Every body is beautiful

This may be the very first descriptive book on “Pilates” based conditioning. I’m prejudice to a small degree as I am one of the first Pilates teachers and appeared in the book.

I am thrilled to find Ron’s book in Kindle form. I read an LA Times review of Ron’s new book in 1979 and ended up studying with him in his Rodeo Drive studio during my first pregnancy. This was the year before Jane Fonda opened her exercise studio down the street and wrote her book on women exercising through their pregnancy that forever changed the way pregnant women moved their bodies. Nobody knew anything about Pilates, nor were they interested 40 years ago. My, how things change! I think it’s interesting that Ron never mentions “exercise”. It’s all about “movement”. This is a beautiful book. Thank you for bringing it back in Kindle form.

I happened to find this book in 1977 (I was in my early 20s) when I had just been hospitalized for lower back pain and severe sciatica. I followed the exercises for back problems and within a month I was without pain. I continued to do the exercises off and on for years because they improved my posture, balance and general well-being. Much later I read in the introduction that Fletcher studied with Joseph Pilates and combined his methods with yoga. No wonder. In 2010, a doctor told me that imaging had shown that the last 2 discs at the base of my spine had been calcified together for a very long time. At that point, I'd had only 2 brief one- or two-day pain flares in 30+ years. The doctor assumed that I'd lived in agony for all that time. Nope! I've probably given a dozen copies to friends and family and I'm now ordering another one for a friend who has sciatica. The format of the book is corny and many of the stars are now unknown, but the exercises are explained very well and it's easy to follow. Forty years ago this book changed my life. After a week in the hospital in traction (now out of style thank god), it was an enormous relief to find a solution.

I haven't read through every word carefully, but perusing the book, it has many celebrity comments which don't mean much to me now. The images are dated, but the postures and the philosophy are not - but I'm not a PMA certified teacher, so there may be disagreement from someone who is better educated and has read the book more carefully than I have so far. This would not be the only or first book I'd read on the Pilates method, but it is very affordable at this point, and I wanted to hear more of Ron Fletcher's perspective on Pilates.

Good read as I love all things Pilates and Ron Fletcher was one of the greats. However, I should have checked the date on this book before I purchased it (actually pushed the buy quick key by mistake) as I think it is a bit outdated I mean you see young starlets exercising with leotards (Ali McGraw, Ann Margret even Ben Vereen is on the.cover. I would have preferred something more up to date.

So glad this book was reprinted....full of common sense health practices,nand more stretching exercises than you can imagine. I wish the reprint pages of the exercises were not so small, though.