“Lazy breathing converts the lungs, literally and figuratively speaking, into a cemetery for the deposition of diseased, dying and dead germs.” – Joseph Pilates
Now we don’t want to alarm you, but that’s some pretty heavy stuff from our guy, Joseph in regards to health of your respiratory system. If you really think about it, when was the last time that you took a deep breath and fully cleared you lungs of oxygen? Perhaps it was the last time you were in it at the studio?
Did you know that even when we’re exercising at high intensity, only about 50% of the air in our lungs gets expelled? It’s even less when we’re not exercising at intensity. Joseph Pilates believed that the air left in our lungs was a “haven for the multiplication of harmful germs,” and one of his main through the practice of Pilates was to purge the lungs, therefore cleansing the system.
Pilates and breath, he said, “is the equivalent of an internal shower.” Further to this, he once said: “As a heavy rainstorm freshens the water of a sluggish or stagnant stream, so does the Pilates method purify the bloodstream.”
It sounds pretty incredible right? Here at VIVA, we certainly don’t underestimate the amazing effects that Pilates (and exercise) can have on respiratory health!
Joseph Pilates was incredibly active in his practice of Pilates during World War 1 in England and through a number of strange circumstances he was charged with the task of rehabilitating injured soldiers when he was a POW on the Isle of Mann. Joseph had a large number of soldiers following his exercise program and when the influenza pandemic swept through the Isle of Mann, Joseph Pilates’ group of exercising soldiers were the only ones who did not come down with this horrible Influenza.
Further to this, it was proven that when Joseph Pilates had his patients, who fell victim to the Spanish Flu, practice his exercises, they recovered faster from this highly contagious virus!
With the a similar pandemic, currently sweeping across the globe, it’s now more important than ever to be remaining clam, practising common sense, keeping moving and looking after our health and wellbeing in any way that we can.
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