Blog - The Curious Mover
Should I STAY or Should I GO?
To exercise or not to exercise? That is the question!
When will exercise help shift you out of feeling tired or when does your body need the rest? These are great questions to ask, but the answer is, it depends. It helps to develop a skill of listening and asking your body.
I can’t even count the number of times clients come in and tell me how tired they are, only to leave feeling better and revived. That’s the beauty of movement! I make sure in those sessions to give more flow to honor tired, but just the right push to achieve that shift. I always encourage communication with clients about how they are feeling during a session so I can adjust what movement direction I go in next. But when do we go and when do we skip exercise?
The Metaphor of Spring
In Pilates, we use springs as resistance rather than weights. That’s not really news to anyone, but let’s take this metaphor of spring a lot further, especially in this Spring season! Let’s apply the spring to muscles: pulling the spring open (lengthening) followed by closing it (contraction). Just like the two phases of muscle actions: the lengthening or load phase, and the contraction or shortening phase. I see more emphasis on the contraction phrase, but not enough on the lengthening, resulting in short and contracted muscles, which leads to pain and tightness.
The Mid Line- PART 2
In Part 2, we go into the importance of the inner thighs and their connection. You heard of the rotator cuff of the shoulder? It is made up of external and internal rotators to stabilize the shoulder joint. These five inner thigh muscles are considered the inward rotators of the hip, and with the six external rotators complete the “rotator cuff” of the hip, but have roles to stabilize and move the body. When I think inner thighs, it's hard not to think of the thigh master infomercial with Suzanne Somers. I am here to tell you, they are so much more muscle than to jam a contraction in and squeeze! We have the magic circle in Pilates, a somewhat similar contraption, but hopefully you also have a teacher that guides the connection of the inner thighs into the core cylinder.
That’s a Wrap - The Deep Six: The Bridge PART 1
The deep six. Sounds like a rock band, or maybe it's because I just finished Daisy Jones and The Six (highly recommended) all about a rock band. Ever wonder why Pilates foundation work is so big on wrapping six tiny muscles around the back of the pelvis? When I meet a beginner to the practice of Pilates, they can be so strong, but chances are these six little muscles have never been introduced. They are the bridge on the back of the leg: Connecting the foot down into the ground, then back up the leg, crossing that deep six bridge to the pelvic floor, the base of the core.
Do you Zoom?
Have you taken a class with me on Zoom or FaceTime? You might not know you are missing out...but it’s true! Taking classes online is not the same, because it is different. It seems as if it would not be as effective as in person with a full studio of equipment, but I am here to surprise you - the results of a 2 year exploration are in!
Exercises for your EYES
In this day and age of getting information, entertainment, learning, reading, shopping, conducting leisure and work on screens, eye strain is common. Symptoms of eye strain can be dry, burning, itching, and watering eyes, blurry vision, headache or neck strain to name a few. The neck muscles help the eye-head coordination, but it could also be the positioning of how you hold your head while looking at your computer, tablet, or phone, which also contributes to neck pain. We can literally get sucked in, looking forward by jutting the chin forward and straining the cervical spine. Although, we are not focusing on the ergonomics of screen posture here, I am going to focus on your eye fitness. I have some great exercises for you to try! There are 6 voluntary muscles that move your eye, and non voluntary muscles/other components inside your eye that control your vision. It may not improve your vision, but toning these muscles and improving blood circulation will reduce your eye strain, and further reduce deterioration. Don’t think you are getting off easy, these exercises are surprisingly hard. Shall we get our eye fitness class started?
Get on UP with a breakDOWN: Part 2
Hopefully for the last two weeks, you have been practicing your get up movement without weight. Good form and understanding of each step is very important, as well as having the basic required strength acquired before you load it up. If you have been so diligent as to practice your get up as a January goal, your next step is here. You have earned the right to load it with weight. This creates a whole different strategy of work but you want to heed some precautions mentioned below.
Get on UP with a breakDOWN: The Turkish Get Up
I have chosen one of my go to full body exercises that works everything, The Turkish Get Up. Not only does this exercise work the whole body, but it’s valuable for a functional reason. It will keep you mobile and strong to get up from and down to the floor. That action is lifesaving. Ironically and unfortunately, that movement tends to be avoided as we get older. We will lose it if we don’t use it, and it is important at any age to be able to get off of the floor. Gravity is a constant companion during our lifetime, and it doesn’t discriminate, so we can fall at any age.
A New Year Protocol
More than once in my conversations, I found people don't have this information yet. I thought it would be more helpful to start 2022 by sharing this protocol. With Omicron surging, researchers have found and are still studying some other methods that might help mitigate, cut down, or reduce your chances of getting sick. I am not a doctor, but this hygiene practice has worked well for me. Without getting into politics, identity, religion, race, or inoculation status, it’s just a suggestion for adding an additional level of protection to the one you already have in place, and you can get it at a drugstore, so why not.
Lengthen While You Sleep
In a Pilates session, I cue you a jillion times to lengthen your spine actively away from your legs, but lengthening while you sleep sounds like a whole not a lot of effort dream come true. Yes you can create length in your spine while you sleep! You might as well, you are there for a good 6-9 hours of your 24.
Your Walking Checklist
Walking is the most basic and natural movement we don’t want to lose as we get older. It’s our body's way of propelling us through the world. Keeping up a walking practice is as important as brushing your teeth. Find and make the habit to get out there. I am here to give you a checklist of alignment and mechanics to explore while walking.
Your Gut Microbiome PART 3
Researchers are finding disturbances of the microbiome create disease, including obesity, diabetes, mental health, autism spectrum disorder, and immunity.
Your Gut Microbiome PART 2
Researchers are finding disturbances of the microbiome create disease, including obesity, diabetes, mental health, autism spectrum disorder, and immunity.
Your Gut Microbiome PART 1
I have done my best to scrape and dig at the surface to bring you an introduction to this new, exciting field of science. Microbes are everywhere, and have been here since the beginning of time. Numerous and diverse, microbes are yeasts, parasites, protozoan, fungi, viruses and bacteria and they live all over your body. That image sounds frightening, but if they are part of a healthy host, they will do their job: creating a healthy metabolism, functioning immune system, inflammation regulation, and even impact our mental health. That’s a tall order! Most of these microbes live in the gut, but it’s the bacteria of all the critters that collaborate with your physiology and good health.
Side Plank, Side Bend, Star
I was surprised by how much these simple exercises worked. Why the surprise? I think of strengthening the lateral body by standing upright and lunging to the side as more functional, relating ground force to gravity. But these were on a mat sitting sideways and what do “rising clams” have to do with functionality?
Acts of Awareness
An act of awareness is a gentle reminder to relax tension and find organization in your bones from a repetitive habit. We all have these habits! Your focus in the world is outwards as you get cues and information from the environment. We study and analyze the external environment that we integrate in and react accordingly. For a brief moment in that navigation, try to take a turn inwards and do a quick scan of the body for tension and postural deviations. Meaning, where are you holding tension, and how your body is aligned. During exercise, there is focus on form. For the many other hours a week when we're not exercising, our form in our environment is just as important. It should be pulled forward from the back burner asking questions such as how am I sitting, standing, holding, relaxing, being? Any repetition can become a habit. So imagine sinking into one hip all day long. Turn that into weeks, months, years. And when there is hip pain, no one can help you out of it because although the habit runs deep, it may be undetectable in front of the searching eyes of a practitioner or doctor.
My Accountability Partner
Next week, I have an anniversary! It is the 4 year first-date-a-versary that fateful, auspicious night at the Culver Hotel, where I met my now husband. I am a loyal wife, BUT I have another anniversary I am celebrating: 6 months with my fitness watch. We’ve been inseparable ever since. And my husband seems to be ok with it!
Dermatomes and Myotomes
Dermatomes are areas of skin (derma) that a single nerve from the spinal column is associated with. Nerves come out from the spinal column and innervate our arms and legs. They connect to our muscles like brain powered extension cords. Why should you know about them? They act like a map, and can help determine the source of a spinal issue. Ever have a shooting pain somewhere in your body? A pinched nerve? Most of the time, those pains may be signals stemming from an issue within the spine, whether it is stenosis, bone spur, disk herniation, or bulge. It’s not a perfect science: sometimes the muscles that nerves run through can also be the source of a nerve pinch.
The Feet, Part 2
With the bow and arrow action of the foot and all the movements it takes to achieve that spring, shoes can inhibit the complex movement of the foot. As a child with a family history of bunions, my mom put me in orthotics, which I hated, perhaps instinctively! Genetics do play a major role in how we are put together! While some feet are more inclined towards orthotics for structural support, I think some doctors would rather make the $500 or so dollars in their pockets versus showing one how to effectively strengthen and mobilize the foot.
The Feet, Part 1
Your feet are your foundation. So look at it this way: If you had a crack in the foundation of your home, you would probably do something right quick and in a hurry to fix it. Your home is your investment. But your body is just as valuable as your home. Issues starting at the foot can be responsible for all kinds of aches and pains in the body. The most common, plantar fasciitis, is explored later. Here is the breakdown of what goes on in your foot and you walk...