30 Days of Wellness at Revive

Day 8 - I feel better now

2010-06-11T19:52:00.000-07:00

I have always been into cardio and weights for any exercise I have done in the past. In the past I have avoided Pilates as I struggle to stay focused due to my short attention span. I am very easily distracted! I always found it hard on my brain as well as my body – for people who say Pilates is too easy – they haven’t really tried it! It’s very challenging and judging by our advanced clients who have come to our studio twice a week for nearly seven years, the challenge never ends! You can continue to master exercises and move up in levels. I did my session with Shauna today. I had a lot of work to do and was not feeling motivated but I’m glad I did. I felt so much better after. Exercise always works that way. You dread getting up in the morning or having to leave your house at night to venture out into the cold for a class, but it’s worth it. Why do have such a short memory for how good we feel after exercise?

Day 7 - Childs play

2010-06-07T23:13:00.000-07:00

Oh boy was I in for fun yesterday. I did kids Pilates. Yes, Kids Pilates – I am trying out everything I possibly can. Shauna Farquhar takes this class twice a week – I think that is all she could handle as it is hard work! There were five of us in the class – four kids and one big kid (me). These classes cater for kids aged 5 – 12 and focus on stability, balance, strength, fitness, the lot. Shauna is fantastic with kids. She treats every one of them equally and is very kind and encouraging, though they will get sent to the naughty corner if they are misbehaving. She makes exercises we do in normal Pilates sound so fun, and they were. We were jumping on volcanos over crocodiles, being aeroplanes and surfing. I was so good I even got a gold star on my hand!

Day 5 & 6 - Home sweet home program

2010-06-07T22:48:00.000-07:00

Ok so you know that extra credit I earned last Thursday. Well I need to use it! I had an big night out at the Sex and the City premiere on Friday night and I was feeling very sick the next day. I have had better days, though I have a commitment, so I did try my home program out on the weekend. It is great to have a home program but it makes it hard to (a) motivate myself to do it at all
(b) know if my technique is correct without studio mirrors or someone poking me in the ribs and
(c) try to concentrate when my sausage dog wants to sit on my chest and lick my face.
But, I seemed to make it through my program ok on both days - though ready to get back into the studio on Monday!

Day 4 - Posture

2010-06-07T22:41:00.000-07:00

Since I left school, my postural habits have become quite bad. I worked in retail clothing stores for several years and wore heels for 10 hour shifts on hard floors standing up all day until I actually got nerve damage in my feet! The dress standards were in the policy manual, and wearing high heels every day was one of the policies. Believe it or not, we actually got reprimanded if we were caught with flats on! Anyway, so with bad habits and work conditions teamed with my lack of body awareness, I developed very rounded shoulders and a very arched lower back. I wish I had discoved Pilates a long time ago!
Today I did a 1:1 with Louise O’Sullivan. Louise originally designed my program a few weeks ago and said she would include some challenging leg exercises (the ones I like) only on the condition that I would do my shoulder/postural correction exercises (the ones I don;t like). It was a deal, and now after doing my program a few times, I am finding that those exercises that I always thought were boring and slow are actually quite challenging, and if you work on it and focus during your sessions, you actually progress quite well! After only a few sessions of this program, I am really enjoying the postural exercises – perhaps even more than the rest of the program. I never thought I would see the day!

Day 3 - Good things come in twos

2010-06-03T16:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was up at 5:00am to do a core class taken by Louise O’Sullivan at 6:00am. It’s been a couple of months since I have woken up early for exercise, and it turns out that waking up at 5am is the same 6am – its dark, cold and either way you don’t want to get out of your warm cave of doona and flannelette sheets. Louise’s class involved a lot of balance, core and stability work on the bosu and foam roller. I was crowned bosu balance champion. After the session finished, I remembered how great it is to exercise before work. You feel much more energized and ready to start the day and your mind is so much more focused – I was extremely productive yesterday. After feeling so motivated, I decided to do a healthy bones class taken by Shauna Farquhar. This is a weights based class aimed mainly at improving bone density, but is also a killer fitness class! The women who were in the class were average age of 6o, so me at half their age only really lifting a little more than them, I was struggling as much as they were! They are really quite fit. So, if I did two sessions in one day, do I get a credit for another day where I’m just not feeling it? No? It was worth a try.

Day 2 - Namaste

2010-06-02T15:21:00.000-07:00

I worked until 6:30pm in the city last night and had to make it to Yoga at Ashgrove by 7:00pm so I had to hurry to get there on time as it is very naughty to be late to yoga. So to save time, I practiced some yoga skills by getting changed in my tiny car on the way. Don’t worry, it all happened at the traffic lights - where I did receive some strange looks! I happened to park really really close to a pole so could barely open my door and pretty much had to dive sideways out the car! I’m normally a much better driver than this. I arrived on time and flustered, but managed to relax after the first meditation. The yoga session was taken by Malcolm White, who is great! I really enjoyed his class. We had a class of eight people who were beginner to advanced level. Malcolm talks through anatomy in such a basic way that is really quite easy to understand. I often have a gut feeling in yoga “I shouldn’t be doing this – it doesn’t feel right” but not at all in this class. I felt pushed but not too far beyond my limits so I was comfortable yet challenged. Does that make sense? Malcolm also educated us about the pelvic floor, the core and the spine. His debrief at the end of our session encouraged us to be aware of our body’s habits at all times - how we sit and how we stand. Are we leaning to one side? Are we overusing particular muscles?

Walk tall, stand tall and lie long. Namaste.

Day 2 - Goals

2010-06-01T23:47:00.000-07:00

Julie (my boss) has encouraged us all to review our goals for this year since it is now June – are we all on track? Well, my goals that I set in January were:
1. Travel overseas
2. Be as organised at home as I am at work
3. Save money
4. Sew more
and of course 5. Take more care of my health and body.

So my tickets are booked for America in July with Shauna (one of our Pilates instructors) in case you haven’t already heard our count down. I can tick number two, three and four off. But number five is why I am here and what I am supposed to be talking about! This year, I have trained ten hours a week for 6 weeks to complete my first triathlon! I have had my skin, eyes, teeth and diet checked. But the cherry on top goes to the 30 days of Wellness challenge. I hope, no, I expect that it will get me back into a routine with exercise, but also help me get to know my body and what I can and cannot do with it. Today, I follow my 12 hour work day with a 75 minute yoga session, not to mention having to wake at 5am tomorrow for a Core class with Louise!! But I am very much looking forward to it and I think it will definitely be a worthwhile finish to my day. Stay tuned....

Breathe - Day 1

2010-05-31T22:11:00.000-07:00

Although I have been employed by Revive for almost four years, I have not always done Pilates consistently. You see, for most of our clients, Revive is a sanctuary to get away and take some time out for them selves. I do see Revive in this way, absolutely, but when you see Pilates all day, hear Pilates all day and talk about Pilates, (and I’m not even an instructor!) by the end of the day, staying back for an hour to do something that you feel like you have been doing all day anyway just doesn’t seem right. Think about staying back an hour at the end of your day at work – does it seem exciting to you? But in saying that, I do know that Pilates is so very important for everyone to do - including myself. So this is why taking care of my body and my health are a part of my 2010 goals.

Today, I did an equipment Pilates group with Jenny Tomkins. Jenny has had an extraordinary amount of experience in fitness, and a decade of experience in Pilates alone. She was doing it way before Madonna and yummy mummies made it cool. Jenny taught me the importance of the breath and to breathe out on exertion as your muscles are stronger when you do this. Easier said than done because once you are holding this in, sucking that and moving this, I am definitely holding my breath to concentrate! So once you think you have the exercise mastered you actually have to breathe too which adds a whole new level. Inhale and exhale……..

P.S. If you don't recognise me in 30 days, its because I might look like this!

2010-05-31T16:46:00.000-07:00

So I have committed……..to 30 days non-stop of Wellness at the one-stop-shop, Revive! This means I will be taking part in a Revive treatment or service for the next 30 days – every day – even Sunday where I will use my own motivation to do a home program designed by Pilates instructor extraordinaire, Shauna Farquhar.
I will be taking part in:

· Mat Pilates
· Equipment Pilates
· Physiotherapy
· Massage
· Boot camp
· Stretch class
· Core class
· Yoga
· Personal Training

I will be completing around 24 hours of exercise and treatment at Revive over the course of the next 30 days. And of course since and am a Gen Y, I will be blogging my experiences here along the way. Enjoy!