move – Page 4 – Personal Euphoria: Pilates & Fitness Classes in CT

Exercise of Life

We can exercise, which I highly recommend, but it’s hard for one hour a day of exercise to unravel eight hours in a chair. Even if your day isn’t spent in a chair, however you spend most of your time will start to be reflected in your body. In addition to making specific time to move every day, considering your body in space throughout the day can help you feel better in your own skin. Check in at different moments. If your back hurts when you are doing something is there a simple change you can make to relieve the pain? If you neck hurts can you make a subtle adjustment? Exercise yes. But make movement and noticing your body during simple movement the exercise of life.

Try to notice your body in the following scenarios:

When you brush your teeth, do your shoulders crunch up to your ears?

While washing dishes does your pelvis bump up against the sink?

When you bend over to scrunch your hair, do you tuck your tailbone?

When […]

Exercise of LifeMaggie Downie2018-02-14T16:49:03-05:00

Just Get Started

I went to Waterford High School, where I think I was lucky to have a number of really good teachers. One of my favorites was my junior year English teacher, Gail Dimaggio. She set up classes like Socratic seminars and asked us to think about what we were reading. It’s hard to teach someone to think, but that typically seemed to be her goal. One of her regular reminders was to “just get started.”

She told us that starting is always the hardest part, but once you start to write a paper the doing gets easier. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were wrong. It’s not the waiting that’s the hardest part. It’s the starting. Mrs. Dimaggio was right. There are […]

Just Get StartedMaggie Downie2018-02-14T17:44:43-05:00

Failure is Always an Option

We put so much emphasis on failing. Lately, I keep seeing articles about revisiting our thoughts on failure. Basically, failure is all the rage. And I love it. In a nutshell the articles point out that if you never fail it’s possible you aren’t trying. Arguably not to fail is to fail. We tend to put so much emphasis on success, a term we struggle to define. What makes a person successful—happiness, money, free time, a family, a home, the right outfit? There is no standardized definition of success. And, perhaps contrary to popular belief, failure is always an option.

Thanks to Merriam Webster for the following:

Success: 1) the act of getting or achieving, wealth, respect or fame. 2) the correct or desired result of an attempt.

Failure: 1) omission of occurrence or performance. 2) a state of inability to perform a normal function. 3) lack of success.

I don’t want fame. So, I guess in not achieving fame, I’m successful in my goal. I don’t think wealth is a substantive sign of success. It’s a superficial form. Maybe it’s a way to tally and compare, but wealth is not guaranteed to bring you joy, or a life without pain, or to make […]

Failure is Always an OptionMaggie Downie2017-12-29T19:44:01-05:00

Client Corner: Movement Helps Parkinson’s

Janice teaching barre in Glastonbury.

“Do what your body can do today,” Janice Flanigan calls out as my leg lifts for what feels like the millionth time and every muscle holding me up starts to burn. I’m at a Total Barre class in Glastonbury which Janice loves to teach because of its focus on the core, hips and legs. By the time 45 minutes have gone by I’ve gotten a full body workout, and I happily relax into our cool down.

Janice has been teaching many different types of classes for over 20 years. You can find her teaching Total Barre, Pilates Plus Strength, Interval Training Cardio, Low Impact Cardio-Strength and Kickboxing this fall with Personal Euphoria. Each class offers a different challenge for her clients. Janice says:

I love Pilates because of its precision. I love Yogalates because we get the best of both worlds with the spirituality and strengthening and stretching of Yoga and the critical core strength of Pilates.

A class that is particularly special is her weekly boxing class held at the Enfield Senior Center. The class is a combination of boxing and functional interval training, […]

Client Corner: Movement Helps Parkinson’sMaggie Downie2017-12-29T20:45:56-05:00

10 Summer Exercises

If your schedule changes in the summer and you can’t get to your regular Pilates class this video and blog is for you. Below you’ll find a ten minute Pilates workout of some of the best exercises to continue doing during your off season.

Best is always a sticky word because the ten best exercises would be different for every person and might be different for a specific individual on different days.

But what I think is good about this series is that is works you in flexion (rounded forward), extension (bending back), rotation and laterally (did you see how I threw in a plank there?). The spine gets mobilized in every direction. We work abs, back, glutes, legs and arms. And we bookended it with two of the best stretches ever.

Watch the video for help or print out this list and take it with you. You can do these moves anywhere, even outside in a park.

Reminder: You want to ensure your abdominals are gently engaged the entire time to keep the work out of your back. If you feel an exercise in your back, stop. Take a break. You can always try again later. Turn up the volume; it’s a little […]

10 Summer ExercisesMaggie Downie2018-01-13T16:15:45-05:00