Issue #391
Wednesday, February 8, 2023
Embrace Your Inner Space: Your Fluid Beginning
Part 2
by Allie Greene
“There’s nothing wrong with enjoying looking at the surface of the ocean itself, except that when you finally see what goes on under water, you realize that you’ve been missing the whole point of the ocean. Staying on the surface all the time is like going to the circus and staring at the outside of the tent.”
- Dave Barry (Humorist/Author)
Welcome back! I hope you have been able to experience the Fluid and Navel Radiation that we introduced in Part 1 (<<insert link>>) and have gained some insights into yourself and your practice as a result.
Recall from Part 1 that your body consists of about 70% fluids — you are more fluid than you are structure! Fluid was your first source of support and communication. You grew by sensing, feeling and responding your way through your earliest developmental patterns. Today, you still continue to sense, feel, and respond to your relationship to gravity and space. This creates “tone”. We don’t have optimal cellular health if we don’t have a responsive, fluid tone; finding your relationship with space helps to lighten your tone and creates a sense of buoyancy.
Now, in Part 2, let’s take what you have experienced and discovered about yourself from these exercises into the Pilates Ab Prep and Hundred.
From the awakening and integration of all your limbs from center to periphery and back through Navel Radiation, your spinal pattern of Head to Tail with Reach emerges. You organize your other limbs around this midline. This is how you grow more coordination and complexity in your body-mind.
Instead of focusing on flexing up from the front of the body, try focusing on the tone of the back body. Imagine you are the balloon and your fluid keeps flowing to the lowest point as you roll up. Explore finding the energetic reach of the tail out and up. See if you can feel that energy flow up and out the head. Form follows function. Your spinal flexion can look different than someone else’s.
If it feels right for you, take the legs to a table or chair position. Find your ab curl again. This time notice the space under your back. Your back in space is expansive and buoyant. The ribs flow out from the spine. The shoulders arms and hands continue this relationship. All are in space. Are you ignoring the support and just pumping through it? Could you let go of any excess tension? Let your breath breathe!
You can extend the legs out. Revisit that naval radiating pattern. The further out limbs travel from center, the more we should feel their connection into center. This is our Reach and Pull. Reach and Pull needs support, so check in with your foundation. If you notice over effort or fragmenting, move back to a place of more support. You can always explore more another day!
Please click on the link to access the video for this practice.
I hope you have enjoyed your experience with your fluid beginnings. To learn more about workshops and classes and be added to my email list, please feel free to reach out to me directly through https://www.somamovementalliegreene.com or my IG and Facebook.
Allie Greene
Allie is a Registered Somatic Movement Educator with the International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association. She is a 500 RYT and a NCPT (PMA-CPT) with the Pilates Method Alliance. She has filmed a variety of workshops for teachers with Fusion Pilates EDU and most recently filmed her Move Into Ease Series on Pilates Anytime.
She holds a BA in Sociology and Performing Arts from La Roche University and danced professionally with the Cleveland/San Jose Ballet and Pittsburgh’s LABCO.
She is the owner of Equilibrium Pittsburgh Movement Studio in Pittsburgh, PA and Soma Movement LLC. Her embodied pedagogy is centered around cultivating love, compassion, curiosity, courage and connection through movement. She is currently pursuing her MSW: Direct Practice -Trauma Informed degree.