How to Bring More Creativity Into Your Pilates Classes Without Chaos

Are you feeling pressure to make your Pilates classes more creative but not sure where to start?

We’ve seen how much you’ve been loving the solo episodes, so Nic is back today to discuss how to be more creative in your classes without losing structure or purpose.

With so much inspiration coming from social media, it’s easy to feel like you need to constantly reinvent your teaching. But Nic challenges this idea and brings it back to what really matters, which is strong foundations, clear intention, and teaching that actually serves your clients.

She shares how creativity in Pilates is not about adding more complexity, but about understanding movement patterns, building from the fundamentals, and creating a class experience that feels purposeful and connected.

This episode will help you rethink creativity in Pilates and give you simple ways to make your classes feel fresh without losing what makes Pilates so powerful.

Timestamps

00:00 Why creativity in Pilates teaching is such a big topic right now

02:24 Why do you feel the need to be creative?

03:10 The impact of social media on Pilates classes

06:18 Letting your personality shape your teaching style

08:06 Teaching with intention and clear class outcomes

13:06 How to break down complex exercises into simple steps

16:11 Creating flow and storytelling in your classes

17:44 How to layer progressions and regressions for clients

20:09 Simple ways to adapt and evolve Pilates exercises

24:09 Taking clients on a journey over multiple weeks

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Coming up on today's episode of Beyond the Reformer. I wondered if we could start with a question. Why do you feel the need to be creative? Is it because you think it's expected of you? You know, are your clients demanding it? Clients will always remember a class taught well. But a class that was trying to be too clever and got chaotic. So sometimes all that extra effort backfires on you. So I think before you get creative, you have to really lean in to the fundamentals of this work. This practice has been going a long time. It's powerful as it is. As a Pilates teacher, make sure it's rooted in Pilates. And from that place, be creative and be creative with a purpose. Today, you are amazing. You are amazing as you are today. Not on a 30-day challenge, not when you've done X, Y, and Z, like right now. Hello everyone, welcome back to Beyond the Reformer. This week it is a solo episode. It's blown me away how the solo episodes are actually, I think, pretty much our most listened to episodes. So I'm so grateful that you're enjoying them and it's great to be able to hopefully bring you some ideas. You know, I always assume that people would love the interviews, and you are loving the interviews, but it's nice to have some of these solo episodes do so well. And it got me thinking about, I guess what you're asking for really is more tips that you can directly take away. Because I think a lot of the guest episodes are very inspirational, but how can we also hopefully share some of our knowledge and help you be a better teacher, a more grounded teacher, a more present teacher, all the things that you're hearing our guests say. When I was thinking about what one to do next, I was thinking about creativity because I am now running reformer teacher training courses from my studios in Bristol in the UK. We've also run them out across the UK. So we're now doing one in Oxfordshire that's coming up in May. And we're looking to work and partner with other studios to bring it out nationwide, which is really, really exciting. And when I was writing that course, I wanted to make it different from the comprehensive course. I wanted to think about what things do you really need to be able to be a really good reformer teacher, reformer group class teacher. And creativity seems to be something that comes up quite a lot. I think we're all inspired by social media. And I think it can get us into a bit of a pickle. I think we can get a little bit lost with that. So today I would love to explore the area of creativity and Pilates. Just some ideas for us to play with. Before I get going, I know I'm like a broken record, but it really helps the podcast. If you could like, subscribe, or follow, there's just a little tick button usually on whatever platform you're on. If you could quickly tick that now, that makes a huge difference to how we can continue to keep the podcast going. So if you've done it already, cheers. Uh, if you still got to do it, which is most of you, I'd be so grateful if you could hit that button. If you're interested in hearing more about our courses and the work that I do and making sure that you never miss an episode of the podcast, then do sign up to my newsletter. I don't send them out that frequently, and I hope that they're useful. You can sign up, we'll put a link in our show notes. You can also, the link in bio on our Instagram links to it as well. There's a link there that allows you to sign up to the newsletter and you can follow along with what's going on behind the scenes of Beyond the Reformer. If you're watching, you're joining me in my office. I've got a cup of tea. I've printed out some pages from the manual of the reformer. I'm gonna add to it anyway, as I always do. Thinking about creativity in Pilates. I wondered if we could start with a question. Why do you feel the need to be creative? Is it because you think it's expected of you? You know, are your clients demanding it? Are you bored yourself? Are you feeling like your teacher training maybe was lacking? This I get lots of messages about this. I think we're starting to learn, aren't we, that there's a big range of teacher trainings out there. And some place more emphasis on the repertoire and programming than others. I mean, this is the challenge around short courses. So it's great that you're starting to recognize that and just think about how we could learn a bit more. What I see a lot is that we're a little bit governed by social media. And I thought it was really interesting when Tracy Mallet was on the podcast. Hugely listened to podcast. I mean, people love Tracy's work. And she is the queen of creativity. I'm sure we would all agree. But it was interesting hearing her say that she feels very pulled by the algorithm. She feels that she has to create content that the algorithm will pick up that will get the kind of views that she wants. So I thought that was interesting because she also shared that she isn't necessarily teaching that kind of thing to the general public. And when she is putting this stuff in a class, there's a sprinkling of it: 80% classical, 20% of this kind of contemporary, more creative work. And I think what is needed really to be creative is to have a solid foundation, is to think about like sometimes I think we're getting creative before we know the basics. And actually, clients just want to come in and move. And if they move, and you know, clients will always remember a class taught well, but a class that was trying to be too clever and got chaotic, that's when they're gonna think that class wasn't very good, actually. So sometimes all that extra effort backfires on you. So I think before you get creative, you have to really lean in to the fundamentals of this work. This practice has been going a long time, it's powerful as it is. So I think it's good to remember that. If you think that your clients are demanding all this creativity, I promise you they're not. I think there's things we can learn from the classical system of the amount of repetition and this idea that we really get proficient in the fundamentals before we move on. And then we get proficient in that before we move on. And we do lots and lots of repetition to get that into us. I think that works really well. Now, I don't follow a set order, and I certainly am not teaching the same stuff all the time. But I do think that I remember in my early days, Diane Nye, who's had a couple of episodes on the podcast, she was my mentor. And I was definitely getting caught up in this. Oh my God, I need to keep doing new stuff. And she was the one who said, you know, 80% of your class could be the same every week. Change 20% of it. And the 20% that changes, because some movements have changed, you'll cue the other ones differently anyway, and it will feel like a completely different class, or put one prop in, and that same class feels different to clients. So I think there's ways that we can be creative, even within the more simplistic method, which isn't very simplistic at all. But I think it's to get those foundations well, just like we want with our clients. Like we're not going to teach our clients snake and twist unless they know the building blocks. And I think we as teachers can get a little caught up with seeing something and just teaching it as it is, instead of really understanding where it comes from, how do we build someone up to it, what are the building blocks of that exercise and how do we program it in? So if all of that is feeling too much, then I suggest you just go back to really honing the fundamental skills. But I do think that creativity has a place in our teaching. It allows you to reflect your personality. And some of you listening are definitely more creative than others. Some of you have dance backgrounds and so are more used to that flourish. Some of you are better storytellers than others. It's nice for your teaching to reflect your personality. I think this idea that we need to try and be a carbon copy of someone else, you will immediately go wrong if you try and be like someone else. You can only be yourself. So lean into who you are, be inspired by other people, but allow creativity to enhance your personality, not try to change it. It definitely allows you to keep your teaching fresh so you're not truly teaching the same 80% every week. Like I think there's ways that you can sprinkle in some little bits of magic. And of course, that will help prevent stagnation and boredom from yourself. It allows you to respond to the bodies that are in front of you. I think that's really important. Who are you teaching? Do you truly understand the clients that are in front of you? And one of the things we've definitely noticed at the studio is even within our client base, the clients who turn up for a 7 a.m. class are different to the clients who turn up for an 8 p.m. class. We have to teach the classes differently. Those 7.15 people, like they want to get going pretty quickly. The 8 p.m. people maybe want more of a window. What about the people who've rushed straight from work? They're often really stressed out. They need a bit more unwinding before we do things with them. So creativity allows you to play with what you're teaching, even within the same level at the same studio, but understand that even at different times of the day, with different demographics that are coming, that you would need to change it up, up or down, depending on who you're trying to work with. But I think it's important to know that creativity needs to feel meaningful. It should be rooted in a purpose. It definitely shouldn't be creativity for creativity's sake. I feel very passionate that as Pilates teachers, we should be teaching Pilates. It should be absolutely recognizable as Pilates. Otherwise, don't call it Pilates. Just call it something else on the reformer. I think that's what's becoming quite problematic out there. I think it's less about the teacher trainings, although, yes, we could look at that too. Clients are confused. They think that they're coming to Pilates and they might have one idea in their head. And of course, as we know and we've explored on the show, there's lots of different styles out there. But my advice to you is as a Pilates teacher, make sure it's rooted in Pilates. And from that place, be creative and be creative with a purpose. What are you trying to achieve? Not what exercise can I pick this week. What is my purpose of this class? How do I want people to feel? Or what do I want them to be able to do today? And what exercises have I got in my toolbox that would enable me to do that? And as I said, Pilates does give us this amazing foundations. It gives us an amazing framework. And I think we should realize that we're not constrained by this framework. It's actually a very powerful framework that allows us to think about and play with how we do this. You know, Brent Anderson in his episode shared that we want to bring people to a point of failure at some point. About 80% of our clients towards the end of the class should feel like they've hit a challenge for them. I think there's too much emphasis in the fitness industry generally about failure is a good thing. It's so hard I can't do it. It's a good thing. I'm not a good teacher if you have failed at doing that. Yes, I want to bring you to a point of failure at some point, but from a place where you feel empowered, like that's why I'm doing all of this stuff. This is why we're doing a bridge or we're doing R marks or we're doing whatever the fundamentals might be. So that I understand, oh, this is leading me there. And if I'm struggling to be there, whatever there is, I don't feel like I'm a failure. I talk about on my courses that if I asked you to write 10 things you don't like about yourself, I reckon you could probably have a good stab at that quite easily. But 10 things you love about yourself is often definitely more challenging for most people. I don't want to, as a teacher, bring anything else that goes on to the I'm not so good at list. I want someone to feel better, more empowered, more positive about themselves when they walk out of a class. I truly believe that we should be embracing this idea that today you are amazing. You are amazing as you are today. Not on a 30-day challenge, not when you've done X, Y, and Z, like right now. I want people to walk out of my classes feeling awesome. That is always my intention. And I don't really mind what we do. And what is awesome to people? Sometimes it's about doing a move they thought they couldn't do. Sometimes it's about relaxing. And there's lots of things in between. So I think understanding what the root of your purpose is will allow you to very thoughtfully curate your class and the creativity that goes into that. So then when you're thinking about what creativity you're going to bring in, you want to think about what is it going to bring to somebody? Is it going to help them feel a different pattern? Does it challenge them? Does it challenge their strength, their mobility, their stability? What does it do? It's important that we understand the purpose of the exercise, whether that's the original classical one or the variation that we've created from that. Does the creativity that you've come up with speak to your teaching style? You can't be anybody else but yourself. If you try and emulate somebody too much, you'll definitely feel fake and you'll get chaotic and you won't feel like you're confident in what you're doing. You can only be you. I have some incredibly playful creative teachers in my studio. That isn't really my style. When I cover their classes, I have to be unapologetically me. I can't be somebody else. And I think when we're learning, it's great to be sponges, but be sponges and pick up ideas, but mold them into a version that is unapologetically you. Clients will buy into you as a person. So then when you're looking at ideas, I can really clearly see does that idea that I've seen inspire me? Do I feel like I resonate with it? Or does it just not lean into my style, my beliefs, my purpose as a teacher? So what happens when you see an exercise, because we all do, on social or somewhere else, and you think, I love the look of that. There's nothing wrong with that as long as it kind of ties into all the things that I've said. So how do we then think about how we teach it? If you go back and listen to the class planning lecture, this idea that we start people's supine allows us to usually unravel, calm them down, chill them out. But more than that, supine is the place where we have the most amount of feedback into our body. So in supine, we could start to set the ideas of what's to come. So if I'm looking at a movement, I want to think about how I could break it down into its components and then think about from right from the beginning of that supine section of the class, how could I bring in ideas that are going to enable them to do that movement well? So most movements, you know, they break down into familiar patterns. Is there a spinal pattern going on? Is it flexion? Is it extension? Is it rotation? Is there weight bearing? Is there lunges or extension or movement through the legs? Like, what are the patterns that are going into this movement? So let's take a snake and twist. I feel like that's the one that's popped into my head. What things do you need to be able to do? What are the patterns there? So we've got some flexion into extension, we've got some rotation, we've got some weight bearing, we've got some full body integration. There's lots going on there. That's what makes it a really advanced move. Yes, it's hard, but it's hard because it's complex. If I look at the rowing series, what do I need to be able to do? I need to understand the roll down. I've got to have some good organization through my arms and my shoulders. I need to understand spine flexion like spine stretch. I need to understand how to move the reformer. That's why that wouldn't be appropriate for a beginner because there'd just be too much in there. So I would probably think, well, I need to know my roll-ups, don't I? I need to have done some work to maybe figure out how my scapula are designed to move and maybe give them a little bit more freedom. I need to have done some work in flexion. I might have wanted to think about how to explain flat back. I might have wanted to make sure they've got enough arm strength to bring themselves into some of the arm positions in rowing. So once you look at a movement, and I do this for all class planning, even within the sort of standard repertoire, really. What are my bigger moves that I'm putting in? And that bigger move will depend on the level of the person you're teaching. So a bigger move for, let's say, a beginner could be quadruped on the reformer, right? That's really complex for someone who's new. That would not be a complex move for an intermediate mover. I would pick a bigger exercise that has a bit more complexity to it. So whatever the big moves are, I'm going to put them in. I'm going to think about where do they go in the class. They normally need to go nearer the middle towards the end. And then the beginning section is what are the building blocks that I need to be able to put together so that they can do that well. So understanding the components of an exercise. So if you see something and you're inspired, what are the movement patterns that you need to be able to do to do that? And put them in your class somewhere. That's going to allow you to be a great storyteller as well. I do believe classes need to feel like an experience, not just set of exercise after exercise. For me, that flow is less, I mean, it can be the flow from exercise to exercise, but I think it's a storytelling. And it's not that every exercise needs to be in there. But when I plan my classes, I've got these bigger moves, I've got these components that need to be in there to them to do those bigger moves. And then I kind of have my fillers. I'm thinking, well, I haven't done anything seated, or we haven't moved our spine in these directions. So it allows me to put things in there. But fundamentally, there's this thread that's taking someone to successfully achieve the outcomes that are in there. Of course, creativity also comes with the idea that we could put props in. So we could take moves that we know and we could add some prop in. The thing is about props is I personally believe like one proper class is enough, maybe two, but sometimes I see like every prop taken out. We already have enough. Matt's a bit different. Matt work would be different, but in reform and equipment, I feel like we've already got enough going on there. So when we add a prop in, we need to think about what is the purpose of this? Is it to challenge? Is it to enhance? And is my queuing going to lean into what this is about? And does this still feel like it's part of the story of the class that I've put together? And then really just thinking about how we put those building blocks together. And so I might use a prop at the beginning of my class, maybe in that supine section, and I might not use it again because it might really fire up something that I know they're gonna need later. They need more of a challenge or more feedback to be able to do these moves that are coming later. Of course, we can play with regressions and progressions. And this often is important, isn't it, as we layer classes. Yeah? Have you heard the term about layering classes? Whilst I do think that we should stream our classes somewhat, like I think that we need to get less about the style of a class because I don't know how you teach the same level of person, like a different, completely different style of class. Yes, don't get me wrong, I could do it. But fundamentally, what I'd be doing is making a level one class just a bit juicier. But I'd be teaching the same stuff. I'd just be making the spring maybe heavier or lighter. What I think is really interesting is to take clients on a journey to progress them, to build them up. And we do that through layering because even through a stream system, there'll be people in there that have things going on in their body. And that means that they will have, you know, they might be an advanced mover, but they've got a bit of a shoulder issue. And so it's great to be able to have regressions and progressions and know the difference between regressions and progressions and variations, which are just, you know, a variation on it. But how do we ramp it up, ramp it down? And how do we lean into letting clients have some agency and confidence and belief in themselves that it's okay to work at the level that they're at? Because what they're feeling today might be different to what they were feeling another day. So how can they listen to their bodies, tune in and do that layer well and right and what is good for them? Trust me, if you're layering and you're saying something like, if you want to go harder, follow me. Everyone will follow because we are so conditioned to believe that harder is always better. And we've all been there, right? You're like, oh my God, everyone is doing the harder version, even though they can't do it. So I like to, you know, lean into if this is feeling good, come along with me and see if how the next level feels. If this is the challenge now, stay here and work on this because this is going to get you to the next level. So regressions and progressions are another way we can be creative and we can play with some ideas. And then, of course, we can play with variations. So we can, you know, change the spring tension, change body position, add rotation, change the tempo, play with transitions between excises. Certainly, as people get to be better movers, this is a great way to do it. And alter the range and the direction. And I think when I sat down with my students and started talking about creativity, and the same in my my teachers in the studio, actually, is that you might find yourself being a very creative and expressive teacher. And I think if you do that well, then that's brilliant. But if you're someone who feels that creativity is quite tricky and you see that crazy creativity done, and you think I can't Can't do that. I want you to hopefully feel empowered that you could think about just twisting what you've already got. This is what I like to do, if I'm honest, mostly. How can I think about something I know from the mat work and put it onto reformer? Or how can I think about, you know, I've got a teaser on the long box on the reformer. How else could I teach a teaser? Could I flow it from roll-up into teaser? Oh, yeah, that works. So there's ways that we can pull things from what we've already got. And this for me is a phenomenally strong place to start with creativity. When I did Tracy Mallet's workshop in LA and I've done her, she's run a course here, this is actually what she teaches a lot. They all lean into patterns that you've seen already. For example, in my training, I did quadruped on the reformer with the hands on the foot plate and the knees on the carriage, playing with hip disassociation, playing with moving the arms, combining them together. That's what I was taught on the reformer. But why couldn't I take that quadruped and we could be on the box with the hands on the footbar? Or what about if I have my hands on the shoulder rests and I had a foot on the footbar and now I'm playing with hip extension and a bit more weight bearing? Can you see how we could take the same exercise, twist it round in a few different places? And it would still be classical repertoire, but it allows you to be creative. It allows you to build on what you've been teaching with your clients already. It allows you to prevent stagnation. And you still feel like you fundamentally know that exercise. You're not trying to learn brand new choreography, but now you're challenging it in different ways. Then we could lean into what if I took one strap off and I played with just doing one-sided work? What if I played with adding some rotation into work? What if I played with a sequence of movements that could link together to build a bit of challenge in stamina? So there's ways that we can be creative, absolutely rooted in the method. And I love this place to start. So I really firmly believe that if you're newer in your journey, like just teach the repertoire that you've learned on your course, practice it, practice it, practice it. Your clients need to practice it, you need to practice it, you need to know it inside out. Then start to sprinkle little bits of moving the position, changing the orientation. Like take a movement you know and put it somewhere else. And then sprinkle in a little bit of stuff that you might see and see how it lands. But really think about how you would structure it in the story of your class. How do I get someone there? Then, if you're teaching, you know, if you're lucky to teach some of those intermediate advanced movers, these are my favorite classes to teach. Because you really can be playful with these people. They are good movers, they have put in the time, they know the fundamentals, the foundations of this movement. I love when I'm working with the teachers training. And often you have to remember when we're on courses, that's the stuff they're delivering to us. But how many years have you worked at this to be able to be on those courses and have that choreography delivered to you? And I bet you still found it hard. I know I did when I was in LA. And I think sometimes we come back and we're wanting to bring that stuff in too soon into someone's journey. So you might want to think about how you're even taking people on a journey. If you're working with clients, you know, whether you're a studio owner or you're a teacher teaching lots of classes, like what is the journey through? In my conversation with Hebra, which is one of my early conversations of the podcast, she was one of my very first teachers, we were talking about how when we plan classes, we should kind of plan them in like six-week arcs and think of them like a six-week course. Now, look, I know clients might not come for every one of the six weeks, but I tell you what, it's gonna give them a feeling that they don't want to miss your class when they feel like they're on this journey and that you can think about if this is week one and this is week six, like where could I get them? And it's probably not gonna be crazy different. It's gonna be lots of repetition, like I've said, but filtering in more complex movements, building on, building and building, that's gonna allow them to get there. And then you can start to reference back to last week we looked at this, and I always say, last week we looked at this, don't worry if you weren't here. I'm gonna take you with it. But I tell you what, it's a great way for clients to be like, I'm gonna book class next week because I enjoy today, but I want to see where we're going with this. I often hear as well, people say that, oh, but I'm worried that if I go too slow, I'm gonna lose my clients. I think this is a challenge. I think the challenge that we have these days is that clients they're also seeing the crazy rolling backwards off a reformer stuff, hanging upside down. They're seeing this stuff. But I think if you can make them feel like they're on this journey, that there is an ethos. My experience has been that clients love that. They find so much from that. So I think it's just a way of mixing this in. So I hope I've given you some ideas about how we can be creative in a class. Because I think what it allows us to do is be inspired, but take that inspiration in and root it in Pilates, which is just the most brilliant practice ethos. It's worked for, you know, I was gonna say centuries. It's not, isn't it? We're young, we're a young industry, and we're just kind of at this point, really, where I think it's becoming a lot more mainstream. And I think it's important for us as teachers to harbour that creativity, ground it in purpose, and bring it to our clients in a way that allows them to thrive and to feel amazing in their bodies today. So I hope that's given you a few ideas, some food for thought. Um, I always love to hear what you've thought from these episodes. I'm sure some of you out there are far more creative than me. And I'd love to hear how you bring this work together. How do you find that you can be creative without chaos? Have you come up against that challenge in your own practice? And what have you done to be able to master your work? And has it mattered depending on who you're teaching? Like maybe some of you are really comfortable with creativity, but you're noticing that in certain spaces it just doesn't feel right. Or are you working with certain studios who don't really want it? Like, I'd love to hear from you what creativity means to you. So do follow us along on the Beyond the Reformer podcast Instagram channel. Um, if you send me a DM or if you comment, I do always come back to you. I do really love hearing them. But yeah, it'd be great to hear how you're doing, what's working for you at the moment, what creativity means for you. I'll be back next week with another guest episode. I'd also love to hear from you if there's any other solo episode subjects that feel like they would be helpful for you. So thank you so much for listening. It's been great for you to join me. I'm gonna have a bit more of my cup of tea in my office. And I will see you next time for another episode of Beyond the Reformer. Thanks for being here.