321. When did Pilates become so obsessed with specific cues? With Raphael Bender

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Music.

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Welcome to Pilates Elephants, I'm Raphael Bender. It may seem completely weird

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to ask, when did Pilates get so obsessed with cueing individual muscles?

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Because that is the norm in most Pilates classes these days,

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but actually it is kind of weird that we do it.

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So I'm going to give you a little tour through a few points in Pilates history

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and look at the evolution of Pilates queuing.

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I'm going to start with Return to Life Through Contrology by Mr.

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Joseph Hubertus Pilates, published 1947, I believe. When was this published?

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1945.

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And there are a few points here that have evolved over time.

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All right, so stick around and we'll learn about the evolution of Pilates cueing from Mr.

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Pilates all the way to a more modern, the modern era and when muscle cues started

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to come in and why they started to come in and a few other core things,

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pun intended that have changed in Pilates cueing over the years and essentially

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reverse themselves over the years.

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So firstly, when, when it comes to cueing muscles, when.

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In Return to Life, this is the original kind of format edition.

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I think it's the one with the picture of Joseph Pilates on the front in a T-shirt.

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Page 17, is it page 17? No, it is page 8.

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Mr. Pilates says, quote, this does not necessarily imply that we must devote

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ourselves only to the mere development of any particular pet set of muscles,

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but rather more rationally to the uniform development of our bodies as a whole.

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So he's saying we shouldn't focus on any specific muscles. We should work on all of the muscles.

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And actually, if you go through his entire book and read all of the instructions,

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he has instructions for all of the mat work exercises in here,

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and he never instructs any muscles.

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There are, I think, two exercises where he mentions that this exercise is good

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for certain muscles. So I think one of the exercises, I can't remember which

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one it is, he mentions, you know, this strengthens the abdominals.

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And then there's one where I think he mentions it's, you know,

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this is good for the shoulders.

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He never mentions any specific muscles by name, but he mentions like muscle

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groups, I think twice from memory.

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And so there are zero muscle cues in this book.

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He literally doesn't mention the name of any muscle, like there's not the name

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of a single muscle in this book.

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Um so that is uh 1945 mr

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joseph pilates then we have the pilates method of

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physical and mental conditioning from 1980 by philip

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friedman and gail eisen and uh

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so in this book they give instructions

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on the same pilates exercises and they

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do not mention any muscles uh there are some differences which i will point

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out to you as we move on but they mention no muscles then we have the Pilates

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Method of Body Conditioning by Sean Gallagher and Romana Krasnowska from originally

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published in the year 2000, I believe.

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And again, we have instructions for many of the matwork exercises and no names

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of muscles, no names of muscles included.

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And then we have, or I have here, Ellie Herman's Pilates Reformer,

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third edition, which was It was also published, I think, in 2001,

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and I think what Ellie Herman represents, now she was actually trained,

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amongst others, by Romana.

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Ellie Herman was trained by Kathy Grant and then Romana, so there is a crossover

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in her kind of training lineage there,

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but I think Ellie Herman kind of represents the next generation after Romana

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and after Philip and Gail, and...

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In her book, we start to see muscle cues.

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So we have cues like feel your lat stretch as your arms raise above your head.

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We have cues like stabilize your scapulae before you raise your arms.

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So we're starting to see a few specific cues, but still not a lot. This is 2001.

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And then from here, I think this is 2001, this is where physical therapy really

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came into Pilates. And we started to see specific cueing of individual muscles

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like Ellie Herman has in the foreword of her book here.

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She talks about the four layers of abdominals and the multifidus muscle in the

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back and how it's really important for spinal stabilization.

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So we're starting to see the emergence of that muscle cueing in 2001.

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And the Stop Pilates training I did, which I did in 2004,

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there was a lot of emphasis on muscle cueing and the manuals had very lengthy

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lists of specific muscles that were active in each movement and always starting

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with lumbar multifidus and pelvic floor and transversus abdominis.

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So really from 1945 to kind of the year 2000, there were basically no muscle cues in any of Pilates.

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And around the year 2000, 2001, they started to emerge with that generation of Ellie Herman,

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Moira Stott slash Marythew and others, where now those muscle cues have just

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become accepted as the normal way that we teach Pilates. But it wasn't always so.

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In fact, Mr. Joseph Pilates was dead set against muscle cues.

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There are a few other things I want to talk about here as well in terms of the

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evolution of cueing specific body parts.

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So 1945, Joseph Pilates says, page 17.

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Quote, in the reclining exercises, be sure wherever indicated to keep your back

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full length, always pressed firmly against the mat or floor.

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So in other words, flatten your lower back against the floor. 1945.

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And in Philip Friedman and Gail Eisen,

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1980, the Pilates Method of Physical and Mental Conditioning,

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one of the things that they mention is spine to mat.

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Can't remember the page here but i did take take a note of it so basically it

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does say there are a couple of um exercises let's have a look at the net call here,

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where they do mention anchoring and position. So you're lying on your back at

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the start of the neck pool and it says, quote, spine to mat, navel to spine.

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So they're still using the same cue that Joseph used there.

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When we get to the year 2000 with Sean Gallagher and Romana Kosinowska,

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the Pilates method of body conditioning,

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in the forward section where they talk about the six principles of Pilates.

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They add on a couple of supplementary points and one of them is spine to mat.

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Lie down on your back, feet together, legs straight, press your back as flat

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as you can to the mat and remove all the space between the small of your back and the mat.

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So they're very direct in saying like, press your back as much as possible to

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the mat, which is exactly what Joseph says. Then we get to Ellie Herman.

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And Ellie Herman in 2001 talks about neutral versus flat back.

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And what she says is this quote. This is from page 23.

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Many people from the New York school teach people to, quote,

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tuck under or flatten the curve of their lower back when doing Pilates exercises.

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In my method, I use neutral spine when it is safe and effective and flat back when applicable.

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My general rule of thumb is to use neutral only when doing exercises that are

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closed chain, meaning the legs are either on the floor or when using Pilates

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equipment supported by a bar or straps.

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Pilates mat exercises are mostly open chain with the legs in the air,

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making the spine vulnerable to destabilisation.

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So this is the first time when we start to hear, around about that year 2000,

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is when we start to hear that word stability or stabilisation used in this context. uh.

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In the open chain exercises, it is safer to use the flat back position if the

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client is not strong enough to stabilize in neutral.

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And that's what I was taught in Stop Pilates as well.

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You may just choose to not give open chain exercises in this case and work on

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gaining stability in the neutral position first.

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So that is not what Joseph Pilates said.

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When Joseph Pilates taught the 100 or gave instructions for the 100 in Return

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to Life, which is the first exercise in the book of course.

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He says now you have your back flat on the mat and your legs straight and your

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heels two inches above the floor,

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and he says remarks quote at first you probably will not be able to carry out

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instructions as illustrated in poses this proves why these exercises and all

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succeeding ones will benefit you however with patience and perseverance you

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eventually should succeed in achieving the ideals as posed with accompanying

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normal health So in other words,

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just do it and, you know, do it as best you can and you'll get better at it.

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So he's not saying, hey, until you can keep perfect neutral spine,

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well, he doesn't even have the concept of neutral spine, you know,

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until you can quite stabilize your pelvis, don't do open chain exercises.

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He's saying, no, just do it with your heels two inches off the floor and your

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back press flat to the mat.

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And if you, if that, if, you know, if you can only do that for like two arm

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pumps or whatever, like just do it for two arm pumps and you'll get better at it.

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Um, and so Ellie Herman, then, you know, in 2001, we have this concept and I

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was taught this in Stop Pilates as well of, you must be able to stabilize first

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before progressing onto the quote, you know, full version of the exercise.

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Um, yeah.

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And then, you know, so Ellie Herman goes on to say, in the flat back position,

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the quartet is slightly altered since now the multifidus muscle will be on stretch.

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And so the quartet is her concept of, you know, the various muscles that form

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the core, including the multifidus.

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Clients who have posterior pelvic tilt and or very strong abdominals may experiment

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with bringing their pelvis into a more neutral in open chain exercises.

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When on the equipment, however, many exercises are closed chain,

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and it is an excellent opportunity to train your clients in neutral spine,

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working with natural curves safely and effectively.

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So we have this concept of neutral being safer starting out around that year

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2000, where neutral wasn't even part of the language of Pilates up until that point.

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It just wasn't a thing. It was always about spine to mat.

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All right. So there are two things. First, the cueing of muscles didn't exist

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until about the year 2000, and then it did exist.

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And then the spine to mat thing was a very big part of the cueing of Pilates

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from 1945 up until about 2000.

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And in about 2000, we started to have this concept of neutral spine versus flat back.

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I want to give you a third perspective, which is the idea of locking joints.

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So in Return to Life, if you've read it, you will have noticed this,

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that Joseph Pilates uses the term locked, like, I don't know,

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40 times or something in the book. He says it a lot.

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So for example, in the instructions for the rollover, in Cautions,

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Pose 3, he says, quote, keep legs tensed, knees locked, end quote.

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So he's like, he specifically says, uh, you know, lock your joints,

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um, in the instructions for the saw on page 47, he says, uh.

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Do, do, do, do, do.

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Arms shoulder high, pressed backward until shoulder blades lock.

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So he's, you know, he's into locking. In the neck pull, page 55 of Return to

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Life, he says, pose four, cautions.

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Quote, elbow straight backward until shoulder blades lock.

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In pose four, keep elbow straight backward until shoulder blades lock. He mentions it twice.

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So he's quite specific that he wants you to lock your shoulder blades,

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and he mentions locking the knees in eight or 10 exercises, quite prolific in mentioning locked.

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Then we come to Friedman and Eisen in 1980, and we've already moved. So Mr.

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Pilates died in 1967, and we've already moved into the classical era of Pilates.

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We've moved a lot beyond the Contrology era, which was Joseph Pilates' name

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for what we now call Pilates, and we moved into the classical era,

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which was very, very influenced by dance because Romana Krasnowska was a dancer.

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And so we now have in Friedman and Eisen...

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They don't want you to lock your knees.

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Instead, stretch your heels as far away from your hips as you can.

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Feel your knees straighten.

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Keeping your heels stretched out, bend your feet back, try to point your toes.

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So they go to stretching the heels as the cue rather than locking the knees.

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And so they go, for example, into talking about stretching a little bit later on page 35 here.

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They say, quote, the most common reaction to the instruction straight arms or

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straight legs is a tensing up that involves locking the elbows or knees.

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This is never useful. It tends to interfere with free motion and it can produce

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a kind of reverse bending of the arms or legs called hyperextension.

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Combined with certain movement, it can lead to injury. when we use the term

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straight arms and straight legs we mean only straight not locked.

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So therefore so from 1980 we've already

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got this concept of not locking the knees or elbows or shoulders and again when

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we get to say the sore in their book they don't mention locking the shoulders

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the shoulder blades back when we get to the neck pull they don't mention locking

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the shoulder blades back,

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they just say something like, elbows level with ears.

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Then when we get to the Pilates method of body conditioning by Sean Gallagher and Romana Kozunowska,

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again in the saw, they say, extend the arms open to the sides,

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but they don't mention anything about locking the shoulders.

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In the neck pull, again, they just say, elbows by ears. They don't mention anything

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about locking the shoulders.

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Ellie Herman's book, now the book of Ellie Herman's that I have is a reformer

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book, so it doesn't have the sore or the neck pull in it.

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But she does have an instructions for shaving, which is one of the reformer arm series.

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And I already mentioned that she says basically stabilize your scapulae before you raise your arms.

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And by stabilize your scapulae, I think she talks about it at the start where

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basically what she means is, you know, flat and flush on the back and, um,

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you know, not anterior tilting or winging or any of that kind of, um, stuff.

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So in other words, not locking the scapulae.

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All right. The final, um, you know, I guess, uh, you know, takeaways for me are that,

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you know, what we currently experience, you know, we go into a Pilates class

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and, And we're cued of all of these specific muscles, activate your glutes,

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activate your adductors, activate your abdominals,

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stabilize your scapulae, relax your upper traps, all of these cues that we have,

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don't over-activate hip flexors, that we take as just a normal part of doing Pilates.

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They were antithetical to how Mr. Pilates taught. He never cued muscles.

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He specifically said, we don't focus on this or that pet set of muscles.

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And that continued right up until really around about the year 2000,

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right through the next generation of Pilates teachers, until basically physical

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therapy came in with what we would call contemporary Pilates now,

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with the next generation of teachers after Ramana.

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And we started to see words like stabilization and activation and feeling this

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or that muscle being part of the cueing of Pilates and that has now become as

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firmly entrenched in most Pilates as like that's just what Pilates is but that's

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not what Pilates always was.

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When it comes to alignment cues the spine to mat you know the flatten your back

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forcefully cue was really right up until,

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again, that same roughly time when physical therapy kind of became infused in

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contemporary Pilates around the year 2000, 2001,

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where we start to see neutral spine being, quote, safer for, you know,

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clients who can't, quote, stabilize, end quote, their lumbar spine or their

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pelvis, you know, in an open kinetic chain with the feet unsupported.

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Then finally, with regard to locking.

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And Mr. Pilates very specifically says, lock your knees, lock your elbows,

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lock your shoulder blades.

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He says it multiple times, probably 40 plus times in his book. He's very specific.

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He definitely wants you to lock your knees when your legs are straight.

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And already by 1980, that had changed to, we lengthen the heels away.

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We don't lock the elbows.

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We simply straighten the elbows or the knees.

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And I can only imagine that's the influence of Romana and dance,

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although I'm just speculating.

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And that continues on into the present day where we have this emphasis in most

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Pilates of not locking the joints.

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But it didn't come from Mr. Pilates. In fact, it's the exact opposite.

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So I think those are three very interesting insights just from a historical

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perspective that we've gone from Mr.

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Pilates saying specifically don't focus on this or that pet set of muscles and

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him never, ever cueing muscles.

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In fact, I've heard an anecdote that people used to say, what's this exercise

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for? He would get cranky and say, it's for the body.

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To now this emphasis on, you know, not only which muscles we're working,

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but which muscles we should contract consciously and which muscles we should

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feel and which muscles we should not contract when we're doing any given exercise.

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And then the flat back, which was a really big part of Mr. Pilates' technique.

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And right the way through class to classical period, now has become a neutral

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spine, which again, I think a lot of people would sort of just take for granted

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as like inherent to Pilates, but actually it was antithetical.

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It was, you know, Mr. Pilates said, don't be in neutral spine.

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It's flattened you back to the mat.

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And then finally, I think, is that all?

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The stabilization, yeah. So the concept of stabilisation, which really didn't

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exist in Pilates up until that sort of contemporary era of Pilates,

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which started around the very late 90s or early 2000s.

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So dear listener, I hope you found that of historical interest and hopefully

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that gave you an interesting perspective on the way we currently do things, or when I say we, I mean,

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the Pilates industry by and large currently does things,

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and that cueing neutral spine, cueing individual muscles, stabilization,

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and avoiding locking joints were all,

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None of them were part of Pilates as designed and taught for decades by Joseph Pilates.

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They've all mostly been relatively recent with the advent of what is referred

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to as contemporary Pilates, which came in around about the turn of the millennium,

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with the exception of the locking of the knees and elbows, which I think passed

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with Joseph and the next generation, led by Romana mainly.

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Emphasize not locking the knees and elbows. So there you go.

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Like a lot of those things have turned around 180 degrees and we now do them

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completely opposite to what Joseph specified in his book. All right.

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Hope you found that interesting. Much love and I'll see you in the next one.