Game changer for me was Stephanie Tallant telling me to not actually rest my legs on my arm at all and now I think of it more like an illusion that my arm is holding up my leg but really my back and butt are doing all the work. Once I stopped resting my bottom leg on my arm I was able to hold myself up without going straight down and it looks like you're doing something similar. It also looks like you're pushing the bottom leg down instead of pushing it back towards the pole and up. I find I have the best set up when the bottom leg is parallel with the floor when I'm trying to take the top leg off so gravity doesn't pull me down (pic of leg parallel to floor). Steph also showed me some floor exercise that really mirrors the engagement you need to be in Janeiro especially if you do it around the pole (idk if she had a video)

I'm going to have to do it in 2 posts bc it only lets me post one pic at a time lol. First tip from my teacher at my studio is you need to push your hips back to clear both hips from the pole when taking that first leg off. It looks like you're trying to push your second hip past the pole while taking the second leg off and that's really difficult to do. In the pic you see both my hips have already cleared the pole.

This is a perfect description of the "what I can when I can" pole method that I live by 😂there's some upper back/shoulder videos where you get to lay in the floor most of the time that I also trick myself into doing. I also sometimes passively watch a video and Steph tells me to do something in the video and I feel pressured to do what she says as another method 🙈😂

Elena Martelli omg Federiga is adorable 🥺she looks like she's loving watching you pole 😍😍😍😍

Stephanie Tallant I just assumed I completely missed that part of the lesson and I needed to pay more attention during the tutorials 😂You're perfect and can do no wrong in my eyes 🥰

HOW DID YOU GET THIS FOOTAGE OF ME DURING POISSON WEEK 😂😂😂😂😂😂

Elena Martelli when I was "reviewing" this week I tried watching the poisson pole dictionary video as a super quick review to make sure I knew what I was doing and literally after thought "Steph what in the world are you doing right now 😭😭😭😭" bc she had the inside leg on the pole

Thank you for teaching me that poisson is French for 🐟 and not "poison" ☠️🙈

🥺🥺🥺

Thank you!! It's my new favorite spin 🙃😍