistance on some of those reformer exercises, which is further challenging your strength, maybe challenging your coordination, your flexibility, because you will also become more flexible over time as you increase your range of motion as you do the exercises.
[00:06:57] And having this [00:07:00] exercise habit where you are doing maybe two, three sessions a week. The American College of Sports Medicine also says if you do those strength training sessions, two to three times a week, plus 150 minutes of moderate intensity, cardio exercise, or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity, cardiovascular exercise that your overall, likelihood of dying for any cause, like with any cause, is drastically reduced. It is the number one thing you can do to preserve the length of your life is to exercise and Pilates can definitely be a piece of that.
[00:07:38] In the longterm, and we're talking real longterm, you can expect the aging process to be kinder on you when you have a consistent practice.
[00:07:50] Staying active allows you to continue to be active and stay independent as you get older and by doing Pilates [00:08:00] consistently, you'll see that the activities of daily living will remain doable. Things like getting in and out of chairs, climbing stairs, getting up and down off of the floor, walking to your gate for your flight at an airport terminal that is somehow always the furthest away gate possible. You can do that while carrying your baggage. Like it, it doesn't phase you. Your body is strong and capable and you can do those things.
[00:08:30] Now, if you're a younger person who isn't really concerned about going up and down stairs right now because your body is fairly cooperative all the time, there are other long term benefits to doing Pilates, including being able to do amazing, cool, super strong person stuff that maybe isn't even on your radar of like being possible at the moment.
[00:08:54] Because when you do Pilates. Especially over a long period of time, you [00:09:00] can get so strong, so flexible that goals that seem fantasy, like you see people who do calisthenics or gymnast that like their bodies can do incredible things. Like your body can also do incredible things. Like that fantasy can become an actual real possibility. Something like doing the splits. Like you can work on that in Pilates, like front splits, back splits are exercises on the reformer. Like that's built in. Handstands, like Joseph Pilates version of handstands on the ladder barrel, which is like a kind of niche piece of equipment, but it is my favorite way to practice handstands because the barrel is just at a height that allows you to do that.
[00:09:43] You want to work on hands free back lunges? Sure. Walkovers on the Cadillac? Yeah, you can do that. High bridge, teaser, every kind of teaser. You can do that. You can work on that. You've got lots of time to do it. Patience and [00:10:00] consistency are really what sets benefits of Pilates apart, in my opinion. Because those impossible things become possible because you're tapping into your incredible potential and really seeing the effects of, cause some of Joe's exercises are absolutely crazy difficult, you know, and when you continue to work on them, they become possible. The human body is amazing and it always adapts to what we ask of it. So when you ask it to do more, it's able to do more.
[00:10:32] Coming up after the break, I'm going to talk about even more long term goals and setting realistic expectations for yourself in your Pilates practice. That's coming up next.
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[00:11:50] There is something that comes up a lot in the fitness space. It comes up as a reason why people start doing Pilates and [00:12:00] also, you know, maybe just a goal they have for themselves in life, and that is to lose weight. And that has a lot of baggage attached to it as well. But losing weight in itself is not morally good or morally bad.
[00:12:16] If that's a goal that you have, Pilates can be a piece of the puzzle in your weight loss journey. The great thing that you can do in Pilates, in addition to it being a very low impact, low barrier to entry form of exercise, where especially the equipment can adapt to support your body. In exercises when you're unable to do things, and then as you become more able to do them, the equipment kind of flips the switch and it goes from helping you and making the exercise a little bit more achievable to becoming more difficult and more difficult to achieve if the spring start working against you in the exercise.
[00:12:56] So that is also why, you know, starting with [00:13:00] Pilates can be really great because of that adaptability, but working with spring resistance, working with your own body weight in, you know, the various different relations to gravity that you do and Matt Pilates as well, all of that stuff, asking your body to do more than what it's used to doing helps you to build muscle.
[00:13:20] And muscle is a tissue in our body that is calorically expensive for your body to maintain. You have to use energy, which is, you know, burning calories is using energy. It's the energy that moves our body. And so as a muscle contracts, we have to use calories. We have to use energy to do that as a muscle, you know, releases. You're also using energy to do that. Something like fat tissue. It doesn't require any energy to maintain, but muscle does require energy to maintain.
[00:13:55] Having more muscle in your body increases your basal metabolism. So [00:14:00] that's your like resting metabolism. Just you going to work, doing your things. You're not exercising per se. It's just getting in and out of your car, walking around your office, you know, making dinner and then like digesting food, breathing. All of that stuff that takes energy. That isn't specific set aside for exercise time, like that is where you burn 90%. Don't quote me on saying 90%, but a vast majority of your calories in a day are burnt just by being alive and moving around and doing the things you do when you're alive.
[00:14:34] Your exercise related calorie burn is just a fraction of the calories that you actually burn. So creating a body that has more expensive calorie needs, you burn more calories because you have more muscle can help you achieve a calorie deficit. One Pilates workout is going to burn some degree of calories, although I'm going to be honest, it's not much higher [00:15:00] than your, I mean, it of course depends on the type of Pilates, but definitely the amount of calories you burn in Pilates is not the most significant point- like part of burning calories in your day and one workout won't make a big difference in terms of building that muscle, but long term consistent work with Pilates can have an impact on that number on your scale.
[00:15:27] Another thing I wanted to share here is setting a realistic expectation, because when we do Pilates, maybe you saw it on Instagram, it looked fancy. It looked fun. Celebrities are doing it. Maybe you want to check it out. Maybe you've gotten great recommendations from physical therapists or other fitness teachers to do Pilates. But Pilates is great. I spend the whole time on this podcast talking about how great it is, but it doesn't have this really fast, immediate change. You don't do Pilates for a [00:16:00] couple of weeks and, you know, lose a ton of weight or, you know, suddenly get, you know, massively developed muscles. Like it doesn't happen in such a short span of time.
[00:16:11] And a story I have that kind of highlights this is one time I was teaching in a studio and a soon to be bride came in and a lot of people do Pilates and kind of preparation or like leading up to their wedding, not just from a weight loss perspective, but also from a feel good perspective. And you know, have that time where you're not thinking about wedding planning. You just get to do this thing for yourself in this really fun form of exercise called Pilates.
[00:16:38] But this bride came in and said, I'm getting married in two weeks. What can Pilates do for me? And now that you've heard me talk about short term midterm and long term, you know, potential rewards of doing Pilates, you can see that like in two weeks, like a, not a lot is going to happen, but you can get started building a foundational understanding of Pilates. You can [00:17:00] take advantage of the endorphin rush and less stress, reduced inflammation, easier time sleeping, like all of that stuff. You can definitely get all that in a few sessions in two weeks, but you aren't going to lose, you know, 30 pounds doing Pilates for two weeks. You know, you're not like, that's not realistic.
[00:17:23] Part of setting SMART goals, if you ascribe to the SMART method, it's about creating goals that you can achieve by making them specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time sensitive. And so if you set goals that meet those criteria, it's easier to know that you've achieved them because you've outlined it.
[00:17:46] You can set SMART goals doing Pilates, but in two weeks you just have to be realistic about what is going to happen in two weeks. Like, I'm so glad you want to start Pilates. Don't know how much that's going to change, you know, the wedding [00:18:00] situation.
[00:18:00] I think as humans, we overestimate what we can do in a day, but we underestimate what we can do in a year. A year is a long time, but it's also a really short time. And I think the longer I'm alive, the more time feels like it's accelerating, and like doing something for a year it doesn't actually seem so long. Pilates can be such a valuable component to your overall wellness picture, but to have that big impact, it just takes more time to get there. You've got to be patient. This whole thing is about what great things await you with patience. So you've got to be patient and you've got to trust the process. Stay consistent. These are all the good things.
[00:18:47] Huge thank you to all my supporters on Buy Me a Coffee, including newest members, Mo and @sprinklernation. Thanks for being part of the project. I look forward to connecting with you in a [00:19:00] coffee chat. Have a great couple of weeks and I'll talk to you again soon.
[00:19:14] Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of Pilates Students' Manual, a podcast helping you get the most out of your Pilates classes. Be sure to check out the podcast Instagram at @pilatesstudentsmanual and subscribe wherever you're listening. Interested in teaching Pilates too? Check out Pilates Teachers' Manual, available everywhere you listen to podcasts. I hope to see you next episode. Until next [00:20:00] time.