Class #2306

First Time Session

45 min - Class
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Meredith Rogers guides Nicole through her very first Pilates session in this Reformer class. She shows her how to use breath to move, and gives her the basics of Pilates terminology. This is a great class for any beginning student because it offers helpful information for a good foundation without being overwhelming.
What You'll Need: Reformer w/Box

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This is Nicole. We're going to do her very first palladia session ever right now. Okay, Nicole, what I want you to do is stand just as you are and look down at your feet and just make sure that they're about sit bone or hip bone distance apart and parallel to one another. I'm going to come around and look from behind, but just stand up tall, okay? Okay, so taking a breath into prepared as we need to feel that you're lifting and lengthening your spine, and then as you exhale, I'm going to have you started dropping your chin into the chest and essentially you're just going to wheel your spine or roll your spine down towards the ground. As you do that, the only thing I really want you to be focused on is lifting and supporting through your middle. This is not a flexibility test, so don't worry. Drop your head all the way and take a breath in. And then as you exhale, I want you to start from the tailbone. So you're going to start to roll back up, draw your belly button up towards your spine, shift the pelvis under and forward so it stacks just on top of the knees, and then stack the spine up over the pelvis. And inhale again. I'm gonna have you do that same thing, but just keep your knees a little soft. So Ben, just slightly. And then exhale, bring your chin towards your chest, softening through the knees, and then lifting.

Just continuing to lift up so your abdominals are working in reverse of what your spine is doing and your arms can just hang and your head can just hang an inhale. And then exhale as you start to let your pelvis tuck under a pull up or you're going to start coming back up. Exactly. So your pelvis can roll up kind of up my body. And then as you come up, stop here just for a second. And when you stand up, go ahead. Don't shift backwards. Okay, so that in my brain is in an erect posture. So we're going to do that one more time.

This is just for me to have a look at how you hold your body and how your body is built. And I'm learning a lot. So drop your Chin into your chest. Go One more time. Soft knees, heavy arms control through the front of your body. Go ahead. So we're rounding and new. You might feel a stretch in your legs. I, I, I'm guessing you probably do. You must also feel a little stretch in your back. Good pause there. Inhale. Exhale.

Feel the pelvis move out from underneath you in that place that I put you in that felt really foreign. Just that last time. Try to find that. Yeah, you're good here. Continue up. Yeah, right there. So the first time, what? I've just, what I had you change the first time as you came? I'd be like stood up and then went backwards. Just it doesn't mean anything to you right now. It just is what it is. So I'm gonna have you lie down on your back and I'm petting Nicole up with the springs that I'm going to use for footwork, which is three red springs. But we're going to do some other things before we do that.

So take the feet and place them just here on the foot bar. And then the first thing that we're going to talk about is breaths. So [inaudible] uses a very specific breathing. So what I want you to do is just take a breath in naturally and notice where they are goes, and then exhale, let it go. So you feel how naturally the air will lift up into the chest, the chest will rise and the belly will typically rise. Do that one more time.

Just natural and then let that go. So there's nothing wrong with normal breath, natural breath patterns. We're just going to make it slightly different. So what I want you to do now is take the heels of your hands on the outsides of your ribs and thread your fingertips across the insides of your rims. And so what we're going to try to do here is we call it lateral breathing. Um, and what we're doing is endeavoring to keep the belly flat or engaged.

So as you inhale this time, pull your navel to your spine and instead of lifting, um, up through your stomach, spread your ribs outwards with your inhale. Yeah. So you're like trying to make your rib cage bigger and then as you exhale, bring the ribs back together and keep exhaling and keep drawing the navel back towards the spine until all of your air is out of your body and you'll feel that natural abdominal contraction, right? And do that again. This time I want you to spread the ribs without lifting them off the mat so they might feel smaller. It's okay. So just let them separate from one another and then drawing the navel back towards the spine. Sink the belly and feel that rib cage connection. I'm going to ask you to do that one more time, but this time I want you to not shift the spine flat to finish your breath and just exhale. Yeah, we're the light ribs coming together.

Naval drawing back towards the spine. Okay? Okay, so that's the next thing that we're going to just be aware of what we call a neutral position of the spine and in the neutral position of your spine, take your hands out to your pelvis. Feel here that your, that your two hip joints and your pubic bone are flat. Okay, so now inhale again, and as you exhale, do flatten the spine. So do exactly what I just asked you not to do. Let the lower spine flatten and your pubic bone is going to lift up.

It's going to come towards your nose. We're going to call this a tuck or a posterior tilt. If you want fancy words, inhale, come back and now lift your, stick your butt out and lift your ribs up. We're going to call that an arch where the back of the pelvis is off the mat or an anterior tilt. If you want fancy words, which I'm pretty sure you don't. So drop the ribs back down again and then we're back into our neutral position. Okay. So the next thing that we're going to do is call it a pelvic curl.

Stretch your arms out straight. And then throughout the whole session, I want you to just keep trying to remember that Palladia is breath. You don't have to be perfect at it today. Okay? All right. So I want you to inhale and prepare. Did you're, you're fine with your feet. I'm going to use my hands a lot. If that makes you feel, um, unhappy, just tell me. I can learn a lot with from my hands. So inhale, as you exhale, I want you to flatten your spine. So pull your navel towards your spine and push your back into the bed of the reformer. Now start to peel the spine up off the reformer, reaching your knees out over your feet and lifting in your, in like a bridge position. Take a breath in there. And as you exhale, I want you to come down slowly. Start from the throat.

Think about placing each vertebra down one at a time, rounding through the lower back, and come all the way down. Okay? So a couple of things here. We're going to just change, get you. All you have to do is listen. Inhale. As you exhale, flatten your spine. So feel that posterior or that, that flatness. This here, I want you to really focus on as you come down as well.

Now as you're lifting up, I want you to feel that your ribs are dropping below your pubic bone. In fact, pause, come to down again. We're going to start doing that a different way. Take your fingertips on your thighs just like that, but not your hands, just your fingertips. So you're reaching and they can kind of be straight like that. Like just like that. Yeah. So inhale again as you exhale first, flatten your spine and then roll your pelvis up towards your arms. You, Yep, you're good. Roll your pelvis up towards your arms, but don't let your ribs go above your arms. So you're pressing your thighs into your arms, but your ribs are staying below your arm.

So that's a different position than you started with. Inhale there and then exhale, start to come away. Your hands will travel away from your thighs. You're going to Tuck the tail. And then continue to come down. Let's do that one more time like that with the hands in him. [inaudible] start over in him first. Slaton spine, so the pubic bone goes up towards your nose. That's it. And then curl.

So start to pick the spine up. Think about picking up one bone at a time until you reach the point where you're flush against your hands with your thighs. You should feel the backsides of your legs working kind of a lot here. Inhale there and now as you exhale, start from here. Start from the chest, start to come down.

Keep the hits high as you place your lower back down. Keep the hips high as you place your middle back down yet. Yet they're going to have to lower eventually. But that's just my way of trying to get you to really try to round and flex through that. Exactly. Exactly. Let's do one more because you really got it that last time.

Drop your tailbone all the way down and then here we go. Starting from the top and he'll let them need to be a little bit separate. And then just notice that this foot is doing the kids, the kind of attorney Audi thing. I just noticed that, but we're not going to let it do that. And he'll prepare. Exhale, find the flattening thing that you just did. So where you rotating, that rotation starts and then you start lifting, continue lifting, continue lifting. Not too high with the ribs but nice and high with the hips. That's it in him. And then the breastbone falls. You've got 12 ribs. See if you can place them down.

One at a time of five bones between the bottom of the ribs and the top of the pelvis. See if you can find those one at a time and then release the tailbone all the way down. Great job. That was the best one. I think. Like taking time to like really feel the, the different bones. Next I'm going to bring your arms back and just back here you'd have, there's some handles. Uh, okay. So I just want you to hold onto those. Okay. So were you, when do you use breath to create movement now?

So I just want you to take a breath in and as you exhale, I want you to sync your stomach muscles away from my hand and float your right leg up off the Bart's. Just gonna lift. Just like that. No, not your pelvis, just your leg. Just like that. So pause there. So what we're going to do is just like a leg float, the spine is not going to change. We're going to attempt to keep that neutral positioning in the pelvis, right with the tailbone down, right? So inhale, let the leg go away and then exhale. Feel the stomach sink. Start your breath and low. Use your breath to lift your leg. Good. And you want to remember to breathe all the air out of your body.

Can you feel how when you do that, you feel your stomach working more. Inhale, let your legs come down again. Pause there. Exhale, pull, sink, float. Beautiful. Let's do one more. So the like only comes to the position where the pelvis doesn't change at all. Let's do one more time. So here are your hip joints. Good. Exhale, flow. Sink away from my arms. Slide the ribs down the center of the body. Great job. It's surprising, I think, how much like just lifting your leg with your stomach muscles can can be hard.

Let's do this like three times. Inhale, prepare. Exhale. Slide the ribs down the front of the body. Draw the navel back to this fine and just float that leg in. Keeping the pelvis connected yet. Keep that tailbone down. And then inhale, just let the fire reach away from you. Pause. Start. Exhaling sliding the ribs down the front of the body. Nice. Right.

Just focusing on the breath to move the limb. One more time. Inhale down. Keep the abdominals heavy. Exhale, float. Keep breathing out. Keep breathing. Keep breathing at. Nice, great job. Good. And place that foot down. Good. So now what I mean, now what we're going to do is some rotation. So what I'd like for you to do is bring your feet all the way together. Yup.

And what we're, uh, we're going to shift the knees from side to side. Before we go. I'm going to just change your head position. It's just off to the side a little bit. Okay? So what I want you to do is keep your knees. Imagine that your lower body is just one unit.

You're gonna lift your right hip off the reformer and let your right foot lift so that your knees are are, are still connected. That's an inhale. As you exhale, I want you to think of pulling your legs back together from this part of your body. So you breathe, use, place the ribs down. You use the side of your body. You feel how all those muscles connecting, move the bones. Beautiful pause and center. Inhale as you come towards me this time and exhale is you start from your shoulder blade, your shoulder blade pulls down into your ribs are going to start from bringing your legs back to center, sliding the ribs in towards the center of the body, sliding the rib cage down the front of the body. Really Nice. You're a natural inhale as you go away from me again.

Good. If you need more air, you should breathe more. So maybe have another inhale and then exhale as you come back. So there's set breathing patterns. But what's most important is not to like make the breath pattern exactly. If it's, if you need more air, you should breathe more or if it feels confusing or whatever.

But I do want specifically for the exhale breath to be in moving you through center. How does that feel on your back? Good. I'm just going to give you a little resistance. Push against me. Nice. Let's do that one more time to each side. Breathe in as you go over. That's fine.

And breathe out as you come back. Sliding the stomach muscles back, sliding the ribs down the front of the body. Nice. And then inhale as you come towards me and exhale rims. We call these old bleaks and finding center. Great job. Keep your feet right where they are. I wonder about this. Can you reach back and bring your first, scooch away a little bit and then can you interlock your hands behind your head?

You're going to have to go like in between those things. Yeah. Okay. So it's kind of a weird place to teach this exercise, but we're going to go with it. Okay. So squeeze your knees together. I want you to inhale, prepare, trying to keep this positioning of your tailbone, or we're going to lift up into like a sit up position. So you're going to curl your head and Chester step on your exhale. Your humbling. Yeah Huh.

Good pause and inhale and exhale and lower yourself down. Okay. So there's a couple of things I want to talk to you about and we'll do it at the top. So inhale again. Is that funky or is it fine? Okay, cool. Excellent. As you lift up, okay, so what I want you to do here is just pause for a second. Take your hands behind your thighs, come down slightly and drop your tailbone down into the reformers.

So now what's important to me is that your low back is connected to the bed. Can you feel that it's flat? Okay. So what we did was just change the orientation of your pelvis. I want you to take your arms and reach them forward. [inaudible] but don't come see. Do you see what like when you come up higher, the, the, the you, you change that. You change the pelvic position.

So I don't even need you to be up quite that high. Come down slightly. Good. Stabilize there. And now I want you to just lift your arms up as you breathe in. Just your arms are moving. We're using them as a weight. And then exhale, push your arms back down next to your hips. Good. Inhale, bring your head towards me. Slightly. Not like this. Inhale, lift your arms and exhale. Press with your stomach.

Your arms back down. Just drop your head into my hand a little bit. That's it. And you'll keep your head with me. Keep your head with me back. Richard. Arms Up, lift arms. Just the arms. Okay. Yeah. So you're just using your arms as a, as a natural way to make your stomach work harder. Can you feel that and then push it back down again.

So you're using your breath to, to connect more deeply. Play good. Inhale. One more time. Or was that pause? They are, bring your hands back behind your head. Oh, that was just a late call. And then lower your [inaudible]. How'd that feel? Okay. Yes. So super simple. We're going to do that one more time. Inhale, prepare. So just notice that position that you lifted to go ahead and come up again.

It won't be like the typical crunch. Good. And then reach your arms forward. The second thing I want you to be aware of is that as the moving of the head for it, I'm gonna touch you on your face. Bring Your Chin back. Okay. So now inhale, lift your arms against, or just use your arms as weights and nothing else changes in your body. Exhale, squeeze your stomach muscles down and push as you're pushing. Reach forward with it. Your arms. Inhale, arms up. Exhale, arms down. Nice. Inhale arms that we can go one more time.

And then we're going to bring them back behind the head. Exhale, arms down. Inhale, arms up in all the way back behind your head without losing your curl and exhale as you come down. Okay, so we call that chest lift in the arm. Variation is just a variation. All right. So what I want you to do next is you're going to come back up into the same position on your x out. Inhale, prepare, exhale. Feel the rib slide down, keep the tailbone connected. Your hands are going to stay behind your head. For this one, you can keep your elbows a little forth further four. But I want you to press your head back into your hands.

It's like your head is weighted. Okay. And now inhale, I'm going to guide you where I want you to go. I want you to bring the right rev across towards the left hip and then come back to center and inhale again. And exhale. We're going to go the other way. So you're going to go across and center. Good. And one more time across. I just want you to notice as you're turning what's happening to your head in your arms and center and across and center. Have you just, um, you can let your hands go and reach forward with your arms and place your head down. Okay?

So what we're going to try to find is how to do that without shifting the neck. And the shoulders around a lot. So I don't want you to do is just lift this leg for me. Like keep it bent. Oh no, that's fine. So as you exhale, you're going to curl up off your shoulders. Just reach your arms forward. So lift your head and chest. Nice.

And then what I want you to do is take this right arm across towards this leg. Like that. Hold onto it and that one comes. Yeah. So you get to hold yourself so you can find the position. So what we're looking for is this rim to go to this side of the pelvis. So rotate. And now this rib on the bottom side, I want to slide actually towards the center of the spine. Okay.

So you're there. Now pull your stomach away from my arm and let go. [inaudible] just let your arms go. Just take your hands off your legs. Yup. Just hold that. You can put them back. Yeah, you just made it harder for yourself, but that's just fine with me. That's fine with me. So keep that rotation. No elbows head back. Head back with me. Hold that. And just hold five, four. You should feel that right in here. Three, two, one.

Take your hands off your head and just reach forward and lower your head back down. So we'll do that to the other side as well. Okay, so just using the leg like that, holding onto the leg too, to teach the body where you want that exercise to go. Okay. So lift the leg closest to me. Curl your head and chest up off the mat. So lift, take the left arm across to the right knee and the right hand comes down just underneath it. So now the left rib cage comes down to connect into this hip. And this, thank you. This rib wants to slide towards the spine. Now I want you to hold that position and pull your stomach in and let go.

Does reach forward, but keep your rotation. Yeah, keep your rotation. Now bring your hands back behind your head though. It gets harder and harder when the arms have to move. Good. Find Center. Yeah. So it comes center with your body and lower your body down and lower your leg down. So now we're going to do that first exercise again or the chest lift with rotation that we did with both legs down.

And I want you to try to really find that position. Try to keep the head almost like it's pressing into your hands. Um, and we'll see what we'll see what happens. Yeah. Okay. So inhale here. Prepare as you exhale, curl your head and chest sta straight up. Pause, head back towards me. Inhale. And then exhale, wide elbows, rotation through the ribs. Keep your head a little more still. Inhale, come back through center. Pull your stomach in. Exhale. As you rotate, keep the stomach pulled in. Keep the elbows pretty wide here.

Any holes you find center, you're better already. Exhale as you lived up in a cross. No head there you go. In heel. As you find center, lift up, keep lifting, keep lifting. Exhale as you lift up in across elbows wide head back, sign center and rest. [inaudible] that feel okay. Okay, awesome. Just bring your knees into your chest and give you a nisa hug. Yeah. Perfect.

So I'm going to set the bar up and we're going to move into what we call foot work. Just bring your knees a little closer to your body for me cause I need to move this bar. Okay? So you're going to place your feet on the bar. And so what we're going to try to do again is bring awareness to the breath and bring awareness to that spinal position. The neutral spine position that we spoke of earlier. So the tailbone is on the, the back of the rib cage to be heavy, but the tailbone to also be down.

So you'll feel that you might have a little bit of space in the low in the lower back. And that's normal. Okay? So just reach the arms, take a breath in. Now with your feet, I want you to do like, like imagine that you stepped in Poo and you're having to scrape it off your foot. So like that little backward drag. Can you feel that? How that works? The back of the legs. Okay. So I want you to keep that, sorry for making you imagine Peru and now and now you're going to start pushing out. So you're going to press the carriage away. Keep the pelvis neutral, push all the way away. Nice and bent. So that's the bare bones of that movement. Inhale, prepare. How's that tension?

Feel good. Okay. And we've got three red springs on Xcel to press away. Okay, good. And inhale to bend. So what I want you to focus on every time is that that connection of the back of the legs, finding that and then pressing out like you're pushing from right here. Good. Go again. Nice, good. And then what you, what I want you to think about as you come in is really resist. Like you're trying to keep the springs as long as your knees bend, keep the springs long, keep the spine long, and then really gently find that stopper. Nice.

And then push out again. And then Ben didn't come back in. All the all control. Good, all. I love the abdominal work that's happening. We're going to do that about two more times. Use Your exhale. Breath to press out if it, if it suits press. And then with your feet, I want you to push into this foot and flex your feet.

Good. And then bend and just reach your toes onto my hand. Just your toes. Okay. Just one more time. Good. And then Ben. So there's a little information that I'm gathering from your feet and it's that this leg bears more weight. Um, so just moved to your toes. And what we're also, what I'm also looking here for here is foot alignment. So what I want you to do is the same thing. So you find that little hamstring contraction, you find your rib cage, you find your stomach muscles and you exhale and straighten your knees, pushing the carriage away. Good. Pause.

Here we are. The feet are right now. I want them to stay. So as you bend your knees, just leave your feet in my hands. Yep. So dropped down into me a little bit. I'm not going to change my hands position. I just want you to try and go again. Push out. Exhale. Try to feel that there is equal weight.

All the time, right where my hands are. And you might feel that that's causing your feet to work a little bit, which is why we call this footwork and press our, one of the reasons why we call this foot work. And then I want you to on just the right foot, put more pressure on your big toe than anything. So you want to, it's like you're going to roll in that way almost. And Bend. Okay. So let the, um, let that correction of your foot be a little more subtle so you're not changing your whole whole hip joint. Let's do just a couple more in, it's just, um, I think that there's something, there's something in that foot that we noticed like that turning out member, we noticed in the very first exercise. So there's something about with the alignment of that ankle that we're not going to change today. So we're just gonna do our best. Okay.

So push out again to just put pressure on the big toe. Like you're lifting your pinky toe up just a teeny bit. That's it. It's already better. Good. And then again, stand on my hands lightly as you bend. Nice. Beautiful. I love it. One more time. Reach out. Good. Continuing. I like that you're continuing to bring in bending, bringing your awareness to the, to the body, to your, to the center body. Good.

And what we're going to do now is what we call first position or small V or Palase v. Um, so your heels are just going to come together. Your toes remain apart. I want you to squeeze your heels really tightly together. Can you feel how when you squeeze them together, you feel the insides of your legs working. Keep the tailbone down still and then press out.

So you're going to press squeezing the inner thighs. Go ahead. Your legs will straighten all the way. Good. Squeeze your glutes as well, your bum, and then bed. So all the same focus points are right, keeping the springs long or working the springs in both directions. Press again and then bend and come in. So I want you to be able to tighten your, um, reach your arms towards me a little bit. I want you to be able to tighten your butt, tighten your glutes without shifting your pelvis. Okay? Yeah, so just a squeeze but not a flattening of the spine. Nice. Good. And Ben and press [inaudible]. So we just do this whole series of 'em different foot positions and being that this is your first time there. Just experiencing that. Now let's do one more.

Okay. Okay. And then bending back in. Beautiful. Then I want you to just unstick the heals and take the fee to their back in parallel to each other. Again, coming up on top of the bar. [inaudible] just on your toes right there. Okay. Push out all the way.

And then here what I want you to do is take your heels underneath the bar all the way under and then lift back up onto your toes. So you're doing like an articulation of your foot, like a calf raise. Really it is a calf raise and then live what? She can feel this one. Awesome. And the good. And I liked the year you're, you're continuing to find that alignment on that right foot. That's awesome.

Let's see. Let's do about five more down. And then when you left, feel that the whole, the trunk is involved, right? Maybe there's a little drawing down of the abdominals. You're doing great. Lower again. And then maybe there's a little bit of tightening through the seat as you lift your heels, your rear end, your glutes. Yeah. And down. So you could lift from just your lower leg or you could take that energy all the way up to your bottom.

Okay, let's do two more and lift. Nice. Last time and lift from here. I want you to bend one knee. Yep. The other foot drops. You're do it. You're in the right place. Put your hands on your pelvis, the heels of your hands on your pelvis. Again, I want you to try to keep the hips really steady. Okay. Lift back up onto bolt hose. Who are going to point both feet? Yep. Perfect.

And then drop this. So we're gonna, we're going to alternate. Yep. So you're going to go down lift, switch. Okay. And maybe it's a little bit smaller, but the pelvis stays a little more still. Go ahead and lift again. So don't lower the foot so much that the pelvis has to come with it.

That was better. A lot better. Yeah. Yep. And then up and then better. Good. Awesome. Up and change. This leg stays straight and then up and change. You're good. You're good. One More Time, Huh? And Change. Pause here. I'm just going to give you a little stretch and tell me if it's too much.

No. Okay. And switch. So this foot comes under now. Okay. Lift up, bend your knees and bring the carriage all the way back home. And then just rest your feet right over the top of the bar for just a second. I'm going to change the springs going down to a red spring and a blue spring.

And we're going to do some armor. So what I'd like for you to do, please is take ahold of your straps with your hands. Okay. I'm going to come around to this side. And the first thing that we're gonna do is just, I want to have a little bit of a conversation about, remember how we talked about the ribs sliding down the front of the body with the breath, and then we practiced sliding the ribs down the front of the body by lifting the upper body. I want you to imagine that you're going to lift your upper body, but you're not. You're going to keep your head down, but the the, it's like that same energetic action. Okay? So straighten your arms. What I want you to do now is right from underneath your armpits, put pressure on the straps. That's where you're going to start and stop. Okay?

So hold that yet. Can you feel these muscles working? Okay, so keep that energy and then lift one leg. Use Your abdominals to do so. It's going to stay bent and it take well in a tabletop position. We're going to lift the other leg. So this 90 degree angle at the hip joint we call table top. Okay? So now as you breathe out, I want you to press your arms down next to your pelvis.

Don't change the position of your pelvis and as you breathe in, keep the ribs heavy and lift the arms, resist lifting the ribs. Arms are going to stay just parallel to your shoulders and press again. And then resistance. So you work the back end both directions. I'm going to have you reverse your breath in. Inhale and then use the breath like you're pushing the air out of your body.

Yeah, like your, that was awesome. Great. I'm just realizing how much I say awesome. That's not awesome. Hip Flex your risks a little bit. So you might feel that and you can hold the straps if it makes more sense. But I want them to be straightened. They're kind of pulling like that. Okay.

Okay, so that last one was so great. Use your breath like you're pushing me. You're pushing energy into your stomach using your arms. Exactly. In him. Lift up the arms, keeping the legs the same all the time. Xcel press nice. And then with the legs without changing them, push into my hand to just energetically push. Oh sorry.

I have both hands on your body. Push into this hand. You feel how that speaks to the abdominal as well. Okay, so lift the arms. We'll do three more. I want you to keep that knee energy. That's okay. Keep that knee energy. Keep focusing on the ribs as you exhale and press your arms down.

Good. And then lift your arms. Inhale. Just one, two more. [inaudible] Nice. Keep your arms straight all the time. So the work of the arms is happening in the back of the body as well as in the front of the body, but mostly like right underneath the shoulder blades. Okay, pause there. You're doing great. Turn your palms to face it. Remember how we talked about the breath, opening the ribs and closing the ribs. We're going to do the same thing with the arms and I want you to take your arms out to the side. As you breathe in, let your ribs go with your arms. Pause as you exhale.

Squeeze the air out of your body so your arms come straight back. Like I'm a bellows, you know, a fireplace, bellows. Inhale, open the arms where the air gets drawn in, and then exhale, it gets pushed back out again. That's my favorite visual for that idea. Inhale, reach out. Exhale, squeeze back. Good. We're just going to do two more in here. Reach out. You're doing so beautifully.

He feel your stomach working x per asin. Nice. One more, and press back and then lift your arms back up so they just come back up over your shoulders. The bars right here, you can place your feet down. Okay, so the next thing, believe it or not, that we're going to do. So we're going to put your feet into these. And so here's how to do it. And I'll just talk you it. So just straighten your knees, push the carriage away. Careful it doesn't have a lot of spring tension on it. Okay? And then take one of your feet. Let's say the left foot. Put the left foot in the strap. Now with that foot, put pressure and [inaudible] press it out that now this leg can come in.

Okay, good. So I just want you to hold yourself still for just a minute. This can feel very foreign the very first time. So I'm gonna stay with Ya. Push down towards a, keep your knee straight. Push towards me. Okay. So what I want you to do is find that open v position again. The pelvis is going to stay still and I want you to transfer energy into your abdominals. Like always inhale as you bend your knees. Yeah, go ahead. Bend the knees. We'll go just outside of the strats. Pause there.

Okay. So just feel that position. That's what are going to be our start in our finished position. Okay. So maybe a little bit past 90 degrees at the hip joint. You're good. I don't want you to come any closer to where you are. Then I want you to push your heels together and press back out towards my body.

You're going to straighten your leg. Yeah. Good. Inhale as you bend. So to pause there, drop your heels down just a little bit and drop your tailbone down just a little bit. Okay, hold that. And then keeping the feet together again, push towards me again. This will only feel this strange ones cause the after cause after that you'll have done it before. Let's do three more. These are called frogs. Bend your knees like a frog. Pause there. That's perfect. Squeeze the heels together to straighten the knees. Yeah, exactly.

Keeping that rotation. Two more. Inhale as you bend, pause, squeeze, press. I like that you're noticing that pattern like as your leg straight and you want to turn the knees together, but you're fixing it every time and I never told you to, so that's good. Then your knees, that means you're a natural and push out. Keep the knees and facing away from one another. That's awesome. Press down. Stop. Open your legs.

I'm going to guide you through this first one and you're going to keep your leg straight. Now separate the legs. Yep. Come around. Heels. Come together. Touch. That's what we call a circle. Go again, push down separate. Keep the knees apart. You want to find the position up here where you're feeling a stretch to the back sides of your legs, but that your pelvis isn't lifting. Okay, so you're good, right where you are pushed down towards me. Separate draws, symmetrical circle around and up with the rotation. Let's do two more. You're right in push down.

Symmetrical circle and together. Last time keeping the rotation in the hips. Knees turned out, heels turned in. Great job. We're going to take that in reverse now. So you're going to open right to there. Not Too much wider than that. Push down. Feel equal pressure into my hands. Come together. Knees apart.

Toes apart. Lift up. Straight up. Okay. Separate. Push down. Nice heels come together. Knees stay as they are. Beautifully done. Inhale, keep the tailbone down as the legs come up, reach down, find your heels coming together. You feel as to how you'd have to use your trunk a little bit just to stabilize.

You're doing a beautiful job. Let's do three more down and together. Just notice that. Um, so that, remember I told you how your right side was like, I'm a little bit more dominant. That's just that manifesting itself and I, it's nice that you could feel it and you brought it right to center. It's good. You're doing great is being key. Key. Being aware of the positioning of the pelvis. You're gonna do just one more good. I think that's, Oh, let's do one more exercise here. So I want you to just find, follow my hands.

You're going to reach out and imagine your feet are just resting on the surface of water, so you're going to go out as why did you can, but you never draw, so it almost feels like a smiley face at the end. It almost feels like they go up at the end. Soften your knees just a tiny bit. Now squeeze with your inner thighs and push your legs back together. They're going to come. They're not going to come up. They're going to kind of push into my hands. Straight across. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's an inner thigh exercise.

I feel that you probably already gathered that information. Pause. They're not too bent with the knees. I just don't want you to pull from locked knees and then press back together. Good. Let's do three more. Breathing and squeeze. Nice. Go ahead.

You're right. There is center to more. Yeah, and squeeze. Nice. Good. One more time. Inhale and exhale. Great job. So we're going to get out the way we got in. So what I want you to do is bend your knees. Let's take the left foot out first.

That foot can stand on the boss and now you know you're safe at home. This foot now can come out and I'll put the straps back for you. So just roll to your side and help yourself up. Okay, cool. I'm going to do two more exercises. How are you doing?

Do you like Hawaii's yet? Suddenly different than anything else, isn't it? So what I'm going to have you do is I think just sit with your hips here. Your feet here facing me. So what I'm doing in this exercise is trying to speak to the muscles and the sides of the body. Okay?

So take your hands and reach back behind your head again and just feel that sense of letting the head press into the hand. So it's like if you move your spine around when you're holding your head like that, there should, you shouldn't have to like change anything much. So what I'm going to have you do before we get going is drop the shoulder blades down. Um, this shoulder blades, this, these bones, you want to feel that they're not squeezing together, but that they're, they actually live kind of outside on the ribs. Okay? So just holding there and the next thing I'm going to have you do is bring your chin into your chest. Again, I'm gonna touch your face again. [inaudible] and that it almost to have the right head position kind of feels like you were wanting more, like trying to make more chin than you actually want. Okay.

That's what it feels like to me anyway. But that's beautiful because most of us have kind of a forward head. So we're pushing the head back now from there, as you inhale, follow with me, we're just going to lift this side of the spine and lean over to one side so you'll feel a stretch on that side as you go. And then as you breathe out, I want you to engage the muscles that you feel stretching right now and pull yourself back to center. Exactly. Beautiful job with your head. Keeping the head still. Inhale, take the spine over and exhale as you pull from the stretch and bring yourself back to center. So just notice as you do this, I'm going to come around, but you keep going.

Notice as you do this, that your, it's almost as though you're in between two panes of glass there no rotation, there's no shifting in the pelvis. So you just go with where your body will let you go before you start to feel your pelvis move and then breathe your way back. Beautiful. Shift forward just a little bit. Let's do one more to each side. Inhale, feeling the side, body stretching and then engaging and bringing it back. Nice. And in here and bringing it back. Beautiful. I'm gonna have you step off the box. Okay. I just stepped to the side of the reformer either side. That's perfect.

So I'm gonna, we're going down to a blue spring and what I'm going to have you do is lie down and I'll show you how though. Do you remember when we were doing that arm exercise? Right where I was asking you to really find this movement. Take your arms out in front of you just like this. Now what I want you to do is imagine that you're pulling something and start to pulling the shoulder blades down.

And as you push your arms down toward your body, lift your chest a little. Okay? So that's the, you feel the energy in your upper back. That's exactly what we're about to do on the box. Okay? Okay. So what you do is you just lie down on the box. Your ribs can be just on your chest, can be just often, you're just going to reach your hands to about there.

Okay? So Yep, your arms are going to slide up the outside of the frame. That's perfect. And then what I want you to do with it, I'm just looking alignment and your just a little bit off. So we're going to bring your legs over this way a little bit. And then we're gonna bring your upper body over this way a little bit.

Cause I'm kind of a sucker for details. Okay? And then when I want you to do with your legs, just feel that they're lifting just a little bit. So they don't have to lift off the box, but just that there's energy in them and then pull your stomach in. Like you have a little piece of ice that's underneath your stomach. That's happening in a second. Okay. So just I'm all of those things.

So here's where this slide comes from right there, Paul towards me. Like follow my hands with your shoulder blades. Now continue. The carriage will move. Pause there for just a second. Look down. I want you to keep looking down in, squeeze here for me, and then release back down. So instead of bending your elbow as well, do one more with Ben Elvis. Don't look forward. Keep looking just right there. That's it. What you've just found, you've just found the work. Okay. Okay. And then come back. Now I want you to do that with, maybe our arms need to be a little further forward. That's fine.

I want you to keep your arms straight so the movement might feel a little smaller, but it's going to be the same as your shoulder blade. Slide into my hands. You're good. Go ahead. Your chest is going to lift. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. You're trying to live from right here with your eyes right there. Good enough. Just feel that, hold thy and then resist from there.

So that's the energy that we're looking for that see this area being in in an attention. Go again. So eyes down, shoulder blades, sliding chest lifting arms, pretty straight. I love it. Okay. And reach for it again. I'm going to let you continue to bend your elbow to go down again cause I feel like it helps you. I feel like it's okay. Go ahead. Yeah, the like how am I, I just used my upper okay. Yeah. So the question is is you have, yeah.

Do you just use your upper body and that's exactly right. [inaudible] I mean w w w you're, you're pulling with your arms but your arms are connected to your back. Yeah. And that's what we're trying to find. So let your elbows bend. If that makes more sense to you. I don't mind, but just feel the, the, the connect to the downward pull of the shoulder blades. The upward pull of the spine could just hold that for a second for me.

Feel that. Hold for [inaudible] three, two, one and slowly releasing that as you release. I want you to not let the shoulder blades lift right there. That's fine. Do go one more time. Shoulder blades down. Nice upper back, active. Great job with your head. Your head's now too low right there. It's perfect. And then slowly release.

Great job. I'm gonna have you step off to the right. So you're standing on the floor against, excuse me, and then just face out and look out at the ocean. We're going to finish the same way we started. So that's like a body check for you. A body check for me. So again, look down at your feet and making sure they are both facing the same direction.

Stand tall. Inhale. Do you feel taller? And then just let that in. He'll go on this time as you inhaled, try not to lift your shoulders, but instead do that Palladio's. Inhale, inhale into your ribs. Exhale, let the head fall. Let the shoulders relax. You're going to start rounding. You can keep your knees a little bit soft, head heavy. Inhale there. And then using again, your abdominals to manipulate your spine.

Start to roll yourself back up. So we use the abdominals to do a lot of things today. Sometimes we stabilized, sometimes we work good. Shift forward about two inches right there. Lift your eyes. Brick. Make Chins. In this, we also use to find posture.

Let's do one more. Inhale, Jen first. Then their ribs fold into your spine. Then the abdominals lift up into the spine. The body goes all the way down the head. State, super heavy. Inhale, exhale, left the pelvis. Start to roll underneath. You. Remember that once your pelvis is right over your knees, you want to just continue to stack your spine right over the top of it without shifting back at all. Beautiful.

And just really let the arms rest. Bring the Chin back slightly this way. Yup. Hold that. So that's a, that's a different, a place. And we started, I feel like, and you're done. Cool. Thank you. You're welcome.

Comments

2 people like this.
Lucky Nicole. I hope someday you introduce me to the reformer too!

1 person likes this.
Very helpful
Simplicity
Clarity
Great teaching skills
2 people like this.
Love you Meredith!! One of my all time favorite teachers, thank you for always teaching with passion and grace. Thanks PA for so many amazing role models!!!!!
I love each and everyone of your classes. This one was really helpful with the cueing to our new clients. I just have one question: what did you feel during footwork by touching her feet when you said that the left leg is bearing more weight?
You are an awesome instructor. Thank you!
Sorry I meant her right leg (not left)
I missed you, wellcome back!!!
This class and Alan herdman begginers mat workout, came just in time ,when i am in a phase that i want to go back to the basics and the fundamentals.
thank you Meredith!
and thank you pillates anytime to bring such an amazing instructors and classes. as a pilates instructor i'm lerning allot!
Christina F
Meredith, I learn so much from watching and taking your classes (which I do on a regular basis). I will refer to this particular video often, as it is such a wonderful tool for working with a first time client. In my humble opinion, the sign of a great teacher is not only being able to demonstrate the highest and most advanced level of exercises (which you do beautifully), but even more importantly, being able to explain and break down the fundamentals to an absolute beginner with clarity, compassion and patience. You are truly an inspiring teacher and a role model to me. Thank you.
2 people like this.
Awesome! Are you going to continue with Nicole? I would like to see you give more sessions with her maybe after ! or 2 months in.
Just what I needed today! Thank you Meredith :)
Thank you all for your beautiful feedback. I kinda threw Nicole under the bus that day and she did SO great. I would love to continue working with her but our schedules are tough to coordinate so I'm not sure. Probably not on a regular basis. I would love to teach her again though...for sure!!
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