I love Pilates and that’s one of the reasons I teach it. The other reason is it helped me with pain I was experiencing in my lower back and neck caused by an injury in my teens (a long time ago)!
Carol (my wife) had just finished her Pilates Instructors course and I decided to attend her newly formed class to give her my support. I never expected anything from Pilates after all it was for the ladies wasn’t it?
After about 9 months I realised that my back hadn’t bothered me for some time and eventually (I’m slow) linked my improvement with the Pilates I was doing. My back although will still occasionally give me a spot of bother is 200% better than it was and continues to improve.
I expected nothing and after a year of regular attendance at class (sometimes twice a week) I’d gained significant improvement.
However some of my clients seem to think that 40 years of poor posture can be “cured” in a matter of weeks! They expect any pain they have to disappear and their posture to improve almost immediately. They will complain bitterly that Pilates isn’t helping them at all and that after all they’ve been coming for 4 weeks and they still feel no improvement! Shortly after that they stop coming.
I sigh and chalk it down to experience.
Pilates is magic but it’s not magical. It takes time for the full benefits to be felt and time for the body to strengthen and re-balance. It’s not something that’s going to happen overnight.
Joseph Pilates promised that if practiced regularly Pilates will help you develop a strong mind and body and my experience has shown this to be true.
The main point is practice or put another way.
If you don’t do the drills you won’t get the skills or benefits that Pilates promises.