Pilates and other Exercises:
Resources, Books, and Videos.
by J. Zimmerman.

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Word of Caution (and see also"Power Pilates" by Dianne Daniels):

It's imperative that you consult your physician before you embark on any exercise program. Pilates (for example) is strenuous exercise and not suitable for everyone. This and associated Web pages are not intended as advice or assurance to any specific reader regarding his or her ability to perform an exercise program safely. If you do decide to begin, warm up your muscles before stretching them. You can walk briskly, jog, dance salsa, have a pillow fight, jump jacks, or chase the cat. But warm up for at least 5 minutes.

Pick from these great topics:

• Calorie Karma. The secret use of other people's momentum in weight loss.
• Get fit.
• Nordic walking.
• Pilates.
• Pilates DVDs.
• Pilates Specifics - some basic exercises.
• Reiki.
• Injury avoidance.

Get fit

• [Beginning.] "8 Minutes in the Morning: A Simple Way to Start Your Day That Burns Fat and Sheds the Pounds" , by Jorge Cruise, Anthony Robbins.

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  Buy "8 Minutes in the Morning"

  Jorge Cruise (a fitness trainer) reports that he has helped millions of cyberspace clients lose weight! This book shows how (with 8 minutes a day of muscle-building in 2 muscle groups) Cruise believes you can "drop two pounds of fat per week, change your shape, and gain muscle and energy." For each pound of muscle you gain, Cruise believes you burn an extra 50 calories per day.

  In addition to his brief daily weight-training program, you eat according to his guidelines, and keep a journal of the categories of food you eat. Thankfully, daily treats are included!

• [Beginning.] "Quick Fit: The Complete 15-Minute No-Sweat Workout", by Richard Bradley and Sarah Wernick.

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  "Quick Fit: The Complete 15-Minute No-Sweat Workout"

  "Move a little more, eat a little less." Richard Bradley

  The core of Bradley's book is, obviously, his 15-minute program. First, he has you self-test to determine if you need your doctor's permission. Then, here's your daily exercise. See his book, "Quick Fit", for details of each movement:

  1. Aerobic activity.

  10 minutes brisk aerobics, e.g. walking outdoors such as walking around the parking lot, airport, or railway station when you reach your destination, or walking round the block a couple of times when you come home. You can also put on some music and then dance or march in place for 10 minutes.

  2. Strengthening and stretching. Only 5 minutes more. If you are just beginning to exercise, add no more than one of the following each day. Eventually you are doing them all. To begin each of these, inhale first, then exhale smoothly as you lift the weight, then inhale smoothly as you lower the weight.

  1 minute each of: Abdominal crunch for rectus abdominis, the external obliques, the internal obliques, and transversus abdominis. Lie on the floor or on the bed, knees bent, hands at neck. 2 sets of 10. Start with only 1/day if you feel weak. Feel free to add 1/day to work up to 50 in a minute. Biceps curl for wrists and forearms as well as biceps. You can even try these without weights to start with, to get the feel of the motion. Stand tall. Move the forearm only, from your hip to your shoulder. Complete 10 curls with each arm, using alternate right and left arms. Floor bench press for chest muscles, shoulders, and triceps. Lie on floor (or bed) with knees slightly bent and feet flat on floor, one dumbell in each hand. Raise dumbells toward ceiling, then lower them. Repeat 10 times. Standing row for shoulders. Stand tall. Grasp the dumbells in front of your body. Raise straight up the front of your body till they reach your chin. Repeat 10 times. 30 seconds each of: Side bend for stretching upper body. Stand tall, hands on hips. Lift one arm overhead while bending toward the side where your hand is still on your hip. Repeat 10 times to each side, alternating sides. Move slowly and smoothly without bouncing. Sit and reach. Sit with straight legs before you, toes up. Reach arms toward toes. Relax in the stretch for 30 seconds.

  
  Congratulations, you have finished this part. See his book, "Quick Fit", for details of each movement, and for additional ideas.

  Notice that Bradley wears ordinary day clothes - no fancy leotards or muscle shirts. The rest of "Quick Fit" gives lots of good advice. It includes:

  How to figure out what kind of walking shoes to buy. Any obvious wear in the heel or sole of your shoes? Then buy a new pair. Add in 1-minute exercises like the posture pickup (p.172) (a 1-minute ab exercise). Try to accumulate 10,000 steps per day, which meets the U.S. Surgeon General's guidelines. Note that if you walk at 3 m.p.h. for 10 minutes, you cover half a mile, or 880 yards, which That is, then, only about 10% of that goal. Add in a little housework, a little playing with kids or going out dancing, a little walking around the shops, and you can increase your steps. Exercise reduces your risk of dying. Burn 500-to-1000 calories per week in exercise, and reduce your risk of death by 27%. Burn more calories (up to 2500 per week) in exercise, and reduce your risk of death by 43%. Exercises that you can add if you want to build up your program.

Pilates

The intention of each Pilates exercise is to engage the abnominals fully and therefore strengthen the body's core.

• [Beginning.] "Hilary Burnett's Pilates Basics". An excellent 24-minute tape that demonstrates breathing and a brief series of stretches, and then introduces a flowing sequnce of 10 basic Pilates mat exercises:
  1. Hundred.
  2. Roll Up.
  3. Single-leg Circle.
  4. Rolling like a Ball.
  5. Single-leg Stretch.
  6. Double-leg Stretch.
  7. Spine Stretch.
  8. Saw.
  9. Side Kicks.
  10. Seal.

• [Beginning.] "Pilates Beginning Mat Workout VHS". This tape introduces the Pilates method for working the body's central muscles (the abdominal and back muscles in your body's core) to improve your strength and posture and to develop a long body line. Also available as DVD.

• [Intermediate/Advanced.] "Pilates Target Specifics" (The Method Series)

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  Buy "Pilates Target Specifics" (The Method Series)

  Good features:

  1. Challenging yet [somewhat] attainable variety of stretches and movements.
  2. A pleasant non-gushy, non-squealy instructor (Jennifer Kries), who uses her 60 minutes to maximum effect.
  3. Combines methods and exercises from yoga, dance, and Pilates.
  4. Uses 6 demonstrator dancers, including one who shows easier steps in the workout, to help beginners.
  5. Energizing yet non-invasive live music (percussive) accompaniment.

  Jennifer Kries leads you through four quick (15-minute) Pilates sequences to tone different areas:

  1. Abs. Targets the muscles that support the lower spine and the abdominal muscle groups that shape your waist.

  2. Arms. Firm your triceps, biceps, and shoulders. Use light hand weights (1-to-3 pounds) to avoid bulking up.

  3. Hips. Perform these toning exercises from yoga, dance, and Pilates, to trim and firm your hips.

  4. Thighs and buttocks. Perform these standing and floor exercises from yoga, dance, and Pilates, to trim and firm your thighs.

• [Various levels.] "Power Pilates" (book) by Dianne Daniels.

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  Buy "Power Pilates"

  Advice includes:

  • Advice on how to position your body to begin and how to scan it for "unnecessary tension".
  • "Always start with the Beginner exercises."
  • Enhancements that you can make to improve "ease, fluidity, increased range of motion".
  • Feldenkrais movement re-education as well as Pilates.
  • How to develop appropriate intention in your mind, by thinking about "doing the exercise with a body that's light, flexible, and responsive."
  • Breathing cues: on the indicated inhale, imagine that you lengthen your entire body; on the exhale, expel all the air "through pursed lips as you contract your abdominals and perform a Kegel".
  • Powering down, to perform the exercises without strain.
  • Powering up, to intensify the work.
  • How to listen to your body and "distinguish between 'good hard work' and 'pain'".
  • How to stabilize the pelvis and the spine.

• [Various levels.] "Pilates for Dummies" (book) by Ellie Herman.

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  "Pilates for Dummies"

  A chatty introduction to Pilates. It includes a sensible series of loosening stretches to do before. Then, its basic sequence of Pilates mat exercises is:

  1. Coccyx Curls.
  2. Upper Abdominal Curls.
  3. Hundred.
  4. Balance Point (Teaser Prep).
  5. Hip-Up.
  6. Rolling like a Ball.
  7. Single-leg Stretch.
  8. Rising Swan.
  9. Roll Down, which the book calls a beginning version of the Roll Up.
  10. Bridge.
  11. Spine Stretch.
  12. Side Kicks.

  See the book for the intermediate series and the advanced series.

• Additional Pilates resources of less good quality.
  • [Beginning.] "Pilates-Inspired Matwork Foundation". Demonstrates matwork and includes use of extensible band to aid matwork. Lacks motivation for the viewer.

  • [Advanced.] "Hilary Burnett's Pilates Advanced". A 23-minute tape of over 40 challenging Pilates mat exercises presented in a flowing sequence in a high-ceilinged room filled with cushions, tiger skins, and candles. Despite the decor, Burnett is instructive to watch. The two problems of quality are (1) the tape jammed my VCR and (2) with a single 23-minute program, this tape is skimpy.

Pilates Specifics

These are some of the more basic Pilates mat exercises.

For specifics, be sure to see the Pilates books and recordings listed above. Note: before exercising, be sure to do some loosening-up stretches, lying on your back with knees bent, with your spine in neutral. They include:

1. Breathing with neutral spine.

2. Shoulder shrugs.

3. Shoulder slaps. Reach your straight arms upward, lifting your shoulder blades off the lap, then letting them slap on your mat.

4. Arm reaches/arm circles. Reach your straight arms upward, back beside your ears, outward, down by your sides, then upward again.

5. Coccyx Curls.

6. Tiny steps. Exhaling, pull your navel to your spine and lift your right knee to your chest.
   Inhale, holding the position.
   Exhaling, pull your navel toward your spine and bring your right bent leg back to the mat.
   Repeat with alternate legs.

7. Upper abnominal curls.

8. Hip-Up.

9. C Curve Roll Down Prep.
   (1) Inhale, holding outsides of thighs near knees, sit tall.
   (2) Exhale, pulling navel to spine and hollowing lower belly to make a C curve of your lower back. Begin rolling down your spine, so your lower back presses the mat.
   (3) Inhale.
   (4) Exhale and press your back into the mat while keeping the C curve and returning to sitting on your tailbone, but now your head is at your knees.
   (5) Inhale and stack your spine vertically.
   (6) Exhale while sitting tall.

10. Modified Rolling like a Ball. In these preliminaries, wrap the hands around the outside of the thighs (instead of holding the shins). This exercise combines Hip-Up and Balance Point (Teaser Prep)

Different programs suggest ten or a dozen basic Pilates mat exercises, doing between 4 and 9 repetitions. Unless otherwise specified, begin by lying on your back with knees bent, with your spine in neutral. Usually the exercises include many of the following:

1. Balance Point (Teaser Prep).
   Basically a Coccyx Curl with your feet off the floor.

2. Bridge.
   Breathe in deeply, pulling your navel toward your spine, squeeze your lower butt muscles, flatten your lower back on the mat. Lift up your tailbone so that you form a straight line from shoulders to knees; this is the Bridge position.

3. Coccyx Curls.
   Breathe in deeply, pulling your navel toward your spine, squeeze your lower butt muscles, flatten your lower back on the mat. Roll up your tailbone slowly so that after 5 seconds you form a straight line from shoulders to knees; this is the Bridge position.

4. Double-leg stretch.
   

5. Hip-Up.
   Put arms above your head (by ears) is you have enough abdominal strength to handle this. Lie on your back with legs bent up in the air, and feet crossed.
   Inhale and rock back, pulling your navel toward your spine as you lift your hips off the mat, so that your knees are above your eyes.
   Exhale, pulling in belly and lowering your hips.

6. Hundred.
   

7. Rising Swan.
   

8. Roll Down, which the book calls a beginning version of the Roll Up.
   

9. Rolling like a Ball.
   

10. Roll Up.
    

11. Saw.
    

12. Seal.
    

13. Side Kicks.
    

14. Single-leg Circle.
    

15. Single-leg stretch.
    

16. Spine Stretch.
    

17. Upper Abdominal Curls.
    Pull your navel in toward your spine. Lift head. Roll up (as if squeezing a small orange beneath your chin), till your shoulder blades are just off the mat.

Reiki

Reiki claims to heal by "laying on of hands". If valid, it could help ease your pains, such as from exercise or illness, without invading your body.

• Practical Reiki by Mari Hall. This book includes:
  • Meaning of Reiki. Hall writes that Reiki (pronounced 'Ray-key') is "one of the highest forms of energy that exists". Reiki is a Japanese word of two Japanese characters:
    • Rei, defined as "Universal life giving" and
    • Ki, defined as "energy or life force".
    Thence, Reiki is defined as "Universal Life-giving Energy". Hall writes that reiki perceived illness as "the result of imbalance"; that "Reiki makes its way to the areas of imbalance during a treatment", and that "The [Reiki] energy is transmitted simply by placing your hands on yourself or another individual."

  • Origin. Hall writes that Reiki "originated in Tibet over 3,000 years ago and has been passed down through the centuries".

  • Principles of Reiki. Hall defines five principles, after Dr. Mikao Usui:
    1. "Just for today, I will let go of anger."
    2. "Just for today, I will let go of worry."
    3. "Today, I will count my many blessings."
    4. "Today, I will do my work honestly."
    5. "Today, I will be kind to every living creature."

  • Four Degrees of Reiki. As defined by Hall:
    1. In the First Degree you reawaken four of your energy centers (chakras): the heart center, the throat center, the third-eye center, and the crown center.
    2. In the Second Degree you learn "absent healing".
    3. In the Third Degree, "the [three] lower energy centers are opened and attuned".
    4. In the Fourth Degree, "you are initiated as a Reiki Master".

  • Self Treatments. Hall defines a series of positions that one can place one's hands on one's own head, such as:

    "The heels of the hand are cupped at the lower portion of the skull, where the head ends and the neck begins. The fingers extend upward with the thumbs and index fingers touching." "Specific imbalances being treated: headaches and migraines; strokes; eye problems; ..."

    as well as the front of one's body and the back of one's body, such as:

    "The hand point downward with the heels of your hands at the waistline and the middle fingers touching the top of the tail bone." "Specific imbalances being treated: intestinal disorders; reproductive disorders; lower back problems."

  • The rest of the book addresses treating others.

Injury avoidance

• June 2002 Consumer Reports lists 12 ways to avoid injuries. The list includes:
  • Stretch before and after exercise.
  • Warm up and cool down with a pulse elevated 15 beats/minute (i.e., only slightly) above resting.
  • Progress gradually.
  • If you have to lay off for a while, restart at 50% (or less) of where you were before.
  • Hydrate with 2 or 3 cups of water in the 2-3 hours before exercising. Sip during exercise. Replace all lost fluid after exercise is complete.
  • Get good shoes.
  • Let old injuries heal.

  Alongside this, Consumer Reports offers good dietary suggestions:

  • Eat small portions of carbohydrate, and combine it with protein. (Protein reduces the blood-sugar spike that carbohydrate can give.)
  • Eat high-fiber grains and legumes: oatmeal, brown rice, whole-wheat bread, lentils, chick peas.
  • Eat healthful fats: olive oil, avocado, nuts, fatty fish such as salmon.
  • Low-glycemic diets are better than low-fat diets.

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