Breathe baby, breathe!
March 6, 2008
Originally uploaded by troymccarty
Breathing in class is an important factor in your movement vocabulary. Often in our daily regime our breath becomes shallow, we often breathe into the upper part of our chest. One way to see if you do this is to watch yourself take a breath in the mirror. If you see your chest and shoulders rise and fall, you are most likely taking a shallow breath.
In Pilates we want to utilize our entire lung capacity. We want to take the breath down to our lower abdominals, feeling that we are filling our pelvic bowl with air. We also want to let our ribs expand sideways to accommodate more air. When your WCS coaches verbally cue you to breathe laterally this is what we mean. We also will ask a client to let their breath carry them through the movements, and give a cue of filling up your back with air. This cue is particularly effective in the exercises that recruit the front body muscles.
Try sitting in a chair in a neutral spine on top of those sitz bones. Take a towel and wrap it around your waist holding the two ends criss crossed, inhale through your nose and feel the towel ends pull away from each other. Exhale and feel the ends of towel come together. This is lateral breathing. This is one of those things that you can practice outside the studio. In fact, you can even teach your children this breath. It’s calming and centering even when you aren’t practicing Pilates.
Troy McCarty is the owner and director of pilates at White Cloud Studios. White Cloud Studios is Cleveland’s oldest pilates studio. The studios have been in operation for 17 years. Troy also runs the teacher training program.
