tips – Page 2 – Personal Euphoria: Pilates & Fitness Classes in CT

Standing Abs

There are multiple reasons to opt for a standing ab workout.

If you have trouble getting up and down off the floor, you don’t have to. Even if you can get up and down, these moves are convenient because you don’t have to pull out a mat and get on the floor. If you’re prone to neck pain when doing traditional ab exercises, standing abs reduces the chances the neck gets aggravated. Often, lots of other body parts are working with you while you do standing abs. And, as most of the physical challenges we face in life occur when we are standing, standing abs are a real functional type of movement.

Consider trying these moves in the NBC CT LIVE video below:

Side Bends with a Squat

Standing Bicycle –single leg or alternating

Opposing Limbs

Keep Reading

Looking for a more gentle way to Keep Moving? Click here to read about Low Impact Cardio.

Struggling to sleep? Read This Blog for effective exercise tips to improve your sleep quality.

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Standing AbsMaggie Downie2024-08-21T17:01:17-04:00

Exercise Tips for Better Sleep!

Sleep is vital to a healthy life. But it can evade us. Hundreds of research studies clearly show exercise can help us sleep. We all know that somewhat intuitively. We see kids playing physically and comment: “They’ll sleep well tonight.”

But research is not definitive for what provides optimal sleep. When should we exercise, how intensely, and what type of movement is best are all up in the air. The research is unclear, in part, because the answer seems to vary based on age, sex, chronic illness, and possibly fitness level.

Not having a definitive answer can feel overwhelming. But it can also be empowering. It means that you have room to experiment and see what works for you.

For years the mainstream advise was to do moderate cardio exercise in the morning because if you worked out late in the day, it would keep you up. Recent studies have contradicted that. Later workouts help some people sleep better. Workouts do raise our body temperature, cortisol levels, and heart rate. None of those help us sleep so you do need 1-2 hours after a workout to wind […]

Exercise Tips for Better Sleep!Maggie Downie2024-05-30T11:48:49-04:00

Spring Cleaning Safety Tips

The days are longer. The sun fuels our soul. And for some reason, we feel motivated to clean. There are a few theories as to why we clean this time of year:

The Practical:

Historically when we heated with coal and whale oil through the winter, it made things messy and homes needed a good cleaning.

The Religious:

Many religious traditions have a concept of cleaning out around springtime. Passover involves purging, cleaning, and renewal. There are indications spring cleaning is linked to Zoroastrianism and a Persian relationship to the spring equinox.

The Physical:

The longer days and added sunlight of spring may motivate us to move more and cleaning is a good, productive outlet.

Whatever our motivation is to spring clean, it is a great form of physical activity. A good spring clean can serve as your workout for the day. But it’s also easy to get injured. Injuries are usually caused by repetitive movement that strains a part of the body, falls, and lifting heavy objects.

Here are some tips to help prevent injury while you get your house (inside and out) in order:

Warm-Up:

I know this is a hard sell. But if you are about to clean […]

Spring Cleaning Safety TipsMaggie Downie2024-03-21T23:04:35-04:00

Help!!! I’m Losing Muscle!!!

Sarcopenia is the loss of muscle tone that happens as we age. It can be seen in lack of strength, balance, and speed—though there are currently no definitive measures for practitioners to look at when diagnosing sarcopenia. That might be changing as sarcopenia became an official disease in 2016. It’s considered a treatable disease.

New research indicates it also might not be inevitable. Humans may not just lose 3-8% of our muscle mass each decade starting in our thirties (that’s the actual data). It could be that each decade we move less and therefore lose muscle. That makes the answer simple: move more and keep your muscles. It also implies you aren’t fighting an uphill battle. So how do we keep as much of our muscle tone as possible?

Keep Moving and use the acronym MOVE:

Movement Awareness:

Notice anything you’ve lost. Is it harder to balance? Can you no longer get up and down off the floor. When you pick something up do you no longer squat and instead hinge from the back? Is it hard to lift a heavy pot suddenly?

Objective:

Set an objective. What do you need to train to help rebuild what you’ve lost? Who can help and is there anything […]

Help!!! I’m Losing Muscle!!!Maggie Downie2024-01-26T12:07:20-05:00

Mindful Eating February

We pick February for our Mindful Eating Challenge because it’s the shortest month of the year. We are not ashamed to admit it. Dry January. Veganuary (being vegan for the month of January). They got it all wrong with a month with 31 days when they could pick a month with 29.

Food challenges are hard. At Personal Euphoria, we are all about fitness, not typically food. But what we put in our bodies matters. It impacts how we feel. It is helpful to take a window of time and try to consider food. Food fuels us and when we exercise how we refuel matters. Sometimes, once I get started, I actually continue for more than 29 days.

Here’s the challenge if you choose to accept it:

You pick any food-related challenge you want—big or small. I usually give up sugar. I still eat fruit and a piece of toast if it has sugar. But I cut out all desserts and snacks with processed sugar. Sometimes I make an exception with honey. I am a beekeeper, after all.

You don’t have to give up sugar. Here are examples of ways others have participated before:

Give […]

Mindful Eating FebruaryMaggie Downie2024-01-19T12:48:34-05:00