One of the most important things we work on in a pilate’s class is posture. That’s because when it comes to longevity and living pain-free, alignment is everything. And that is what we are all about, we want to provide a great quality of life for people of all ages.
So most of us are working at a desk, right? And what that creates is this posture, which I call the “gargoyle posture.” You’ve got the mouse and the keyboard and multiple screens to look at, and you stay hunched over it for hours at a time. And then when you’re done, you walk away with your phone in your hand and your head bent over it while you text. All of this creates poor alignment in your body, your body is scooped into sort of a C shape, head down, arms forward, back bent. Worst of all, poor alignment causes pain and accelerated aging.
So with Pilates, we’re working on alignment, and we’re working on posture. Because, when you have a more upright posture, you will be more effective at the other things that you do in life. You won’t be in pain, movement becomes effortless.
At Club Pilates, we say, “Do Pilates, Do Life.” So how do we do Pilates in life? I can remember the first time I caught myself doing Pilates in life while I was grocery shopping. I was moving and I was rolling a shopping cart and suddenly I thought, “Oh my gosh. I caught myself using my abdominals without thinking about it and really that’s the goal!” My posture even while walking down that grocery aisle pushing the cart was in perfect alignment and it felt great! Ideal alignment is when the body effortlessly maintains and upright position against gravity. When this happens, all of the joints align at their centers. This means there’s less compression at the joints and your body has to compensate less for the lack of center of gravity caused by poor posture and misalignment.
So when we focus on posture in Pilates, and we get your body in better alignment, you will have better stability, better balance and a lot less pain. And at the end of the day, that’s what it’s about. That’s how you prevent injury and that’s how you get stronger. It’s for you to be able to workout safely. And that helps you get fit, with less pain, providing you with better quality of life in the long run.
