35 Top Health Benefits of Pilates - Physical and Mental

People are starting to realize about the importance of healthy lifestyle is. Healthy lifestyle is not only about what foods you should consume what drinks you should avoid but also about how often you do exercise. When it comes to exercise, sometimes people just do it when they need to do it or when they think they should do it like when they start gaining weight or when they have free time and have no idea what they should do to spend it. The fact is, exercise is not giving you any benefits if you’re not doing it regularly.

That’s why very important for you to make a strict schedule for doing exercises. However, what kind of exercise that suit your need best? The question is kind of tricky but since there are a lot of options, you’re not going to run out of idea. How about Pilates? These kinds of exercise are similar to yoga but when it comes to benefits, there are a lot of health benefits of Pilates you could enjoy.

What is Pilates?

Pilates are about balance, even since it was initially introduced in the early 20th century by Joseph Pilates, this kind of exercies is not only focusing on how to strengthen human body but also the mind. He believes that both physical and mental health is related, that’s why to have a healthy lifestyle, people should balance both their mental and physical health.

Generally, Pilates are a physical fitness system which conducted by certain principles like breathing, concentration, control, centering, flow, postural alignment, precision, relaxation and stamina. However, the effects are more than just physical but also mentally. Furthermore, in modern medical treatment, Pilates sometimes used as physical therapy solution for patients with back pain and some muscle conditions. Right now there are several methods of Pilates that are applied based on the difficulty, so it depends on whether you are a beginner or advance in Pilates.

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If you are currently looking for one type of exercise that is not only able to help you maintaining your physical health but also your mental health, Pilates sound like the best option in this matter. To ensure you more, below is the health benefits of Pilates you should know.

Pilates Are Great for Women

Well, it is not easy for women to do exercise. There are a lot of reasons why exercise are not always friendly to women but as long as it is fun and give them great body and since women could do everything for a killer body shape, Pilates will make their dream come true as long as it is conducted regularly.

Pilates Give Women Great Abs

For some women having great abs sound like a dream but with Pilates everything are possible. Just by doing Pilates regularly with high discipline which focus on the core section, you don’t need to do intensive bodybuilding for great abs.

Eases Up the Back Pain

Unlike men who mostly work on field, women mostly work in the office and spend most of their time sitting behind the desk. This condition could increase the risk of back pain and doing Pilates regularly could ease up the symptoms in long term.

Alleviates Muscle Stress

There are a lot of factors that could cause muscle stress and the effect could lead to more serious muscle conditions. However, with Pilates no matter what the factors that caused the condition, you could alleviate the muscle stress.

Gives Women More Mobility

Women are great in multi tasking and probably better than men. However, their ability to mobile sometimes limited because they don’t have enough time to do exercises. Pilates are great solution for women who don’t have a lot of time to exercise but want to have healthy lifestyle.

Easy Exercises for Joints

Pilates required you to do some slow movements in repetition. Unlike the other types of exercise, this kind of exercise is considered easy for your joints and reduces the risk of injury during a workout.

Improves Sex Life

Though many people have proven that Pilates are able to improve your sex life but for you need more insurance, scientific also stated that some Pilates movements are focusing on the core section where pelvic floor muscles were located. Those movements are going to strengthen the muscles and the effect is yourself life will be improved significantly.

Better Sport Performance

You love doing a certain sport but sometimes you just don’t have the stamina you used to have to do it. So, instead of enjoying the sport, you prefer to quit it for good because what you only do is just catching your breath. Doing Pilates regularly could give you more endurance so you could better in sport performance.

Gives Women More Flexibility

Have you ever experienced tensed muscles because it has been long times you don’t do exercise? That condition are not only making you feel in pain when moving the muscle but also limit your movement. Pilates give women more flexibility so you could move in easier and more flexible way.

Reduces the Risk of Injury during Workout

Do you know that the side effect of intensive workout is your body is in risk of getting injured. That’s why Pilates are kinds of exercise that highly recommended for women because it is so easy in the joints and muscles so reduces the risk of injury during a workout.

Pilates for the Sake of Beautiful Mind

As mentioned above that Pilates are more than just physical activity that contributes to you physically but also mentally. The perks of Pilates are when you could walk beautifully in your great body; you could have a beautiful mind as well.

Natural Brain Booster

As mentioned above Pilates are about balance. The movements are the combination which required by both body and mind. Some studies have been conducted that by doing Pilates after 10 weeks, there are improvement in women’s brain activity. That’s why Pilates are considered to be the natural brain booster.

Urges You to be More Focus

Doing Pilates are not easy because you need to learn how to focus on breathing while at the same time moving some parts of your body. It is not an easy jobs but good training for you to learn about focus. The perks of doing Pilates are you could forget something that stress you out though for a while.

Reduces Stress Significantly

There are a lot of reasons why Pilates are good to relieve your stress because during the Pilates session, your mind and body will asked for to work together in balance. The repetition will relax your body as well as your mind and the direct effect is your stress will be reduced significantly.

Improves Your Memory

It is not only an empty promise but some researches have been shown that there are significant relation between Pilates and memory improvement. It is because not only body that is affected by regular exercise but also brain and some movements in Pilates are able to stimulate the regeneration of new cells in the brain to improve memory.

Lowers the Risk of Alzheimer

Alzheimer occurs when brain is no longer able to fight the degeneration of cells. It is because the cell regeneration processes are disturbed by several factors. Pilates could assist in making sure that the regeneration process of brain cells is in optimal stage so the risk of Alzheimer could be lowered.

Makes You A Better Learner

There is no such a stupid person but just those who don’t want to learn. If you love to learn new thing perhaps it is the time to make you a better learner. Pilates are kind of exercise that have been proven to be good for both body and mind. Why don’t you give it a try and prove it yourself about how effective it is?

Pilates Are Brain Fitness Solution

Fitness is not only for your body but also for your brain. Reading, learning and even talking are exercises for brain. To optimize your brain function you should find a solution like Pilates. Pilates are brain fitness solution that will improve it function and at the same time release your stress as well.

Promotes Healthy Nervous System

Most people don’t realize that brain is the source of everything including the nervous system. Healthy nervous system means your body could communicate in a much better way. This condition will make you more stress-free and excellent for good mood booster.

Boosts Your Mood Hormones

As mentioned in previous point that Pilates could boost your good mood hormones because Pilates are closely related to your nervous system. If you find yourself in a bad mood for some times with no solution to deal with the condition, why don’t you put Pilates to your regularly schedule and enjoy the benefits.

Relieves Depression

Dealing with depression is not an easy task but being calm is one of the solutions to fight the symptoms and avoid the worst effect. Pilates is similar to meditation that will make you a calmer person. Though don’t ever depend your depression condition with Pilates, intensive therapy and medication are still required.

Fights Addictions

When it comes to addiction, the response is not only coming from your body but also from your mind. Pilates are physical exercises but the movements are beyond physical exercise because it could affect your mind as well, so it is also applicable for those who are currently in addiction state and eager to fight it.

Better Emotion Control

When you are doing Pilates you will understand why these kinds of exercises are good to help you learning how to control your emotion. Doing the Pilates movements in perfect harmony is not easy, you need to focus your mind and train your body to follow the order. It needs a great patience and excellent exercises to control your emotion.

Improves Creativity

Being a creative person is not easy but it is not impossible as well. You must think that it is ridiculous how could Pilates make you a creative person. Well, it is not working that way but Pilates are having prominent contribution so your brain could function optimally that will affect your creativity.

Makes You Happier Person

It is not difficult to be a happy person as long as you know how to eliminate all the stressful factors in your life. Pilates are not going to magically eliminate all the factors that make you stress but Pilates are able to make you a better person to fight those factors.

Gives You More Confidence

There is no magic that will make you a confident person but if you have beautiful mind, healthy body and great body shape, of course you don’t have any reason to not feel confident with yourself.

Pilates for Human Health Physically

Pilates will give you great abs and great body shape as well as great mind. However, the benefits of Pilates are beyond great, they are amazing. That’s why many people have been depending on Pilates for their healthy lifestyle.

Solution to Toned Body

Toned body is not going to make you look good but also make you move better. It it because Pilates are focusing on your core muscles like lower back, buttock, hips and abdominal muscles that are remained contracted during the workout.

Gets Lean Body Shape with Pilates

There are a lot of benefits you could get when you get lean body shape. That’s why sometimes being healthy is not enough but healthy with lean body will make you feel like you don’t need anything in this world and Pilates are not a hard things to do for you who are dreaming of having a lean body shape.

Strengthen Your Core

What is the core section that many fitness professional always talk about? Well, core section are consisting series of muscles that form the core section starting from the abdominal muscles, lower back, hips and buttock included. Those muscles have important role in the whole body anatomy.

Improves Bone Density

It is no secret that regular exercises are good to improve bone density. However, Pilates will bring this exercise’s benefit to the next level because Pilates could be done by anyone from kids up to senior people. The movements that are so easy in the joints are safe for senior people to do it as well.

More Endurance During A Workout

If you feel like you are not going to do a workout anymore because you are old enough to have the stamina like you used to be, well perhaps it is the time to switch what kind of exercise you should do. Pilates are type of exercise for those who don’t really like active movement that drain your energy.

Boosts Heart Rate

Believe it or not but there are already some studies and researches that showed there is a strong correlation between Pilates movements and good heart rate. Having heart rate that is working in healthy pace indicates that your cardiovascular system is fine.

Improves Cardiovascular Endurance

What is cardiovascular endurance? Well, even your heart has its own limit about how hard they should work. Pilates have been proven to make your body gets better endurance as well as your brain and your heart.

Promotes Weight Loss

Looking for an easy solution to deal with your weight problem? Why don’t you book a class in one of the Pilates studio nearby and start losing your weight.

Improves Body Posture

Toned body, great abs, ideal weight with flexible movement are what you need to improve your body postures and Pilates are the solution to all of those.

Balances Your Body

Who said that it is impossible to balance your body? Pilates have proven to you that nothing is impossible even it is actually so easy to balance your body as well as your mind at the same time.

Makes You More Aware of Your Body

Be a better you will not work if you don’t know what best for you. Pilates show you how to learn about your body and make you more aware of what you are capable of.

Cautions Words of Pilates

Though there are a lot of studies and researches have been conducted, paper and books have been published about Pilates, still there are some cautions you should aware about Pilates.

Pilates are not kind of exercise you could do yourself. It is not something you could learn from DVD. If you are a beginner is better for you to find a professional trainer to help you. It will prevent you from the risk of getting injured.
Pilates are not going to work on everyone, it depends on age, body posture, health condition and consistency. If you have a serious health problem that prevents you to do physical activity, consulting your condition with your doctor is highly recommended.
There is always a chance to get injured during workout. Though, Pilates could reduce the risk but for a beginner, you should aware of the possibility.

The unique thing about Pilates are though it is very popular among women but it is not limited for men to join as well. However, perhaps men prefer type of exercise with more energy and physical activities while Pilates are more like doing some controlled movements that most men don’t have the patience to do them. Furthermore, unlike yoga Pilates are relatively safe for kids to do, so for mothers who want to do Pilates, instead of put their daughters to children day care, they could choose Pilates studio that offers Pilates session for both mother and daughters. It makes Pilates more fun to do.