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Introduction to the Pilates Principles

“Why boast of this age of science and invention that has produced so many
marvelous wonders when, in the final analysis, we find that man has in the race
for material progress and perfection, entirely overlooked the most complex and
marvelous of all Creations—Man himself!”

J.H. Pilates in Your Health, 1934

By the time he wrote these words, Joseph Pilates was fifty years old. He was
living in New York City at the height of the Great Depression, having left behind
his native Europe during the short peace between two world wars. His life also
corresponded with an unparalleled pace of discovery and invention that utterly
transformed civilization, in the form of the automobile, airplanes, color
photography, sound movies, radio, television, penicillin, and the theory of
relativity. For all the rapid change and upheaval of the early twentieth century,
Pilates could scarcely have imagined the “marvelous wonders” that were waiting
for humanity, just around the corner. And yet, in today’s Internet Age, Joseph
Pilates’ call to remember the body, “the most complex and marvelous of all
Creations,” resonates across the decades with more relevance to people living
today than ever before. Why boast of all our accomplishments, wrote Pilates,
when we have lost touch with our very own bodies? Our bodies, organic and
receptive, have adapted to changing work and home environments, deferentially
molding themselves to the technology upon which we have come to rely. This
trend is famously captured in the cartoon that charts man’s evolution from
primate to bipedal hominid, to early human hunter, to modern slouching desk
worker. An unfortunate by-product of our “race for material progress and
perfection,” in other words, seems to be a profusion of humans with chair-
shaped spines.
Against civilization’s overwhelming historical march towards “progress,” Joseph
Pilates stood—with his strange machines fashioned from reconfigured
wheelchairs, bedframes, and beer kegs—to re-enliven humanity, as do we who
carry forward his work today. The son of a gymnast and a naturopath, Pilates put
forth a model for physical life that enabled modern people to reconnect with
their natural somatic instincts. It is said that, as a child, Pilates spent long hours
in the woods watching animals, and that the movements of stray cats provided
inspiration for him during his wartime internment on the Isle of Man, where the
early seeds of what we now know as Pilates took root in his mind.

Figure 1.1: Evolution from primate to bipedal hominid, to early human hunter, to modern slouching desk
worker.

Eventually, he brought these keenly developed powers of observation across the

Atlantic to bear upon the deteriorated physical state of his fellow urban dwellers
in New York. He criticized the “brutalizing training regimens” and “artificial
exercise” widely considered to be the path to health but which seemed to him to
disregard scientific and functional principles. He decried the misguided ways in
which children’s innate physical intelligence was stifled by adults, “whose
physical and mental balance was either deranged or, perhaps, never even
attained.” Perhaps it is no coincidence that back pain is now the leading cause of
disability globally, stifling productivity and enjoyment of life for countless
numbers of otherwise prosperous people of all ages.

My (Marylee’s) grandmother was a little girl living in New York at the time
Pilates wrote these words. Two generations later, I watched helplessly as failed
back surgery after failed back surgery robbed her of vitality. With all of
technology’s promise of a more connected world and a better quality of life, no
quick-fix device or innovation has emerged in the past century to reverse the
growing incidence of age-and lifestyle-related spinal disorders. It is common to
assume that these kinds of degenerative change are just an inevitable part of the
aging process, but I think Pilates was on to something. If everyone could find a
way to restore what was stifled and eventually lost in the children Pilates
observed, then maybe we could rewrite our own twenty-first century endings and
remain active and pain-free until our final days.

The Lost Wisdom of Kinesthesia

It has been said that you cannot outsource exercising; in other words, no one can
do it for you. We would add that you cannot “tune out” truly functional exercise.
Today, many exercise programs emphasize fast pace and high intensity, in the
hopes that we can squeeze more benefit into shorter workouts. Like the
“brutalizing training regimens” Pilates described in the early twentieth century,
for the average person such workouts leave little room for subtlety, centering,
precision, curiosity, and awareness—all principles that awaken the “innate
physical intelligence” to which Joe was referring.

Fortunately, more and more personal trainers, physical therapists, and body
workers are beginning to grasp the importance of kinesthetic awareness—how
our body moves and the ability to be “present” in our body and aware of its
sensations. Without kinesthetic intelligence, we are disconnected from our
bodies; we miss out on the physical dance of life, and many of the body’s
countless daily requests to adjust, stretch, and express itself physically are tuned
out, making us more prone to stiffness, pain, injury, and degenerative changes.
Science is beginning to support the notion that the quality of our attention can
have transforming effects on all systems of the body: neurological, circulatory,
respiratory, visceral, psycho-emotional, energetic, and myofascial. Slowing
down and paying attention so that kinesthetic awareness can awaken is—or at
least, ought to be—the very essence of the rehabilitative process.

The great news is that holistic fitness programs like yoga and Pilates are now
widespread. From enlightened Baby Boomers who suffered overuse injuries
during the “no pain, no gain” fitness days of the ‘80s and ‘90s, to college and pro
sports teams, people who need a sustainable exercise strategy are looking to us.
This growing trend foretells a shift, not just in the nature and content of our
workouts, but also in the role of exercise itself as an indispensable piece of the
healthcare continuum. With a growing aging population and lifestyle diseases
such as diabetes, heart disease, and osteoporosis on the rise, the general
population requires sensible exercise choices that nurture functional strength and
awareness in preference to punishing routines and unrealistic goals.

Pilates instructors are uniquely positioned to lead the way in this holistic fitness
revolution. Whether your Pilates training is “classical” or “evolved,” Pilates is,
and always has been, a corrective exercise program at its core, conceived and
designed to restore modern (wo)man to a more optimal alignment and more
efficient patterns of movement. During the past fifteen years in particular,
practitioners from diverse disciplines—including dance, gymnastics, yoga,
Feldenkrais, manual therapies, personal training, sports medicine, and physical
therapy—have added new dimensions to the work of Joseph Pilates. With this
book, we bring together ideas from these various fields to help ensure that this
century-old program remains as relevant and beneficial today as it was in Pilates’
time. We also hope that Pilates teachers and enthusiasts will gain a better
understanding of the “complex and marvelous … Creation” that we are. May the
ideas explored here help you further Joe’s wish to enliven body, mind, and spirit
and awaken you to your true nature.

Pilates for the Twenty-first Century

While considerable diversity exists in the ways that Pilates is practiced and
taught today, six principles derived from Joseph Pilates’ writings are widely
accepted and cited in the Pilates community as the defining features of this
exercise system. They are as follows: Centering, Concentration, Control,
Precision, Breath, and Flow. Let’s look at each of the six principles of Pilates
through a modern lens. In particular, we will consider how these excellent
foundational guidelines are reinforced and complemented by principles
emerging out of recent discoveries in two dynamic fields of research:
neuroplasticity and fascia.

Neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to reorganize itself by developing new

neuronal connections. It was once believed that this ability of the brain to change
itself was limited after a certain age, but in recent years discoveries have
revealed that the brain is learning and changing throughout one’s lifespan. We
can leverage the brain’s plasticity to create the changes we want to see in our
lives, including our bodies.
The lessons of neuroplasticity suggest that practicing Pilates can be much more
than executing graceful choreography to strengthen and elongate the muscles of
the body. Pilates can also be a vehicle for creating a vibrant mind. Like food for
the nervous system, curious and attentive states of mind attract new neuronal
activity. Sensory nerves swim like fishes to those areas where our attention
summons them, and in a Pilates session that can mean an oceanful of kinesthetic
“swimming” and brain rewiring.

Being playful, interested, and exploratory in our routines and cueing fosters
greater mental and physical dexterity. As we practice new skills and master
subtle changes, we notice and concentrate, try and fail, adapt and try again.
Through this process, function improves, not necessarily because we will it to,
but because the body discovers more-efficient options it previously did not know
that it had. By this logic, Pilates is not only about precisely executing exercises;
it is about exploring and adapting them in order to create new options for the
body.

Fascia refers to the connective tissues of the body, including the alternately
viscous, tough fibrous, and delicate web-like matrix within which everything
inside the body floats. Previously considered to be mere “packing material” for
the cells and organs of the body, fascia is now understood to be involved in
much more. Because of its dense innervation with mechanoreceptors, fascia’s
role includes sensing and adapting to the mechanical forces placed upon the
body. For example, wherever continuous loading occurs, the fascia reorganizes
itself by thickening in response to the greater demand placed upon it. Most
sports injuries relate to connective tissue (fascia) as opposed to muscles or
bones, and increasing numbers of sports teams are beginning to incorporate
exercises (like Pilates and Yoga) that improve fascial elasticity and resiliency.

There is also an important perceptual dimension to fascial training and fascial

injury prevention, which we will discuss next.

Exercising the Neuromyofascial System

In fact, the brain/nervous system and the muscle and fascial systems are
intimately intertwined. Pioneers in the developing field of exercise known as
fascial fitness (Robert Schliep, Divo Muller, and Tom Myers), as well as
specialists focused on improving brain function through movement and exercise