I counted how many times I touched my face during Pilates class

I counted how many times I touched my face during a 50-minute Pilates class.

It was twenty-three.

And the thing is, that number didn’t freak me out. It just made me pause.

Because this wasn’t me zoning out or being careless. This was me being aware. I was paying attention. And it still happened constantly.

Some of it was obvious. Wiping sweat. Adjusting my hair. Pulling off random dog hair that somehow always follows me into the studio.

Other times I barely registered it until after. A quick brush of my cheek. A scratch. Totally automatic.

What stuck with me wasn’t “this is gross.” It was more like, wow, this is just how people move.

In a Pilates class, your hands are everywhere. Straps. Handles. Loops. Springs. Then your body. Then back to the equipment again. It’s fluid, unconscious, and normal.

And even in really clean studios, there are certain parts of the reformer that are harder to deal with between classes. Especially fabric pieces like straps and handles. Not because anyone is doing something wrong. Just because time is tight and classes move fast.

So once I noticed how often my hands moved from shared equipment to my face, I couldn’t stop noticing it.

Not in a paranoid way. More in a curious way.

Like, okay. If this is unavoidable human behavior, what actually makes sense here?

The answer wasn’t “never touch your face again.” That’s unrealistic and unnecessary. It also wasn’t about being afraid of shared spaces.

For me, it landed somewhere calmer.

It’s not about stopping the behavior. It’s about supporting it better.

Touching your face is normal. Shared equipment is normal. The question becomes how you reduce friction between the two without turning it into a whole thing.

That framing felt grounding to me. Preventative, not obsessive.

And once I saw it that way, it made sense why small changes at the point of contact can have an outsized impact on how class feels.

Sometimes awareness doesn’t lead to a dramatic shift. Sometimes it just leads to one small adjustment that makes everything feel more intentional.

And honestly, that felt like enough.