Pilates and Yoga

What really is the difference between Pilates and yoga?

Firstly, let me be clear - I’ve done yoga and really enjoyed it. I’m also by no means a trained yoga professional, and can only write from the experiences I’ve had in it, and in discussion with other movement practitioners. But I do have very good insight in to what Pilates offers, and where there may be some obvious comparisons between these two modalities which are so often lumped in to the same category. So let’s start with the similarities between yoga and Pilates.

Moving Meditation

When I first explored yoga, it was described to me as ‘meditation with movement.’ This really struck a chord with me as it linked in nicely with my own understanding of what a movement practice should entail. When we take time out of our busy schedules to move, whatever that movement might be, we are able to escape external thoughts and worries, focus internally and connect with our bodies in order to better ourselves and test out our potential. Often people who focus on external rewards tend to miss this key point - the mind-body connection. They may be worried about achieving a “beach-bod” or be adding extra reps “to make up for binge eating that cake” etc but what they fail to understand that it’s not actually about what you do or how you look. A movement practice is about spending time doing something that encompasses your full attention, physically and mentally. It requires you to be present. This better unifies the physiological benefits with the psychological, and fires off a host of extra hormones and chemical reactions for greater health benefits than just ‘lifting tin’. Pilates embraces this through a series of all encompassing principles; Concentration, Control, Centring, Flow, Precision and Breathing which are applied to every movement. Yoga embraces this by focusing heavily on linking one’s breath with specific movements or postures. Both emphasise a ‘mind-body’ connection in order to do the movement practice correctly.

Physical Exertion

Although the specific movements may differ between the Pilates and yoga, the over arching idea is the same - move your body into foreign positions and gradually load it up to make you stronger. Yoga tends to focus on challenging the muscles or joints at ‘end of range’ - in deep lunges or strong side bends. Depending on the style, you can hold poses for short or long periods of time. The movements also tend to be more global (recruiting more of the larger muscles and coordinating the together to move the whole body). Pilates is often known for being more rehabilitative and Clinical Pilates especially can focus more heavily on isolating small muscles and local muscle groups for stability. However as a client develops in Pilates, the expectation is that the movements become bigger and full range of motion is explored in all directions. Pilates also places a strong focus on spinal movement. Both ways of working the body - globally or in an isolated way - have their pros and cons. Each can be utilised at different times to progress the overall health and strength of a person. The important thing is to to load up the musculoskeletal structures of the body in order to maintain ideal physical health and both Pilates and yoga do this in their respective ways.

Now let’s look where they start to differ…

The Moves…

Yoga has been around for a REALLY long time (we are talking ancient Asian civilisations) and as such it has been deconstructed and re-branded a million times over to suit the general population. I should add, often some teachers pull it apart and make their own versions if they see gaps that can be better filled with additional ideas. As a result, there are many versions of yoga which makes it hard to know what yoga actually is. Traditional yoga was always spiritual practice, called an Asana, aimed at connecting to your spirituality, to the physical, and aiming for the divine. These days there are a lot of studios that don’t focus on this, instead emphasising the physical exertion of the movements. Pilates is similar, although much younger (think 20th Century) and as such, there are less variations on what Pilates looks like, although it may appear diverse to the consumer. But at the bones of it, for Traditional/Classical Pilates there are 34 mat exercises that every Pilates practitioner should know that inform the rest of the repertoire. These moves are repeated in order, 4-6 times each, and applied to the Pilates equipment to help facilitate or restrict movement, depending on what the practitioner needs. These moves are what every client should aim for, but often aren’t able to and as such, things like clinical Pilates and pre-Pilates exists to help pull apart the movements and “modify” in order to correct muscle imbalances first.

Class Sizes

Because of how yoga has become westernised and commercialised it is often the class is taught with one lead Yogi at the front of the room demonstrating and a lot of people in the room! I’ve heard of class sizes that range of 10-12 through to 90! If you’re lucky and depending on class size, there may be extra teachers to keep an eye on the students. However in some cases, it is still offered as a 1:1 experience with your teacher and this is slowly re-emerging with the introduction of clinical yoga for injury rehab. Pilates on the other hand is very much about the accuracy of the movement execution and was initially designed to be delivered in a 1:1 setting. Again, as it grew commercially, discount models started to appear in gyms and studios, so now class size has begun to vary much more. But generally most studios that pride themselves specifically on their Pilates will keep class sizes capped, and have access to the equipment for private and semi-private sessions. Because of this, Pilates has been more heavily favoured for injury rehabilitation by health professionals across the board.

Finally, a little fun fact; Pilates has a capital letter where as yoga does not! Pilates was created by Joseph Pilates, which makes it a last name hence the capital, however his original name for the movement practice he developed was Contrology. Yoga is not a name, its a practice from which many different styles of yoga have evolved meaning it is not a proper noun and so doesn’t have a capital letter!

So what’s the best option for you? If you like to focus more on breathing through large movement sequences and meditation work, then a good yoga class is your jam! If you like smaller class sizes, lots of detail, and personalised instruction, then Pilates is probably more up your alley. Like a bit of both? Most health-focused studios are likely to offer both, like ours. Many will offer a discount trial so make sure you try lots of different places before committing.

Written in assistance from Carolina Moya, an 800hr trained yoga practitioner.