Jan. 13, 2025
In searching for something to write about today, I wondered whether I had ever written about Pilates on this blog before. I modified the search of my posts from yesterday’s post to look for the word Pilates1 and it only came up once in a post about revisiting my ambitions ten years on.
There I wrote:
“I haven’t taken up meditation at all because the inside of my head is way too noisy. What I did do (at Ingrid’s suggestion) is take up Pilates: I swear by it now. It’s not quite the same as meditation but I’ve found the improvements to my core strength to be quite useful for my mental health.”
And so every week on Monday evening we trek down to our Pilates class. The walk itself has benefits. Tonight I noticed that it was not as dark as last week, it was visibly lighter and so it provides further proof that despite the cold, winter is on the wane. Meanwhile, we have a very good teacher who varies the classes: mixing in stuff we know by heart alongside rarer routines and those are new to us even after all these years.
I think I’ve been doing Pilates since late 2016. It’s been nice to progress from complete dunce to partial dunce over that time. At the start the routines would really wipe me out. Back then, they were on Wednesdays and it was always Thursday night and Friday morning when I’d ache. I get fewer aches now and I hope that’s because my body is a bit better trained now.
We even did classes online during the Covid lockdown. That wasn’t quite the same. For one thing, we had classes twice a week at some points. It was harder to follow along on the laptop and my mat didn’t feel quite the same on our lounge floor as it does at the dojo. Moreover, cats have interesting opinions about Pilates… perhaps they support the idea of cat stretches but get intimidated by downward dog. At any rate, you never knew what they would do: get the zoomies halfway through the class, or sit staring aloof from up high in the cat tower.
And yes, it does not take long for even someone with my mediocre effort levels2 to reap the benefits. Improved core strength leads to an improved sex life, which is great. And I was not just being coy in my earlier quote, there are plenty of other mental health benefits too. It is relaxing and not just because of our instructor’s wafty playlists but it’s useful to have that protected time to relax and then do planks for slightly longer than feels sane.
There’s a community too. Our class has had people come and go, but there are a core of people who I’ve seen week-in week-out for years. It’s nice to see them even if it’s just a nod at hello or goodbye. People probably get a similar sense of community from going to the gym or regularly doing a parkrun.
So if you are considering doing a class, I would urge you to go for it. I had some trepidation when I started and sometimes I still feel like a bit of a berk when I lose my balance or just can’t quite keep up with the sit-ups. But in a good class no one will be judging you or probably even looking at you, and besides the tough bits are all part of the fun!