Be well in life & within yourself

If you need inspiration, if you need to detach from the everyday, to reset your mind body and soul, join our Wellness Retreats in Italy. You will find yourself enjoying nutritious meals, developing a peaceful mind and forming a healthy body alongside other deserving women. We welcome you with open arms.

 The Benefits of Pilates

A mind-body workout

Pilates has been described as a thinking person's exercise. This is because when Pilates is practiced correctly it is a form of mindful movement. By working with the breath and finding correct spinal, and pelvic alignment, and concentrating on smooth, flowing movements, you become acutely in tune with your body. You gain awareness and control over your body's movement and build muscle memory of the optimum biomechanics for your body. It is about quality of movement rather than quantity. We work with the breath to connect the deep muscles of the abdominal region (the core) and combine it with specific, intentional movement. This helps the mind stay in tune with the body and the present moment rather than getting lost in thoughts, rumination, planning etc. It can be deeply restorative in this way.

Improve posture & spinal health

The core consists of the deep abdominal muscles along with the muscles closest to the spine. It is not uncommon for me hear from clients that their friends and family comment on how great they are looking and how much their posture has changed.  They can even look taller.  In Pilates we help you find the optimum posture for your spine and build and strengthen the muscles to support this.  This naturally changes how you hold your posture in your day-to-day life and supports and protects the spine from injury and can reduce pain.  This is invaluable for injury recovery, sports performance, good posture and optimal health. We aim to build strength, stability and mobility around all of the joints in your body helping you to move safely and gracefully in your everyday life.  It is all about functional movement so you can live your best life!

Gain long, lean muscles and flexibility

Buildings strength through Pilates is done very differently to your traditional Gym workout. It works to build long, lean, toned muscles that work perfectly within the context of your body as a whole. Pilates exercises work to strengthen the weaker muscles and give the overactive muscles a break by demanding that you work symmetrically. It is all about creating balance.  It also makes you more aware of your body, enhancing coordination, proprioception, and strength. Fewer repetitions with the greatest precision, quality and control means that you get the most out of your workout. We increase flexibility through range of movement exercises designed to improve flexibility as well as taking time for traditional stretches. 

It’s gentle but it is also challenging

Most of the exercises are done in reclining or sitting positions, and are low impact. Pilates is so safe it is used in physical therapy facilities to rehabilitate injuries. It is also challenging enough to be used by elite athletes to improve their performance. In my classes I aim to meet the needs and levels of everyone in the class safely.

Mindfulness Meditation

 Mindfulness meditation is not an emptying of the mind or an absence of thought. It is not a practice of turning off our thoughts or feelings. Mindfulness meditation is a practice where we learn to observe them without judgment. It is the cultivation of present moment awareness.

We all know what it is like to eat something delicious but to be so distracted by our thoughts or something else (multitasking) that we miss the experience entirely. Before we know it, that moment is gone and we are onto the next thing. We can live our lives this way. Anxiously moving from one thing to the next without ever really living or being present.

Mindfulness enables us to be present for life. For one another. To know ourselves. To explore the thoughts or emotions that arise with curiosity rather than avoidance or judgement. This is very powerful. The benefits of mindfulness meditation are numerous and varied and supported by science. Reduces stress, controls anxiety, promotes emotional health, enhances self-awareness, lengthens attention span, may reduce age related memory loss, can generate kindness, may help fight addictions, improves sleep, helps control pain, can decrease blood pressure and it is accessible anywhere.

Thich Nhat Hanh - Mindfulness is the practice of being fully present and alive body and mind united. Mindfulness is the energy that helps us to know what is going on in the present moment. I drink water and I know that I am drinking water. Drinking the water is what is happening. Mindfulness brings concentration. When we drink water mindfully, we concentrate on drinking. If we are concentrated life is deep and we have more joy and stability. We can drive mindfully, we can cut carrots mindfully, we can shower mindfully. When we do things this way concentration grows. When concentration grows, we gain insight into our lives.

A poem by Jon Kabat Zin:

Tasting Mindfulness

Have you ever had the experience of stopping so completely,
Of being in your body so completely,
Of being in your life so completely,

That what you knew and what you didn't know,
That what had been and what was yet to come,
And the way things are right now
No longer hold even the slightest hint of anxiety or discord.

It would be a moment of complete presence,
Beyond striving,
Beyond mere acceptance,
Beyond the desire to escape or fix anything or plunge ahead.

A moment of pure being
No longer in time.
A moment of pure seeing, pure feeling.
A moment in which life simply is|
And the is-ness grabs you by all your senses
All your memories
By your very genes.
By your loves and welcomes you home.

Pause and breathe to take it in
This moment in your life.

 Yin Yoga

Yin Yoga is a gentle, restorative form of Yoga. It has been around for thousands of years and some of the oldest yogic texts note only sixteen postures, which is far less than the millions of postures practiced in a yoga class today. In addition, these original postures were quite yin-like in style, designed to help promote meditation and sitting. It is important to maintain a balance of Yin and Yang practices to support optimum health and wellbeing.

Yin Yoga helps balance out the more Yang practices such as athletic Vinyasa flow Yoga classes, Pilates or Cardio workouts.

Yin Yoga is a more relaxed, cooling, calming, rejuvenating, grounding practice that has tremendous benefits for body, mind and soul.

The Class

In a Yin Yoga class the postures are more passive and predominantly done on the floor either seated or lying down. It is slow paced and therapeutic. We come into asanas (poses) with or without the support of props finding what is called your edge and then holding that for longer periods of time. It is common to hold a pose between 2-6 minutes but poses can be held for even longer. Your edge is where you feel the sensation of stretching but without coming into any negative pain or pushing into a stretch as you would in active stretches. Rather we allow time and gravity to do the work giving the body a supportive environment to let go. We create an environment where the parasympathetic nervous system can take over. Rest, restore and recover. We want the body to feel safe to release the tight muscles, ligaments and connective tissue. We are trying to access the deeper tissues of the body, such as connective tissue and fascia.

Fascia 

Each part of the entire body is connected to every other part of the body by fascia.  Fascia covers and goes within every muscle, bone, nerve, artery, vein as well as our internal organs, heart, lungs, brain and spinal cord.  It is found in every bone, muscle and organ but it is most concentrated in the joints.  If we don't use our full ranges of movement and joint flexibility, the connective tissue will slowly shorten to the minimum length needed to accommodate your activities.  So, understanding this brings great implications to the way we live in our modern world.  So much of our time is time spent seated in front of screens or driving cars in contracted positions among other mobility limiting habits.  In the morning when we wake up and feel that urge to stretch that feeling of the first stretch and movement is a release of the fascia that has built up over night.  When fascia has built up over long periods of time it requires time in positions without muscle activation to release or manual massage in myofascial release work. Your fascia requires at least 2 minutes of continued pressure to exhibit change.  This is what we achieve in a Ying Yoga class and the benefits to your overall health, quality of life and wellbeing can be significant.   Holding our Yin poses for extended periods of time increases blood circulation to connective tissues and enhances lymph movement.  They increase range of movement and fascial fluidity. 

Mind & Emotions

While Yin Yoga is wonderful for the physical body it also can have a very positive impact on the mind and emotions.  In Yin Yoga we are able to move into the parasympathetic nervous system.  We have strong physiological responses to stress which are controlled by our autonomic nervous system.  This is the involuntary part of our nervous system that controls our heart, blood pressure and digestion.  When we feel stress, fear or anxiety our body moves into the sympathetic nervous system which is known as the fight, flight, flee response.  It's a survival mechanism so we can escape or fight the proverbial Lion.  This releases chemicals that temporarily improve performance such as cortisol, adrenaline and other stress hormones.  Our heart rate increases, blood moves into our muscles, heart and brain so we can think quickly and do what we need to do to survive.  This is only meant to be temporary.  Our body is able to recover from these stressful situations via our parasympathetic nervous system.  When we switch into the parasympathetic nervous system, we stop producing the stress hormones so that we can rest and recover.  In life today chronic stress can seem more like a way of life.  Demanding jobs, family responsibilities, traumatic events all take their toll and can be damaging to our health and peace of mind.  In Yin Yoga we are asked to use the breath or sensations in the body as an achor in the same way that we do in meditation.  We focus on the present moment allowing thoughts and feelings to arise and to let them go rather than to attach to them.  The constant chatter of the mind can fade away, opening a space to just be.  The benefits of this on the mind, body and spirit are profound and need to be experienced to be understood.  

Sone of the Benefits of Yin Yoga

Improved Sleep
Reduced Stress and Anxiety
Increased Circulation
Increases Flexibility and Range of Motion
Builds Strength and Perseverance
Releasing Stored Emotions
Encourages Slowing Down
Shifting into the Parasympathetic Nervous System
Cultivates Gratitude and Joy
Releases Fascia and Improves Joint Mobility
Forces Us to Slow Down
Encourages Self Compassion and Healthy Body Image
Encourages Mindfulness and Meditation
Balances Internal Organs and Improves flow of Prana
Balances our fast Paced and Yang Yoga Practice, Pilates or other Exercise Modalities

Self Myofacial Release
Using Massage Balls

Myofascial Release is a hands-on technique that involves applying gentle sustained pressure into the Myofascial connective tissue. This helps to eliminate pain and restore movement. We work with Massage Balls to release fascia and tight muscles. It is essentially a form of self-massage. It can be empowering to learn these techniques to ease pain and restore movement. The balls roll along the skin to increase circulation, create heat, calm, and lengthens not only the targeted tissue but the associated tissue as well. They can also be held on a particular spot to release knots and tension. This process is called 'myofascial release'. 'soft-tissue release' and sometimes trigger point therapy'.

The first time I did a class that incorporated the use of these balls I was blown away by the difference in how I felt and my range of movement. We do not always have access to a massage therapist but these balls enable us to release our tight muscles and connective tissue ourselves. Often when I am receiving a massage, I would like the therapist to spend longer on a particular area as I can feel in my body where the tension is. With the balls we have control over the pressure and time spent on an area. In a class you will be guided through a series of movements and ways of working with the balls. This can be in a specialised class sequence or incorporated into Yoga or Pilates classes to compliment the exercises.

The Benefits

Improve your range of motion and flexibility.
Improve muscle function.
Reduce soreness and help assist the tissue recovery process.
Help the body relax overall.
Improve circulation.
Release tension, knots and stress