Pilates Principles: Let’s Get Our Flow On!

No matter how long we have been practising Pilates and Pilates based movement, it is always worth returning to a good prop/toy free Flow-style class once in a while. The concept of ‘Flow’ is one of Joseph Pilates’ original six main principles from his seminal work Return To Life .

And honestly, The Big Wide World just seems a little more cranked up crazy than usual doesn’t it? Forget that bloke over The Pond (if only!), Liz and I are tiptoeing on egg shells/feeding/soothing around the double whammy of our respective ‘offsprings’ doing GCSE and A Level exams. So, as Spring finally brings more light to be outside and feel there is hope and time to sigh in the sunshine, it’s a perfect time to Get Our Flow On in class.

I love a bit of Get Your Flow On planning too. It’s an opportunity to just return to all the brilliant familiar exercises and find some quiet moments. A time to focus in on our movement and tap into our mind-body connection, especially coming back after a holiday break when we have perhaps been out of routine on lots of levels.

Being in a ‘flow state’ is often banded around in lots of arenas (Andy Murray a big fan!), but in Pilates, “flow” refers to the smooth transition from one movement to the next, exercise to exercise, emphasising controlled and co-ordinated movements. It’s a principle that enhances body awareness, stability, and efficient movement patterns helping concentration and aided, if we can, by a good focus on our breath. Our Vita Pilates flow routines follow a carefully structured progression of exercises from a focused mind-body start to progressively more challenging work, and always looping back to where we started so we can feel the ‘anything different?’ feels, as we say. As utterly inveterate teachers, Liz and I have a real need to ensure clients feel and acknowledge their wonderful bodies, with curiosity and not judgement, and how our hour of movement has strengthened both body and mind.