upcoming conferences

Two upcoming conferences on the West Coast that may be worth checking out: The 5th Annual Yoga Journal San Francisco Conference from January 18-21) features some of the bigwigs from the yoga world, including Saul David Raye, Shiva Rea, and Rodney Yee, as well as various others from complementary fields including Dr. Dean Ornish. In addition, Seane Corne, is leading, among other sessions one on Monday (appropriately, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day) that sounds interesting called "Off the Mat, Into the World: Yoga, Spiritual Activism, and Social Change."

The second is the Pilates Style Magazine conference in Los Angeles the following week which also includes some of the big name pilates teachers including Rael Isacowitz, Ana Cabán and Mari Winsor, as well as a number of Romana Kryzanowsk's proteges. Should be an interesting mix of teaching styles and techniques.

crouching tiger, winking skull

One of my favorite aspects of being a pilates student is that I get to glean interesting tidbits of anatomical information from my teachers. In some cases, their level of expertise is only somewhat better than my own which is somewhere between being able to sing "the foot bone connected to the ankle bone" song and quoting the learned Dr. Nick, a graduate of the Mayo Clinic Correspondence School. But a number of my teachers are former dancers, physical therapists in training, or otherwise anatomy wonks who share their knowledge in the form of detailed cues that help students achieve better form.

A great resource for learning on human anatomy can be found at at WinkingSkull.com where you can see detailed drawings of muscle structures, and even quiz yourself on the various parts if you're into that sort of thing. There's a fine line between anatomy geeks and ninjas.

teaser 2008

You can probably guess what my New Year's resolution is. I gave up on the goal of perfecting my teaser by the end of the summer and realized it's probably going to take way longer than that.

At a group class-turned-private (no one showed up but me - I love the holidays sometimes!), I did some chair work and discovered the "twisted teaser" which proved that I'm nowhere near my goal. The twisted teaser - and there are, as with all things pilates, surely a number of variations -- as done on the Wunda chair is sort of like a cross between a teaser, the spear-a-fish roll and a side-over.

I'm not even going to try to write a description as it would probably be wrong, and someone would try it and land on their head and I'd get sued. Not good. Anyway, suffice it to say, I was shaky and off balance, and if I can't do a teaser the proper way there's no way in hell I can do it while also rolling from side to side on a small platform. But it was great oblique work and (is fun the right word for that level of pain and poor coordination?) a good way to tie together some of the many pilates skills that are so often done a piece at a time, over and over.

It'll probably take more than a year to perfect the teaser, but I'm working on it.

ps. this is a good mat-based twisted teaser (see number 4) courtesy of Pilates Style Magazine, that I will add to my at-home mat repertoire.

itty bitty teaser

Maybe it's the holiday season that's made me think about Christmas stockings - or perhaps it's the cold air that's making my feet so chilly in the drafty studio, but I've been looking for socks that will keep my toes warm but not slippery. There are only a few different styles (and somehow all the cute colors are sold out in my size) either with or without toe-separators, so I don't have too many options but I went ahead and ordered a few pairs. I'll post a review of my favorites once I've had the chance to try them.

In the meantime, all of my sock-surfing led me to the cutest baby onesie ever: the Itty Bitty Teaser. I've always suspected that my niece, who despite lots of time spent at Mommy and Me Yoga (and her apparent crush on Uncle Ted, the yoga-studio-dude) is actually a pilates pro. Her teaser puts my own wobbly attempts (yes, still...) to shame.

easy does it

When doing roll downs -- the sloooowww, painful kind where you stop at the hardest point and then hold-hold-hold-I'mgonnadie-hold-hold-release -- the other night Madison reminded us of yet more advice that applies on and off the reformer:

"When it gets really hard, just make it look easy. If it looks easy, it actually feels easy."

Sounds sort of ridiculous, but he has a point. Feigning effortless doesn't lead so much into cheating and finding shortcuts, but actually getting so deep into the hard stuff that you're learning something new and in effect teaching your brain/body a new trick.

pilates for pink

It's October, which means that the color of changing leaves is being overshadowed by the newly omnipresent color of fall: pink. It's breast cancer awareness month, and it's hard to avoid the connection between the disease and shopping. That is, the increasingly successful marketing of the disease as a sort of sisterhood through the power of the (pink) purse.

Don't get me wrong: this is a serious disease that tragically affects hundreds of thousands and kills thousands of women (and yes, a few men) every year. But every illness, every serious social issue, should be so lucky as to benefit from the marketing dollars spent (and contributions raised) for awareness, research and treatment. While a very serious disease, the rates of death compared to other diseases affecting women are lower than the abundant attention to the disease might suggest.

It seems that the companies who take part in BCA month cause marketing initiatives benefit from the halo effect as much or more than the companies who receive the donations generated. When Campbell's soup last year changed its iconic red/white soup can labels to pink/white during October, the mom friendly product made a bold move - and albeit a relatively small contribution to the cause. Their $250,000 contribution to research is generous, but feels small compared to the amount of good will to the brand that the campaign surely generated. The Marketing to Women Online Blog suggests that the actual amount contributed works out to $.035/can. Yikes.

The "pinkwashing" of the disease has even generated an anti-marketing backlash and the San Francisco-based organization Breast Cancer Action makes the excellent point: " If shopping could cure breast cancer it would be cured by now." The organization's "Think before you pink" website and related outreach provides an interesting counterpoint to pink-lanthropy that encourages consumers to look beyond effective cause marketing at the sources of risk factors for the disease, including car and cosmetics companies whose pink-beribboned products may be helping cause increased rates of the disease. And, it provides a list of ways of taking action that don't involve shopping, from using public transit (fewer cars on the road = less pollution, a risk factor for breast cancer), to using non-rGBH dairy products.

So, Pilates for Pink? It's basically another attempt to raise dollars for companies, and yes, the disease, this October. Led by Shape magazine in conjunction with a number of advertisers (including Honda, granted a car company that is making some effort to build environmentally friendlier cars), the program seems to be a exposure opportunity for the magazine's key advertisers under a conveniently alliterative umbrella.

My pilates studio is getting behind Pilates for Pink and having a few classes this month that raise funds for breast cancer research. Knowing how little pilates teachers make (teaching is often their source of income to support dance or other creative and low-paying careers), I'm all the more grateful that they'll donate their time to this effort.

So yes, I'm critical of some of the pinkwashing, but on a personal note, I'm grateful for the abundant exposure the disease gets and only wish other serious issues did too. At risk of sharing too much, I found a lump in my breast last, yes, October, while in a remote part of the world (think electricity every other day... if god was willing and the creek didn't rise). Miles from the nearest Internet connection, I was grateful to have a copy of the October issue More Magazine with me which explained the likely (and not so likely) possibilities of what I found. Bottom line, I probably didn't need to worry... but it was hard not to. Six months later, I had surgery and was relieved to learn that it was just a lumpy lump; not cancer.

Will I be at Pilates for Pink classes? You bet. But I'll be wearing my t-shirt to encourage investing in women to overcome extreme poverty, and maybe a red AIDS ribbon, too.

so what about that teaser challenge?

Teaserme was actually started as a challenge to myself -- to be able to do a teaser by the end of the summer. The action/blog challenge was inspired by another interesting challenge: Trash Talk to carry one's own garbage for 2 weeks as a way of building awareness of how much garbage you really generate and the simple things we can all really do (yeah, I know, blah blah, Al Gore, blah, but it's true) to reduce our waste.

So while the Trash Talkers' challenge has helped them come to terms with their wastefulness and perhaps inspired them to make some truly lasting changes that may contribute in a teeny tiny way to the global environmental crisis we are facing... what has my pilates challenge done or the world? In a word, nothing. And what has it done for me? Again... not so much.

I'll plead busy: Work has consumed me this summer. And bad weather: The coldest winter anyone ever spent was a summer in San Francisco (global warming anyone? They say it'll just put us under water - and possibly make it even colder here. Lose lose, people.) I'm not sure why bad weather has prevented me from teaser-ing, but there must be an excuse in their somewhere.

That said, I'm rededicating myself. I got that first glimpse of fall tonight on my way home. It was 7 pm, but there was something about the light that made me think of wool sweaters and blister-inducing back to school shoes. The summer is almost over, and I have not made enough progress. I call my weekend swims waterlates, but let's face it, I'm just splashing around hoping I'm burning off some Pinkberry.

I'm going to class on Wednesdays and Fridays. And home-practice one night per week, plus swimming on weekends. I've always been the procrastinator and somehow can pull these things together in the last few days of the term... I'm counting on that ability this time. I will teaser.

in and out

Wise words from Madison last night: He started the class by reminding the importance not just of entering each pose, but of exiting with grace and control, too. It's very easy to start with perfect composure and control but once the powerhouse is burning and the pose is almost complete to just sort of dissolve into quivering muscles and let everything flop. But starting, being in, and then completing each move quietly and with consistent focus is not just difficult but enhances the whole experience.

east coast or west coast?

East Coast and West Coast rivalries extend beyond just politics and fashion. From swing to rap to pilates, the coasts have very different perspectives on just about everything and that includes pilates.

When Joseph and Clara Pilates came to the US, they settled in New York City where they worked with dancers who naturally benefited from the exercise both for training and rehabbing from injuries.

Ron Fletcher, a dancer with Martha Graham, studied with Joseph and Clara, and moved to Los Angeles, where he opened his own studio in the early 70's -- effectively west-coast-izing the work. Tupac to Joe's Biggie -- but without the guns.

Perhaps it was California in the 70's and 80's but it seems that west coast pilates uses more aspects of yoga and is often considered less true to the original work... according to east coasters. I think those of us on the west coast recognize that we are just innovators at heart and while committed to form, find room for further development of the practice. Whatever you choose to believe, the work is slightly different: East coast inhales on the muscular effort and exhales on the release, while west coast exhales on the muscular effort and inhales on the release. The former may be more difficult and a good explanation is here.

Personally, I've done both types of breathing and don't find a significant difference between the two, other than just remembering to be consistent.

pilates history

Most every Pilates student knows the basic history of "Joe" and his German roots, the reformer having been invented as a rehab tool for people confined to their hospital beds. A good historical perspective on Joseph and Clara Pilates illustrates how the exercise came into existence and then spread virally nationwide.