Experience and Movement

"In general, there is no isolated sensory experience.  From the beginning, there is a tendency towards testing each new sensory experience by the other senses.  ... We have shown that it is not legitimate to speak of a sensory impression separately from motor-vegetative changes."
-  Moshe Feldenkrais, Body and Mature Behavior, 1949, p.112



The Potent Self: A Study of Spontaneity and Compulsion.  By Moshe Feldenkrais.  Foreword by Mark Reese.  This book was originally written in the late 1940's.  Frog Books, 2002.  288 pages.  ISBN: 978-1583940686.  VSCL.  

"Moshe Feldenkrais, D.Sc., a visionary scientist who pioneered the field of mind-body education and therapy, has inspired countless people worldwide.  His ability to translate his theories on human function into action resulted in the creation of his technique, now known as the Feldenkrais Method of Somatic Education.  In The Potent Self, Feldenkrais delves deeply into the relationship between faulty posture, pain, and the underlying emotional mechanisms that lead to compulsive and dependent human behavior. He shares remarkable insights into resistance, motivation, habit formation, and the place of sex in full human potential.  The Potent Self offers Feldenkrais' vision of how to achieve physical and mental wellness through the development of authentic maturity.  This edition includes and extensive Forward by Mark Reese, a longtime student of Feldenkrais, in which Reese discusses many of the important ideas in the book and places them in the context of Feldenkrais' life and the intellectual and historical milieu of his time."  - Quote from AmazonBooks



Body and Mature Behavior: A Study of Anxiety, Sex, Gravitation, and Learning.  By Moshe Feldenkrais.  Foreword by Carl Ginsburg.  Berkeley, California, Frog Books, Somatic Resources, 2005.  Index, 233 pages.  ISBN: 978-1583941157.  VSCL.

These essays were first presented as lectures to members of the Association of Scientific Workers at Fairlie, Scotland, given in 1943-1944.  They were first printed in book form in 1949.  Moshe Feldenkrais worked for the British Admiralty during World War II on submarine research in Scotland, and taught self-defense since he was a Judo Master.  Dr. Feldenkrais discusses learning, movement and consciousness, the psychological and physiological development of humans, recent research in psychology, training and reeducation, mind-body unity, instincts, anxiety, habits, and the impact of gravity on our soma/psyche.  It was written before Dr. Feldenkrais developed his somatic Awareness Through Movement methods and educational theories.  His topics and conclusions are wide-ranging. 


Moshe Feldenkrais  (1904-1984)
Awareness Through Movement, Functional Integration
Bibliography, Links, Quotes, Notes

    

Yang Style of Tai Chi Chuan, Standard 24 Form

My webpage on the Standard 24 Taijiquan Form has been a very popular webpage on the Cloud Hands Tai Chi Chuan Website since 2001.  In the sidebar of this blog, you will find a quick index to this webpage.   

Standard Simplified Taijiquan 24 Form. Research by Michael P. Garofalo, M.S. This webpage includes a detailed bibliography of books, media, links, online videos, articles, and resources. It provides a list of the 24 movement names in English, Chinese, French, German and Spanish, with citations for sources of the movement names. It provides detailed descriptions of each movement with black and white line illustrations and photographs. It includes relevant quotations, notes, performance times, section breakdowns, basic Tai Chi principles, and strategies for learning the form. This hypertext document was last last updated in December of 2017.  

The Peking (Bejing) Chinese National orthodox standard simplified 24 movement T'ai Chi Ch'uan form, created in 1956, is the most popular form practiced all around the world. This form uses the Yang Style of Taijiquan.  

There is also a famous short Tai Chi Chuan form, created by Professor Cheng Man-ch'ing in the 1940's.  It has 37 movements in the Yang Style of Taijiquan.

My 24 Form webpage provides many good suggestions for a person learning this basic Tai Chi Chuan Form of 24 movements on their own if there is no Tai Chi class in their area.

I started learning Taijiquan in 1986.  I was taught the Standard 24 Movement T'ai Chi Ch'uan Form in the Yang Style of T'ai Chi Ch'uan.  I learned it from Aikido Sensei Frank McGourick in Whittier, California.  

In 1986, were no books or instructional videotapes on this popular form.  In 2019, there are dozens of books and instructional DVDs, videotapes, UTube demonstrations by women and men, streaming content, and scores of webpages on the subject of the 24 Taijiquan Form.  

Sensei McGourick also taught me the standard Long Form of the Yang Style of Tai Chi Chuan.  You hit the floor a lot in Aikido, it is vigorous, and it is very challenging for anyone, and it was too hard for me.  So, being a man in his 40's, and working 50 hours a week as a library administrator of 22 libraries in the busy and growing San Gabriel Valley, I practiced only Taijiquan and Qigong at the Aikido Ai Dojo in Whittier with Dr. Robert Moore and Sensei McGourick.

The most detailed book that I have seen on the subject of the 24 Form is:
The Yang Taiji 24 Step Short Form: A Step by Step Guide for All Levels
By James Drewe.  London, Singing Dragon Press, 2011.  382 pages, black and white photographs, charts, detailed descriptions, training tips. 

I give information on many other fine books by other good authors on the Basic 24 Tai Chi Chuan Form in my webpage.  Find books by Andrew Townsend, Cheng Zhao, Foen Tjoeng Lie, Eric Chaline, Le Deyin, etc.

Many persons have told me that their favorite instructional DVD on the 24 Form is: Tai Chi - The 24 Forms  By Dr. Paul Lam.  I attended Dr. Lam's Tai Chi for Arthritis workshop in Monterey, California; and  later workshops on Sun Tai Chi with other Bay Area teachers.  I am also quite fond of using instructional DVDs by Master Jessie Tsao from San Diego.  


I have played and practiced this form with many different persons and groups over three decades.  The many slight variations are fun to play and observe.  Taijiquan is a very pleasant and satisfying group exercise, dance, marital arts, and choreographed body-mind movements class.  Taijiquan and Qigong provide an excellent fitness class for seniors to help them with aging well.  I have practiced this Basic 24 Form with different groups in the Vancouver and Portland areas, and for many years around Red Bluff, CA.  

At age 79, I can do quite a few repetitions of the form during any day.  I warm up with Qigong and limbering up movements, if needed, before practicing the 24 Form.  I make adjustments necessitated because of my former injuries, falls, surgeries, and decreasing balance skills.  I like to play with the named movement sequences in ways outside of the 24 form choreography, e.g., HsingI type forward drills using Yang postures, changing directions to accommodate indoor practice near furniture, faster movements with intermittent fajing, etc.  I also think about the martial applications of defense or offense, following the Teacher and group members so to achieve a coordinated beauty in the performance style desired, the courtesies and comradeship of the practice team, Taijiquan principles, etc. 

I try my best to try to learn, and relearn, and unlearn.   

"At this period of wushu, the Nanking Central Kuoshu Institute in 1956 tasked the choreography of a Taijiquan routine what would be more suitable for popular dissemination among the masses, in keeping with the government's egalitarian agenda.  The traditional forms were just too long and time consuming to practice, and the traditional methods too arcane and demanding for mass propagation.  The challenge was to reduce the one hundred-odd movements of the traditional Yang Style Taijiquan, prevalent then, to its core, by removing the many repetitive movements as well as the less essential ones.  Thus, the 24-Form Taijiquan set was created.  Instrumental in this simplification effort was Li Tianji (1913-1996) who had been appointed a wushu research fellow at the Institute.  Under official auspices, the 24-Form Taijiquan quickly became the standard form, taught throughout China as part of physical education curriculum in schools and colleges.  It is perhaps the best know Taijiquan form in the world today.  As widespread as it is, the 24-Form is at best an abridged version of the traditional Yang form, a synopsis of the art."
-  C. P. Ong, Taijiquan: Cultivating Inner Strength, 2013, p. 7.  


Lift the head, stand strong and balanced, move gracefully.
Imagine resistance, water boxing, dealing with an opponent, pushing hands.
Be loose and relaxed, avoid over-exertion, use coiling energy.
Keep moving, flowing, shaping yourself in body-mind.
Shoulders down, gentle breathing, dignified bearing.
Stylish, artistic, beautiful, sensuous, dancing, formal.
Yin more than Yang, soft over hard, water over stone, gentle over muscular.
Follow the Teacher, coordinate, create unity, act as one. 

Somatic Intelligence

I have learned and benefited greatly from reading and studying the following three books:

Awakening Somatic Intelligence: The Art and Practice of Embodied Mindfulness    By Risa F. Kaparo, Ph.D.  Berkeley, California, North Atlantic Books, 2012.  Index, 368 pages.  ISBN: 978-1583944172.  Subtitle: Transform Pain, Stress, Trauma, and Aging.  VSCL.  

Philosophy in the Flesh : The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought.  By George Lakoff and Mark Johnson.  Basic Books, Perseu Books, 1999.  Index, bibliography, 624 pages.  ISBN: 0465056741.   "The mind is inherently embodied.  Thought is mostly unconscious.  Abstract concepts are largely metaphorical."  VSCL.

Mindfulness Yoga: The Awakened Union of Breath, Body, and Mind.   By Frank Jude Boccio.   Boston, MA, Wisdom Publications.  Index, bibliography, notes, 340 pages.  ISBN: 0861713354.  VSCL.   

Somaesthetics, Body-Mind Practices, Embodiment Arts:  Quotations, Facts, Information, Bibliography, Resources

Valley Spirit Yoga

Qigong (Chi-King) Mind-Body Practices

Yang Taijiquan Long Form Third Section

For Tai Chi Chuan players: I often take a section of a long Taijiquan form and restudy and carefully practice only that section many times. I look up that section in books to learn more from master teachers. I also use instructional DVDs and UTube for sectional reviews. Smaller bites assists with better chewing and digestion.

I use the fine books by Fu Zhongwen, Li Deyin, T.T. Liang/Stuart Olson, and Gordon Muir for review. All have photographs or line illustrations of the movements and much commentary.

Here are some UTube demonstrations of the Third Section (Movements 56-108) of the Traditional Long Form of Yang Style Tai Chi Chuan:

In 2023, my Daily Body-Mind-Spirit Practices include: 

Yang Style Taijiquan - Traditional 108 Movements T'ai Chi Ch'uan Long Form

Standard Simplified Yang Style Taijiquan 24 Movements Short Form

Eight Immortals Cane Routine #1, Yang Style

Wudang Qigong , Warmups, Exercises, Ideals, Meditation

Daoism: Principles and Practices

 

Third Section,  Movements 55-108,  List of Movements

Third Section List ,  Movements 55-108,  Yang Long Form 108 

    Provides a list with the number of the movement and the name of movement.  In the PDF format (print only), 1 page, 26Kb.

Third Section List,  Part I,  Movements 56 - 82,  Yang Long Form 108   

    Provides a list with the number of the movement, the direction one is facing at the end of that movement, the name of the movement, and a brief description or notes about the movement.  In the PDF format (print only), 1 page, 65Kb.  In the HTML format provided below in this document.  

Third Section List,  Part II,  Movements 83 - 108,  Yang Long Form 108.   

    Provides a list with the number of the movement, the direction one is facing at the end of that movement, the name of the movement, and a brief description or notes about the movement.  In the PDF format (print only), 1 page, 63Kb.  In the HTML format provided below in this document.  

Comparison of 108 Long Yang with 88 Long Yang - Chart

The Human Body and Religion

I am always keenly interested in our understanding, appreciation, and uses of our human bodies.  Somatics and mind-body arts practices are one focus of my research and writing.  My own opinions about a philosophy of living one's life, and enjoying the use of our bodies are, generally, non-religious, Epicurean, skeptical, and philosophical.  

Religious views of the body-mind are a serious impediment to scientific and pragmatic progress. 


"Two thousand years of Christian discourse—anatomy, medicine, physiology, or course, but also philosophy, theology, and aesthetics—have fashioned the body we inhabit.  And along with that discourse we have inherited Platonic-Christian models that mediate our perception of the body, the symbolic value of the body's organs, and their hierarchically ordered functions.  We accept the nobility of heart and mind, the triviality of viscera and sex (the neurosurgeon versus the proctologist).  We accept the spiritualization and dematerialization of the soul, the interaction of sin-prone matter and of luminous mind, the ontological connotation of these two artificially opposed entities, the disturbing forces of a morally reprehensible libidinal humanity ... All have contributed to Christianity's sculpting of the flesh.

Our image of ourselves, the scrutiny of the doctor or the radiologist, the whole philosophy of sickness and health—none of this could exist in the absence of the above mentioned discourse.  Nor could our conception of suffering, the role we allot to pain and therefore our relationship with pharmacology, substances, and drugs.  Nor could our conception of suffering, the role we allot to pain and therefore our relationship with pharmacology, substances, and drugs.  Nor could the special language of practitioner to patient, the relationship of self to self, reconciliation of one's image of oneself with a ideal of the physiological, anatomical, and psychological self.  So that surgery and pharmacology, homeopathic medicine and palliative treatments, gynecology and thanatology, emergency medicine and oncology, psychiatry and clinical work all obey Judeo-Christian law without any particularly clear understanding of the symptoms of this ontological contamination.

The current hypersensivity on the subject of bioethics proceeds from this invisible influence.  Secular political decisions on this major issue more or less correspond to the positions formulated by the church.  This should be no surprise, for the ethos of bioethics remains fundamentally Judeo-Christian.  Apart from legislation on abortion and artificial contraception, apart fro these two forward steps toward a post-Christian body—what I have elsewhere called a Faustian body—Western medicine sticks very closely to the church's injunctions.

The Health Professionals' Charter elaborated by the Vatican condemns sex-change operations, experiments on the embryo, in vitro fertilization and transfer, surrogate motherhood, medical assistance with reproduction, but also therapeutic cloning, analgesic cocktails that suspend consciousness as life comes to an end, therapeutic use of cannabis, and euthanasia.  On the other hand, the charter praises palliative care and insists on the salutary role of pain.  These are all positions often echoed by ethical committees calling themselves secular and believing themselves independent of religious authority." 

-  Michel Onfray.  Atheist Manifesto: The Case Against Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.  Translated from the French by Jeremy Leggatt.  New York Arcade Publishing, 2005, 2011.  ISBN: 10161145008X.  Annotated bibliography, 246 pages.  VSCL.  A lucid, strong, well reasoned, insightful, and stylish presentation.  Excellent explication of the French and European writing on atheism, anti-clericalism, irreligion, deconstruction of religions, and anti-fascism.  His detailed knowledge of religious customs and ideas is very impressive.  I agree with Professor Onfray's assessment about the negative influences of the three monotheistic religions surveyed; as I do with the dynamic and robust critiques of religion by Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris. The above quote is from p. 47 or Professor Onfray's book.  


When my mother, June, was dying of colorectal cancer, she spent her final days comfortably in a hospice.  When she died my superstitious Catholic father said many times that the hospice killed her, that the hospice practiced euthanasia, that the hospice was sinful and evil.  No matter how much I explained hospice care to him, he would not listen.  It is no wonder my mother did not want to see my father at the end.  I concluded that that he would rather have seen her suffer more, believing that suffering was good for the soul.  He was often a mean and rigid macho man, lacking loving-kindness and compassion. 

When I was 12 years of age, I was told by my priest confessor that masturbation was a mortal sin, evil, unnatural, and inspired by the devil; and, that I would go directly to hell for eternal horrific punishment if I continued to masturbate.  I knew that that masturbation was pleasant, harmless, disease free, legal, and entirely private.  I could not understand how if I should murder somebody I would go to hell, and if I masturbated I would go to hell.  These church rules and penalties regarding masturbation seemed to me arbitrary and absurd.

The longstanding mistreatment of women by religious authorities and religious rules is also completely unsatisfactory to me.  Dr. Ben Carson, for example, a recent secular Republican political candidate, believes our laws should be changed so that any woman who is impregnated by a rapist or through incest should not be allowed to have an abortion even if she chooses to do so.  Reflect also on how women are oppressed and mistreated under the domination by Islamic men.  

I was not surprised to read that the Catholic Church, Islam, and Mormons still all object to vasectomies.  Religions supported and encouraged slavery for centuries.  Religions significantly slowed the progress in anatomy for many centuries by refusing to allow post-mortem autopsies.  Large families are encouraged by religions (more paying believers in the long run I suppose) despite the grueling poverty of overpopulation.  Examples of the pernicious effect of religion on medicine, psychology and public health can, unfortunately, be multiplied with ease.  

The fact that people hold antiquated and false views about bodily functions is not so troublesome as the fact that their religious leaders want to force everybody to accept, obey and follow their nonsensical opinions.  These religions do not favor freedom of thought and action, scientific investigation, and freedom of expression.  Most sensible and modern 'social church goers' simply quietly ignore and disregard most of these outmoded ideas about bodily functions and behaviors pandered by their priests and preachers, if they can do so without being harmed by the local religious police enforcers.  


I have never gone to any church since I was 16, after I left Catholic high school.  What a wise move on my part to abandon the silly rules, anti-scientific opinions, fables, myths, superstitions, and authoritarianism of organized religions.  A good life is much easier to live and enjoy, without the burdens of religious twaddle.  


"The source of man's unhappiness is his ignorance of Nature. The pertinacity with which he clings to blind opinions imbibed in his infancy, which interweave themselves with his existence, the consequent prejudice that warps his mind, that prevents its expansion, that renders him the slave of fiction, appears to doom him to continual error."
-  Baron d'Holbach, The System of Nature

 
"The whole thing is so patently infantile, so foreign to reality, that to anyone with a friendly attitude to humanity it is painful to think that the great majority of mortals will never be able to rise above this view of life. It is still more humiliating to discover how a large number of people living today, who cannot but see that this religion is not tenable, nevertheless try to defend it piece by piece in a series of pitiful rearguard actions."
-  Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 1930 

Wisdom Within Our Flesh

"The human body is not an instrument to be used, but a realm of one's being to be experienced, explored, enriched and, thereby, educated."
-  Thomas Hanna

"There is deep wisdom within our very flesh,  if we can only come to our senses and feel it."
 -  Elizabeth A. Behnke

"He who feels it, knows it more."-  Bob Marley  

 "The hand is the cutting edge of the mind."
-  Jacob Bronowski


'The Heavenly Level is the function of feeling."
-  Cheng Man-ch'ing

"No matter how closely we look, it is difficult to find a mental act that can take place without the support of some physical function."
-  Moshe Feldenkrais  

"I would have touched it like a child
But knew my finger could but have touched
Cold stone and water.   I grew wild,
Even accusing heaven because
It had set down among its laws:
Nothing that we love over-much
Is ponderable to our touch."-  W. B. Yeats  

Touching, Feeling, Sensation: Quotations

The Five Senses

Bodymind Theory and Practices, Somaesthetics

Self-Massage 

Body-Mind-Spirit Movement Arts

Lunge Exercises, Yoga Lunges, Taijiquan Lunges

Body-Mind Centering

Exploring Body-Mind Centering: An Anthology of Experience and Method.  Edited by Gill Wright Miller, Pat Ethridge, and Kate Tarlow Morgan.  North Atlantic Books, 2011, 470 pages, index. bibliography. VSCL.

Principles of Body-Mind Centering Approach

"All cells have consciousness (mind).

All levels of physiological organization (e.g., tissues, systems) have consciousness that can be experienced directly.

As we begin to make all systems more conscious,
they become more accessible. 

We can transmit to each other the embodiment.
of the group's shared learning.

The mind of the body system (e.g., bones, muscles, organs,
nervous system) is reflected in the room when that system.
is touched.  

It is possible to create, evoke, and titrate resonance.

Support precedes movement.

Embodiment can initiate movement; movement can
initiate embodiment.

The is a difference between the map of the body
and the territory of the living person's somatic experience."

Revealing the Human Body

I have attended two of the Human Bodies Revealed exhibits.  The first exhibit was in Redding, California, at the Turtle Bay Museum, where I also conducted three introductory Qigong classes.  The second exhibit was at the OMSI museum in Portland, Oregon.  The OMSI exhibit was quite large and impressive, and well attended.  I am a supporter of more education in the medical sciences and technologies.  

Green Way Research

Ways to Improve Our Lives

Reprogramming the Body and Brain

Change Your Age: Using Your Body and Brain to Feel Younger, Stronger, and More Fit.  By Frank Wildman, Ph.D..  Certified Feldenkrais Trainer.  Da Capo Lifelong Books, 2010.  Index, 214 pages.  ISBN: 978-0738213637.  VSCL. 

Karen and I have been doing many of the movement-awareness routines specified in this informative book.  

Moshe Feldenkrais (1904-1984)  Bibliography, Quotes, Biography

I attend a one hour class "Awareness Through Movement" on Wednesday  conducted by Christine Toscano in Vancouver, Washington.  

Body Moving, Mind Moving

"We human beings have bodies.  We are "rational animals," but we are also "rational animals," which means that our rationality is embodied.  The centrality of human embodiment directly influences what and how things can be meaningful to us, the ways in which these meanings can be developed and articulated, the ways we are able to comprehend and reason about our experience, and the actions we take.  Our reality is shaped by the patterns of our bodily movement, the contours of our spatial and temporal orientation, and the forms of our interaction with objects."
-  Mark Johnson, The Body in the Mind, 1987, xix

“The human body is the best picture of the human soul.”
-  Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations

"It was a great thing to be a human being. It was something tremendous. Suddenly I'm conscious of a million sensations buzzing in me like bees in a hive. Gentlemen, it was a great thing."
-  Karel Capek  

“Somaesthetics can be defined as the critical study of the experience and use of one’s body as a locus of sensory-aesthetic appreciation (aesthesis) and creative self-fashioning.”
-  Richard Shusterman


Somaesthetic Practices for Health, Well-Being and Mindfulness

A Good Life

The Five Senses

The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination, and Reason  By Mark Johnson.  University of Chicago Press, 1987, 1992.  Index, notes, 272 pages.  ISBN: 978-0226403182.  VSCL.

Thinking through the Body: Essays in Somaesthetics.  By Richard Schusterman.  New York, Cambridge University Press, 2012.  380 pages.  ISBN: 9781107698505.  

Hands and Touching

"The hand is the cutting edge of the mind."
-  Jacob Bronowski

"The mind has exactly the same power as the hands: not merely to grasp the world, but to change it."

-  Colin Wilson 

"By rubbing up against the world, I define myself to myself."
-  Deane Juhan

"The upper limb is the lightning rod to the soul."
-  Robert Markison

“We leave traces of ourselves wherever we go, on whatever we touch.”
-  Lewis Thomas

Hands and Touching:  http://www.egreenway.com/reason/touch.htm

"When things get out of control, we say they are out of hand. When we want to take control, we try to get a grip, or get a handle on things. When we are missing a view of fundamental reality, we say we are out of touch. When we are likely to say something, truthful, but possibly embarrassing, our mothers tell us to sit on our hands. This last one describes the interesting relationship between the hands and speech. Stifle the hands and the mouth is mute, but the body, its weight squirming on restrained hands, hints of things ready to pop from the mouths of babes. So which came first? The intelligent use of the hands? I would say so, hands down. If the hands have the power to restrain speech, we know where they fit the hierarchy in relation to the brain.

    Educators like Froebel, Otto Salomon, and Felix Adler made it quite clear that the education of the hands was a direct means of social liberation, not just for the lower classes, but for all. It wasn't a conspiracy. They were very clear about their objectives. Froebel's kindergartens were shut down for a time by the Kaiser. Could it be that the Kaiser and rulers of other nations had not yet figured out how to disguise their intentions? There are at this point countless confirmations of the fact that all human expressions of intelligence both in art/craft and the written/spoken word are rooted in the hands. One is the insight that the study of metaphor provides. Another is Susan Goldin-Meadow's study of gesture at the University of Chicago. Still another is the baby signs movement in which children are being taught sign language first, before speech and realizing a major advancement in verbal skills as a result.

    There are at this point countless confirmations of the fact that all human expressions of intelligence both in art/craft and the written/spoken word are rooted in the hands. One is the insight that the study of metaphor provides. Another is Susan Goldin-Meadow's study of gesture at the University of Chicago. Still another is the baby signs movement in which children are being taught sign language first, before speech and realizing a major advancement in verbal skills as a result."
-  Doug Stowe, The Hands as Metaphor

Moving Towards Self-Improvement

"Correction of movements is the best means of self-improvement:
1.  The nervous system is occupied mainly with movement. 
2.  It is easier to distinguish the quality of movement.
3.  We have a richer experience of movement.
4.  The ability to move is important to self-value.
5.  All muscular activity is movement.
6.  Movements reflect the state of the nervous system.
7.  Movement is the basis of awareness.
8.  Breathing is movement.
9.  Hinges of habit."
-  Moshe Feldenkrais, Awareness Through Movement, pp. 33-39, 1972

Notes on Feldenkrais Methods

Trying New Movements

“Movement is what we are, not something we do”
–  Emilie Conrad

"Old age, for instance, begins with the self-imposed restriction on forming new body patterns.  First, one selects attitudes and postures to fit an assumed dignity and so rejects certain actions, such as sitting on the floor or jumping, which then soon become impossible to perform.  The resumption and reintegration of even these simple actions has a marked rejuvenating effect not only of the mechanics of the body but also on the personality as a whole."
-  Moshe Feldnekrais, Embodied Wisdom, p. 31

Body-Mind Practices: Quotes, Bibliography, Links

Awareness Through Movement

My wife, Karen, has persistent painful problems with her upper back and neck.  Arthritis, head tilted forward, upper back rounded, injuries, and 70 years of active use have all causally contributed to her discomfort.  My own back has been cramping up lately on the mid and lower right side.  We both are doing restorative yoga, massage, and heat treatments.  

We have found a local Feldenkrais practitioner, Christine Toscano, that we both will visit for lessons starting in November.  Ms. Toscano also had a career as a licensed acupuncturist. 

Ms. Toscano recommended we read Chapter 5 of the book by Norman Doidge, M.D., "The Brain's Way of Healing: Remarkable Discoveries and Recoveries from the Frontiers of Neuroplasticity," (Penguin Books, 2016).  The chapter covers the life and work of Moshe Feldenkrais (1904-1984).  He was a engineer, kudo master, movement therapist, and healer.  The chapter discusses some of the core principles of his theory and methods as follows:

"1.  The mind programs the functioning of the brain.
2.  A brain cannot think without motor function.
3.  Awareness of movement is the key to improving movement.
4.  Differentiation: making the smallest possible sensory distinctions between movements - builds brain maps.
5.  Differentiation is easiest to make when the stimulus is smallest.
6.  Slowness of movement is the key to awareness, and awareness is the key to learning.
7.  Reduce the effort whenever possible.  Relax.
8.  Errors are essential, and there is no right way to move, only better.
9.  Random movements provide variation that leads to developmental breakthroughs.
10.  Even the smallest movement in one part of the body involves the entire body.
11.  Many movement problems, and the pain that goes with them, are caused by learned habit, not by abnormal structure." 

Awareness Through Movement by Moshe Feldenkrais

Change Your Age by Frank Wildman

Even the Ring Finger Remembers

“The body uses its skin and deeper fascia and flesh to record all that goes on around it.  Like the Rosetta stone, for those who know how to read it, the body is a living record of life given, life taken, life hoped for, life healed.  It is valued for its articulate ability to register immediate reaction, to feel profoundly, to sense ahead.
        
     The body is a multilingual being.  It speaks through its color and its temperature, the flush of recognition, the glow of love, the ash of pain, the heart of arousal, the coldness of non-conviction.  It speaks through its constant tiny dance, sometimes swaying, sometimes a-jitter, sometimes trembling.  It speaks through the leaping of the heart, the falling of the spirit, the pit at the center, and rising of hope.

     The body remembers, the bones remember, the joints remember, even the little finger remembers.  Memory is lodged in pictures and feelings in the cells themselves.  Like a sponge filled with water, anywhere the flesh is pressed, wrung, even touched slightly, a memory may flow out in a stream.

     To confine the beauty and the value of the body to anything less than this magnificence is to force the body to live without its rightful spirit, its rightful form, its right to exultation.  To be thought ugly or unacceptable because one’s beauty is outside the current fashion is deeply wounding to the natural joy that belongs to the wild nature.”

-      By Clarissa Pinkola Estés,  Women Who Run with the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype, 1996  


Body-Mind Practices, Somaesthetics

The Five Senses

Touch, Skin, Feeling, Hands, Tactile

Growing Up Oneself

"The secret of the Tao Te Ching is its idea of Tao, modeled on the life of a plant.  Just as a living plant is tender and yielding (Chapter 76), so is Tao weak and yielding (Chapter 40).  With plants the hidden roots support the visible leaves and flowers, which return to the roots upon perishing (Chapter 16).  Likewise, Tao is the hidden root (Chapter 6), the non-being from which all beings spring (Chapter 40 and Chapter 21) and to which all beings return (Chapter 34).  The life of a plant is conditioned by seasonal rotation.  So is the movement of Tao in four stages: great (summer), disappearing (fall), far away (winter), and return (spring) (Chapter 25).  In the same way does the Taoist model spiritual life after a plant.  A living plant is tender and pliant, whole a dead plant is stiff and hard (Chapter 76); one who is with the Tao is also tender and pliant, while one who departs from the Tao is stiff and hard.  The plant kingdom is a quiet kingdom (Chapter 16) that sleeps in beauty; Taoist quietude is the spiritual condition for regeneration.  A plant grows at its own pace.  One must not, like the farmer in the Mencius (2A.2), help the growth of the corn stalks by pulling them up.  In the same way the Taoist allows events to unfold according to their inner rhythms; he acts by non-action (wu-wei), which is acting with, not against, the inner rhythms of things.  A plant is always renewing itself; the Taoist celebrates perpetual childhood (Chapter 55)."

- Ellen M. Chen, Tao Te Ching: A New Translation and Commentary. Paragon House, 1998. Detailed glossary, index, bibliography, notes, 274 pages. The above quote is from page 41. (I have found this book very useful.)
 

Tao Teh Ching Chapter Index    Hypertext Chart by Michael P. Garofalo
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	30
31	32	33	34	35	36	37	38	39	40
41	42	43	44	45	46	47	48	49	50
51	52	53	54	55	56	57	58	59	60
61	62	63	64	65	66	67	68	69	70
71	72	73	74	75	76	77	78	79	80
81

Son (Michael) and Father (Mike)
Two Gardeners in Vancouver, Washington, June 12, 2017
Backdrop of Western Red Cedar, Sitka Spruce, Firs, Maple, Green Lawn

In a sunny spot for a vegetable garden.
On the east corner of Michael and April's lot.
April, Michael and Karen all worked on this garden.
June 12, 2017

Spirituality and Gardening

Nature Mysticism
 

"The first act of awe, when man was struck with the beauty or wonder of Nature, was the first spiritual experience."
-  Henryk Skolimowski   



"A little too abstract, a little too wise,
It is time for us to kiss the earth again,
It is time to let the leaves rain from the skies,
Let the rich life run to the roots again."
-  Robinson Jeffers



"In the assemblies of the enlightened ones there have been many cases of mastering the Way bringing forth the heart of plants and trees; this is what awakening the mind for enlightenment is like.  The fifth patriarch of Zen was once a pine-planting wayfarer; Rinzai worked on planting cedars and pines on Mount Obaku.   ...  Working with plants, trees, fences and walls, if they practice sincerely they will attain enlightenment." 
-  Dogen Zenji, Japanese Zen Buddhist Grand Master , Awakening the Unsurpassed Mind, #31 



"Gardening helps us realize somatically, viscerally, the laws of growth and gradual unfolding.  We can't pull the plants up to make them grow, but we can help facilitate and midwife their blooming, each in his own way, time, and proper season.  I have learned a little about patience and humility from my gardens.  It's so obviously not something I'm doing that creates this miracle!  I also like to reflect upon and appreciate the exquisitely, evanescent, transitory, and poignant nature of things in the garden.  If you love the Dharma, you have to farm it. Go to a garden.  Just stand in it.  Breathe in the air, the fragrances, the light, the temperature, the music of the different plants, insects, birds, worms, caterpillars, grasshoppers, and butterflies.  Inhale the prana (cosmic energy) of all the abundantly growing things.  Recharge your inner batteries.  This is the joy of natural meditation."
-  Lama Surya Das, Awakening to the Sacred, 1999