Ep 35: Circle of Trust – LIVE Round Table @ Village Pilates, Chicago

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What is a circle of trust? It’s a gathering of people who honor the process, not the outcome. It’s a coming together of diverse histories, experiences, strengths, skills, motivations, and talents in order to discover…something or maybe nothing.

The first and only place I’ve ever heard of a circle of trust is from author Parker J. Palmer in his book “A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey to an Undivided Life.” He also talks about the COT in one of my all time favorite books, “The Courage to Teach.” Palmer talks about the essence of a COT this way: “Honest, open questions are countercultural…”

Honest and open questioning is what you are about to listen to.

This episode is a very special moment in time with teachers who are exceptional, not for their technical skill, although that is in no short supply, but for their willingness to be vulnerable, to discover, and to be neither right nor wrong but instead aware and awake.

It might sound like I’m over-reaching or over-congratulating them, but if you were there you’d undoubtedly agree that there is something in the community at Village Pilates Studio that far surpasses most of the studio environments that you’ve experienced.

A heartfelt THANK YOU for all of the kindness and generosity extended to me by Regan Zubak and the teachers of Village Pilates, including Len Palomi, Kay Harmon, Julia Haptonstahl, Andy Cox, Cathy Ditto, Krystal Lee, Misti Fredstrom and those who came from afar: Sarah de Guia, Stephanie Constadine, Becky Vento, Becky Lenski, Naydia Miller Kull and so many others.

What an honor.

Heroes

Our “hero” for this episode is the aforementioned Parker J. Palmer and his book “A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey to an Undivided Life.”  I’ve “read” (listened to) this book several times now and it never disappoints. Along with his other book “The Courage to Teach” have helped me make some of the greatest shifts in my life and in my teaching and in bringing the two into balance, aligning them along the mobius strip.

A Hidden Wholeness is a relatively short read and is likely to nudge you in a direction that brings you a little closer to cultivating not only a fulfilling and successful teaching career, but a joyful and fulfilling life.

Here are a couple of quotes from A Hidden Wholeness that have been top of mind for me lately:

“Afraid that our inner light will be extinguished or our inner darkness exposed, we hide our true identities from each other. In the process, we become separated from our own souls. We end up living divided lives, so far removed from the truth we hold within that we cannot know the “integrity that comes from being what you are.”

“Solitude does not necessarily mean living apart from others; rather, it means never living apart from one’s self.”

“First, we all have an inner teacher whose guidance is more reliable than anything we can get from a doctrine, ideology, collective belief system, institution, or leader. Second, we all need other people to invite, amplify, and help us discern the inner teacher’s voice”

I hope you’ll investigate this resource and that it might take you to new and unknown, or rarely frequented, places.

 

Pro Tip

The Pro Tip for this episode is super simple: Allow your students to LEAD you.

This is different than teaching to the person/body in front of you. It is allowing the student and the body to make decisions independent of you and your feedback, cueing, opinions.

I worked with a wonderful and incredibly talented teacher at VPS who allowed me to help LEAD her out of herself and her present moment stories into a reclaimed sense of joy in movement. You’ll just have to listen to the podcast to get the juicy stuff, but the bottom line is this:

After you’ve cued, aligned, taught, touched, and demonstrated, it’s TIME TO SHUT UP AND BACK UP! Get out of the way. Students can’t find their own path, honor their own journey unless you get out of the way.

Consider the difference between guiding a student toward understanding and allowing a student to let their body guide them. In my experience this is the difference between “telling” our students what and how to be and giving our them permission (and an opportunity) to trust themselves.

Ultimately this is about letting your work migrate from higher brain function where there’s a steady list of things your student needs to accomplish, to lower brain function, where the list dissolves into knowing, intuitive, and responsive.

All it takes is this:

“Now, just move. Allow yourself to move and find the easiest, most enjoyable path into and out of the exercise/movement. Don’t think about the pieces, FEEL the whole. Move when you’re ready and at the pace and within the rhythm that feels organic.”

What would happen?

We risk very little in this moment. In fact, we take US out of the equation entirely and leave it up to the student to truly DISCOVER what is in them.

How could you do this today? Tomorrow?

(Good luck and we’re all counting on you 😉

Links and Resources

Learn More About Village Pilates Studio

Learn More About Parker J. Palmer and the Center for Courage & Renewal

Connect With Us

Reach us Individually

  • Chantill – chantill@skillfulteaching.com
    • Phone – (707) 738-7951
  • Debora – dkolwey@gmail.com

Thinking Pilates Podcast - Connect with Us

Ep 34: Brain, Mind, Body – The Missing Pieces w/ Anne Bishop

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Ep 34 BBCWhat’s your brain got to do with it? What is your mind?

We are taught that Pilates is a body, mind, spirit approach, but one sometimes wonders (in my case a lot of the time) where the mind and spirit fits in when we were being taught.

Our podcast guest, Anne Bishop, founder of Body Brain Connect, is going to help us gain some insight into just how the brain fits into our mind/body approach and I dare say clear a more wide open path to spirit — in that trifecta.

The brain we really just don’t talk about. As for spirit…

We’re often told that the spirit part is subtle, an undertone, not something to be talked about overtly or directly because it’s too out of our scope, or because people are uncomfortable with the idea of what spirit might mean. It’s unfortunate that they’re not totally wrong when it comes to the latter part. However, Anne helps us find a way to connect the brain and the mind with the body in a way that is not only clear and concise, but incredibly powerful.

Hope this blows your mind, changes your movement and elevates your spirit!

Enjoy.

 

Heroes

Our “hero” this week is Vanessa Rodriquez, author of the book “The Teaching Brain: An evolutionary trait at the heart of education.” This book was recommended to me by Anne and it’s also one of the required reading texts for the Master’s Program. AND it’s utterly insightful and delightful.

One of the stand out points for me in this book is how the author explores the importance of awareness of self and others in the teaching paradigm. She lists 5 areas of awareness that are critical for cultivating your craft and becoming an expert teacher. She calls them the Five Awarenesses of The Teaching Brain and they are:

  1. Awareness of self as a teacher
  2. Awareness of learner
  3. Awareness of interaction
  4. Awareness of context
  5. Awareness of teaching practice

Here’s a tidbit from the book for you to enjoy:

She’s quoting Sanjoy Mahajan in this first paragraph:

‘Deliberate practice requires sustained concentration, and the rewards are subtle and apparent only in the long term. Thus, one needs motivation in order to enter into and sustain the hard work of deliberate practice. But the learning happens not simply through putting in the hours, but through doing so intelligently.”

In the most basic way, expert teachers are deliberate about how they reflect on their practice. They are aware of the multiple areas that they must consider in order to hone their craft: the learner, the interaction, the context, their teaching practice, and their overall lens as a teacher. Expert teachers ask themselves: “Why did I become a teacher? What are my assumptions about teaching? How do I approach teaching? What do I expect to get out of this enterprise?”

Wow!!! So good!

I hope you’ll check out this wonderful HERO! Here’s where you can pick up the book: http://www.teachingbrain.org/

Pro Tip

Thanks to Anne, we have a wonderful teaching tool called Visual Enhancement of Touch (VET) based on her work with bridging the gap between brain research and movement practice. This is a tool that Anne introduced to the Skillful Teaching Mentoring cohort last January and not only has it been helpful to me in my teaching of teachers, but to the teachers working with students a all stages.

Here’s how Anne first introduced the technique, although you can use it ANYTIME, ANYWHERE, with ANY EXERCISE.

Teaching/Informing Neutral Spine:

From your normal supine hook-lying position (the most common place for us to teach neutral spine) here’s what you do:

  • Students place their own hands on the ASIS
  • Cue them to rock the pelvis from 6 o’clock to 12 o’clock (anterior/posterior tilting), making sure to tune them into the outer sensations of their pelvis and back touching or not touching the floor, movement under their fingertips, areas of tightness, effort etc.
  • Then have them curl up just enough so that they can SEE their hands on their pelvis and continue the rocking.
  • Cue them to notice what it feels like when it looks a certain way. Where is their body in space when they experience a certain sensation. Trying to draw their attention to the visual experience while coupling the more felt experience (bridging the gap between seeing and feeling = enhanced proprioception)

 

This VET can be done standing as well. One of my favorite ways to teach finding neutral is to have a student place their hands on their ASIS as above, but stand perpendicular to a mirror. They rock their pelvis as before but now turn their head to SEE what the body looks like as they experience what it feels like both from their hands and tracking any “felt sense.”
I tend to use a mirror A LOT for these purposes and get the students to inquire about what they’re experiencing as they move vs what they’re seeing as they move. I find this has a tremendous impact on their spatial awareness as well as their ability to formulate more articulate questions and problem solve for themselves. In short, you’re empowering them to discover their bodies for themselves rather than depending on you to always TELL THEM.

Links and Resources

 

Learn More About Body Brain Connect & Anne Bishop M. Ed

Learn More About The Science & Psychology of Teaching Master’s Program

 

Connect With Us

Reach us Individually

  • Chantill – chantill@skillfulteaching.com
    • Phone – (707) 738-7951
  • Debora – dkolwey@gmail.com

Thinking Pilates Podcast - Connect with Us