Testing your Expectations

A recent New York Times Article talks about how test taking improves a student’s ability to retain information. Just like the idea that we can use attention and awareness to make neurological changes (because our nervous system is fundamentally adaptive), this is a pedagogical belief that we in the Feldenkrais community have been talking about for years. If you want to get better at doing something, you have to do it with a clear way of knowing what is different each time you do it. And that is why the focus of the work that I do is on how we can do the things we are already doing, better and better.

What is Attainable?

My last post was about how a richer more densely layered understanding of our core could help us be more at ease as we interact with the world.  This week I am more interested in that external, rather than internal place.  If your core is the most proximal place, what constitutes the realm of the most distal?  Or in other words, what is within your reach?

Like most things the answer to this question depends on what perspective you take to consider it and with more perspectives come richer understanding and more vibrant experiences.

1. For example: can you reach the glasses on the top shelf in the kitchen?  This is a purely physical approach that looks at the range of the reach of your arms.  Where do your arms begin and where do they end?
2. You could also consider what is possible for you to think about: could you imagine reaching those glasses and what would that look like?
3. And finally, what belongs in the range of your beliefs.  Do you believe that you could attain those glasses or are you doomed to be glassless?

I propose that these three ideas of what is within our reach are interrelated so deeply that they are in practice, impossible to separate.

Don’t take my word for it, consider reaching for glasses in your kitchen.  If you are at home: go to the kitchen are reach for the shelf that is most comfortable for you today.  It isn’t important that you actually reach the shelf, it is important that you notice the level of ease with which you are reaching and then come back and do the mini lesson below.

 

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Here is my suggestion for doing this lesson:  read through the whole thing and then do the lesson afterwards.  If you don’t remember the next step, you can stop to read it and then come back to doing the lesson.  Alternatively you can read one direction, do it and then take the resting time in between to read the next section.  And remember, whatever isn’t specifically disallowed, is allowed.  Have fun!

Sit on a firm chair, preferably without too much cushioning.  Notice the contact your pelvis makes with the chair.  Can you sense a difference between the two sides?  Bring your attention to you r shoulders.  What do you notice about your shoulders?  What is your sense of the distance between your pelvis on the right side and your right shoulder?  How about on your left side?  How far is it from your shoulder to your ear?  Does one shoulder see closer to your ear than the other?  What is between your shoulders and your pelvis?  Does your breath change the shape of your torso or lift your shoulders?

1)

Gently, making the movement as smooth as possible, slide your right shoulder a tiny bit upwards so that the distance between your shoulder and your ear is slightly less. Hold it there for a moment.  And then very, very slowly, I mean slooooowly, let your shoulder sink back down.  Do this a few times making sure to let your shoulder sink very slowly back down each time.

• As you lift your shoulder do you feel any change in the way your pelvis makes contact with the chair?
• Are you able to continue to breath easily as you lift and lower your shoulder?
• What do you do with your other shoulder?  Does it lift as well, stay in place or sink?
• Stop and rest for a moment.

2)

Now leave your shoulder where it is and slightly tilt your head so that your ear moves towards you shoulder.  Make sure to keep your face forward so that you are not turning your head at all.  Do this ever so slightly, stopping the moment you begin to feel the need to push.

• Do you feel a change in how your pelvis is supporting you?
• Can you sense any movement in your ribs?
• How easy can you make this movement?
• What is your breathing like as you do this?
• Stop and rest.

3)

Now easily raise your shoulder and hold it there as you tilt your head to bring your ear towards your raised shoulder.  Keeping the distance between your ear and your shoulder exactly the same, begin to bring your head back towards the upright and then back.  Remember it only works if you move your head and your shoulder as one package.

• How can you shift in your ribs and your back to make this easier?
• What could you do with your pelvis to help?
• How is your breathing now?
• Stop and rest.

What do you notice about your right shoulder now?  How has your contact with the chair changed?  Is there a difference between your right and your left sides?

 

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• How was the lesson?
• Did you actually do it or are you just reading on?
• Go back to that shelf and reach again.  What has changed?
• Can you reach higher with greater ease?
• How does reaching without strain to a higher shelf change the thoughts you have about the organization of your kitchen?

How does this new higher, easy reaching distance affect your belief about yourself and your competency in the world?

 

What is “Core Strength” Anyway?

Hello,

I’m curious about the concept of “Core Strength.”  Strengthening the core is prescribed as a way to become a faster runner, it is recommended to dancers as a means to improve fluidity and control, and it is seems to be the cure-all when it comes to back pain.  I spent years trying to identify and use my core as a way of improving my movement to no avail.  What was I doing wrong?  Why couldn’t my core support and protect me like it was supposed to?  At the root of my confusion, I believe, is the fact that I misunderstood what constituted my “core,” and that I placed too much importance on the, “strength” part.

Lets think of what core means for a moment.  When you core an apple, you take a column out of the center; when you take a core sample, you remove a column of material to study the different layers.  If you think of the Earth’s core, it is the densest most central part of the planet.  So if we are to apply these ideas to ourselves we have to ask what are the densest most central parts of ourselves and what does that have to do with a column?

The fact that we are standing vertically allows us to turn around ourselves with very little effort and just may be one of our greatest survival tools.  We don’t have sharp teeth, we can’t see in the dark, our hearing is average and we have no defensive coating to protect us.  All we have, functionally speaking, is our ability to be facing one way and then the other without any hesitation.  So, I like to think of my core as anything that helps me rotate around my central axis.  There are many muscles involved, but the beauty of it is that it takes very little actual work in order to turn around and if there isn’t much work required, there does not need to be great strength.  If it isn’t strength that accomplishes the task of turning, what does it require?  Coordination.  And the greatest facture in organizing our ability to turn is the movement of our eyes.  Don’t take my word for it.  Try it.  Sit or stand so that your back can be more or less straight and look to the right.  Now look to the right and at the same time turn your head to the right.  Does that feel easy, smooth, natural?  Now look to the right and turn your head to the left.  Not quiet as clear and easy, huh?

How do you organize the central parts of yourself in a way that supports your ability to safely reach out into the world?  How do you move around your central axis in ways that improve your range of expression from reaching to shake someone’s hand to dancing with a loved one?  How are your eyes influencing the way you move all the time?