pilates inspired practice.
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I hope you enjoy these ideas to help release and strengthen the shoulders. Take your time and let me know how it goes! 1. Shoulder Blade ReleaseWe'll begin with a release so you can get deeper in the following exercises as well as bring awareness to this area. We're trying to soften the fascia and muscles around the back of the shoulder - specifically the serratus anterior, rotator cuff muscles, latissimus dorsi and teres major. So, find your tennis ball (or other preferred self-massage tool) and make space at a wall!
2. Arm Half Circle at the Wall
The ribs and hips move as they want. If it feels like too much of a stretch or too intense in general, simply step further away from the wall. To make the sensation more, take a step closer to the wall but always keep at least some space between the inside shoulder and the wall. Repeat on the other side. 3. Elbow Squeeze #1
4. Elbow Squeeze #2
*When this starts to feel clear, slide the hands further back along the ribs so they rest more towards the side of the ribs than front. 5. Wall leanStand sideways to a sturdy wall. Find a distance where the inside hand can be on the wall, with the elbow bent, and you are leaning in a straight line in to the wall. The hand is a little bit below shoulder height, and the elbow points down to the floor. The feet are close together. This is your starting shape. You can always adjust the distance from the wall to make the exercise easier or more difficult.
The goal is to feel a sense of effort in the upper arm muscles and possibly also underneath the armpit on the back. Abdominals are also supporting. Ideally the shoulders feel more relaxed afterwards. Congratulations, you made it all the way through! I hope you're feeling stronger and more relaxed around the neck and shoulders.
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Happy New Year! I hope 2018 is full of many moments of joy and gratitude for all of us! I’ve recently been experimenting with my diet and noticed that I feel better when I eat less carbohydrate. At first I was pretty sad about this but now I love all my extra energy! So I’ve been playing with different substitutions and in an effort to find a replacement for noodles, I discovered cabbage! Now, I happen to love cabbage so this is a natural progression for me but even if you’re on the fence about it, I would encourage you to give this a try. You can use this preparation for any sauce base that would usually have a pasta or grain with it. Two generous servings. Ingredients:
4. Add the cabbage with a pinch of salt and pepper.
5. Cover and stir occasionally for 15-20 minutes until the cabbage is tender to your liking. 6. Add your desired sauce! If you have extra cabbage - it will save better if you keep the sauce and cabbage noodles separate. Hope you enjoy! I believe awareness is feeling. It is questioning. It is the opposite of being on automatic pilot. Awareness is what pulls me out of my spiraling monkey mind. I use Pilates exercises and other different movement methods as meditations to get free from my thoughts, worries and preoccupations of the moment. It also gives valuable attention to the body, the blessed vessel which carries me through life. I breath deeply. I stretch. I strengthen. My intention is to listen to what I need. Not what I think I need. But what I feel I need.  E.E. Cummings wrote: “A lot of people think or believe or know they feel — but that’s thinking or believing or knowing; not feeling."
He goes on to say “And poetry is feeling — not knowing or believing or thinking”. I love this quote. For me, movement, like poetry, is also feeling. It’s not knowing or believing or thinking that we are feeling something. It is a direct experience. When we get lost in only repeating movements with out sensing the movement, the overall experience of moving is severely limited and less effective. Repetition without awareness is a waste. If I move the pelvis repeatedly in the same way, like in pelvic tilts, what is the experience in the feet, the legs, the pelvis, the spine, the ribs, the neck, the head? How is the breath? I’m curious! Can it ever feel exactly the same? I don’t know. The powerful and opinionated mind is well intentioned. But when it comes to movement, I encourage you to let the mind drop into the body, to be less goal-oriented. And since we could even say that each cell in the body - all 37 trillion - has its own kind of command center, the mind then is in fact spread out throughout our entire body and not only encased by the skull. Wonderful! Feel the movement. Experience it. Is it boring? Fine! Pleasant? Great! Painful? What can you do to make it more pleasurable? Is it luxurious? A moment for gratitude! And this again does not mean that we avoid discomfort. But we don’t search for red hot pain or stay in the shape if we experience it. If we are committed to being aware of how our movements make us feel, we are awake, we are present. We are making choices. We are patient. But if we move without feeling, how can we know when our form disintegrates or when our muscles are over-tired, or if the breath is stuck or the jaw locked? I can only know how it feels for me right now. And suddenly the experience becomes a conversation and not a task. It is alive. This is how I hope we can continue moving together! With awareness. With feeling. I'm so happy to announce that I finished filming a new batch of videos and am really excited about the content! They'll be gradually added and available for members to stream once some small edits have been made. Woohoo!  Last minute review of the moves planned for the upcoming stress-buster video! This series is designed to bring some awareness to the buttock/side leg area. Specifically the deep rotators and gluteus medius. Please, be patient! I often find that when we practice on our own we don't give ourselves enough time - the first few runs through the series will take a bit of time but eventually it can become a nice flow. Maybe you start with one or two of the exercises and gradually add more. Or perhaps one of them resonates with you more than another? Enjoy the process of learning what your body needs today! standing breath with active feetBegin standing with the feet in parallel. You could have a block or book between the feet as long as it puts the feet hip-width apart or just a bit less.
knee circles on all foursBegin on All Fours. Breath is flowing throughout.  Stretch the left leg back behind you with the ball of the foot on the floor. Feel the hips in line, the natural curves in the spine, and the chest open. Finally, lift the left leg a little bit off the floor - this is your starting position.  Pull the left knee in towards the chest and allow the spine to round.  Then lift the knee out to the side as high as possible - think ‘dog at the fire hydrant’. Finish by stretching the left leg back behind you into the starting shape. Repeat 5 times with the left knee circling. Then repeat on the right side. You may feel some effort building in the buttocks as the knee circles. Move slowly and feel how the femur bone is rolling in the hip joint. If you aren’t able to come onto All Fours, play with a version of this action standing with the hands resting on the wall. side-lying leg pressLie down on the right side with the head resting in the bottom arm, knees bent, heels in line with the sitz bones. To find the starting position, stretch the top leg long and move it behind you on the floor. As the leg moves backwards, allow the top hip and upper body to roll forward so that the top hip points downwards and the top leg is internally rotated (toes point downwards). Feel both space and length between the top ribs and the top hip. Keep this space throughout. 
Notice the upper leg bone rolling in the hip joint and keep the low back long. The focus is on the glute medius which will contract in the middle of the top butt cheek and is closer to the sacrum than outer hip. TIP: If you're not sure what's working to lift the leg, use the top hand on the buttocks to feel what area is contracting. standing flamingoStand on the right leg and use both hands to hold the left knee so the left leg is mostly relaxed into the hands and the arms are working to support the weight of the leg. The focus is on the right leg. Breath is flowing throughout.  Feel a very slight bend in the right knee and activate the leg by pressing the big toe mound down into the floor, lifting the pinky toe mound up and pulling the inner ankle outwards, toes flat.  Begin to tip the pelvis backwards and then return to standing. Repeat at least three times and then change to the other side. This is of course a balance challenge! Stay playful and notice the effort building in the standing leg - in the buttocks, perhaps also in the leg and/or calf. To increase the difficulty, tip the pelvis further so that eventually you could look between the legs to the wall behind you!  weeee! tennis ball release
Try to stay on each side for at least 2 minutes. The breath should be full on the inhalation and soft on the exhalation. time to stretch!Take one of the two stretches below and repeat on both sides. Stay at least 10 deep breathes in each position.Try to feel even on the back of the pelvis and gently press the sacrum down towards the mat for a more intense stretch. Finally, check that the neck feels comfortable. Ideally the eyes are pointing towards the ceiling - it could be helpful and nice to rest the head on a cushion.
optional: repeat knee circles on all foursRepeating the knee circles on all fours can give you feedback about how the exercises influenced your mobility. Perhaps it feels more fluid now, or the range has changed, or..... Congratulations! You made it all the way through!
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| I love to make this soup when I get the first hints of a cold and also find it useful as a preventative measure to boost my immune system. And actually, I use the abdominal massage the same way - members can watch the upper body release for space and ease video for a guide. But back to the topic at hand: garlic is said to have wonderful antiviral and antimicrobial properties. This soup won’t leave you with crazy garlic breath and it just feels so good and healing! I usually serve it as a starter because I feel like I need something more filling for a main dish. But you an also spice it up by adding some fresh greens or some steamed vegetables. Get creative! |  |
Ingredients:
- Coconut oil (or other oil for sautéing the garlic)
- 2-3 cups of vegetable or chicken broth
- 1 head of garlic, cloves separated, peeled and roughly chopped or smashed
- Salt & Pepper
- OPTIONAL: Fresh herbs like cilantro, chives or parsley
Serves 2 as a starter
- Coconut oil (or other oil for sautéing the garlic)
- 2-3 cups of vegetable or chicken broth
- 1 head of garlic, cloves separated, peeled and roughly chopped or smashed
- Salt & Pepper
- OPTIONAL: Fresh herbs like cilantro, chives or parsley
Serves 2 as a starter
- Sauté the garlic in a saucepan with a little bit of coconut oil over medium heat for 5 minutes or until slightly browned.
- Add broth and bring to a boil.
- Simmer partially covered for 15 minutes or until the garlic has softened.
- Use an immersion or regular blender to puree the soup.
- Season with salt and pepper and add some fresh herbs if you like!
What are your favorite combinations?
I've been thinking about what kind of things I’d like to share in the blog and as I was reading the weekly dose of wisdom from Brain Pickings, I thought, yes, this is the beginning. On the topic of aging and what beauty really means Maria Popova writes about Ursula K. Le Guin:
Le Guin considers the dancers she knows and their extraordinary lack of “illusions or confusions about what space they occupy.”[…]What dance does, above all, is offer the promise of precisely such bodily happiness — not of perfection, but of satisfaction. Dancers, Le Guin argues, are “so much happier than dieters and exercisers.” She considers the impossible ideals of the latter, which cripple them in the same way that perfectionism cripples creativity in writing and art: Perfection is “lean” and “taut” and “hard” — like a boy athlete of twenty, a girl gymnast of twelve[… ] “Perfect”? What’s perfect?There are a whole lot of ways to be perfect, and not one of them is attained through punishment.
As some of you know, I was fortunate to live for a brief while as a dancer. And when I read this quote, I felt so validated for my experience of living with my body as an instrument and discovering this hard earned truth that meaningful improvement cannot be attained through a sense of punishment. This does not mean that one avoids discomfort, but more on this topic later.
I also felt validated for my intentions in sharing my movement practices and beliefs - it has never been an interest of mine to create perfect bodies but rather smart, energized, and inspired bodies that are ripe for movement and expression.
I hope this can be a space where we do no seek the kind of perfectionism that is “lean” and “taut”. But rather we create a space together where impossible ideals are checked at the door and we seek to experience comfort and joy in the space that we occupy.
With gratitude,
Rebecca
Le Guin considers the dancers she knows and their extraordinary lack of “illusions or confusions about what space they occupy.”[…]What dance does, above all, is offer the promise of precisely such bodily happiness — not of perfection, but of satisfaction. Dancers, Le Guin argues, are “so much happier than dieters and exercisers.” She considers the impossible ideals of the latter, which cripple them in the same way that perfectionism cripples creativity in writing and art: Perfection is “lean” and “taut” and “hard” — like a boy athlete of twenty, a girl gymnast of twelve[… ] “Perfect”? What’s perfect?There are a whole lot of ways to be perfect, and not one of them is attained through punishment.
As some of you know, I was fortunate to live for a brief while as a dancer. And when I read this quote, I felt so validated for my experience of living with my body as an instrument and discovering this hard earned truth that meaningful improvement cannot be attained through a sense of punishment. This does not mean that one avoids discomfort, but more on this topic later.
I also felt validated for my intentions in sharing my movement practices and beliefs - it has never been an interest of mine to create perfect bodies but rather smart, energized, and inspired bodies that are ripe for movement and expression.
I hope this can be a space where we do no seek the kind of perfectionism that is “lean” and “taut”. But rather we create a space together where impossible ideals are checked at the door and we seek to experience comfort and joy in the space that we occupy.
With gratitude,
Rebecca