Mind-body exercise can mean all kinds of different things. I hear it in connection with both yoga and Pilates often, as well as Taijiquan (or T'ai Ch'i) or other martial arts. I've been thinking a lot about Pilates and bellydance lately – many of you know that I teach a combination bellydance/Pilates class called BellyCore(TM). (For those of you who didn't know that, it's all true! Check it out at www.bellycore.com!) So I'm going to use bellydance and Pilates as examples of mind-body exercise in an effort to illustrate what the heck that term really means.

Mind-body exercise seems to be broadly defined as exercise in conjunction with some sort of mental discipline, whether it's yoga's spirituality or breath control, Pilates' total concentration on each muscle, or Taijiquan's focus on the flow of ch'i. With bellydance, the focus is also on muscle articulation, breath control, and, for some practitioners, spirituality.

Pilates is all about controlling the body primarily through the core abdominal muscles – the rectus abdominis, internal and external obliques, transversus abdominis, and pelvic floor, for all the anatomy geeks out there. It's about using muscles to stabilize the center of the body so that the arms and legs can move freely without fear or risk of injury to the spine, since the spine is held safe and strong by the core muscles.

It's also about thinking very specifically about particular muscles and parts of the body, and how they are moving. Without being aware of your stabilizing muscles, you can't effectively strengthen them, because you don't know when they are working, and when they aren't. Eventually, the base movements become automatic – you no longer need to think about your stomach contracting as you breathe – and you can focus on more complex moves and positions.

Bellydance is all about controlling the body to hold some bits still while others move around. Isolations are a key component and distinguishing characteristic of the dance. The most spectacular dancers are able to hold perfectly still while their hips, stomachs, or shoulders execute intricate, elaborate movements.

Again, the practitioner has to be very aware of parts of the body, and how they can work together or separately. In bellydance, you also put parts of your body on autopilot so you can concentrate on moving other parts. The basics of bellydance are, essentially, learning the movement patterns you can use automatically, freeing your mind to concentrate on other things such as musical phrasing, timing, layering a different move on top of the base move, or what have you.

Each discipline complements the other – the flexibility and spinal mobility of bellydance, blended with the strengthening, and lengthening effects of Pilates, becomes a system that changes the way you think about your body. And as you change your thinking about your body, you connect with it in a different way.

This is the essence of mind-body exercise: to think about your body, the mechanics of its motion, the difference a change in breathing makes, the mental focus on a different image, muscle, or movement changing the way your body moves physically. It differs from traditional exercise in its emphasis on the mental dimension – while traditional exercise has a mental component (ask any runner!), mind-body exercise makes the mental focus and visualizations a major part of the class/discipline/etc.

With the advent of summer, I encourage everyone to go forth, take a morning taijiquan class in the park, check out a BellyCore class (yay!), or try some yoga on the beach. See for yourself what a difference working out your mind can make, both to your body and to your mind.

Reference and further study:

1. Bellycore: check out www.bellycore.com to get all the info!

2. Effectiveness of some mind-body therapies:

a. Elsenbruch S, et al. Effects of mind-body therapy on quality of life and neuroendocrine and cellular immune functions in patients with ulcerative colitis. Psychother Psychosom. 2005;74(5):277-87. Counseling, self-care, diet advice, and stress reduction training improves quality of life for patients.

b. Oken BS, et al. Randomized, controlled, six-month trial of yoga in healthy seniors: effects on cognition and quality of life. Altern Ther Health Med. 2006 Jan-Feb;12(1):40-7. While yoga didn't do much to improve cognition, it definitely improved quality of life!

c. Chan AS, et al. Association between mind-body and cardiovascular exercises and memory in older adults. J Am Geriatr Soc. 2005 Oct;53(10):1754-60.

d. Shannahoff-Khalsa DS, Sramek BB, Kennel MB, Jamieson SW. Hemodynamic observations on a yogic breathing technique claimed to help eliminate and prevent heart attacks: a pilot study. J Altern Complement Med. 2004 Oct;10(5):757-66. Resetting the heart through breathing techniques. Very small study sample, but very cool idea.

3. Kerr C. Translating "mind-in-body": two models of patient experience underlying a randomized controlled trial of qigong. Cult Med Psychiatry. 2002 Dec;26(4):419-47. This is a cool study – talks about two ways of looking at qigong. One can only hope that a future study will explore differences in the effects of the two perspectives..

4. Pilates studies:

a. Blum CL. Chiropractic and pilates therapy for the treatment of adult scoliosis. J Manipulative Physiol Ther. 2002 May;25(4):E3. Case report on Pilates therapy for lower back pain.

b. Mallery LH, The feasibility of performing resistance exercise with acutely ill hospitalized older adults. BMC Geriatr. 2003 Oct 7;3:3. Pilates exercises can indeed be done by bedridden older adults.

c. Segal NA, Hein J, Basford JR. The effects of Pilates training on flexibility and body composition: an observational study. Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 2004 Dec;85(12):1977-81. Pilates might help with flexibility, but didn't do much for these subjects' body composition, height, weight, etc.

d. Jago R, Jonker ML, Missaghian M, Baranowski T. Effect of 4 weeks of Pilates on the body composition of young girls. Prev Med. 2006 Mar;42(3):177-80. Epub 2005 Dec 27. Four weeks of Pilates improved 11- year-old girls' body mass index (a height-weight ratio). Plus, they had fun.  

***Melissa is a fitness professional, dance teacher, and performing Middle Eastern dancer based in New York City. She's currently fusing bellydance and Pilates into BellyCore(TM), a movement system that makes you feel elegant, graceful, and good about yourself. Class schedules and other info is at www.bellycore.com. Also check out www.melisssasdance.com for more information on Melissa, and how she can help you love the way you look. Training Notes is Melissa's monthly newsletter on all things health, fitness, and exercise-related. If you've got a question you'd like to see in a future issue, you can contact Melissa at me (at) melissasdance dot com.