Pilates with Sandra

Give it a try in your next lesson

I thought I might mislead you with the cover photo - but that’s me leading a short breathing meditation before a special Pilates class.

But here’s why you’ll want to keep your practice an eyes-open affair. 👀 (I’ve also thrown in a solid plug for why you might want to close them on occasion too.)

Pilates emphasizes precision, alignment, and awareness on a subtle scale so with your eyes open, you can visually orient yourself. Like noticing whether your pelvis is level, whether your legs are tracking evenly, etc.

Even if you’re not consciously looking at anything, your visual system is still contributing.

Keeping your eyes open gives your brain an additional stream of information to integrate with your proprioceptive & vestibular systems. (Which are generally accessed more with eyes closed).

So with eyes open, you’re utilizing full sensory integration.

You maintain spatial orientation and even lying down, your brain benefits from knowing where “up,” “down,” and the surrounding environment are.

Keeping your eyes open gives your nervous system more information with which to control movement.

Where you look can influence head position, neck tension, balance, and movement strategy. This is why Joe invented his eye chart.

So what changes when you close your eyes?
The sensory information your brain receives changes, even when the exercise feels completely stable (like the 100)

The proprioceptive & vestibular (inner ear) demand is greater. Balance and spatial orientation is more challenging. Cognitive and motor challenges can be harder.

But remember Eyes closed doesn’t automatically mean better body awareness.” Sometimes you can close your eyes and become more internally focused. But sometimes you simply lose useful information and become less precise.

So here’s how you might integrate the two (if you’re interested to do so):

Once you’ve learned an exercise safely, briefly close your eyes as a sensory challenge, and try to sense things like:
• pressure through your feet / hands
• your rib movement as you breathe
• amount of muscle tension
• subtle differences between your left and right sides

👀 What were you taught? What do you teach? What do you practice? And why?

I’d love to know.

Follow for more “Myths” & “Truths” about Pilates, its history, its practice and mindful movement technique.

If you can think of others who might be interested in this information, please share.

My students would agree. 😁

Instructor:

“I have something fun for you guys today.”

Immediate red flag.

Because apparently Pilates instructor “fun” means:

Less spring.
Smaller range.
More control.
And some deeply disrespectful variation you’ve never seen before.

Meanwhile everyone in class is shaking violently while she stands there smiling like:

“Isn’t this GOOD?!”

No, Jessica.

But unfortunately...

yes.

Had to share.

💯

So wonderfully put.

Couldn’t say it better. Thank you Brooke Siler Pilates.

Wonderful cues to deepen your Roll Up.

From my friends LifeSpan Pilates, A Romana's Pilates Studio

A Little Pilates History Worth Knowing

Joseph Pilates spent his entire life building a movement system with a very specific internal logic. Every exercise warms up what comes before it and prepares the body for what comes next. The sequence or "the order" is one of the most misunderstood things about the original method.

Here's why it matters: when the sequence is intact, the method becomes its own diagnostic tool. Structural imbalances surface. Compensations get corrected. The exercises work on each other in a way that only holds when the architecture is respected. Joe called it Contrology. Modifications exist for every body — but the order itself does not change.

We'll be unpacking the history and method in short educational pieces designed to give you a deeper understanding of the work you're already doing because understanding why the work is structured this way changes how you experience it.