Joseph Pilates designed every movement in his system to involve the ‘whole body,’ and to connect it in its entirety to and from its core/center/powerhouse. Do you move from your center in a truly organic, whole body, integrated way? Are you able to assess whether your clients can – and if not, why not? In this workshop we will utilize Pilates exercises to develop our visual assessment skills to determine whether movement is actually coming from ‘the center’ correctly and efficiently, and if not, how to correct it. The ultimate power and health potential that can be achieved through Pilates is only possible when this integrated connection is accessed as its inherent human design dictates.
We’ll begin with an anatomy discussion of what constitutes our center/core/powerhouse to better help us understand what we truly mean by these terms. This will include the abdominals, psoas, pelvic floor and diaphragm. Then we will explore how all these muscles work together in natural harmony through breathing correctly. This is how to create truly integrated whole-body movement. Then we will look at Pilates exercises to discover the deep power of their design to organize and unite the body into a single moving animal through breathing and moving from our center.
Come prepared to move, explore, discover, awaken and heal your deep core to create whole body integration.
Instructor Bio
Amy Taylor Alpers co-founded The Pilates Center (TPC) and The Pilates Center Teacher Training Program (TPCTTP) over 20 years ago in Boulder, Colorado. When not traveling the world to teach both foundational and graduate level Pilates teacher education she remains part of the core faculty for TPCTTP, mentors advanced teachers, teaches classes and sees clients. In addition to teaching TPC sponsored workshops, Amy has presented numerous times at the Pilates Method Alliance Annual Meeting, Balanced Body’s Pilates on Tour and Passing the Torch. In 2013, Amy presented at the Shared Traditions Conference for Fletcher Pilates and will present at The Pilates Roundtable.
Amy was born in Youngstown, Ohio where she began classical ballet at age two.
She attended The Juilliard School for Dance, danced with the Garden State Ballet in New Jersey, and received a B.A. in Dance and a M.A. in Dance History from New York University. In addition, Amy taught ballet at various dance schools in New York City for ten years before launching her Pilates career.
Both Amy and her sister Rachel studied Pilates under the direct tutelage of Romana Kryzanowska at the original Pilates Studio in New York City. They received their Pilates teaching certificate from there in July of 1989. In 1990, after moving to Boulder, Colorado, Amy and Rachel founded The Pilates Center. The sisters then created and established The Pilates Center Teacher Training Program in 1991. The school has since expanded to include an Intermediate Program, Advanced Program, Bridge Program, Master’s Program, and a Mentorship Program. In addition, TPC now has “Licensed” and “Host” studios established all around the world.
Amy and her sister wrote The Everything Pilates Book, published in 2002. She was a founding board member of the PMA and sat on the board that created the PMA Certification Exam. Recently she has also had the honor of filming classes and workshops for online organizations such as Pilates Anytime and Pilates On Demand.
In 2011, Amy, her sister Rachel, and Ken Endelman of Balanced Body, developed CenterLine – a line of equipment designed for classical Pilates and based upon the specifications pioneered by Joseph Pilates.
Two sisters, Amy Taylor Alpers and Rachel Taylor Segel, trained under Romana Kryzanowska, Joseph Pilates’ protege and inheritor of his studio in NYC, and founded their studio in Boulder in 1990.
The Pilates method is a system of movement and therapeutic exercise developed over a span of 60 years by German born athlete and physical therapy pioneer, Joseph H. Pilates.
