Feel so good you'll dance in your kitchen! Simple shifts will make a huge impact as you become aware of the daily postural patterns that keep you in pain and add bite-size exercises into the things you're already doing everyday. Soon you'll feel lighter on your feet and you'll bounce and glide through your day.
Feel better no matter what
Last week I spent 9 hours driving to Big Bear Lake to see my family. (Yes, they threw me a sweet birthday party!) And then 9 hours home.
It was a fantastic visit. I got to ski in the perfect Southern California spring sunshine - the conditions were amazing - and snow shoe in the virgin snow behind our house at the edge of the national forest. (In April, what!?)
It used to just kill me to sit in the car that long but now I shift and tilt and rotate as I drive. Sometimes tiny movements to keep my body happy and sometimes full out car dancing to the pounding beat of some silly 80's love song while I sing at the top of my lungs!
Years ago I would experience sciatic pain down my left leg, terrible neck pain and spasms and feel terrible for days after a drive like this.
But I figured out how to take a mundane task like driving and turn it into an exploration of better functional movement. It helped that my Pilates teacher training (23 years ago now, wow!) was in San Francisco shortly after I moved up to Sonoma county, an hour and a half drive at best. Sometimes it took me an extra hour during rush hour. I was a newlywed so I wanted to rush home and see my groom!
I'd think about that day's lesson and translate it to my body during the drive home. I had atrocious postural habits before I did my teacher training, especially in the car. I slouched, tensed my shoulders and let my knees fall open. No deep support at all!
Imagining the movements I'd done that day on the Pilates apparatus kept me upright, aware and activated. Voila! I felt better when I got home, even after the stress of stop and go freeway travel.
I've taught my students how to translate better movement into their daily lives with great success for all these years. Why spend hours exercising and not let it explicitly impact the way you move through your day? It takes some awareness and habit building but the rewards are outstanding, especially as we age.
I created a course: Pilates for your Life to expand my reach to students who can't make it to my Pilates studio or afford the individual sessions I offer. I'm really proud of it and now I'm giving it away to the founding members of my newest creation, The Kitchen Dancer Community. In my last email I said I was charging $17 for it but I changed my mind. Through the end of April it's all free.
The course includes tutorials on the building blocks of integrating Pilates concepts into your life and 6 thirty minute classes in different environments, including Pilates in your Car.
You'll get access to the course and a growing community of like-minded movers who want to feel so good they dance in their kitchens - literally and figuratively. You'll be able to ask me questions as you go through the material, I'll answer you and maybe even create a new video to explain things more clearly.
Founding membership in the Kitchen Dancer community includes:
- 30 days free ($17 monthly charge grandfathered in for life after the trial period).
- Curiosity Labs (explorations of movements you want to learn how to do with more ease and less pain).
- Pop up dance parties (including tutorials for happy feet, knees, etc. which you can apply even if you don't feel like dancing.)
- A cool community on Circle.so where you can share your challenges and wins. I've got lots of fun ideas for building community, motivation, accountability and participation. There will be prizes!
- Discounts on workshops or Playshops as I call them. I've got 2 planned for May!
- Mood SHIFT - an exploration of how the nervous system effects how we feel: body, mind and spirit and how to work with the nervous system to create ease and joy in everyday movement, even if you have old tension patterns from injuries or trauma that you might not even realize.
- Your Feet Are Your Foundation - learn to love your feet, they are much more resilient and important than you think. Small daily attention to your feet make a huge impact up the chain of your whole body. Plus fun ways to practice and integrate better foot mobility and strength.
There will be recordings if you can't make it live and a growing library of courses and Playshops inside the community.
You'll receive your invitation on Thursday, April 20th. Make sure you look for that email it will include the link to join the Kitchen Dancer Community as a founding member.
For now, follow me on Instagram or Facebook to join in the excitement!
https://www.instagram.com/pilateshomepractice/
https://www.facebook.com/kakigrech
If you have any words of encouragement, I'd love you to hit reply and give me some digital love. Are you looking forward to being a founding member? Is there something you'd really like me to include? It's all for you!
It's lonely and weird creating a community by yourself in your bedroom - I can't wait to share it with you. I've built it based on real feedback I've received from real clients over 23 years so I know it will resonate.
With love and gratitude,
Kristen
https://kitchendancer.circle.so/checkout/kitchen-dancer-community
Pilates Home Practice
Feel so good you'll dance in your kitchen! Simple shifts will make a huge impact as you become aware of the daily postural patterns that keep you in pain and add bite-size exercises into the things you're already doing everyday. Soon you'll feel lighter on your feet and you'll bounce and glide through your day.
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If you ever feel pain in your knees, hips or shoulders you'll probably benefit from exploring the relationship of your feet to the rest of your body. Just a small shift in the way you stand into your feet will cause a ripple up your whole body. Stronger feet allow you to release tension up above and feel more grounded and at ease. It can be really simple to make a huge impact. Surprising, right? I had no idea when I first started to examine the role my feet play in my posture and the way I...