If you’ve been coming to Pilates for several months, you’ll have noticed some improvements. You’ll likely have a lot less pain and your posture will have improved.
If you stop coming to Pilates or you stop exercising for a while, your body will regress. You’ll lose the coordination and strength that you’ve gained.
Your body just does whatever is easiest for it to do. You’ll have to rebuild your strength and regain your mobility.
That’s okay.
We’ve all fallen back at one point or another, whether that’s due to an accident, a severe injury, or just not making enough time to exercise.
There’s nothing wrong with sitting on the couch with a pint of ice cream and watching Netflix.
It’s important to find exercise that we enjoy and look forward to, because it makes it easier to stay consistent.
Here are three easy ways to recover your strength after taking time off.
Start small. Even just twenty minutes of a mat workout every day makes a difference. If you throw yourself into a regime that doesn’t work for you, you’ll quickly burn out. Start with a walk, a swim, a bike ride, or twenty minutes of Pilates at home. A manageable routine is the only way it’ll become a consistent one.
Be patient. It’s frustrating to lose strength and coordination so quickly, to fall back so fast. The only way you’ll regain it is if you start exercising again, but you have to be as patient and understanding with yourself as you would be with your best friend, your cousin, your brother, or the barista down the street.
Try something new. If you’ve never done yoga before, book a class. If you’ve always wanted to try squash, do it. Choose a new route when you go for a walk or a bike ride. Take a Pilates class with an instructor you haven’t met yet.
Your brain needs novelty, challenge, and focus to acquire new skills and to grow, and trying something new and making progress with it will help you stay motivated to keep doing it. Who knows? You might actually end up loving kickboxing, spin class, or karate.
2020 has been a hard year for everyone. We’ve all really missed the gym and our favourite exercises. Stress and unexpectedly difficulty in our lives might have sidelined our routines.
What’s important is that we don’t dwell on it. We accept it for what it is and move forward.