Spilling the Pilateas☕️: Edition 29 What if the exercises you avoid aren’t the ones you’re bad at…but the ones with the most to teach you?

Before I go any further, I’m not talking about true physical limitations. Pain, injury, structural differences, and medical conditions deserve respect and thoughtful modifications. That isn’t avoidance—that’s wisdom.

If any of those apply to you, one of the best investments you can make is working with a well-educated instructor who has experience teaching many different bodies over time. Good instruction meets you where you are while helping you move forward safely.

What I’m talking about are the moments when our mind has already decided the outcome before our body has had the opportunity to explore.

Avoidance can sound like:

• “I’ve never been good at this.”

• “I know I can’t do that.”

• “My balance is terrible.”

• Rushing through an exercise you dislike.

• Holding your breath because you want it to be over.

• Mentally checking out the moment something feels unfamiliar.

One of the most beautiful things about Pilates is that it asks us to spend time in places that feel unfamiliar.

Not unsafe.

Not painful.

Simply unfamiliar.

The same is true in riding.

If we want to understand a difficult movement, improve our communication with our horse, or work through a sticking point, we eventually have to step into territory that feels unfamiliar. We have to explore what’s on the other side of the habit we keep repeating. If we stay inside what feels comfortable, we often stay inside the same loop—and nothing really changes.

That’s such an important distinction.

The goal of Pilates isn’t to master what already feels easy. It’s to become curious about what doesn’t. Just like riding, each challenge builds the foundation for the next step.

The method invites us to replace judgment with observation. Instead of saying, “I can’t,” we begin asking, “What’s happening here?” That small shift changes everything. Curiosity creates space for learning in a way self-criticism never can.

This week, notice the exercise you secretly hope I won’t ask you to do—or the place with your horse you hope your trainer won’t address.

Instead of avoiding it, get curious.

Ask yourself:

What is this revealing?

The answer may have less to do with your strength or flexibility than with the story you’ve been telling yourself.

I hope you move and groove without judgment, embrace the unfamiliar, and discover what’s waiting for you on the other side of curiosity.