Quick announcement before we get into the workout! This Tuesday is the August edition of Pilates for Abortion Funds, my post-Dobbs fundraiser that’s so far raised more than $40,000 for abortion funds. Learn more here or here:
Happy Sunday, friends! I recently had the pleasure of interviewing the brilliant Jessica Valant, MSPT, who is a physical therapist and Pilates instructor. She shared a Pilates term I hadn’t heard before, but that describes one of my absolute favorite elements of the practice: dissociation. It’s not the mental experience of feeling disconnected from your body or thoughts (that’s a different type of dissociation!) — it’s a physical ability to move one part of your body without allowing other parts to move. It’s one of the biggest reasons why I’m always saying that there’s no such thing as “easy” Pilates: If you’re doing an exercise that seems simple or easy, focus more deeply on, for example, keeping the rest of your body really still and neutral as the intended limb moves. This focus and dissociation helps make the exercise so much more challenging and effective.
Anyway! I decided to put together a Pilates-based workout for you where each exercise allows you to practice this concept of dissociation. To do it properly, you’ll need to find deep core, spinal, and pelvic stability to keep everything steady and aligned as you move. It feels great and is an amazing supplement to strength training (or whatever else you have going on). As Jessica and I discussed, we both kind of cringe at the term “mind-body connection” because it’s so overused, but that’s exactly what we’re practicing here: How can you connect so deeply to your body that you’re able to perform these challenging movements without letting some other part of your body go off-kilter?
You don’t need anything for this other than a mat.
Let’s go!
