Movement Culture

Polestar Mentor Highlight: Juliana Fabio

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The Spirit of Polestar is their ability to bring creative, intelligent, innovative, kind and loving people together to not only create a dynamic and positive community but also family.

Juliana Fabio

What Three Words come to mind when you think of “Polestar Pilates”

Community

Family

Knowledge

What do you love about teaching Pilates and owning a studio? 

JF: I love making connections with my clients and instructors and watching them grow through the Pilates work.

Where did you take your training and who was the educator?

JF: My Polestar training was with Mette Hansen at my studio Aligned Pilates Studio in Santa Barbara.

What are your current Inspirations? 

JF: I am currently inspired by how our emotional health affects our physical health. I love teaching Pilates as a way to help others feel better and more empowered.

Why Pilates? How did you find the practice?

JF: I suffered from chronic back pain as a child and young adult. Nothing helped until I found Pilates in my mid-twenties. I no longer suffer from back pain and feel stronger and healthier.

Why Polestar Pilates? How did you come to join the Polestar Community?

JF: I wanted a more in-depth knowledge of how to work with people who have different pathologies. Over and over I kept coming back and taking classes and workshops from Polestar teachers. Eventually, I realized I needed to be Polestar trained.

What do you hope to convey in your teaching?

JF: I want to give my clients the tools they need to help themselves and feel empowered.

Is there a quote you live by?

JF: We are only on the planet for a little while. Making authentic connections with others is at the heart of what I do and who I am. I try not to take myself or life too seriously. I feel my best when I am present with the person I am with and living in the moment.

What is your favorite apparatus or favorite way to move?

JF: I love doing all the Runity movements. They are functional movements and can be used on any piece of equipment. Since I am a runner it has changed my life for the better.

Selecting a Pilates Studio

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You’re either new to teaching, you’re moving to a new city, or it’s time for a change, and you’re facing the big decision of either opening your own studio or finding an environment where you can teach. This article focuses on the latter: how to select the ideal environment in which you can thrive as a movement professional. Below are some helpful points to consider in your selection.

There will be various factors unique to you and the city you live in that you’ll need to consider, and this can help you get the process started. – Kate Strozak,

First consider the type of environment that would appeal to you most. Here are some of the typical options:

  • Corporate options: this entails working for a studio that is housed within a larger complex such as a gym, social club, hospital, or university. The benefits of these environments are that you’ll likely have support from an HR department, consistency with expectations, and you likely won’t have to concern yourself with your own extensive marketing. Protocol will have been established and there will be processes in place to support you in your work environment. Some instructors dislike this option because it might feel restrictive in terms of established processes and procedures, and you’ll have to adopt their specific corporate culture.
  • Small business: this option involves working for an independently owned business, and the sizes can vary. Some of the perks include joining a business that has a unique culture where processes and systems are evolving over time. Some instructors thrive in this environment as it may be more conducive to flexibility, creating your own unique identity, and being able to run your own business within a business. On the other hand, working in a small business might entail inconsistencies in terms of rules and expectations.
  • Franchises: these are an interesting mix between how I describe corporations versus independently-owned businesses. Franchises are typically owned by somebody local who has subscribed to the franchise model. You benefit from the consistency and procedures in place, but you will need to subscribe to the larger franchise culture, which permeates each independently-owned franchise. Franchises might feel as though you belong to a large community, which can be a satisfying experience for somebody.

 Second, consider the type of clientele you would like to work with. 

  • If you are passionate about working with a clientele with a specific condition or situation, you could either find an environment with an existing reputation for that specialty or you can find an environment that would support you in specializing. 
  • If research is of particular interest to you, it would be helpful to find a university or hospital-based environment that has existing resources to support you in your endeavors.
  • For sports performance-based specialization, see if you can collaborate with professionals already equipped and servicing this population. Some professional sports teams are building out Pilates studios within their training centers.
  • For the general public, you have a wide spectrum of options, and you’ll likely select your environment based on a multitude of other factors, including some listed below.

 Lastly, these are some miscellaneous recommendations to ensure that you’re being selective with your decision.

  • Spend time in the prospective environment at various times of the day and on a variety of days. Notice how coworkers interact with each other and with clients, and notice the clientele that come into the space. Does it seem like a supportive, collaborative, and positive environment?
  • If possible, talk with some instructors who have been working there to get their perspectives. What are their favorite attributes about the environment? What are their greatest frustrations? How long have they worked there? 
  • Is your goal to progress to a management position? This is a nice thought to consider early on, and it might be something you could begin with or work towards over time.
  • Do the requirements for the position seem rigorous? If you’re looking for a place to work that is focused on high quality and caliber, they likely have more stringent requirements for instructors coming on board. Continuing education benefits are more than just a bonus; they can indicate that an organization is willing to invest in their employees/contractors and that education and development are highly prioritized.

Ask the person you’ll be reporting to how they support you in building your clientele. It is helpful to know these expectations from the get-go. Do they expect you to market yourself and attract your own clientele? Are they marketing you and generating leads for you? Do they already have classes and clients established for you?

 This process can be challenging and lengthy. Everybody responds to changes differently, and considering that we spend so much time and energy on working, it certainly is a big decision to make. Above all else, be selective and go with your gut. Try to find an environment that will be conducive to your personal and professional growth and evolution.

You can find Kate on instagram at @katestrozak

Fascia in Pilates by : Kate Strozak
Pilates in Healthcare by: Kate Strozak

Fascia in Pilates

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Chances are you’ve heard about fascia and its importance in the human body – But how do we take this information and apply it to our training sessions with clients? – Kate Strozak

Fascia is a connective tissue that runs continuously throughout the entire body. According to the International Congress of Fascial Research, the fascial system:

“…consists of the three-dimensional continuum of soft, collagen containing, loose and dense fibrous connective tissues that permeate the body. It incorporates elements such as adipose tissue, adventitiae and neurovascular sheaths, aponeuroses, deep and superficial fasciae, epineurium, joint capsules, ligaments, membranes, meninges, myofascial expansions, periostea, retinacula, septa, tendons, visceral fasciae, and all the intramuscular and intermuscular connective tissues including endo-/peri-/epimysium.

The fascial system surrounds, interweaves between, and interpenetrates all organs, muscles, bones and nerve fibers, endowing the body with a functional structure, and providing an environment that enables all body systems to operate in an integrated manner.” 

Some in the field also propose that bone is calcified or mineralized fascia. Fascia is an important communication network in the body that communicates via photons. Its depth and function is remarkable!

Being aware of what fascia is and where it is located is a great start to incorporating our understanding of it in movement education and science.

Have you also ever wondered why continuously stretching what you think to be muscle tissue doesn’t consistently yield results in you or your clients?

Perhaps it’s not the muscles that need impacting but a fascial restriction that is producing sensations of tightness, restriction, or rigidity. How do you address this? I propose a whole body movement integration session with manual therapy, movement, or a combination of the two.             

Some schools of fascial-based modalities advise long, sustained holds to facilitate fascial releases. Other modalities might advise movement-based techniques to promote tissue gliding and release. I’d recommend trying both and seeing how your client responds. Every body is different, so some people might respond better to one technique over another.            

An example of a sustained hold would be a supine stretch over the ladder barrel where you can facilitate release of tissues in the front of the body by sustaining the position and breathing for 5 minutes.

The ladder barrel could be too extreme a range of motion for a client, in which case lying over a bolster, foam roller, or even on the ground might be more ideal. Make sure that your client is comfortable and isn’t feeling an extreme pull or tension anywhere. An example of a movement based fascial release could be book openings where you’re rotating into the position and rotating from the position in order to facilitate a release of tissues on the front of your body.             

Fascia runs continuously throughout the depths of the human body, so how can we impact those deepest fascial tissues? As Joseph Pilates intuitively knew, breath!

Practicing 3 dimensional, natural breathing that embraces the movement of our rib cage and diaphragm is perhaps the most accessible way to influence the fascial system. Applying your breath to sustained holds or to movements will help reap more benefits from your intervention.            

As one final thought on fascia and its role in movement, our tissues respond to the loads and demands we place upon it.

When we palpate and feel “tight tissue,” it might be there for a very good reason and not meant to be broken down or released. For example, our IT-bands. Our IT-bands have the tensional strength to lift a 2-ton car. In the human body, IT-bands support stability in the lower limbs and pelvis, help with knee tracking, and more. More so than releasing IT-bands, we could help people by addressing their methods of stability and their strategies for movement.            

If you’re looking for more information on fascia there are great resources out there. The International Fascia Research Congress offers yearly conferences, many massage therapy modalities focus on fascial tissue, and you can find all of the latest research on fascia utilizing research databases such as pubmed.

Interested in Learning more? Try our Online Course:

Subtle Energy and Pilates

Read Kate’s Blogs on the Nervous System, Healthcare and Expanding your Movement Potential

You can find Kate on instagram @katestrozak 

Efficiency: Should it Always be the Goal?

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Teaching Pilates has made me realize that the more I know, the more I don’t know. With any profession, hobby or skill set I am sure that’s the case. After ten years of teaching, I finally feel that I have a true understanding of the way the body works and how to help people achieve their goals. Regardless, I will always find a way to learn new things even in the most unexpected places. 

My current love is efficiency in movement. I have researched and experimented with how to make both my Pilates practice and life more efficient. Let’s say I am working with a client and we are doing feet in straps. The most efficient way to perform this exercise is to hinge from the hips and bring the legs up and down with ease and grace. If the client would tense up all of their muscles to do this relatively simple movement, they could potentially lose degrees of range and overexert themselves. It’s like cleaning my house in high heel shoes. I can definitely make it happen, but why would I waste time and energy walking around in those things when I can make my body work less to do the same thing in bare feet. 

This brings me to a new thought… is efficiency always the right choice? I learned the answer in the most unusual place: checking the mail. When I get my mail the most efficient way to do this is to walk a straight line to the box, take the mail out, and walk back inside. However, when I ask my 9-year-old daughter to do this same task she takes twice as long, because she cartwheels, finds a rock to throw, balances on the ledge of the curb and opens the mail box with her foot. Now, we both executed the same task, but Hazel took more time and effort and had way more fun accomplishing the same function.

So translating this to yourself you have to, like all things, decide your intention in doing a certain thing. What is your goal? In exercise and chores, efficiency might be the answer. What about everything else? It would be more efficient to take a picture of something than to paint it. It would be more efficient to buy meat at the store than to go hunting in the woods. It would be more efficient to walk across the stage than to dance across. It would be more efficient to use a computer program to compose a song than to learn how to play the piano. If you are looking to do all things in life fast and easy, you could lose joy and zest. Efficiency is the right choice when you need it to be.

Becky Phares, NCPT is a Polestar Pilates Graduate, Practitioner and contributor to the Polestar Life Weekly Blog.  With more than 10 years of teaching Becky teaches at her studio The Body Initiative Pilates Studio in Lafayette, Louisiana.  Find Becky and her Studio on Facebook: The body Initiative Pilates Studio and Instagram @the_body_initiative_ .

The Breath as a Tool

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The Breath As A Tool –  Katrina Hawley, NCPT, Polestar Educator I was once at a Polestar Pilates Educator meeting in which we were working hard to create content for the Internet to communicate to the world, “Why Pilates?” And “Why Polestar?”  The answers I found to these questions were easy.  Why Pilates? Because Pilates keeps every person doing what they want to do!  Whether that is hiking mountains or pulling weeds, running marathons or playing on the floor with grandchildren. Now Why Polestar?  That’s an easy one.  Polestar Pilates allows me to be creative within a system of principles.  Rather than teaching me a series of exercises that become a rote script for a beginner, intermediate and advanced Pilates class, Polestar provided a structure within which I could be creative. This meant that I could use the same tools to teach an 85 year old grandfather as well as a ten year old boy.  I wasn’t taught a recipe of exercises but a systematic approach and theory.  The amateur chaos theory mathematician in me was stoked! The Polestar Pilates system is based on six principles (Polestar Principles of Movement) that are designed to guide the critical thinking of a Polestar Pilates Practitioner. In this post I want to describe the first one. The Breath Principle Now, we don’t specifically choreograph when one should inhale and exhale.  We study the anatomy and physiology of the breath and we also learn the “biokinematics” and the “arthrokinematics” of breath.  All of this information within the principle allows us to decide how to best use breath as a tool for movement facilitation. When we study the breath principle we choose to ask the question how can I use the breath to create the best movement.  Will an inhale help facilitate healthy movement, or is an exhale better?  Or we might ask, how can I use this breath to challenge the mover in front of me to create greater integration of movement. The Polestar Principles encourage client-centered inquisitiveness – Can our understanding of the breath shed light on any other physiological questions?  How might I use breath to improve posture? Create more flexibility or space in a joint?  Create axial length or facilitate thoracic mobility? Why do I love Polestar Pilates?  Because Polestar gave me a plethora of information and then said, “okay kid, take this and run with it!  Have a ball, and most importantly help people move”. Experiential: The breath is a system and tool we can learn to control (and teach our students to control as well).  Try “Box Breathing” for stress reduction, grounding and activating the parasympathetic nervous system. • This breath practice can be done anywhere!  Wherever you are, sit or stand in a way that you feel grounded (weight distributed evenly between the feet or sits bones) and lengthen the spine as if your head was being pulled up by a thread. • “Box Breathing” consists of the same number of counts during your inhale as your exhale with an added pause at the peak of the inhale and valley of the exhale. Try It!: A. Inhale Four Counts (1,2,3,4) – (Pause Four Counts – 1,2,3,4)  B. Exhale Four Counts (1,2,3,4)- (Pause four counts 1,2,3,4) C. Try Repeating this Cycle 4 times.   • This rhythmic breathing practice can help activate your parasympathetic nervous system (the one that makes you feel calm).  Experiment to find the number of counts that works for you – it should be easy, steady and grounding.  Breathe On! Katrina Hawley PMA-CPT, Polestar Educator and Affiliate is the owner of The Pilates Studio Hadley providing expert instruction in private and small group sessions as well as group mat and apparatus classes.The Pilates Studio creates goal-based programs that empower clients to increase strength and flexibility as well as improve posture, coordination, and balance.  Join Katrina for the Fall Comprehensive teacher Training in Hadley, MA.  The Polestar Principles of Movement: Breath, Axial Elongation & Core Control, Spine-Articulation, Organization of the Head, Neck and Shoulders, Alignment and Weight Bearing of the Extremities and Movement Integration.  Start the The Teacher Training Journey and Learn more about Polestar Principles Online Course Here:  Principles Online!