Feldenkrais pedagogy and body behavior therapy " Learning is healthier than being a patient"

 

Norbert Klinkenberg

Feldenkrais pedagogy and body behavior therapy

" Learning is healthier than being a patient"

Moshe Feldenkrais is one of the scientists and thinkers of the 20th century with a lasting impact. The method he developed is nothing other than the critical observation of the natural experiment of physical movement on itself. The fact that the physicist did not accept anything that could not be thought through and experienced down to the ground means that many of his concepts of functional movement and his conclusions and postulates on the functioning of the nervous system are still relevant and groundbreaking today. Today, Moshe Feldenkrais is rightly counted among the "pioneers of conscious perception through movement experience". He was the most successful in "overcoming a dualistic conception [of body and soul]"; his main merit must be seen in the "integration of theory and practice" (Petzold 1993). As a consequence of his observations, Feldenkrais called for self-education ("adult re-education") as an adult form of human realization (Feldenkrais 1949, p. 163) and a critical approach to all forms of educational and therapeutic heteronomy.

The distinction between pedagogy and therapy may be understandable based on personal experience and may make sense for ideological, professional, political, and legal reasons. In concrete educational and therapeutic work with people, however, it often seems superfluous and artificial when the objectives and procedures of educational and therapeutic methods are identical in key areas. The physicist Moshe Feldenkrais preferred to refer to his clients as students, but often also as patients, and spoke of his method as "healing therapy" (Feldenkrais 1994). In his theoretical writings, Feldenkrais proposed the application of his learning method in various areas of society, but most explicitly advocated its integration into the field of psychotherapy. He repeatedly pointed out the importance of his observations for improved psychotherapy. He considered disembodied psychotherapy to be a "convenient abstraction ... the benefits of which were in fact very soon exhausted" (Feldenkrais 1994, p. 225). He regretted psychology's ignorance of the "physical-chemical basis of all functions in the organism", whose "somatic evidence ... was not even utilized in their theoretical work" (ibid. p. 63). "Organic learning", i.e. the undisturbed development of human learning ability, on the other hand, is "fundamental, therefore indispensable". It can not only have a "therapeutic effect", but is also "healthier than being a patient or even than being cured" (Feldenkrais 1987, p. 57). Despite this proximity to psychotherapy, the Feldenkrais Method in Germany today sees itself explicitly as an educational method and not as a therapy; it "is a learning method and not a medical or therapeutic treatment" (Feldenkrais Guild 1996). Feldenkrais teachers are understandably suspicious of the framework conditions of our public health system (e.g. Strauch 1986, Pieper 1993), just as medical practitioners and psychotherapists may regard Feldenkrais teachers as esoteric, unclear and arrogant. On the other hand, the goals of Feldenkrais's work, such as "improvement, increase, expansion, facilitation of self-confidence, learning ability, competence to act, performance, self-awareness, expansion of self-image and body schema" etc. (Pieper & Weise 1966). (Pieper & Weise 1966, p. 26; Pieper & Weise 2000), are among the original goals of psychotherapeutic and, in particular, cognitive-behavioral therapy approaches. In the context of self-management therapy, on the other hand, therapists do many things that do not seem to correspond to narrow concepts of therapeutic action; they inform, advise or care for their patients in a "resource-oriented" way, prefer to speak of "improvement", coping and prevention and ultimately describe their patients as clients who give them a specific assignment.

From the beginning of the century, Freudian psychoanalysis dominated the ideas of healing and improving the human psyche and in turn, promoted the dualistic approach of conventional medicine. Feldenkrais, on the other hand, argued for a holistic approach and for the conscious perception of the human body as the easiest access to self-awareness and conscious self-regulation. With his view of self-education as the highest possible achievement of human intelligence, Feldenkrais shared with other intellectuals of his time the hope for the possibilities of humane human self-improvement, both of the individual and of society.

Despite the extensive theoretical reflections of the physicist and pedagogue Moshe Feldenkrais, his thinking and his method - as is inevitably the case with all body-oriented methods - are not accessible via discussions of the history of ideas, anthropology, neuropsychology, or the natural sciences. No student can avoid the path of their own individual discovery. Every Feldenkrais teacher remains committed to the example of the pedagogue Feldenkrais, of whom one of his immediate students said that he "allowed her to participate in all of his discoveries in such a way that each of us was inspired to discover them all over again" (Alon 1993, p. 11). For all the appeal that Feldenkrais' rational thinking may exert on modern people, and for all the confidence that one develops in a method that can be described with scientific vocabulary: Awakening the potential for change in learners, students, or patients, and allowing them to experience their kinaesthetic sense as a medium of change, is work that inevitably and frequently resists verbalization and conceptualization. The Feldenkrais Method, which was developed empirically and which seeks to improve thinking and feeling through physical movement and the experience of movement, can ultimately only be "grasped" in practice. This should precede this first attempt to present the essential features of the Feldenkrais Method and its significance for behavioral medicine.

This book is about a particular pedagogy in the context of therapeutic action: about the theoretical justification and practical experience with Feldenkrais pedagogy as a building block of a multimodal cognitive-behavioral therapeutic treatment of psychosomatic patients and finally as a model of body behavior therapy. As a rule, bodywork is not a topic of cognitive-behavioral therapy. One searches in vain for corresponding keywords in the specialist literature. Taking up this topic therefore meant breaking new ground and building bridges. In addition to the complexity and multi-layered nature of the topic, there was also the problem of describing holistic thinking and action in dualistic language. In addition, interdisciplinary references had to be acknowledged and necessary basic knowledge had to be included. Finally, this work is not an exhaustive description of the Feldenkrais Method with its complex ways of thinking and diverse working methods. Reference is made at the appropriate point and at the end of the book to the abundant primary and secondary literature now available in German. In some places, the "meta-concept" of the Feldenkrais Method necessitated a certain redundancy in the presentation, as it was necessary to refer repeatedly to fundamental connections when considering individual aspects to improve understanding. The smaller sections contain examples of actual work with patients, while the sections in italics contain sketches of practical "experiments" or parts of Feldenkrais lessons for personal comprehension. The Feldenkrais Method is a learning method for safer, better, and more precise self-awareness and self-education. It cannot be understood through theoretical explanations. Readers who wish to understand it from the ground up and verify the statements made in this book are therefore advised to engage with M. Feldenkrais' learning method and their own movement organization in a practical way.

May this presentation of the Feldenkrais Method in a therapeutic context encourage you to take up this extraordinarily interesting learning method, examine it, and use it as a model for body-oriented cognitive behavioral therapy (body behavior therapy). Because: learning is healthier than being a patient.

 1.2 Two ways of learning

There are two basic types of learning: imitation and repetition or searching and self-discovery. And there are two basic types of teaching: demonstrating and explaining or stimulating curiosity, accompanying the search, and savoring the discovery together. The first type of teaching is still used far too often today, although it prevents real experience and is not suitable for forming authentic personalities. The second type of teaching requires the teacher to make an intensive effort to get to know the learner, to know where he begins to ask questions, and to recognize how he learns and in which structures he thinks. The second type of learning and teaching is characterized by the Feldenkrais method. Essential features of this method of "knowledge transfer" can be found in modern concepts of pedagogy, behavioral, and self-management therapies. Reason enough to take a closer look.

Here is an exercise for searching and finding:

Lie on your back. You should lie on a comfortable, not too-soft surface, e.g. a mat on the floor. Feel how you come into contact with the floor. The contact of your body with the floor gives you a feeling of security and relieves your sense of balance. Where are you lying; which parts of your body are touching the ground and which are not? Where do you lie more firmly, where more lightly? Strictly speaking, our skeleton rests on the ground in fewer places than we think on the surface. Think of the floor beneath you as a friend or partner who uses touch to tell you how you are organizing your body at this moment.

The Feldenkrais Method is a learning method based on physical movement. In the lessons of this work, we primarily "move". We can also expect positive effects for our movement organization. But it is about much more. In the foreground of our actions are the sensation and perception of a movement, its planning, and the feeling of how we realize it. The search for improvement and reflection on how and with what quality we organize our attempts are more important than the movement itself. It is more about the "how" than the "what". The situation is more like a hypothesis-driven experiment, a scientific investigation, and more like a research laboratory than a gymnastics class.

Keep your legs long. Feel how your heels rest on the floor. Do they rest equally or unequally on the right and left? Is one heel a little further out than the other? It may be that one heel rests a little more on the outer edge or that you feel a wider contact with the ground on one heel than on the other side.

How are your feet aligned in space? Does one toe point more towards the ceiling than the other? Or does one toe point more to the side, towards a wall, than the other? It may be that you have the feeling that both feet, and both heels are in the same position; it may also be that you have the feeling that they are not in the same position.

If you start a Feldenkrais group lesson lying down in this way, you will notice something interesting: There are no two identical foot postures in the group. Each participant organizes the position of their feet differently and in an individual way, no one is exactly like their neighbor. One person's heels are closer together, the other's further apart; the tips of the feet are oriented differently in space. Isn't this simple observation enough to make us certain that there cannot be one answer for everyone when it comes to the individual organization of movement? That we can confidently stop looking for "the" rule of movement? The questions that Feldenkrais students explore will be just as individual as the answers they find. We have to reckon with this.

Is your right foot slightly different from your left - perhaps only a small difference, but a noticeable one nonetheless? Can you feel how the calves rest; are there differences on the right and left? Is one calf wider than the other? This may be possible. Where are the thighs in contact with the ground? You may find that the entire thigh is not in contact with the floor. Is one side of the pelvis flatter than the other, wider, or more in contact with the floor than the other? If we observe ourselves closely, we may find that we organize ourselves differently on the left and right. We are not always as symmetrical as we think we are.

You may feel such a difference - or you may not. The Feldenkrais teacher's questions are always "open" questions. In this respect, no specific answer is intended. The only important thing is that you put yourself in a state of curious observation. The student should not expect to be "right" or "wrong" only if he or she meets the supposed expectations that he or she thinks he or she can read from the questions. This would not correspond to a real experiment. After all, there may or may not be a difference. And it may or may not be felt. The Feldenkrais student will be able to determine and decide this more easily over time.

How is the back in contact with the floor? Where is the back in contact with the floor? How is it under the lower vertebrae of your spine, above the pelvis, where the five lumbar vertebrae are located? How big is the space between the lumbar spine and the floor? How large do you estimate the distance? Take one hand and feel whether your estimate was accurate. How is the rest of your back in contact with the floor? How are the shoulder blades positioned on the right and left? Is one shoulder blade flatter than the other? Is one shoulder blade more pointed than the other? Is your head lying comfortably, or do you need support?

A Feldenkrais lesson usually begins with a conscious awareness of the initial situation, a kind of momentary assessment. A snapshot of our body organization and our perception of it; how we are now, lying down, standing, or performing a certain movement; how we feel with our kinaesthetic perception, now, on this day, at this time of day. You may encounter this image more often if you continue to observe yourself in this way. You may also notice over time that and how your body image changes. It will be interesting to see whether this image, our "reference value" that we perceive now, will still correspond to the initial situation at the end of the lesson, or whether it will be clearer or changed.

Feel how your arms are positioned to the right and left. In a group, you can often observe all kinds of variations in how the arms can be bent less or more in relation to the torso or how the hands can be oriented in space. In this supine position, the hands can lie on the stomach or next to the torso. The palms can be open towards the floor, the body or the ceiling - how have you organized it? Is the angle between one upper arm and the torso greater on one side? Is the space in one armpit more open than on the other side? Is the arm turned more on one side, upwards towards the ceiling or the floor, than on the other side? If you notice a difference in the arms, is the corresponding shoulder blade flatter or more pointed in contact with the ground?

Rest a little; and only return to your explorations when you actually feel ready to do so again: Observe: How is your head lying? Is your head resting more above or below the point where it is usually in contact with the surface? How big, how wide is the distance between your chin and your breastbone? How far is the distance between the right ear and the right shoulder and the distance between the left ear and the left shoulder? It is possible that the distance is different. There can be several reasons for this. It may be that the head is tilted a little, or it may be that the shoulders are at different heights, higher on one side, closer to the ear than on the other side.

Come back to the overall image you perceive of yourself. Are you wider, flatter or more pronounced on one side of your body than on the other? That may or may not be the case. Imagine you were an astronaut floating through space with exactly this configuration of your body, without any influence from gravity. What would your body be prepared to do in the next moment? What movement (bending, tilting or turning) would it be prepared to make in the next moment here, under the influence of gravity?

 Many people who begin to observe their body organization more closely are surprised at how unevenly they move, how crookedly they lie or how one-sidedly they do certain things. This seems unusual because the human nervous system tends to suggest that we are equal in both halves of the body and have the same skills on the right and left. The symmetrical image of ourselves that we carry within us may be "practical". But everyday life shows us how unequally we use ourselves and that we have different skills on the right and left. Moreover, hardly anyone has two legs or arms of exactly the same length, even when measured objectively.

Come back to the perception of how your heels rest and how your feet are aligned in space. Is it the same impression as before, or has it changed? Check another small experiment: Fold your hands so that your fingers are interlocked, one finger next to the other, and form a kind of "bowl" with the palms of your hands. Place this bowl under your head so that your elbows are pointing toward the ceiling. This should help you to lift your head a little for a brief moment without changing your posture much. In this way, lift your head carefully for a moment and see if the position of your feet corresponds to what you felt. Leave everything and rest.

Here we come across another phenomenon: there is an objectively given form of our body and a subjective image that we carry within us. The two can coincide, but they don't have to. Feldenkrais speaks of the ego image that we carry within us. It seems desirable that the ego image and the objective body image coincide and that we can exploit all possibilities even in the case of physical deficiencies.

Come back, stretch your legs, and feel whether the short break has changed anything. The movement you can study now seems very simple: lying on your back, pulling one leg up as if it were to be straightened, and letting it lengthen again. Take some time to study this movement on your own. Observe closely how you organize yourself to pull the same leg up and let it lengthen again and again. When you have explored enough, stop and rest.

When people are encouraged to explore a movement in detail, they often reach for similar aids: They perform the movement rather calmly and slowly, repeat it from different "angles" and sometimes make the movement smaller or only realize parts of it. They spontaneously use "investigation techniques", as they characterize the Feldenkrais method. According to the laws of human sensory physiology, small and calm movements allow for clearer perception. It is interesting that in everyday life, without realizing it, we rarely resort to this strategy when we want to improve a movement ...

Come back and pull your leg up twice as slowly as you did before. Feel whether you get more information the slower you perform the movement. How do you organize yourself? Do you lift your leg from the start so that your heel leaves the ground? Or do you choose a different strategy where the heel slides across the floor? Which is easier and more comfortable: keeping the heel in contact with the ground or lifting the whole leg off the ground?

In traditional learning, "what" we learn is important. In Feldenkrais's work, it is more about the "how" than the "what". The process is more important and must be distinguished from the intention to achieve a specific goal. Learning "how" to learn aims to improve learning in general and improves - of course - the "what".

Return to your movement of pulling your leg in and letting it become long again. Observe whether you let the leg slide more over an imaginary "center line" of the heel or over the outside of the heel and foot. Try out both options and feel which is more comfortable for you. Then leave it and rest.

Feldenkrais lessons differ from gymnastics exercises in which movements are repeated several times in order to "practice" them. Instead of repeating the same movement ten times, a hundred times or even more, a few movements performed with awareness and each time with different aspects and small variations are sufficient. There is a reason for this. Movement is primarily an activity of the nervous system. Performing the same movement several times is as interesting for the nervous system as calling up the same software on a computer. Pleasant, varied movement, however, contains new information for the nervous system. Learning movement is like programming a computer. It plays a central role in the formation of the structure of our brain and in the construction of our objective world. Everyone has learned to understand the world through movement. As a child, no one learned to turn, crawl or crawl, to stand upright, walk, and stand freely using the techniques of gymnastics or academic learning. This happened solely through the curiosity and ease of childlike learning. The Feldenkrais Method is all about rediscovering this innate, natural way of learning.

Come back, let your leg tighten and lengthen and this time observe what movement your knee makes in space. Imagine a point of light on your knee glowing in the dark and captured photographically like the light of passing cars in a night photograph. What stripe pattern would the movement of your knee create in the photo? Would it be a straight line or a curve? Is the outward movement identical to or different from the backward movement of the knee and leg? Determine how you move spontaneously and try variations. What is the most comfortable and satisfying variation? Then leave everything for a moment and take a break.

Many breaks are taken in Feldenkrais group work. Rest breaks help the nervous system process the sensations that the students have perceived during their examination. They can consciously re-imagine the movements they have made. They can determine how they are lying during the break. But they can also simply do "nothing". Feldenkrais said that there is only one law when practicing his method, namely that there is no law. Feldenkrais students are motivated not to subordinate themselves to external or self-designed laws, but to follow their own needs and discover the laws of life for themselves. This means taking a break whenever they feel the need to do so, or varying movements when this is more comfortable. If you lie down long enough with your legs stretched out, for example, you can put them up during the break. Feldenkrais students are encouraged to be kind and caring to themselves at all times and not to do anything, absolutely nothing, that goes against them in any way, makes them feel uncomfortable, or even causes them pain. Only then can learning succeed.

Come back to the movement, let the leg straighten and lengthen, always just the same leg. As you try to do this with increasing quality, observe your breathing. Do you inhale or exhale when you pull your leg in? Or hold the flow of breath. If you notice that you have inhaled, next time let your leg tighten as you exhale. And vice versa; try the other option and feel how different your movement organization in the back feels. Take a break.

What phenomenon did you encounter? Fold your hands again in front of you on your stomach as you did at the beginning. Feel how you folded your hands: which thumb is the top one, the right or the left? Organize your hands/fold them differently so that you move all your fingers by one position and the other thumb is now the top one, followed by the thumb of the other hand, the index finger of one hand, then the index finger of the other hand, and so on. Feel how this feels. Come back and organize your fingers in the usual way. It is a habit to fold your fingers in one way and not another. Habits can be so strong that it feels uncomfortable and strange to fold your fingers in a different way, for example. For example, it can be a habit to breathe in or out more when I tighten my leg. The way I fold my arms in front of my chest or cross one leg over the other when sitting is also usually habitual. Possibly the leg you put on - was it the right or the left? - was also an unconscious decision.

The fact that we form habits when we move is practical and a prerequisite for moving appropriately in our environment. It seems "clear" that a door can be opened from this side with one hand and from the other side with the other hand. The vast majority of our motor activity takes place unconsciously and automatically. However, depending on our lifestyle, certain habits can become more and more dominant over time. The range of our movement options narrows. Alternative options are suddenly no longer available. Age, we then say, is the reason.

Come back to this movement, in which your - let's call it - "leg of first choice" tightens and straightens to finally become long again. Allow your breath to flow. Observe what happens to your entire torso. How do your ribs move? Which shoulder blade has the tendency to slide across the floor a little more than the other? Which relationship is clearer in your perception: the relationship between the hip on the side of the "working leg" and the shoulder on the same side or between the hip on one side and the opposite shoulder?

Observe whether and how your head moves. Feel whether it wants to shift or roll a little on the surface. Does the distance between your chin and sternum change? Allow your head to roll to the side when you tighten your leg. Does your head tend to roll to the left or right? Both are possible. Try it out and taste the alternative way of organizing yourself.

We almost always don't do the best we can out of habit. We almost always do too much. Even if we simply lie down and think we are doing nothing, our physical organization is different from that of an unconscious person. Our movement system is constantly active. If we put one leg up while lying down and at the same time lift our feet and toes upwards, we are doing useless work that is not purposeful. If we put a leg in the same position and our head has no noticeable tendency to tilt or roll to one side, we unconsciously hold it there. We are doing useless holding work without actually wanting to. Feldenkrais refers to this as "parasitic movements".

Think about everything you have explored: the movement of the foot, the leg in space, the organization of the trunk, the breathing, the shoulder, the head. Imagine how it feels when you choose the most pleasant alternative from all the alternatives you have explored and use the easiest way to organize a harmonious and satisfying movement in which you pull your leg in and let it lengthen again. Perform the movement a few times and enjoy it. Then rest.

Feel how you are now at the end of this long "journey of discovery". What is the first thing you notice? How do the two halves of your body feel? Does one side feel warmer, fuller, more alive? Does one leg seem longer? Which leg? Which eye is deeper in its socket? How does the tongue feel? On which side is there more space? Does one side of your face seem more relaxed? How are you lying compared to the snapshot at the beginning of the lesson? Is the familiar image clearer to you or has it changed? How is your head tilted now? Has the position of your arms changed? Has the space under both armpits become more different? How are your legs positioned in relation to each other; where are the tips of your feet pointing in space?

Slowly come to a sitting and standing position. Close your eyes for a moment and feel how straight or crooked you are standing. On which leg do you stand up more? Which half of your body seems more secure, taller? Take a few steps and feel the effects of this lesson on your gait.

This chapter imitates the structure of group lessons in the Feldenkrais Method, the rhythm of doing and practicing, action and reflection. Both are essential elements of human learning. One is incomplete without the other. Perhaps, due to lack of time or habit, you have only read the text set "recite". You have then absorbed information in the usual way of learning. If you were able to take your time, follow the italicized text, and put it into practice, you were more likely to learn the way the Feldenkrais Method makes it possible: physically, tangibly, joyfully, and simply.