Lolita San Miguel

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Ms San Miguel gives Pilates Mat class to 150 Pilates enthusiasts right in Joseph Pilates birthplace Mönchengladbach.   I’ve participated in Pilates Day celebrations every year since the Pilates Method Alliance originated the idea, sometimes even twice in the same year.  In 2007,  I celebrated in both Miami and Madrid, but nothing compares with this year.”

“It was wonderful to see children, senior citizens, Pilates students and Pilates teachers joining together in the beautiful Festsaal of the Kaiser Friedrich Town Hall.  It was a lovely setting with the members of my Mentor Program in Germany demonstrating some of the more difficult Mat exercises,”  she said.  “I thank Claudia Holtmanns for hosting and helping me coordinate the event.”!

San Miguel held the first of her European four-session, two-year Mentor Program from April 30 to May 5 in Dusseldorf, not far from Mönchengladbach for hundreds of  Pilates enthuiasts.   For more information on Lolitas World Wide Tour see her schedual,  email Lolita or please fill out the on-line application.

“LOLITA SAN MIGUEL DISAGREES WITH  PILATES METHOD ALLIANCE STAND ON “PILATES DAY”

Lolita San Miguel, Pilates PMA Elder and one of two persons officially certified by Joseph and Clara Pilates to teach The Method, today expressed her disappointment with the position taken by the Pilates Method Alliance (PMA) to make “Pilates Day,” which is to be held on May 2, an exclusive PMA celebration.

“Joe does not belong to the PMA alone, he belongs to the world,”  Ms San Miguel said, “I fought alongside many others to take Pilates out of the hands of a few people who said they owned the Pilates name and everything connected with Pilates and we were successful.  I will continue to oppose any attempt to make Pilates the exclusive property of anybody or any organization.”

“The PMA should be praised for its continued efforts to establish high standards of quality in the teaching of Pilates and in the certification of Pilates instructors.  Obviously its success depends on its openness and willingness to attract as many Pilates professionals as possible and convince them that the PMA’s mission is absolutely necessary for the good of the Pilates industry and that its collateral operational efforts carry great merit.  Nevertheless, trumpeting

‘Pilates Day’ as the exclusive trademarked property of the PMA is the wrong way of going about it and furthermore impossible to enforce.” “I dream of a ‘Pilates Day,’  she continued, “where millions around the world will perform The Hundred in stadiums, studios, gyms, plazas, etc., resulting in many new converts.

“I hope my respected friends and colleagues of the PMA Board of Directors will reconsider this alienating decision and make it an open invitation instead,” Ms San Miguel, who was one of the first PMA members and continues to be a member, concluded.

As I start my 2009 calendar book I pick up 2008’s beat-up book and as I look through its pages I review mentally the 24 weeks that I spent working away from my home in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.

As a Pilates Elder I am invited to offer workshops and seminars internationally.  It amazes me that whether in Barcelona, Leeds, England, London, Dublin, Tenerife, Marbella, Cincinnati, Jersey City, Los Angeles or Puerto Rico, the teachers are eager to learn more about our professional parents Joseph and Clara Pilates and the history of The Method.  It’s a common bond they all share!  I am fortunate that my husband is able to accompany me and that we both enjoy travel and meeting new people.

Of the nine workshop topics that I present, I am glad to say that Mat is the most popular. This makes me very happy as I feel that Mat is the basis for The Method and the most difficult to perform and teach and yet the most beneficial and easiest to adapt to our clients’ needs and abilities.

I believe in giving clients homework and letting them know that they will see results sooner if we create a partnership and they do their homework in-between sessions.  As the majority of our clients are mature, my workshops for seniors combined with BodyWalk are very popular.  They see in me at 74 a good role model.  Seniors are without a doubt our most committed and best clients.

The memories of Pilates Day in Marbella, Pilates on Tour in Austin, Texas, and the many eager faces and appreciative hugs from the many teachers I have been privileged to teach are like rays of sunshine and love.

This year I will be traveling less as I am starting my Pilates Master Mentor Program in Palm Beach Gardens, but I am certain that at least eighteen weeks I will again be “on the road,” and loving it!

Next Blog:

The positive and negative conditions regarding Pilates teaching I find in my international travels.

THE VISION:

To create the San Miguel paradigm of The Pilates Method by:

• Continuing the legacy of Joseph and Clara Pilates and Carola Trier, as taught to Ms San Miguel by them, with the respect, accuracy and fidelity—and love—they earned and their work deserves;

• Incorporating on an ongoing basis the latest findings in kinesiology and sports medicine with classical Pilates techniques;

• Integrating Ms San Miguel’s knowledge of dance, the result of more than 60 years of experience in the field of ballet—one of the oldest methods of body conditioning—as professional dancer, educator, choreographer and artistic director into The Method;

• Exploring in a more profound manner The Method’s Mind-Body-Spirit connection with particular emphasis on the “Spirit” component.