Reddit mentions of Alethea Austin Stretching For Pole DVD

Since your body is tight to begin with, I'd recommend going through a stretching sequence once or twice every day, more if you can fit in the time. Make sure you do your whole body - neck, arms, shoulders, back, legs, feet (pointed toes!). Make sure you're taking all the stretches as far as possible, take a breath, and on exhale see if you can stretch it further. Try to remember which stretches your instructors do in your pole classes, or buy one of the pole stretching DVDs. I've heard good things about the Alethea Austin and Amy Guion ones.

How many pole, yoga, and pilates classes have you taken and how hard are you pushing yourself in each of those classes? One of the big problems I see in yoga classes are disengaged instructors. They lead the class through the poses, but don't really explain what the poses should do or where you should feel the stretch. A lot of instructors also don't know how to properly adjust their students' bodies.

If you have the money, you may want to try other yoga studios or get private instruction. The pilates may also be working against you - I use pilates in my routine primarily for core strengthening, not stretching.

With the dancing, it's kind of just practice:

• Watch yourself in the mirror. If your studio has specific flow or fluidity classes, take those.
  
  
• If you don't have a pole at home, practice the body rolls using a chair. A lot of the dancing/floorwork exercises can be done at home with a chair, which is typically how I practice.
  
  
• Become more familiar with the music your studio plays. My free styling isn't great, but it's a million times better when I know the music and can anticipate what it'll do, so in my head I'll start stringing together the possible combos.
  
  
• Really get comfortable with combinations. I'm not sure what level you're at, but when you practice going from one move to the next and concentrate on making it work together, the flow gets better.
  
  If you have any more questions about these, let me know. I'm trying to type quickly between classes, but I'll be on again later.