I’ve started working with a Feldenkrais practitioner. For those of you who don’t know what that means, it’s a somatic therapy, using touch and movement for the purpose of awakening the body and nervous tissue. This woman has taken me under her wing and can’t help but teach me the science and philosophy of her work (she’s a Sagittarius, look it up, it’s just in her nature). I am eating 👏🏼 it 👏🏼 up 👏🏼
It’s fascinating observing what the mind decides to keep as relevant information vs what it discards… She said something to me the other day that has JUST STUCK, and might be the rawest truth of my movement practice, and might possibly help your body too…
We finished the touch portion of our session and she had me stand and begin walking. She was directing my movements, looking for something in my gait, and, still not finding what she’s looking for she says;
‘darling, ask yourself, what sparks JOY?’
OH. Well when you put it that way. Done. My sternum lifted exposing the softness of my chest, my steps lengthened and my knee began easily tracking over my toes with no heel whip. (Shout out to Marie Kondo amirite?! Who knew methods for de-cluttering could shift my habits in an instant).
Now, holding on to aligned posture is not necessarily going to be this easy. I’m here to WORK to unearth the behaviors that have shaped this body to be constantly thrust forward and ‘on the ready’, but I seem to have stumbled on a lovely way of re-finding my body in space when I observe myself charging ahead too quickly. Are some of these patterns inherited? Maybe, and others definitely yes. But even then I’m learning there is the possibility to soar above the hillsides of any coding etched into my DNA. Does that mean that those rocky terrains of my predispositions cease to exist? No. But I do fly on unencumbered by them…
So much joy to be found, living in these delightful bodies 💕
-Jackie