Moving away from center

On the Reformer:

In the Coordination, hips and shoulders are contact points, and the pattern is in planes.

In the Backstroke, hips and shoulders are contact points, and the pattern is in circles.

In the Teaser, only the hips are a contact point.

In the Horseback, the contact point moves away from the hips to the inner thighs.

On the mat:

In the Leg Circles, the shoulders and hips are anchored.

In the Corkscrew, only the shoulders stay anchored.

In the Hip Circles, only the hips stay anchored.

The idea of pilates is: uniform eccentric loading through progressive patterns of movement.

In these two sequences, you see how loading is accomplished by moving further away from center by decreasing contact points.