When I feel strong I can do anything!

So I have the training, lots of experience and now I am busy figuring out how to start my own business.  Such a different type of work than I am used to!  There are so many great resources available now. I am so thankful for the internet...but why is it so hard to make a website look how you would like it to look? It has taken me two weeks and still it is not there.... but it will be ... I even splashed out on the dot com web address!  

I have also been designing publicity leaflets and writing articles for the local press.  It is such fun to harness so many different skills into the service of Lotte Berk - and a real challenge.  

Every day after school my boys come home and ask, "Did you have any students today?"  On the playground as I wait for my youngest to come out of school the other mums ask, "How many in class today?" It is not a big number...I'll be honest.  But I have students (!) and knowing how well these exercises work and how fun the classes are I trust that students will come.  

As I start to spread the word about Lotte Berk and my classes I have been thinking a lot about my responsibility towards women and girls.  I really do not want to be another person jumping on the bandwagon about how women's bodies should look.  I do not want any woman to feel like they are not good enough or that they need to change to be lovely, to be loved.  What I would like to share is that when we feel strong and when we look after our bodies we are more confident, more free and live a richer life because we are not limited by our bodies as much.  I love that Esther still has a spring in her step at 79 years old.  I love that I feel strong in myself.  When I feel strong I can do anything! 

I think that is what I like best about the classes.  They are for everyone.  It doesn't matter what size you are, Lotte Berk will strengthen your muscles.  Lotte Berk will lift your posture so you stand taller.  Lotte Berk will work every area of your body, like a tune up so that your muscles and joints, organs and skeleton are all protected and work as well as they can. I like that.  

Classes!

Oh, and if you fancy attending my classes, they are at
St George's Hall
206 Andover Road
Newbury, RG14 6NU

Classes are Mondays and Wednesdays 9:15-10:15 am
£10/session

Please book in advance...and wear tights or leggings

You can contact me, as always, at lotteberkoriginal@gmail.com

Long lost blogger......

Hello!!!!!!!

Apologies.  I know I have been quiet. It has been a real time of change and growth for me and I have dropped off the radar a bit...but now I am back!

I realise I left you on a cliffhanger... So to pick up where I left off and fill you in on what I have been up to, well...

After my observed session teaching my 'guinea pig' I passed my diploma with flying colours!   Even though I have been at Esther's studio since 2006, teaching my own classes in 2007-2008, generally assisting with classes and training new teachers and have even taught one-to-ones with private clients it really meant something to me to finally get my official diploma...but it was scary!  Esther was dressed beautifully in her professional clothes (no leotard!) and sat stoically with her notebook watching as I put the lovely Lydia* through her paces. When we finished Lydia said I was the best student teacher she had had (she has been a guinea pig quite a few times) and Esther showed me her notebook - she had no notes because I had done the class perfectly.  I was especially complemented on how I connected with Lydia and how I explained the movements. So...all those nerves for nothing!  That said, nerves are good - they kept me sharp and served me well.  Phew.  All those hours (years!) in class and all that time absorbing Esther's technique have paid off! It has been so good to study at the feet of a master and someone who knows the technique in such depth and has perfected it further over the last 49 years of teaching (!).  Thank you, Esther.

So now I am being really brave and overcoming lots of fears and have started my own classes.  I do not know why this past year I have been sort of stuck.  I feel like I have been a  caterpillar in a chrysalis and now, at long last, I am ready to spread my wings.  Some kind of transformation has taken place and I am now ready.  Even though I have been quiet on the blog, every week I have been in class at Esther's helping when needed, and not really sure where I fit in all this.  Where has the time gone?  I have been busy with my private life, with family, with singing, songwriting, art,  healing some things that have been broken ... and then suddenly I just knew I needed to start my own classes.  Now.

So I have!

At the moment it is a bit quiet.  I don't mind that.  I just remember Esther slinging her records over her shoulder, hopping on the back of her husband's motorcycle and driving to doctors' surgeries and village halls when she started and I know that the best things are earned.

I am going with the 'build it and they will come' philosophy with my classes. I am not slick and well marketed .. but I am accepting this, my authentic self, in keeping with the ethos of the original Lotte Berk, and her singular daughter, Esther:

                                                                    Be honest

                                                                    Be selfish

                                                                    Be yourself

          Watch this space!


* a pseudonym

Today in Class....

It felt like a perfect class today.  Maybe it was my new leotard but it just felt great and I am feeling stronger and stronger, especially in the stomach work (my weak spot). Esther is getting ready to push me out of the training nest.  I have my guinea pig next week and will teach her a full class, watched by Esther's eagle eye.  Then...off to start my own classes! Gulp!

I am not going to give you an exercise today.  Instead I ask that you hop over to the 'The Tilt!' page (in the sidebar at the left) and have a try at that crucial movement.  Happy tucking!

See you next week....I'll let you know how it goes!

Today in Class....

One of the great things about the method is that it is about working with your unique shape to make it strong, shapely and supple.  It doesn't matter if you do not naturally have a dancer's physique. It does not matter if you are not very flexible.  All you need is the desire to work hard and your body will transform into one that is lifted, toned, energised and with strong muscles that will hold and support your bones, joint and organs...and beautiful.  In class there are women of all different shapes and sizes, all ages, all abilities (and there has even been the occasional man!), all of us giving a couple of hours a week to ourselves and our bodies, trying to be the best we can be. Class celebrates each of us for who we are.  As Esther said last week, "we don't want all our tomatoes to be regimented!"  Nor do we want our bodies to be.


Hear, hear.

Today's Exercise:

1. Sit with your hands on the floor between your legs, your knees bent, feet on the floor.
2. Slowly extend your legs out straight, keeping them off the floor, until fully extended, toes pointed. You will be balancing on your sitting bones.  Make sure your pelvis is tucked into the tilt position. Feel the effort you need to exert to keep the top half of your body from leaning back too far and to keep your bottom half off the floor.  Aim for your legs to be about 6 inches above the floor.
3. Slowly raise your right leg up and lower your left leg until it is just above the floor.  Hold.
4. Lower your right leg and raise your left leg until they are even.  Hold.
5. Now lower your right leg until it is just above the floor and raise your left leg. Hold.
6. Bring both legs back to being even again. Hold.
7. Repeat entire sequence.

This is one of what we call the escape/no escape exercises.  It works deep into the core muscles of the abdomen, especially the low ones that are sometimes hard to work, as well as using the entire system of muscles in the torso, legs and even the arms. Comprehensive, hey?!  Keep the motion slow and smooth for maximum benefit, maintaining the tilt to protect your back.

Happy New Year!

Hello....

Hope your 2012 is starting off bright!

So good to be back in the studio.  Esther was full of energy after the break and class
was a vigorous!  Lovely to meet Margot's daughter Lydie...Esther does love to stir it up, goading us to be competitive and trying to stoke up little rivalries....sometimes we are all like school girls!  Great fun though....and it does get us working our hardest (and yes, I almost always rise to the bait...and yes, Lydie is a natural!).

It seems that most of us who are regulars to class (some could say devoted) have a certain determination and drive.  We seem to thrive under Esther's whip and want to be our best.  Funny how some of us just get hooked....

Esther and I were speaking today about how the exercises are about empowering women to feel sensual for themselves, to feel good about themselves. She said Lotte loved to know that she was firm and toned and that she would please her lovers...and be able to enjoy them more for being in such great shape!  It was about more than that, though.  It was about being strong yet feminine, having a body that you were the master of and that served you well, and the confidence that comes from that.  How wonderful to enjoy having your body, to feel great walking down the street, putting on clothes,  just moving.  Grace, suppleness, strength: the dancer's joy in her body can belong to us.  It can be ours with just a little dedication.

What a wonderful gift.

Today's exercise:

                                                         

1. Stand sideways to barre, outside leg lifted, knee bent to the side and toe pointed at the standing leg.
2. Fold the lifted knee across the body towards the barre.
3. Open your leg out to the original position then stretch your leg keeping your thigh high, really feel the stretch, toe pointed.
4. Bend your lower leg in again and start at the beginning.  Across-back- stretch-bend. Repeat ten times.
5. The last time hold the leg out in the stretch position.  Really feel the stretch.  Hold it there.  Now teensy little bend-stretch, bend-stretches.
6. Repeat on the other side!
7. Well done!
Put your hand on the top of your thigh as you do this and boy, will you feel the muscle working! Make sure you keep your hips square and centred.   The work you do to keep your standing leg and hips in the correct position is as important as the work your 'busy' leg is doing! This is a big part of the effectiveness of the method - the small but intense work your muscles do in the tension between where your body wants to go and where you are telling it to!

Thursday 22 December

And another year draws to a close...

Fun class today with Christmas exercises: 'Santa with his sack', 'the Turkey' and 'Stirring the Christmas Pudding'.  Glad they only come around once a year, especially the 'Turkey'!  Ouch!

                                                                                     ...and afterwards mince pies and cookies and chat!

Lots of reminiscing...Ahhh the good old days…the classes in the fisherman’s lodge at Great Shefford, behind the Green Door in Newbury, in the doctor’s surgery at Hermitage…Esther is amazing and she certainly used to get around.  The funny thing is how her students speak with such love of the days when studios wireless than salubrious.

The Green Door was above a dental technician’s and you had to pass shelves of teeth to get up to the studio.  Once up the ceiling was so low you could hardly stretch your arms above your head and if you needed the loo you had to go back downstairs, out the front door around the side of the building to the back.

The lodge was damp and cold and there was no door on the toilet-only a bead curtain.  Moisture ran down the walls and students would try to dry their mats by the gas heater, steam billowing around them. It was so small that the students had to cram in like sardines.  That is why the section of stomach exercises we do in the centre is called sardines now: from everyone lying together in a neat row so they could all fit!  

In Hermitage a doctor so believed in the benefit of the exercises she gave Esther the lobby of the surgery rent free and she ran classes there between surgery sessions!

Funny. Some of the fondest memories are of these days. Who needs posh studios with wall to wall mirrors (Lotte didn't like mirrors in studios anyway) and smart lobbies?!

Esther during the Christmas class in her quirky, warm, dry and light filled Hungerford 

studio (with high ceilings as well!).   Her students are so spoiled!

A little exercise to see you into the New Year:

Stirring the Christmas Pudding

1. This is a 'No Escape' exercise so usually would be done sitting on the floor under the barre with your back firmly pressed against the studio wall, both arms pressing upwards on the barre, chin on your chest, head curving forward to ensure your back has maximum support.  If you do not have a well-fixed barre then sitting like I am in the photo above is the next best thing.  This is the position teachers use to lead this part of the class. 

2. With your legs lifted off the floor, knees bent just more then slightly, toes pointed, balancing on your bottom, imagine that you have two christmas puddings in bowls beneath your feet. Circle both feet inward as if you are stirring the pudding (the left foot clockwise, the right foot anti-clockwise).  This should be as if your calves/feet and toes are a wooden spoon as the main motion is below the knees.

3. Now repeat this, rotating your toes/feet/calves outward.  Quite often students find one way harder than the other.  Holding this 'No Escape' position works the deep core muscles of the lower abdomen, an area that can be hard to work.

A very happy holiday season to you all!

May your 2012 be joyful....see you then!