Magic Circle Essentials

Hi, everyone. It's Amy havens here at Pilates anytime. So happy to be back. Magic Circle with reformer today. We'll spend a few minutes standing warming up, and we'll get right down onto the reformer. For me, the magic circle is such a fun prop.

It's a useful prop. And to me, props should be useful and have an intention for connection. So it's about midline connection. That's fairly obvious, but if it's obvious for you. Hopefully, it will be after the end of this class.

So we'll begin with the ring between our knees. Stay on with your feet a little bit apart. And, ideally, we do have our heels together, And you're starting with a little bend in the knee. So you're somewhat low here. It's not a dance position, so it doesn't have to be a ballerina first position.

But what we're looking for here is your legs are a little bit bent. Heels pressed together at the ground. Even that starts to send the message of midline and pull everything up, right, from the ground up. So let's take a breath here. Relax your sit bones, relax your rib cage, relax everything here, take a breath. But then as we exhale, I want you to start to engage toward the center. Ideally, the knees straightened, but that's not going to happen for everybody.

Okay. If it doesn't, you'll feel here. Inhale as you pla or bend. Let things relax as you go down. Exhale is the engagement together and up. Okay. We'll do about 8 of those.

So inhale as you let this relax, meaning your pelvis, your sitting bones, the exhales where the effort is here to engage to the midline and up. So you might be starting to feel a little bit in this part of your abdomen. Obviously, your inner thighs, a lot of us start to sense a little bit back here behind the thigh by the sitting bones. 4 more. Inhale. And exhale. Engage and lengthen up.

Inhale. Down. Relax. Exhale. Engage together midline and up. 2 more. And the up can also be your spine muscles.

I think some of you are gonna start tapping into that right away. Low back, even through the back of your skull. Last time, exhale is the where the strength is to engage to the center and up up, up. Just hold that a little bit longer. Sometimes one leg is working more than the other. It's okay. It's okay. I know I can tell mine is because my ring feels uneven.

Don't worry. I'm gonna marked out through my head and fixed out along the way. Okay? So now we're gonna put the ring at the ankles, everybody. It's right above the medial malleoli, which is your ankle bone, not on the bone, but right above the bone and organize in parallel. Again, just even in standing, you're working, pulling together. I have a queue at home in the studio too. I'll say pull the floor together.

You feel that? Okay. You're bending down the same thing. You're relaxing through your sitting bones. Excel engage to pull up. Now we're gonna add a little lift of the heels and a lowering of the heels to challenge it.

Bending as you inhale relaxing or softening, exhale engage and pull up. Okay? And bend and straighten pull up and down. We'll do 8. So here's number 4. If the heel lifting is a little too awkward, you don't have to do that. But it's fun to challenge the connection of your in size, your back size, your spine length, and your control of your rib cage to your abdomen here and your hips.

Right, and no arching in other words. So this is all the connection we've prepared for for lying on the reformer in footwork. This nice internal connection, two more times, bending down, and straighten, adduct and lower last time and bend straighten the legs and then lift your heels. Hold here. Holding here.

I want you to think about bringing your sit bones closer together. Yes. You'll feel your glutes. Pull your thighs up. Pull your abdomen up and lower. Okay. Here's something interesting.

Try for the camera. You have to turn sideways. We're gonna be walking out to a plank. I might look silly as I try to keep the the ring connected between my ankles. It's okay. We have fun here.

That's actually some interesting connection anyway. So let's take a breath. Keep that hug. Hug meaning hug the inner thighs. Hug that magic circle.

I want you to slowly round down. On the way down, lift your tummy up, everybody. Get your hands to the floor. Now walk out into your front support where you're playing, if that's the name you like to have, and hold your shoulders above your wrists. Engage your legs.

Pull your stomach up. Engage your legs. Now as we lift the hips, keep using the legs to hug the circle. Walk your hands back. Walk your hands back and roll up to standing. Keep hugging the circle.

Use the legs and hug that midline. Do it one more time. Breatheing in. Exhale. Hug over rounding I'm lifting my tummy up, hugging that ring tightly with my inner legs, and muscles near my sit bones. Hopefully, you're feeling that also.

Hold into a plank. Let's do 3 cycles of breath. Keep it held. Keep it connected. 1 more on this exhale.

We'll lift the hips. You can push your hands on the floor, walk yourself back, There's a moment of little bit of wanting to release that contraction of your legs. Hold on to it. We'll all the way up. Okay. Release the ring. And then just take a quick assessment.

What do you feel? You know me? I love that. What do you feel? You should be feeling pretty clear in your in between the legs and around your sitting bones. Okay? So we'll take that into footwork. So come on down. I'm on 3 red.

To begin here, just place the ring in your hands, feet are in first position. And I want you just to do a little scapular warm up when you're lying supine. So all I'm doing is bringing the ring down to my chest, reaching to the ceiling. Nothing too complicated. Lightly pressing the circle with my hands.

So that the upper inner arms are connected to the trunk. The chest muscles are starting to connect to the trunk. Shoulders are pulling down off of the shoulder rest or away from the shoulder rests two more times. Pretty simple little warm up here, of course. And then one more, everybody. Okay?

Now holding your arms straight, shoulders back on the mat I want you to press the carriage out. Not too squeezey on the ring, but then as you return, squeeze the ring or press it. So we inhale. No pressure. Exhale pressure. And we go.

Now use that same connection you had in your legs in the warm up, even though the ring is now up here in your hands. Okay? 5 more key pressure on the circle. Keep pressure heals together around your sitting bones in high inner thighs. Last two and your last one. Okay. Wonderful.

Relax your arms. Change the position of your feet to your arches. Take a little look. Make sure you're centered. Arms come back up.

You're in a neutral spine. Now press the legs and press the circle. Relax the press of the circle as you come in. So we press and press release the arms. Legs come in.

Okay. And little coordination for the brain. Now if the next five keep pressure on the circle 1 and connect the inner thighs together right up along those hip sockets up through the abdomen along the spine and our last one here and rest your arms and legs. Okay. Now heels parallel. I like full adduction because I'm connecting to my midline. You also could separate your heels if that's better for you. But today, I'm going here.

Arms stay straight up. Now the whole 10 reps were pressing the circle. Let's go press pull. Press. What I'm saying pull, I'm pulling myself into the stopper with my hamstrings. I'm going 5 more now pressing the circle.

Sometimes it's fun to think of trying to make it an oval That's a lot of squeeze. And 2 and one all the way in. Okay. Relax your arms. Now as you step onto the balls of the feet for, tendon stretches, you can separate your feet. Pretend you're doing the standing warm up there with the ring between your ankles as you're here. We'll take our arms up with a light pressure on the circle. I'd like you to do 2 counts to lower your heels, 2 counts to rise, 2 counts to lower, two counts to rise.

And I'm lightly holding that circle. Keep your gaze to the ceiling. 5 more starting now. 5 And can you press the circle with a little more of the pinky finger side of your arm? Last three, last two, and last one, and come all the way down.

Good. Everybody. Come on up. We're gonna change our springs. I'm going for the 100 next, and I'd like to take my bar down. So it's out of the way, and that sets us up also for coordination where I like the bar out of the way. I'm now just down to 2 red springs.

This will go between the ankles. Right above that malleoli again. Grab your straps or handles, whatever you have on your reformer. Here they are. Now nudge away from the shoulder block so you don't get caught.

Strong room's reaching up. You just did all of that connection here. Take a breath of the nose as you exhale first. Just engage to the midline. Chest, abdomen, inner legs.

Next breath out. You'll come up to your 100 shape. Pump the arms for 5, and xl2, 3, 4, 5 with the legs. Pump with the arms 45, XL 2, 3, 4, 5, and 1. So this is definitely a coordination game.

We're halfway there. Arms. Lags. 2345. Upper body. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. It's hard to keep that ring pretty still in the center of the legs. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and last one, 3, 4, 5, exhale, 3, 4, 5, bring everything down. Fold your elbows, bring your thighs closer to your chest, pull your abdomen in. Coordination, we come up to the hundred position.

Just squeeze those legs together, fold the knees in, relax the arms and chest down. So the energy is up here being held. Contract to the center midline. Keep it as you pull your legs in and release it as you lower. And engage to that midline and lower for 2 more.

In her thigh right near the sitting bones. Keep it as you pull in. Relaxing down last time, pulling it in, pull the thighs in, and relaxing down. I think you're starting to feel your midline. If you're not already, Okay. Next is feet in these straps. See if you can keep your circle through this whole thing. We're going short spine. Okay? Now if the ring falls out, just reposition. Please take your headrest flat.

Arms by your sides. Few leg extensions. Just feel that connection as you deliver your legs forward. Can you keep the work to hold a ring? It's pretty easy to feel upper inner thigh. Can you feel a little more back around the back of the thigh?

Concentrate with this. It'll kinda wrap toward the center. We'll take one more everybody, hold the legs out. Okay. Couple slowly first.

I like to take it slow. Feel the work. Keep the legs active toward the center line. If you can get to the stopper, great. If not, that is okay. Here's where it's gonna count. Keep the abdominals active.

Rise up to your upper back. Lift your sit bones to your heels. Now I'm gonna do a little soft flex of my feet as a frog in parallel. Take a moment and try to lift your sitting bones higher to the circle. Take a breath.

Keep the active inner thigh connection as you roll down. My abs are also pulling toward that midline. Place your pelvis level. Extend. Let's do it again. So we're bringing the legs into deep hip flexion.

Try to keep the circle held. Curl, articulate, articulate, articulate, keep hugging that midline. Bend. I'm thinking lift the sitting bones to the ring. I'm gonna spend a breath there. Next inhale. Exhale.

Start rolling down. Stern him away from the chin. Vertible by vertebra. We want it to feel good two more times. Right? You can pick up the pace just a tiny bit. Peel it up.

But if you pick up your pace, try not to lose the connection. The prop is there for an intentional reason. It's to connect us to the mid line. Sometimes if we go too fast, that dims out. Okay? And press once again.

P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. P. O. Oh, yes. Frog and parallel. Take a breath.

And I want you to roll down slowly. Peel your shoulders open. Nice articulation. Now when you get your pelvis down, just take the ring out from underneath and just set it to the side of the reformer. Connect your heels together.

We're gonna do about 5 leg circles each direction. I'm gonna go parallel here up the midline. I like to open at the top. Wonderful stretch in the inner thigh after all of that gathering together. And make these circles your circles.

If you need them wide, you can go wide. But when you're bringing the legs together, it's the same activity, the feeling of bringing that mid line connection. It shouldn't just be in the legs. It should also be in this lower region of the tummy, reversing for 5. So I have a subtle, image here of my hip bones coming together in the front to my pubic bone region, that whole lower core, if you will, together.

Last two circles and the last circle and then bring all the way together and everyone come down into a frog and just pause for a moment. Wonderful. Let's take our straps off of our feet, and you'll just hang them right back on your post. Now we're coming up for stomach massage series. And I like my foot bar on the low setting. Feel free to take it on your high setting if that's your choice.

I like the low. I'm gonna just keep us on 2 red springs, everybody, and I'm also having a pad. Alright? So place the pad you can do it, long or narrow. I really don't, you know, have a preference on that. Have a sit on your pad. What's the pad for? So we don't slip. So have your circle nearby. Feet up on foot bar, pilates stance.

Take a minute. Pull your hands behind your knees and pull yourself up first. Push the carriage and place your hands. Now you wanna be in the middle. You wanna lift this up heels together. Ready. We're gonna go lower lift heels, pull the carriage forward.

So there's no magic circle use in the round back part of the sequence. That doesn't mean you're not connecting to your midline. My heels are pinched together. They are firm. That makes me feel my stomach.

We're only gonna do 5, so here's the 5th one. Okay. Now grab that circle. Place it up on the mat behind you. I do not have a preference how you're holding it. You can have your hands flat.

You can have them on the side. I'm gonna take my index finger to the side of my ring and try to press the ring together behind me. What's that doing? Lats, upper back, spine. Same leg work. Press. Lower lift to heels come in.

Press. Lower lift. So the midline is not just our legs. It's not just our tummy. It's our lats. Part of that upper core We use all the time in Pilates. It connects to our lower half. Right? I think that was our 5. Take it out of your hands.

You're reaching. It's on a diagonal. You're simply reaching the arms, but you're pressing with the arms. I'm using the pinky fingers side of my arm, trying to lift my lower spine tall, even through the back top of my head. Last one, and please hold.

We're gonna pulse the ring with the little rhythm. 4, 2, and 1, and hold it. And come all the way in sitting as tall as you know how and then take your legs to a straddle sit, place the ring down, open your arms for a moment. Feel your shoulder blades together behind you. I want you to rotate your trunk not your arms.

They're not gonna go anywhere. You're turning your trunk. Come to center. Other side. So we just had the magic circle behind us to feel the side back and the upper back.

Can you keep that connection even without having to squeeze or integrate the use of the circle? That's the idea, right, that the prop helps us connect. We don't always have to have our hands or feet connected to it. Use your muscles, use your mind. We'll do one more each direction now.

Can you all turn more? Turn more. Let the turn also be through your neck eyes. One more from your tail all the way through and center. Okay. And just feel what you feel. Your back, hopefully. Intersect your body. Yes.

That's what we're doing. Full body work. Take your pad away. Footbar down, I'm using one spring for pull straps. I like a red. We'll get our box.

Keep breathing as you're tearing around, positioning. We will use the ring between the knees. It's like a circus trick here when they get this up. I like my head rest up. Doesn't need to be down.

Okay. Place yourself first prone. Place the ring second between your ankles. Again, it's right above that malleoli. Hug it with your inner thighs. Chest is right at the edge of the box. Grab your straps.

Now as you lengthen your legs, I want you to keep your legs somewhat low. Hug that mid line. Let your chest come down. Feel your scapula first come down. We're just doing some simple pull straps, everybody.

Work the mid line. Worked in connection of the arms to your back, the legs to the center, and then relax down. We'll do five total. Whatever breath is suiting you. Press your pubic bone down.

And relax. You do have to effort a little lift of the naval up off the box to the inside of you and lower down. Are you holding the circle with just your ankle bones, or are you holding with your whole upper leg connection? Hopefully, the second answer. Okay.

Last one and just to hold it there. 3 little kickbacks of the shoulders and elbows. 1, and 2, and 3, and everything comes down all the way. Okay. Hook your straps, take the ring out from the knees, ankles, I should say, and come up. We're gonna turn over on our back on the box. You can keep your springs just as is for now.

Few from the series of 5, hold it about 3. Ring in your hands to begin. Connect, roll back. Bring your thighs to you. Ring over your shin bones.

Single leg stretches. Just 10, 9. Squeeze that ring, guys. 4, 3, 2, and 1. Bring your knees in. Want you to take your head back.

Bring your head up and then stow that ring behind your skull. My elbows come together. Lift the chest. We're going double leg stretch. So it's the double leg stretch.

And then ab interaction. I'm not pulling on my neck. It's just there to support the head. Remember, the prop is useful. It's for support.

Last two and in. Last one and in. Stay with me. Ring in the hands. Let the head go back. Scissors. Bring your legs up.

Bring your chest up. Reach the ring up toward the ankles. Take one leg down. That leg's gonna do a pull pull. Bring your shin to the ankle, bring your ring to the ankle.

Your leg to the ring, your ring to the ankle, 5, 5, 4. You know what I mean? And three, 3, 2, 2, last one, and give it a rest. Okay. Up we go. Now I am gonna have us do some short box material in long box set up So we'll need our strap, but I don't know if you need all your springs. I've been known to not do too many springs on some of this because you have to hold the carriage steady that way, but if you wanna add a few more springs to steady it, For safety, you can. I added one more red.

Alright. Sit tall. Hold a ring in your hands. Hook your fingers for a moment, everybody. Pull out on the magic circle.

Take a deep breath in as you pull out exhale and round. Contract a core. Contract those arms. Inhale is your articulate to sitting tall. Pretty simple. In terms of choreography, go inside, make it work a little deeper, roll up sit tall, pull the ring apart, Last two.

I'm trying to think about my floating ribs going back one more time. My last ribs at 11:12 on my back going back. And then roll up to sitting tall. Okay. Now keep your arms straight. I'm gonna ask you to hook your thumb on the inside and just take your arms on a somewhat of a diagonal line to your trunk and hold.

Now I'm pulling out with my thumb, but I'm also pressing in a little with my fingers a little bit of both. And I want us to do the flat back, just holding that beautiful plank line, and right back up. This is now more stability, of course, ribs to hips in the front and ribs and hips in the back. Challengeing not to arch or open the ribs. One more only.

Keeping the arms steady as useful, I think, and then center. Okay. Bring it to your chest. Rotate. Just do a few spinal rotations. I'm pressing the the ring a little bit, but now I'm gonna pause as I'm rotated towards you.

I'd like to hinge back. Hold the hinge doesn't have to be far. Three times, the arms will go forward. And in a little higher forward and in, higher hold, come off off of your hinge, rotate to center, lower the ring, bring it to the chest. The same thing to the other side.

So the rotation is small, The hinge is not too big, and we reach. We pull it in. You reach a little higher. You pull it in. You reach a little higher hold it. Press the circle, everybody.

Bring your body up return to center lower and in. Let's take that one more time around everybody. So we'll rotate first and hinging back second. Now hold that hand. The arm movement 3 times, reaching forward. You don't have to even go any higher if you don't want to. But going a little higher is more challenging, of course. And then hold it up, hold the integrity of that. Bring your body up.

Keep the rotation, then rotate lower and in. Ready? Last time, you rotate. I'm pressing the circle. I'm hinging, still pressing the circle. Arms out and in, still pressing the circle, gaining a little height and press. Here's your last one. Let's really connect. Hold.

Bring your body up reach for that corner. Reach for that corner. Reach for that corner. Return. Arms down and in. Okay.

Just round forward for a moment. Shake it out. Now we're going into hamstring curls. Hamstring curls with the magic circle at the ankles. Always a crowd pleaser. Your can just keep the springs as is.

Let's turn this way. We can stay this. Oh, let's go this way. Gonna come on to her, tell me again, like we did for pull straps. You really technically could go either way. We'll go this way.

I want you to hug the box. You can hug the risers and the shoulder blocks. Okay? So press your legs long. Now This I've done many different ways. Lots of people do this different ways. You can arch up into a little back extension if you'd like, or you can keep it more level, or you could even let your head rest. For me, this feels good because I can't overuse my low back I wanna use the back of my leg.

So I'm gonna flex my feet. I want you to do the same thing. Bend your knees and pull that circle towards your bum. Elevate your thighs a little and extend your legs back. This is so tricky to keep that ring still.

And, again, lift your thighs a little, bend the knees, bring the heels toward the buttocks. I'm trying to keep my thighs a little elevated and reaching back. Don't worry about what it looks like. Please consider what the connection is. Are you feeling the inner legs?

Are you feeling around the sitting bones? If yes is your answer, you're doing the work. Can you elevate your navel up in your body a little? Very challenging when you're lying on your stomach. Okay, guys. We're gonna do it one last time only.

Try to raise those size. Bend the knees. Pull them toward you. Hold now a little extra. I want you to just flex harder with your ankles. Press your heel bones to the ceiling and relax.

Press your heels to this guy and legs down 3 more time. So I'm trying to hug the midline and lift the legs. Right? Last two, navel up in the body and one more and lift, hold it, hold it, and then relax. Well done. Take that away. Spiral off your tummy.

And let's let's put our box away. We're gonna put the ring down for just a moment. So as we put our box away, you know, that plank roll down I did at the beginning, we're gonna do long stretch down stretch, up stretch elephant with no ring, but you wanna feel and connect as if you're still holding the ring. Okay? I like to put the feet on the headrest. We're gonna go for two springs.

The bar will come up. You can go high bar on this reformer. It's a mid bar. Okay. Legg's together.

Commit. One foot. One foot. I forgot to mount my other spring. That's a good idea. Here we go. It's second leg up.

Now as I have my legs there, I'm imagining I've got that circle. We're only doing 33 reps. Now at the beginning of class, the legs were apart, but we had the connection of the inner thighs. I said you don't always have to have a prop to make the connection happen. Hold this here, please.

Lower your knees. Separate your feet for down stretch. The leg should be still ad ducting the midline. I love the sternum up three times. Press. Pull.

The lats. Shoulders to your back, last one, and hold, round your back. Come up for up stretch. Same idea. Pretend that magic circle is between those legs. Press out to your long stretch, round your spine to come in, lift in around the spine. Press the hips back.

Everybody tried to keep a little bit of round spine. I know it's strange. But that's the work. Floating ribs up. Last one.

Keep the connection. It's in the legs. It's in the hips together. It's in the stomach. And now flatten your feet.

Okay. Make a long flat spine for a moment. Make a round spine. What feels more useful for your challenge? Some of you like a flat, go flat.

Some of us like around, go around. Let's do 10 quick movements. Use the connection between the legs and the back of the thigh, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, hold the carriage forward, rise up on your toes, lift, and then just set your knees down. Rest on your shins for a moment. Take a breath.

Well done. So see, we don't always have to have the prop present to make the connection. I think we're getting it. Okay? Now, everybody, take your footbar down. I'm gonna do some standing splits now. Okay? So I like, again, my footbar toward me on this reformer. I am gonna ask you to use the circle in your hands. Step up on the solid side, moving side, couple inches away, have the ring in your hands, take a breath, stand nice and lifted, connect it.

So if the ring were at the ankles, we'd be pulling the legs together, but we're pulling the carriage home. Now press the carriage out. Press the ring with your arms. Close the carriage. Keep squeezing in the ring.

3 or 4 more. We'll probably do 4 to a total of 5. So here's the third one. Keep using the arms, the pinky finger side of that arm. Okay.

Last one to hold. When you close the carriage, lower the ring, and elevate your sternum into a high release, I am still pressing the ring. Hold, hold, hold, and center. Okay. Other side. Step back with the carriage leg, walk around the front, step up on the stable side, then the moving side. Add up your legs.

Press the circle with your arms. Press the carriage out. Lift your arms. Keep contracting the upper body toward that ring. Even though the legs are changing their work, the upper body is not standing lifted from tail to head.

Good. One more time. Now as you close the carriage, lower your arms, high lift of your sternum, things like standing swan, hold, hold, still add up those legs. And release. Well done. Step back. Now we're coming down to kinda cool it down.

We don't need this anymore. You can stow that. Foot bar to mid height. We're taking bottom lift. Two springs.

Lie down. Bottom lift. I'm okay with the head rest up. Heels in the corners. Again, use the legs.

Pull them energetically toward the midline, pull the low abdomen toward the midline, and I want you to karate chop your fingers. Press as if you're holding the ring here in your hands, press towards you. Curl your pelvis, roll up just to your floating ribs, and we're doing 10 movements of the carriage. Can you still, this last hurrah, pull to your midline? I should say, what can you pull to your midline?

5 more. I'm pretending I'm holding a circle in my arm, holding my stomach and hips together, inner thighs together, Good. 2. And one, close the carriage all the way. Roll the pelvis down.

Relax the arms. Place your feet. Now it's only two springs for walking in place. So just go easy. Just easy. Just calming it down. Keep thinking that all the places we did midline connection. Always between the ankles, anytime it's between the knees.

It's not just the legs, though. It's that lower core, hip bone to hip bone. It's the sit bones. It's the arms to the back, right, legs to the trunk. Exactly. And 4 and 3 and 2 and 1.

And then just hold both heels under everybody. Take a few breaths Thank yourself for coming. Lift your heels. Come all the way in, and then finish with a hug. Give yourself a beautiful hug.

And I wanna thank you for coming and playing with me and let me know how it goes. Hope to see you again soon. Bye bye.