Practice What You Teach: Getting outside my Pilates comfort zone…

One of my goals in my own practice is to pick one new to me Pilates Anytime video and do it each week.  And I made a deal with myself that once I picked one and started it…I would finish it.  You see many times I find myself picking something to watch and workout with and if I don’t like it ( ie it’s not what I expected, it’s more challenging than I wanted that day, or it’s a style of teaching I don’t love) I just stop the video and do something else or maybe even call it good for the day.

I decided that there are so many reasons I shouldn’t do this like:

• Getting outside of your comfort zone is good( as a teacher it’s a good reminder that this is what a new student feels like in my class…)
•  The stuff we don’t like is often what we need most( following my own advice…)
• There is always a takeaway, a lesson, something positive in any situation ( again…following my own advice)

This week I happen to be scrolling through Facebook and saw Pilates Anytime had posted a new little clip of Portia Page doing Single Leg Stretch with a big ball promoting her latest class.  I thought….” I need to sneak a workout in and I do love a little Pilates Mat and Big Ball”.  So I opened up my Pilates Anytime app to check it out.   It was a 30 minute workout which was perfect for my schedule so I started it up on my phone.

Right away as the video started I knew it was not what I expected it to be.   We started with some standing squat like movements and Portia was talking about getting your cardio in, music and having to coordinate to the music(ahhhh…coordinating with music is not normally my thing!) I really wanted to stop the video and try something else. This was definitely not the style of class I was thinking it was going to be, but I could stand to get some cardio in and I had made myself that promise, so I stuck with it.

2 minutes later….This was not your traditional Pilates workout, and I clearly was not doing everything exactly right or getting all of the choreography(I’m a little bit of a perfectionist so this drives me a crazy!!) but I was getting a workout!  My heart rate was up and once I just let myself not worry about being perfect…it was fun!  Portia is a great instructor and as I was doing the workout I was thinking that there were definitely some things we were doing that would be fun to add into my TGIF Mat class where we often played on the big ball.  I really loved her positive attitude and just plain enthusiasm to move and have fun!  The unexpected cardio and Pilates based movements ended up being a perfect workout to start my day.  Lessons learned and noted!