Pilates changed Brooke Siler’s body — and her life. Now, helping others transform themselves for the better has become her life’s work.
Coverage Faces of Experience Life
CORE
Value
By LAINE BERGESON
She may be the queen of the
American Pilates scene, but Brooke
Siler still recalls how intimidated
she felt when she first encountered
the Pilates stretching and strengthening regimen as a 25-year-old fitness instructor.
“I had been in the fitness world
— both as a teacher and a consumer
— for about 10 years when someone brought Pilates equipment into
the gym and started teaching,” says
the New York City–based trainer and
author of Your Ultimate Pilates Body
Challenge (Broadway Books, 2006).
“I began taking classes, but I quickly
recognized that I couldn’t do the
exercises! I was so strong as a trainer,
but I was completely inflexible, and I
didn’t have the core strength to perform the movements. When I realized
I couldn’t do it — that was all I needed. I like challenges!”
Before long, Siler fell in love with the Pilates exercise methodology — developed at the turn of the century
by Joseph Pilates — and began studying with Pilates’s
own protégé, Romana Kryzanowska, who was teaching in
Manhattan at that time. Today, Siler is widely credited
with helping to bring Pilates to prominence in the United
States. She opened her own Manhattan Pilates studio,
re:AB, in 1997, where she has taught and trained some of
Hollywood’s biggest stars.
Celebrities, in fact, were some of her first clients.
“Growing up in New York, you just end up knowing people
who are go-getters,” she says. “I was recently looking
back at my day planner from my early years as a Pilates
instructor, and it was really funny because I was training about nine people a day in my apartment, and every
top model at the time was a client — Kate Moss, Amber
Valletta. It made me laugh when I saw it. I was like, ‘Wow,
those really were the days.’” Siler has since trained Kirstin
Dunst, Madonna, Maura Tierney and Liv Tyler, to name just
a few of her high-profile clients.
The Pilates approach, which trains the brain and
body to work together, and which emphasizes quality of
movement over quantity, resonated with Siler because it
engaged her mind as well as her muscles. “Pilates allowed
me to use my mind to help my body get stronger and
longer, and leaner and more vital. It was just revelatory,”
says the 41-year-old mother of two.
“Concentration is the first principle of Pilates. I
often liken it to rubbing your head and patting your
tummy, while hopping on one foot and reciting poetry
at the same time.” (For more on Pilates technique, see
“Pilates Power” in the January/February 2007 archives at
experiencelifemag.com.)
Pilates also made the 6-foot-1-inch Siler feel graceful for the first time in her life. “In my early 20s, I was
lifting heavy weights, and I felt strong, but bulky. So to
find this technique that engages the body’s core — or the
“powerhouse,” as we call it in Pilates — was so helpful for
me. My body became alive. This immediate sense of grace
overtook my body, and people thought I was a dancer just
because of the way I was holding myself.”
As Siler saw her body change, she began to feel more
empowered in everything she did.
Now, with a thriving studio and several books and
Pilates DVDs already under her belt, Siler has instituted
her own teacher-education and certification program.
“I’ve seen plenty of schools be willing to sign their name
to just about anybody’s certificate, and I really feel that
this art cannot continue with the integrity it deserves if
people can graduate without having demonstrated a real
mastery,” she says. “This is a profession, not a hobby.”
And not an easy one. Pilates is often perceived as
just another way of stretching, an easy path to a better
body. Not so, says Siler. “Pilates — if taught authentically
— is stretch, strength and cardio,” she explains. “You are
working hard. It is athletic. You are changing your body.”
And for all its benefits, she notes, Pilates classes
remain a bargain. “I always say to people, ‘A class costs less
than a pair of sneakers; if you hate it, you can walk away.’”
Siler herself has become a student again — this time
of even more Zen-like pursuits. After having spent the last
decade building her business, getting married and raising
two young boys, ages 5 and 3, she realized it was time to
focus on taking better care of herself from deep within —
something that she hasn’t always kept sight of along the way.
She’s using kinaesthetic anatomy classes to relive
the joy of being a student, learning to meditate to get in
touch with her breathing, and working hard to take stock
of her life daily. “I have to learn to balance because, as
your body ages, even with all the working out, you do
hit a turning point,” she admits. “And I’m really learning
to breathe, to stop and really enjoy what I’ve created.
I feel so blessed every day, and to allow myself to fully
acknowledge and embrace that joy is ultimately my most
important lesson.”
