Embodiment. It’s a term I see thrown around quite often in the online spheres I’m in. It has a sort of spiritual lofty connotation to it and quite simply I describe it as your ability to feel at home in your body and to be connected to the sensations and feelings that travel through it.
In my 15 years of practicing Pilates my "why" for doing Pilates has evolved.
Yes it keeps me strong. It helps me to have the stamina and zest for my crazy insane life and I feel confident and strong even as I’ve entered life after 40. At first I said it was a moving meditation. Seated meditation doesn’t work for me, but this was something that stilled my mind and became a place where everything about my day fell away and I was able to find a stronger sense of inner fortitude to show up for my life in a more grounded way. When I had baby #3 I was amazed that my blood pressure never went up (despite gaining 40 lbs), and I had good energy and a body that didn’t ache.
So my definition of fitness and health began to expand as well as my perspective about what the real potential of Pilates is.
As I have deepened into my spiritual journey and my training as a Shamanic Practitioner I learned about how the body has the ability to store and / or process stuck emotions. And that all disease (“dis-ease”) originates in our energetic fields. The body has the ability to process emotions and experiences that we have, but only if we let the body do what it is designed to do.
When we shove our emotions and feelings aside, the emotions don’t just go away. They get stored in the body. When left alone, they fester and can potentially turn into something more. On the flip side, we may wish to live our lives with greater purpose, more power and with greater presence. All that comes from the body too! If we’ve conditioned ourselves to stop listening to our bodies, we start to lose our ability to feel our pleasures. The sense of direction and body connection is lost and we realize we have no idea what our purpose is. What we want to do with our life and what we want next.
Can you relate?
Do you feel at home in your body?
If you don’t, it’s not your fault. We live in a society that teaches us to ignore the messages our body is sending. So much time is spend in front of a computer, sitting at a desk or being stuck in traffic in our workforce and culture today. If we were to tune into our bodies, most likely we would hear a sad story. And maybe that is even what happened to you. Sitting at a desk hearing stiff hips, aching back and feeling tired. And you might have said something like: Not today body! I need to push through this. I need to get this done! And in that moment, we shushed the whimpering body and stuck our setting to ignore. Over time why would you want to pay attention to an aching unhappy body? Its saying something you may not want to hear and just easier to ignore it. Disconnection becomes normalized.
Aside from the picture painted above, here are some signs you might be living more in your mind than in your body:
A feeling of uncertainty / unsettledness
Indecisiveness
Shallow breath, up high in your chest
Feeling foggy headed
Most of your feelings and sensations occur in your head or you experience head pressure
Numbness: you want to feel joy and excitement, but can’t access that in your body
Something feels like it’s missing but you can’t put your finger on it.
Sometimes you feel like you’re swirling
You bump into things.
Here are some signs of embodiment and living in your body:
A feeling of calm
Able to make clear decisions
Breath finds its way towards the belly
Clarity of thought
You are moved by what is happening at the moment. You can feel it in your body.
You feel at peace
You feel steady and grounded
(list from the book The Nature Reset by Kathleen Mcintyre)
How does Pilates help to increase your sense of embodiment and help you feel more like you are at home in your body?
The first thing I think about is the 6 principles of Pilates: Breath, Concentration, Control, Precision, Centering and Flow.
Pilates isn’t just about doing the exercises, there is a focus on the how it is done.
You must pay attention to what your body is doing and how it feels. I also think about the Classical order of Reformer and Mat exercises that I use every day every time with my clients. This helps the body to develop repetition that helps it to find comfort and rhythm. Finally, the apparatus. It has so many touch points. Your hands on the handles. You spine against the reformer carriage bed. Your feet in the strap. The springs and resistance when moving both ways. The emphasis to always connect and feel your body as you’re moving and to deepen your overall sense of connection and body awareness. By doing this yes you will increase you ability to maintain stability and control, but you will also increase your sense of being in your body and how it is feeling.
When my clients come in to do their Pilates I prioritize not just the Pilates and the work out, I encourage an increased sense of awareness, and an opportunity to feel into whatever the exercise is to sense how deep the body wants to move. If it craves a more rigorous workout, or needs a bit of soothing balm. My goal is to give my clients an opportunity for it to become a moving meditation, and to feel their bodies more deeply.
You body is so much more than just the shell you’re in. Connecting and listening to it brings so many benefits. One of the things I love about Pilates is that for me (and my journey), it has given me a holistic body centered approach to living my life. Movement is a priority, but not just because I want to look a certain way, or to have certain mobility or health levels but because I also want to feel a certain way and go through my day in a connected embodied way.
And sometimes (often) there is an emotional component to what brings a client in, and why we feel the way we do or why we have disconnected from our bodies into a disembodied state. My experience is that movement in general, and Pilates specifically can help in the release of stored ignored emotions, but it’s not as affective as other modalities. Pilates can help you to feel your body, but for the release of stored emotions the body needs a greater freedom of movement; it needs to move and express itself in self led expressive way.
For this reason I am offering Chakradance and “ecstatic” dancing at the studio. (More about this in a future post.)
Now that you've read this, check in with you body today in what ever it is you're doing. Ask it what story it wants to share with you and what it might want you to know. Do this again and again. Your body and your self deserves it.
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