The very first episode of Can Pilates make you Beautiful?!

This week The Art of Pilates will be talking with Helen Fletcher!

Helen Fletcher is level 4 APMA Professional Pilates Practitioner, movement educator and rider. She is former contributor to USA based magazine Dressage Today, and Australian Equestrian Life magazine. She is a Equitana 2018 presenter an a member of International Equestrian Biomechanics.

If people would like to find out more or contact Helen here are her links:

Email: [email protected] 

Website: https://equipoisepilates.com.au

Facebook: Equipoise Pilates

Phone: 0411 552 30

This podcast contains sensitive content as we talk about pregnancy loss and stillbirth. If it triggers anything for you, please contact SANDS on 1300 072 637

Lauren Hewes has been in the fitness industry for just over 20 years. In the early days, Lauren studied Applied Science (Physical Education) at Uni and after a few years of being a Physical Education teacher, Lauren moved into Personal Training and Pilates instructing. Lauren’s career has continuously evolved. Lauren is passionate about training postnatal women who have experienced pregnancy loss and assist them on their fitness journey. It’s through blending personal and professional experience that Lauren has created ‘Tiny Ladder' and is here today to talk about her vision.

“Tiny ladder is a interesting name for a business, particularly for a fitness business. It’s been in my visions for quite a number of years now and it’s through blending my professional experience and my personal experience that I had in 2009, I experienced a stillborn baby, my baby was forty weeks and two days gestation, when I found out my baby’s heartbeat had stopped and through that experience of stillbirth I felt my body had failed me, I felt like… I wanted to turn my back on my body. After awhile I became wanting to get back into my exercise regime, but ironically there was nowhere in the fitness industry I could turn, I didn’t fit into a regular mums and bubs class, I didn’t fit into a group training class as my post natal body had those consideration of that late pregnancy, so I developed Tiny Ladder by blending both my personal and my professional experience to create a safe space for women to meet, talk and train in a comfortable and safe environment following pregnancy loss with a postnatal exercise specialist.”

http://tinyladder.com.au/lauren-hewes/

https://www.facebook.com/TinyLadder/

SUPPORT NETWORKS – Australian organisations 

Stillbirth Foundation 

https://stillbirthfoundation.org.au/

Stillaware

https://stillaware.org/

Bears of hope

http://www.bearsofhope.org.au/

Rednose

https://rednose.org.au/

SANDS 1300 072 637

Pelvic Floor Essentials with Sue Croft 

Physiotherapist

Author Pelvic Floor Recovery: Physiotherapy for Gynaecological and Colorectal Repair Surgery and Pelvic Floor Essentials

In this podcast, I talk with Sue about the role of Pilates Instructors and pelvic floor health.

"It started about 30 years ago when I had my last child and I did 4 hours a week relieving at a major hospital in Brisbane. When that little locum job had finished, the girl who was doing pelvic floor health physiotherapy left and they asked me would I do it. No one else... "

Sue Croft is a Brisbane Australia Physiotherapist with a special interest in pelvic floor dysfunction particularly pelvic pain. Sue is a passionate advocate for pelvic health issues and speaks at physiotherapy, nursing and medical conferences and does many lectures to the general public.

Sue writes a blog (over 300 to date) on Pelvic Floor Dysfunction for the public and health professionals and she has discovered the power of social media such as Twitter and Facebook to disseminate information around pelvic health. Sue has written two patient-directed books: Pelvic Floor Recovery: Physiotherapy for Gynaecological and Colorectal Repair Surgery and Pelvic Floor Essentials which demystify pelvic floor dysfunction and give simple, easy-to-follow strategies for patients. Sue currently is a Committee member of the Continence Foundation of Australia’s Queensland Branch and has been involved with the Committee now for 28 years.

www.pelvicfloorrecovery.com

www.suecroftphysiotherapist.com.au

http://suecroftphysiotherapistblog.wordpress.com/

https://www.facebook.com/suecroftphysiofitness/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/sue-croft-10b50b3a/?originalSubdomain=au

Carla Mullins is based in Brisbane. She is an educator, creator and designer of the Makarlu, which is a amazing, Australian made, product. She is a teacher, a mother, an inspiration, an ex-lawyer. Carla is also a student studying occupational therapy.

“I’ve been exploring with these ideas for a while, and then in 2015, Michael, my partner, (who helped us with the Makarlu) his bicycle, got caught on a country bridge and he went flying over the country bridge, two and a half into a rocky river. He broke his pelvis, sacrum in six / seven different places. Wasn’t the best moment in my life. I found him in the freezing creek and had to help him up to the car and then get  him to hospital. He was in hospital for about six or seven weeks. The hospital was good, they had their rehab unit, and things like that. I channeled *channeled* Joseph Pilates, and had him in the hospital bed. I had all of these exercises and what we took in, I cannot tell you how much stuff, from foam rollers to franklin balls to tharabands: we had basically a suitcase of stuff that I had taken into him, into the hospital, to help him get better. 

The doctors said that Michael probably won’t be surfing for at least two years. If you knew Michael, this was not going to happen. So, we did all of this work and when we eventually did get him home, it was about three and a half, four months later. Were all worked hard and he was surfing, not well, but surfing at six months. So I was very excited. That whole process made us stop and think, when you’re injured or when you’re traveling or even in a studio. . ."

Kimi takes us on her own personal journey with her mind body connection and how this has made her a better Pilates Instructor. Kimi is a Polestar educator, mentor, studio owner and third for Pilates Anytime in 2018 as well as all round lovely person!

"The body and the mind are one.

When you identify with yourself as an athlete, and physical strength is your strength, and then you take a hit there (with an injury), you learn a lot about yourself and it can be really mentally debilitating. You can feel really worthless and lost, but it you can make it through it, and learn the lessons that it gives you, it can give you an incredible amount of insight and as a Pilates instructor, insight into helping your clients.

Having an injury makes you appreciate the gold in the basic Pilates exercises.

As Pilates instructors, our battle with clients that may be coming from a personal training world, it that we need to teach our clients that Pilates is not linear. We are constantly trying to go ‘is this beginner exercise, is this an intermediate exercise, is this an advanced exercise.’ It is too hard to do that because it changes from body to body, but it also changes from day to day depending on what the person is going through and how they are feeling. I guess that’s what that journey is about.

When we’re stressed, there is a hormonal effect. You’ll have a cascade of hormonal drugs pumping through your body, so your cortisol levels go up. As your cortisol levels increase, that does affect your tissue integrity. This is what happens, and what I believe contributed to my injuries.

We do hold emotions in our body.

My advice for Pilates instructors who are just starting out, if I can inspire you to be gentle, to identify that there is more to movement than just movement – it goes deeper, to create space for your clients, to be a little bit intuitive, to feel like an impostor but do what intuition tells you to do anyway. You are about to go on an amazing journey; it is more than just exercise. Pilates is so much more than just exercise and I think everybody should do it."

Amy Jayasuriya or better known as Amy J or Amy Jaya! Amy is a yoga and Pilates teacher, she also does teacher training workshops, she is based in Melbourne, and she is a mum with a three year old. Amy is a very inspiring person, she has done retreats in the past and we are going to talk about how to organise a retreat.  

"From a very young age I was introduced to meditation. My passion and love affair, if you can call it that, began with meditation, and then moved onto yoga. I love everything mind body and the peace it brings as well.

I thought Pilates and yoga go hand in hand, so I explored Pilates. I actually really like both modalities. I feel like they compliment each other. I feel like they have both helped me, weather I am injured or just need to roll the mat down and breathe or work on something specific. That’s what I like about both, they are non-impact and anybody can do it.

We all lead really busy lives, and we are always so busy with whatever is going on in our lives, partners, children, work, and all that sort of stuff. It’s nice to take a break from that business and really switch off. People come of retreats for that switching off. They don’t have to look at their diary the whole time, they don’t have to show up for appointments, so they really switch off, eat yummy food, explore different places, make new friends and also progress in their practice.

The main focus for me is to allow people to really let go and enjoy it. Everything is organised for them, all they need to do is show up for their yoga sessions. My main idea is that they actually Restore, Recharge and Relax.

At the end of the day what I want them to do is, after the retreat, try and take these feelings we create where you’re relaxed and if you get a bit stressed, we give strategies to cope with it. I just want them to take these strategies back to their everyday life. To cast their mind to: how would you deal with these stresses when they come up in their everyday lives, after the retreat." Amy Jaya

In this little podcast I talk to Jo Stewart about Yoga, Pilates, and Aerial Yoga/Pilates.

We discuss the creative process of designing and delivering a movement class, her new studio Garden of Yoga, and core philosophy. As well as her podcast Flow Artists and her business buddy and life partner Rane Bowen who has overcome stomach cancer.

"I think my core thing would be be on your own team...... If we put a lot of energy into being down on ourselves, or being negative or thinking about all the things we don't like about ourselves it totally saps our energy to make any changes. I think just cultivating self acceptance and self love is super powerful. If there are things about your life you are not happy with, rather than just being really self critical and negative about it, put that energy into making changes, but don't put a lot of energy into putting yourself down while you are doing that. I think that just makes everything harder if you are not on your own team."

Aerial Yoga | Yin Yoga | Studio Pilates

Jo's creative approach adapts to each practitioners individual needs, with a focus on body positivity, self compassion and inclusivity. She is excited to share the whole spectrum of yogic experience with her students - from high flying fun in the aerial hammock, to calm meditation in the quiet of a yin style practice. 

I loved talking to Jo about all things from Yoga to Pilates and Sound meditations in the Aerial yoga hammock. Loved to hear how Jo has grown her home studio into her dream and her journey with Rane. Please enjoy this little episode.

Rocco Sorace has created an awesome cook book "EAT your way SLIM" with meal planning to help everyone become better cooks and create a healthier lifestyle. I really loved recording this episode as I felt I learned so much about enjoying food with a healthy mind set to eating and improving the relationship to your body and your relationship to food. Thank you Rocco for your awesome inspiration!