Pilates Method Alliance

Community Highlight: Polestar Mentor Valentine Hilaire

by Leave a Comment

You are here: Home / Archives for Pilates Method Alliance

In your own words describe “the Spirit of Polestar”:

VH: A benevolent environment. It helps you to understand that the most important thing is not only about what you do but how you feel. It has guided me to connect with myself.

What three words come to mind when you think of Polestar Pilates:

Observation

Freedom

Serenity

What do you love about teaching Pilates?

VH: I love Pilates mostly because the practice isn’t about the person adapting to Pilates, but Pilates adapting to the person. Polestar Pilates gives you a sense of observation which helps you to understand each person individually. I did my training in Paris with Alexander Bohlander, Birgit Scheffe and Yaelle Penkhoss. They all helped me train my eye.

What are your current Inspirations?  

VH: I love to explore movement. As a dancer I learned how to move with music, now I love to move with my own rhythm, to find fluidity and connection between exercises, and to create a harmony that makes sense with how I feel in the moment.

Why Pilates?  How did you find the practice?

VH: I began Pilates when I was in a professional dance school. I was 14 and it helped me to find both mental and physical balance. Since my first Pilates class, I felt that something had changed not only in my body but also in my way of visualizing my body.

Why Polestar Pilates? 

VH: My Pilates teacher told me it was surely the best Pilates training. I came to the Pilates studio, took a class, and knew it was where I wanted to be.

What do you hope to convey in your teaching?

VH: That everything is possible! I remember one of my clients who came to me because he had pain everywhere; low back pain, hip pain, and shoulder pain. At the time he told me “I thought I couldn’t do this anymore” speaking of a specific movement. Today he can, and he’s free of pain. I hope to convey that there’s always a way to feel better.

Do you have a favorite Quote? 

Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass, it’s about learning to dance in the rain.

Vivian Greene

To me this means to remember that the most important thing isn’t what happens to us, but what we do with it.

What is your favorite apparatus or favorite way to move?

VH: Of course I love each apparatus, but If I had to take only one apparatus on a desert island it would be the reformer because of its fluidity and its ability to adapt to all our needs.

Valentine is a Mentor for Polestar Pilates France – You can find Valentine on Social Media @valentinehilaire

Polestar Graduate Highlight: Lorna Jarrett MS, LPTA, AIB/VR-CON, NCPT

by Leave a Comment

You are here: Home / Archives for Pilates Method Alliance

What is your movement mantra?

LJ: Your purpose is fulfilled as it is lived in your best body.

How did you first hear about Pilates?

LJ: As a personal trainer and dancer, Pilates was part of my personal workout and training repertoire at the gym. I enjoyed how it connected to traditional dance choreography and I valued its ability to challenge my expert movers and support my special population clients.

Why Polestar Pilates?

LJ: I am a Polestar Graduate (Rehab track) and NCPT. I chose Polestar Pilates because for me there was no other option. I researched many certifications. Polestar certification discussed the founder Brent Anderson along with his background. The focus of the certification coincided with physical therapy practices and evidence-based research. This is what interested me. I am a Physical Therapist Assistant with a corporate business background and wherever my career took me I needed my education and practice to be sound.

What is your Teaching Philosophy?

LJ: I specialize in those with neurological disorders and the special population i,e, Myotonic Dystrophy, MS, Stroke, Parkinson’s, spondylolisthesis. Most of my clientele have chronic conditions. During our sessions, we focus on movement potential. This approach allows my client to redirect and discover that they can still have joy in movement no matter the diagnosis. This practice creates an opportunity for me to instill hope on an ongoing basis.

How has Pilates impacted your life?

LJ: Pilates as a tool has allowed me to serve a cross-section of the population with varied needs and abilities. Its principles have provided a level of discipline and organization to my own movement. It has provided a common theme to which I have built lasting relationships. It’s an industry that is rooted in tradition but remains progressive, contemporary, and relevant.

What is your favorite apparatus?

LJ: My favorite apparatus for the last two years is the Core Align. It allows me to challenge every client and support the principles in a standing position. I am excited to complete Core Align for Rehabilitation at POT Rehab Summit 2020.

What is your favorite thing about your Job?

LJ: What I love most about coming into the studio, is creating an environment of peace and tranquility so that clients can have a pain free, enjoyable yet challenging mindful movement experience. An atmosphere, where every sense is impacted, to evoke mental, emotional, and physical change. In creating this environment, I myself get to experience it over and over again. I value being able to help people improve their abilities. Movement ability is taken for granted and this work reminds me of what a blessing it is to move.

What is Unique about your studio?

LJ: I co-founded Whole Pilates studio with two physical therapists. It is unique in that we offer an integrated and holistic approach to our studio. Utilizing music and essential oils assist with focusing the senses. We partner with a Doctor of Naturopath, who provides complementary alternative therapies in our studio space i.e. infrared sauna, vibration plate, IMRS table. Therefore, our clients can receive nutritional counseling along with complementary alternative therapies with their Pilates training. Our staff is certified in Pre and postnatal Pilates, so we value meeting the needs of every season. We value education and our offerings based on an integrative and holistic approach are real and very important to us.

What do you find intriguing?

LJ: The concept of the mind and thoughts determining gene expression. The fact that the brain can rewire and change the physical state of the body.

What are you reading?

LJ: I am reading about Decision making in healthcare leadership as I am completing my Doctor of Health Science with an emphasis in leadership and organizational development from AT Still University, Osteopathic Medicine/College of Health Studies. I am an entrepreneur and have developed a non-profit and wellness business. I realize that effective leadership is at the foundation of any cultural change or initiative. So, one day I decided instead of writing another proposal that instead, I would become the decision-maker.

Also, I am reading “The Bridge Across Forever: A true love story” which is a book about experiencing your soul mate.

What are you excited to learn about?

LJ: As a rehab practitioner, I have completed CEUS for stroke therapy, certification as a Stroke Recovery specialist, Pilates for MS and other neurological conditions, Vestibular Rehabilitation and Concussion Management Certification/ American Institute of Balance 

What is something Unique about yourself?

LJ: I love chocolate! I have jumped 15,000 feet with a parachute, Arizona mountains make me feel like I am coming home, I am my happiest when I am dancing, I believe a new thought precedes any new experience.

Read more from Lorna on the Polestar Blog:

Patient & Client Safety: On The Blog

Teaching Self Monitoring in Pilates

by 2 Comments

You are here: Home / Archives for Pilates Method Alliance

By Polestar Educator Noelle Dowma DPT, BFA, NCPT, CMTPT

October 2017 was a busy month for me…I presented in the International Association of Dance Medicine and Science (IADMS) conference in Houston, Texas at the beginning of the month, and again at the Pilates Method Alliance (PMA) conference in Indian Wells, California at the end of the month. The IADMS presentation was called “Dance Conditioning with Pilates as the Foundation,” and it was basically a Pilates mat class with lots of other exercises that dancers need. A good portion of my participants did have Pilates experience, but I wanted to highlight the unique non-Pilates exercises I teach to help dancers get the strength and flexibility they need.

When preparing to teach for the PMA conference, I knew my audience was 100% Pilates and not many dancers. So, I taught the directly inverted Pilates mat class. I used far more traditional Pilates exercises and only interspersed a few that would specifically benefit dancers (and regular people). This act of teaching similar things in a small time frame made me realize how versatile Pilates mat and equipment work can be.

A Pilates mat class can easily be transformed from a basic class appropriate for very unconditioned people by simplifying and modifying exercises, to challenging the most elite athlete. The difference in these two classes comes down to content and difficulty, although safety and challenge must be our focus as teachers.

I worry that we, as Pilates teachers, over challenge people, which can result in injury, the development of poor form, frustration, and misinformation.

What these teachers might be overlooking is the focus to teach the students self-monitoring so that they can make ideal choices for their body.

An example of this is to help provide our students with information about how to perform self-palpation, internal assessment (feeling what is happening), or external assessment (looking at their alignment). Our role as teachers is not to say “in-out” or to count for them, but rather to help them to know if they are doing the exercise correctly and when to modify, stop, or continue onwards.

It is always joyful for me to hear a past student tell me about trying a Pilates class elsewhere. Because of having this self-awareness, they often can assess how good the class was and are able to keep themselves safe, even if the pace and advancement of the exercise were too much. This makes sense after all, because Joseph Pilates said:

“It is the mind that shapes the body.”

If we follow his philosophy, we can help teach others to have the consciousness so that they follow Polestar’s mantra of “intelligent movement.”

Discover Noelle Dowma and Kinesphere Physical Therapy here