improve your quality of life

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84 PREMIER ISSUE 2014 www.nowsingapore.co.id SPA & HEALTH improve with pila tes your quality of life By LayYong

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It is quite prevalent in today's digital lifestyle, people suffer from common aches and pains - these affect the quality of life. Yet many people do not understand the causes of their aches and pains, and what they can do about them. A key tip make time to exercise, and choose the right program that will retrain your muscles to gain a better posture and to improve flexibility and mobility in all joints.

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Page 1: Improve your Quality of Life

84 PREMIER ISSUE 2014 www.nowsingapore.co.id

SPA & HEALTH

improvewith pilates

your quality of life

By LayYong

Page 2: Improve your Quality of Life

85www.nowsingapore.co.id PREMIER ISSUE 2014

Pilates, the physical fitness system created by Joseph Pilates in the 1930s, has been popular in the US for many years. Recently its popularity worldwide has grown quickly and Singapore is no exception. In the last five years, Pilates has grown rapidly here, with classes being conducted in parks, gyms, community centres and offices, as well as fully-equipped studios.

This growth can be a ributed to its versa lity and the crea vity of the exercises or ‘movements’, as Pilates’ teachers prefer to call them. Pilates can easily be adapted, from people with no exercise experience to hi gh performing athletes like marathon runners, tennis players or golfers.

I started prac cing Pilates a er suff ering chronic shoulder pain due to long hours spent at the computer. The pain aff ected my quality of life – I couldn’t focus on my job, had fears that it might aff ect my career and I couldn’t enjoy fun mes with friends and family.

Although I tried alterna ve treatments to relieve the pain, it was through the prac ce and educa on of being a Pilates teacher that I understood the leading cause of the problem and could manage it successfully.

Ron Fletcher, the American Pilates Master Teacher and student of Joseph Pilates said, “ Movement is Life. Life is Movement” and I strongly believe our quality of movement is synonymous with our quality of life.

Today’s technologies may have greatly improved our lives but they have signifi cantly changed the way we use or underuse our body, with nega ve consequences. It’s very common today to see people with forward head posture and rounded shoulders - the result of spending long hours at the computer, on the phone or hunched over a tablet. Recent research in Britain suggests that UK adults spend more me on media devices than sleeping and this is probably true in Singapore too.

Poor posture can aff ect our ability to balance. Simple balance is the ability to get up from a chair, stand and walk without a problem. Poor posture means some muscles are ght

and some muscles are weak, which may not allow individuals to react well when faced with uneven terrain. This can result in falls and injuries such as sprained ankles and wrists or broken bones. Balance is even more cri cal for older people. There are signifi cant risks for older people when they fall as they may suff er a fractured hip, wrist or elbow which may take longer to heal. And o en a er a fall, a cycle of fear can prevent an individual from moving normally, aff ec ng their quality of life.

In recent mes, si ng too much is some mes known as a si ng disease? It’s not just a syndrome for the elderly. In today’s world, most of us are si ng too much – driving to the offi ce, at the offi ce, driving home and then in front of the television at home. On MRT trains people are seen scrambling for seats, even a er spending so many hours si ng in the offi ce.

We lose fl exibility and mobility in our hip joints when we sit too much. The hip joint allows us to walk, run and jump. It is one of the more mobile joints in our body. Having good hip mobility allows us to move well, preven ng too much wear and tear thus reducing the risk of hip replacement and other joint problems in later life.

Pilates training is used to retrain your muscles to gain a be er posture and to improve fl exibility and mobility in all joints. For clients with posture problems and poor hip mobility, it’s important to stretch out front chest muscles, strengthen upper back muscles and retrain shoulder joint movement. For improved hip mobility, Pilates exercises stretch ght muscles, build strength and prac ce hip joint movement to increase fl exibility.

All Pilates exercises can be adapted to diff erent levels of fi tness and strength, with the common philosophy being that movement is life, so we need to keep moving to stay healthy. For free videos of Pilates training, go to h p://pilatesdaily.net

LayYong has been prac cing and teaching Pilates for over nine years and is co-founder of Pilates BodyTree® Singapore. In July 2014, PBT opened an affiliate studio in Jakarta, Indonesia.Email: [email protected]: www.pilatesbodytree.com