Yoga & Pilates - with Rose-Marie Sorokin

Flowing Hatha Yoga

The style I am teaching is a flowing style with sequences of postures (vinyasa) to create energy, heath, stamina and rhythmic, deep breathing. This is mixed with some standing static postures for alignment and strength and some seated postures for deep stretch, flexibility, awareness and focus. We will also do specific breathing exercises (pranayama) and some aspect of yoga philosophy (for example mental focus, positive affirmations, inspirational texts, personal development) will also be covered, usually as a short talk at the beginning of the class.

Yoga is deeply relaxing

Many people come to yoga because they suffer from stress and tension so I increasingly work on helping my students release tension in the body and stress in the mind. We will therefore spend some time at the beginning of the class relaxing the body, focusing the mind and perform some simple breathing. This is then followed by some gentle limbering to prepare for the yoga postures and the flowing sequences.

The breath is used in every posture to further release tension, provide energy and take us deeper into a posture. The class then becomes like a ‘moving meditation’ where we are fully present in our body. We can then fully enjoy the deep relaxation at the end of the class.

Why Yoga?

• Union of Body, Mind & Spirit

• Deeply relaxing/Relaxed Mind

•Improved strenght & flexibiilty

•A deeper connection with Life

•Improved breathing

•Stronger back

•Improved balance

•improved circulation

•Better body awareness

Evolution Pilates

Let me tell you a little about my unique style of Pilates. Many years ago I started out teaching the more ‘standard’ style of Pilates based on Joseph Pilates work. His work consists of 36 basic mat exercises for complete balance of body and mind. Joseph Pilates was a unique man with an extensive background in various physical disciplines and over time he developed his own system helping many people become stronger, fitter and feel better about themselves.

However, as with anything, it is important to evolve, so I started to experiment with new variations of the basic exercises. The main reason I did this was that I discovered that many people had difficulties with the standard mat exercises. They were simply too difficult. I also quickly discovered that muscular tension in the neck, shoulders, back and hips was a major problem. Most people brought all the tension with them into each exercise and were unable to get the most out of the program for this reason.

So I realized that I had to modify my exercise program to make it more accessable and that is how I developed Evolution Pilates. The emphasis in Evolution Pilates is, apart from strenghtening the back and abdominals, on release tension in back, neck and shoulders. I have designed many very efficient and unique exercises to deal with this problem. Because of the success I have had with this I now get a huge number of referrals from GP's, osteopaths, chiropractors and physiotherapists.

Why Evolution Pilates?

• Less muscular tension

•Helps release stress

•Freedom of movement/enhanced functional fitness

•improved posture

•increased core strength/stability/stronger abdominal muscles

•stronger back

•prevention of injury

•improved strength & flexibility

•better body awareness

•no-impact - easy on the joints

•improved performance in sports (golf, skiing, skating, dance, etc.)