Day three: POT wrap up

Hi Lisa! Here is your Daily Horoscope for Sunday, October 21

You are feeling even more driven than usual -- which is really saying something! You may want to try something new in order to commit yourself to a new direction. That should work out well for you! That's what the stars had in line for me today. I would say that they were pretty much spot on. Today was a really great day. Lesley, an instructor I had hired when I was running Posture Perfect,  came to POT for today. We didn't talk beforehand. I didn't even know that she was coming, but we ended up in the same workshops. When I hired her she was pretty much starting out, and there's just something so mature and perceptive about her. I love watching her grow as an instructor.  I wish I could claim responsibility for training her, but I can't take credit for anything other than giving her a job and believing in her. She trains one of my favorite clients of all time who didn't follow me from PPP to EBC, so it was good to hear a few stories about him. My first workshop was with Troy McCarty. Can I please just take a moment to say that he is simply one of the greatest. His handouts are a work of art. They are clearly well thought out and beautifully produced. Because these exquisite handouts that were full of great photos and detailed descriptions of the exercises, we could plow through immense amounts of choreography in a short amount of time. His creativity and innovation are inspiring and remind me of how I like to play before I used "managing" as an excuse to be too busy. I think I found my new direction....less static excuses, and more freedom to come up with my own new things, maybe even ones that I might be able to hand on someday. When I type something like that...it comes from such a humble place. I would love to lead a workshop at POT....but in the grand scheme of things, I am a green compared to the people that present at POT. I have a feeling, that it will come together organically...in a few years...with much, much more experience under my belt. Even though I feel like I know a lot, I still have so much more to learn. Workshop #2 today was with Amy Tayor Alpers on the Assessing the Psoas. I agree with many in our field that the Psoas plays a major role in Pilates work and is often overridden by other muscles and retraining it's function to coordinate with the entire musculature can create profound improvements in one's overall functionality, but when it comes to awareness, I sometimes feel that a lot of what I read/hear is a little obtuse. It becomes, for some, an experience of worship for the Psoas Major that starts to have a little bit of disregard for the rest of the muscles of the body. To some, a healthy supple Psoas will solve all of the world's problems. If this works for those who buy into that notion, then I don't discourage that practice, but I can't buy into it as whole hog. Alright, that was a bit of a tangent. Amy, if I may be so bold as to call her by her first name, didn't go that far in the spectrum of Psoas Worship, but hers was a different perspective than I have gotten from other facets of my education. The Psoas was the only muscle addressed by name. It was a fascinating way to examine it really, and her approach was really classical, and you could tell that she had given a lot of thought to all of the rationale for movement coming from a deep inner support that cues psoas recruitment in each of the exercises. I loved her approach to the 100. Interestingly, her approach to single leg, double leg, and single straight leg stretch involves curling  almost the entire spine. Lesley and I were wondering how that played into situations where flexion of the spine might be contraindicated, such as a herniated disk. Would she use the same tactics on a spine with a herniated disc? She responded essentially yes. As someone who has sensitively introduced flexion to spines previously diagnosed with herniated discs and had success, I can follow her line of thought.  I kind of regret asking the question because it opened the door for people to question  the use of extension for cases of spondylolisthesis and stenosis, and a few of the people were very closed to what she was saying, and I felt that she was on trial a little bit for a few minutes. Regardless, I'm going to play with her approach and see what it does for my body. When I see a need to apply it to a body in front of me, I think it will be interesting for that body to experience it. And this concludes my daily transmissions from POT Chicago. My the Balanced Body folks have a safe and stress free return to their respective homes. I'm going to finish watching Almost Famous and sleep in tomorrow...or should I say today..it is 12:04 after all.