Ageing gracefully | Tips on staying strong and flexible as you age

Ageing gracefully: tips for maintaining your strength and flexibility as you get older

What does ‘ageing gracefully’ mean to you?  

Brands promoting the latest miracle cream, facial fillers or a popular super-food fad will tell you that you need what they’re selling to stay young and look and feel good as you age.

As a Pilates instructor (and woman of a ‘certain age’), ageing well is all about confidence. It’s about knowing yourself better, having a sense of purpose and appreciating who you are. 

It’s also about keeping active, maintaining physical strength and balance as you age.  

The truth is, your body won’t work the same way it used to when you were young. You need to be prepared, committed even, to make adjustments to your routine to prevent any injuries and strains. 

4 tips for healthy ageing

There’s no ‘magic’ formula to ageing gracefully. But there are some tried and true guidelines that will help you stay healthy and happy as you age.

1. Manage your stress - and breathe

Stress seems to be a modern plague. With so much going on in our lives and our ‘always connected’ lifestyle, people seem to feel stress more than ever. 

One way of dealing with stress is breath control. The correct breathing technique is crucial to support your body’s stamina, especially during exercise. 

During our Pilates classes, I notice that a lot of people don’t know how to breathe properly. As people learn to breathe better, they often find they can handle challenging situations with ease. They tend to move more easily through life.

Some of the key breathing techniques we teach include: 

• Keep your neck and shoulders relaxed to avoid neck tension

• Your breathing should flow – try not to hold your breath

• Breath in through the nose and out through the mouth – this approach helps your body make the most of each breath

• Breathing ‘into your back’ or shoulder-blades – this helps you focus, filling up your lungs with energising breath.

2. Stay strong as your family life changes

When you’re a parent or a grandparent of young kids, there’s lots of lifting and running around after them to keep you busy. 

To keep up with the demands of a growing family, it’s important to condition your body in a way that’s appropriate for your age and fitness level. It also means you need to be realistic about what you can fit into your day. Being committed to a regular routine is essential. 

I still remember a comment from one of my first clients: “Kat, I love your classes. I can jump on the trampoline with my kids again.”

And that’s really what it’s all about. 

3. Adjust your exercise routine as your body changes

As you get older, you’ll find that hormonal and lifestyle changes will mean that you’ll need to work a little harder to maintain your muscle and bone strength.

Healthy Bones Australia (HBA), formerly Osteoporosis Australia, reports that osteoporosis, a chronic disease affecting over 1.2 million Australians, leads to over 173,000 broken bones each year.

To stay healthy into your old age and avoid breaking bones and injuries, you need to keep up your exercise. Having a regular exercise routine is crucial for maintaining your body’s functioning. 

Pilates is relatively low-impact exercise. It offers a great combination of resistance training for strength, balance work, and even some weight-bearing exercises like plank. The right combination will help to maintain healthy bone density age you get older.

Flexibility is also the key to protecting your body against injury and pain. In our Pilates classes, I help clients train their body to move with ease and grace.  

4. Keep challenging yourself

I always recommend that everyone should adjust their exercise routine for their fitness level.

But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try something new. Don’t be afraid to stretch your limits a little under the supervision of a qualified teacher. 

I’m a great believer in the importance of giving individual guidance to each person who attends my Pilates classes. My goal is to find a way for you to do the complete Pilates repertoire so that’s comfortable yet challenging enough to give you the full benefit at each session.    

Finally, Pilates works at any age. It won’t stop the ageing process, but it will keep you strong and healthy. To make the most of your life, you just need to understand and listen to your body and have a good instructor to help you on your journey.