Why Pilates is Amazing - Part 3: Breath and Concentration

A couple of weeks ago we began our journey to find out what Pilates is exactly and why is it so amazing for our bodies. If you missed Part 1: Intro, you can find the article here.

As a quick recap: Pilates has a set of principles that we can apply to our Pilates practice, but also to our daily life:

• Awareness (proprioception)

• Balanced Muscle Development

• Breath

• Concentration

• Control

• Centring

• Flowing Motion

• Precision

Firstly we explored Awareness and Balanced Muscle Development, please head here to read the article.  Those two principles are super meaty and quite important to our practice. Today lets dive into Breath and Concentration.




BREATH


Breath literally keeps us alive. It's the first act of life, and the last. Every system in our bodies rely on our breath (oxygen exchange). Improving the way we breathe brings many physiological benefits:



• oxygenates the blood


• releases toxins (carbon dioxide)


• improves circulation


• calms the mind and lowers stress levels


• helps with concentration, bringing greater mental clarity


• provides a rhythm and focus for our movement practice


• assists in activating the muscles we want to use

In Pilates, we use lateral (side) breathing, also called intercostal breathing and 360 degree breathing. When laterally breathing an effort is made to emphasize the expansion of the front, sides, and back of the rib cage when we inhale. This promotes a consistent inward pull of the abdominal wall. On the exhale, our abdominal muscles assist our bodies which in turn helps to stabilize the trunk.



In our Pilates practice it’s key to know when to exhale and inhale during certain exercises so our abdominal muscles can assist us most beneficially. Normally we inhale on expansion or length of the spine and when we stretch the spring. We exhale when we flex or twist the spine and when we close the spring. In exercises not specifically moving the spine, we normally exhale on effort.



Joseph Pilates wrote "breathing is the first act of life, and the last. Our very life depends on it. Lazy breathing converts the lungs, figuratively speaking, into a cemetery for the deposition of diseased, dying, and dead germs." Joe took how we breathe very seriously! There are many studies out there all revealing the importance is good breathing techniques.

To breathe laterally on the inhale try to expand the rib cage 360 degrees around. On the exhale the rib cage gently hugs in closer together and your waistband muscles hug around the spine. Limit lifting up the shoulders on the inhale and see if you can open and expand the rib cage instead.



Above I have provide a quick walk through on the Pilates style of breathing, it's a quick 3min video clip of me teaching this technique to my zoom Mat Life participants. Try it out!




CONCENTRATION


“Always keep your mind wholly concentrated on the purpose of the exercise as you perform them. This is vitally important in order for you to gain the results sought" - Joseph Pilates



Concentrating on a particular muscle or muscle group can result in a more accurate and intense activation of it. For Pilates to be effective we need to focus on recruitment of specific muscles, as well as, maintain correct body alignment, which in turn helps avoid unnecessary strain.



The cool thing is we can use our breath practice to help us concentrate on our bodies. Adding the focus of the rhythm of breath during each movement will help keep the necessary concentration on the purpose and function of the exercises we are performing.




Amazing! We explored 2 more Pilates principles, that's 4 out of the 8, we are half way through our Pilates Principles journey together! Next time we will explore Control and Centring and how they apply to our Pilates practice.