Teach Concepts – Not Exercises

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images I just watched the amazing documentary about Eve Gentry: The Power of Pilates.  Eve Gentry is considered a Pilates elder as she is a first generation Pilates instructor who trained with Joseph and Clara Pilates.  Her story is quite amazing and inspiring and if you get the chance- watch the documentary.  There were so many take-aways for me from her story but probably most profound was hearing her say, “Pilates is a concept”.  We teach concepts and not exercises.  If you are just teaching exercises than you are merely a conveyor belt.”

I couldn’t agree more and find that as I help train future Pilates instructors that this is one of the most important concepts I pass on.  Teaching Pilates isn’t just about images-1memorizing all the exercises, or doing all the exercises.  Teaching Pilates is about teaching the Pilates concepts of efficient movement to our clients bodies so that they can actually have a Pilates practice.  As a teacher it is just as important that you know why you are doing an exercise or movement as it is that you know the choreography of the exercise.

To teach the Pilates concepts you have to know how to adapt them to your own body and your client’s bodies.  You need to be able to put yourself in a client’s body and help them find what they need to do to get to the next step.  Sometimes this means not doing traditional Pilates exercises at all.  Sometimes this means changing or adapting an exercise so they can learn the Pilates concept you are trying to teach them. Often times this means practicing the fundamental movements that make up the exercise before actually progressing to the traditional exercise.

[tweetthis remove_hidden_hashtags=”true”]When you are teaching #Pilates and your client is struggling…[/tweetthis]

As instructors our jobs go well beyond just knowing the exercises and a few modifications.  Learning to teach Pilates concepts to each different body is a skill that takes lots of practice and experience seeing different bodies move.  This is one of the many reasons that a quality, comprehensive Pilates training program requires not just workshop hours but also hands on practice and observation designed to help instructors fine tune this skill of teaching concepts.

Contact us today to learn more about Pilates instructor training programs at Rivercity Pilates and mentoring opportunities.

Pilates Instructors: Get rid of your cheat sheets

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IMG_2445When it comes to teaching Pilates I am pretty firm with my instructors about not using cheat sheets during classes or sessions. Often times I think that new instructors just think I being mean or that I’m just trying to make things difficult for them.   On the contrary I really want instructors to learn how to teach the method as it was meant to be taught, from a place of knowing the work and teaching the body in front of them. I want them to fine tune their teaching abilities every time they teach.  The only way to continue to grow as a teacher is to teach and practice your teaching skills is to force yourself to do it( and not rely on that cheat sheet!).

I can tell you that if you are looking at a sheet of paper to decide what you are going to have your clients do you are not teaching the bodies in front of you- you are teaching choreography. And quite honestly, your clients can go anywhere and get choreography….. Jazzercise, step class , pump class,……

Pilates is a method of exercise that teaches concepts in clients bodies and then uses these concepts to create balance, strength, and flexibility. Is there an order or a sequence?- of course! The Pilates Mat and Reformer work have a beautiful sequence that lay a wonderful foundation for teaching all of the Pilates concepts to any body. If you are at the point you are teaching Pilates you should know this order in your body inside and out. I often tell my trainees that the Pilates sequences should act as your framework to teach from.  The order of the work gives you a standard guideline of where you are going with a client.

When it comes to class time or session time your job as an instructor is to already have a general plan in your head of what you’re going to do. If it’s a Mat class you’ll do a Mat sequence based on the bodies you are teaching, if it’s a private session with a new client maybe you’ll use a combination of Reformer, Cadillac and Mat work to introduce Pilates concepts, etc.

IMG_6765Once class or the session starts though, your job is to give clients instructions that are clear on what you want them to do and then teach them how to do it better, how to get more out of each movement, how to balance their body, or whatever their body needs on any given day.  If you pay attention to the body or bodies in front of you- you will know what the appropriate next exercise is. You’ll use the Pilates order as your framework and work through the appropriate exercises for those bodies.

Personally one of the things I love about teaching is the challenge of finding ways to individualize the Pilates work in different bodies.   I often have moments when I’m teaching when I’m asking myself…hmmmm… what are we going to do next ….but  if I pay attention to the body or bodies in front of me and observe, the answer always comes.   And let me tell you it is not always the next exercise in the sequence or the full version of the next exercise in the sequence.

Every time I have these challenge moments of what to do next or what would be good for this body I learn something as an instructor. I fine tune my teaching skills, my ability to read bodies, make decisions, and give the client or clients the best movement experience. If you fall back to your cheat sheet every time you’ll never learn how to do this, you won’t grow as a teacher.

So, as scary as it might be I urge you to trust yourself.  Trust that you know the work in your own body and trust that you know how to teach different bodies.   Tear up those cheat sheets and teach and see what happens.

 

 

Cheap and Quick are Two Things that Should not be Associated with a Pilates Training Program!!

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Shelley and Nancy at a recent Mat Instructor Training Class at Rivercity Pilates.

Shelley and Nancy at a recent Mat Instructor Training Class at Rivercity Pilates.

Anything worth doing is worth doing well!  Often times when people are looking at our training programs I hear things like,  “Wow that is really expensive!” or “That takes a long time.” Here’s the deal.  Our training programs are teaching you to teach a highly effective, complex movement practice called the Pilates Method to any body.  The first step in being able to teach the method is actually doing it in your body and having a Pilates practice of your own.  You will also need to learn to communicate with different types of clients, modify movements to different bodies and be able to effectively progress clients at the appropriate level.

The process of fine tuning your own Pilates practice and learning how to teach it to others is not a short one. It involves you spending time with an qualified instructor so that you can learn and keep learning and involves you practicing what you learn in a variety of environments.  Just like getting your haircut with the best hairstylist in town is much more expensive than going to Cost Cutters, learning from an experienced knowledgable instructor is more expensive, but of course worth every cent!

Taryn is ready for another Instructor Training session1

Taryn is ready for another Instructor Training session!

Like most things in life, you get what you pay for when it comes to Pilates instructor training programs!  So if you are serious about teaching Pilates, take some time to do your research and find a program that is credible and meets your specific goals in taking the program.  At Rivercity Pilates we encourage potential Pilates instructors in training to start the discovery process by simply taking a complimentary private session and maybe a few classes at the studio to start the process.  We also have you come in and chat with us one on one so you can get all your questions answered.  For more information contact us today!

Teaching Pilates can be as centering and meditative as doing it!

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I have to admit I love my job.  There are so many job perks to being a Pilates instructor that I often forget how nice it is a to live in my Pilates clothes, be active all day long and spend my work hours teaching something I’m passionate about.

IMG_6734A job perk I don’t always think about is how present and centered I have to be as an instructor to do my job well.  I often forget how good this is for my brain and soul until I have a day when it’s a challenge for me to keep my mind focused on the task at hand.  Teaching Pilates isn’t something you can mindlessly do.  It’s hard to think about what you are going to make for dinner and walk a client through a sequence of exercises helping them find their best form.

Most days I have no problem staying and going into  “instructor” teaching mode, but a few weeks back I had an evening where a friend had shared some exciting news with me during the day and I found myself having to really work to be focused.  While I was teaching I was continually having to bring myself back to teaching and the body in front of me.

mindful2It reminded me a lot of when I meditate and use a word to focus on and the continual process of coming back to that word when my mind drifted to other places.  That’s when I had that “ah ha” moment  of realizing that the process of teaching Pilates probably has a lot of the same effects on my body and brain as a meditation practice.   Pretty cool and just another reason to love my profession!!

Marketing for Pilates instructors is just like learning Pilates…

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As a Pilates instructor I spend a lot of time instructing clients who are brand new to the Pilates method of exercise.  I find myself reminding and reassuring them a lot that’s it’s ok to be a beginner and that learning anything new is a process that just takes time (I wrote a whole other blog about that here).  You can’t expect to learn everything the first day and really the only way to keep improving is to practice.

If you are an instructor or maybe even a Pilates or Yoga  studio owner I would say the same thing to you about marketing.  Learning to market yourself and your business is a process that just takes time and practice. You can’t learn it all in one day and there is always more to learn, so the best thing you can do is stay positive and keep working at it.

If you are anything like me, when I first started teaching, even when I first opened my business I was not thinking about marketing.  I had found something I loved that I could do as a profession and I was excited to teach.  I thought if I just did what I loved really well the word would spread and soon my business would grow.  I didn’t want to have to “sell” something because that just wasn’t me and I wasn’t good at selling things to people.

Well, in many ways my business did grow (but slowly).     It wasn’t long before I figured out that if I was going to make a profession out of teaching Pilates, I needed to figure out how to run a business and how to keep new clients coming to me.  I still didn’t like to use the word “marketing” as it just sounded to salesy for me.  Luckily. there is a ton a free content online and great business books out there and I dove in learning whatever I could.

I signed up for an online business training course for Pilates instructors (Profit with Pilates) that really sparked my love for figuring out how to run a successful business and make $$ doing what I loved.  I also started to love the challenge of marketing (and I could finally say the word without feeling like it was a bad thing!)  Through that course I connected with an amazing group of fellow instructors who were on the same quest I was.  To this day I still share ideas and business and marketing questions with this group of Pilates friends.  It’s been fun to watch their businesses grow over the years and continue to learn from them.

After having such great results in my business by putting a little effort into learning about marketing  I decided to dive in a little deeper into the business and marketing world by signing up for BSchool, an 8 week online business school.  (This was about 4 years after I had originally started my business).  I was starting to figure out that I needed to continue learning and growing my marketing skills if I wanted to run a successful business.  I was also starting to figure out that the more I learned and implemented, the better I got at marketing, and the better my business did.  Bschool was nothing short of amazing and since I have lifetime access to it I still go back and use the content on a regular basis to work on my business.

Fast forward to today, about 7 years after originally opening my business and my love of marketing and growing a business is as strong as ever.  My business has grown enough for me to realize I can’t effectively do all the marketing myself if I want to spend my hours doing what I really love to do- teach Pilates!

sm2I’ve learned through my training and learning process what a crazy powerful tool social media can be in marketing and I have been trying to use it, but honestly I knew my efforts were not that effective.  Sure, I would post when I thought about it or maybe before or after I was teaching, but I was really inconsistent.  I tried teaching some of my front desk staff to post or help but they didn’t always know what to post or the proper timing of it.  I knew there was a better way to do it, but quite honestly I was having a hard time figuring out how to learn it and how to find the time to do it!

Farm Girl Marketing SolutionsThat’s where Farm Girl Marketing Solutions comes in to save the day.  Becky (aka Farm Girl Marketing Solutions) had been a Pilates client of mine for well over a year and we often talked social media and marketing because she was a social media super star (clearly she loved it and knew her way around it better than anyone I knew).  I was a business geek who was trying to learn everything I could about how best to promote my business.  Somewhere along the way I asked her if she had any interest in helping me with social media at the studio and it turned into one of the best things I’ve ever done for my business and me!

One of the many thing I love about working with Becky is that I’m continually learning and growing my skills along the way.  She consistently takes care of doing the marketing things I don’t have time for but also teaches me along the way how to keep growing my marketing skills and be more efficient at it.  Just like my clients who continue to practice and improve their Pilates practice, I am able to continue improving my marketing skills every step of the way!

If you are an instructor or studio owner trying to figure out this marketing thing, don’t be discouraged!  There are a ton of great resources out there to help you out along the way.  My best advice is to dive in and start learning and practicing!

 

 

 

Momtrepreneur

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The British definition of Momtrepreneur! "MUMpeneur"

The British definition of Momtrepreneur! “Mumpreneur”

I love this new word that has been thrown out a lot in social media:  Momtrepreneur.  It sounds fun, hip and cool!  As a Momtrepreneur with 3 kids, a growing Pilates studio and a pretty busy Pilates teaching schedule I can tell you it doesn’t always feel “cool”or “hip” or even”fun”.

Quite honestly there are many days that I question why I didn’t just stay home with my kids or work a few hours part time instead of going all out and trying to build a growing, successful business.  I’m pretty sure my super supportive husband who would never say it out loud has this thought that too!

It never fails when I start to have some moments where I’m doubting what the heck I’m doing- something happens to remind me how much I truly love to teach Pilates and really enjoy the challenge and journey of growing a business and life around that.

IMG_6734For me those moments are almost always teaching moments.  It doesn’t matter if I’m over tired from lack of sleep, stressed out about getting the kids where they need to be, feeling guilty about not getting to every single event of my kids or not having a real conversation with my husband all week, or anything else.  Something somewhat magical happens when I start teaching.

I find it practically impossible to think about what’s going on in my own life and as soon as I start connecting with clients, paying attention to their bodies and movements, and teaching I feel like I’m in the zone.  And by the zone, I mean that space in your life that you truly enjoy being in and you really are just doing what you love…   And it really makes it all worthwhile!

So if you’re thinking of becoming Momtrepreneur, my best advice is to find something your passionate about and go for it!  It’s not always the easiest path but I think you’ll find it is truly a rewarding one and the happiness factor of loving what you’re doing is worth it!