AY #113 With the arms sideways; turning the arms

Before this lesson starts, Dr. Feldenkrais spends a little time encouraging his students to, "… do it as a game, without trying for it to be good or beautiful….as if to waste the time, not in order to accomplish anything…." (AY, Vol. 3, Part A, pg. 743.) After a couple of movements he mentions that, "It is possible to do this a lot more comfortably in order to play and waste the time." (ibid.) More than in any other AY lesson so far these ideas are repeatedly stressed: treat the lesson as play, do the movements without the desire to do well or to accomplish anything. Looking at this lesson's structure, you might call it, "Advanced Dead Bird". This lesson is all done in side sitting, the trunk is twisted and differentiation of the head and shoulders is brought in. However, here the arms are held straight out in front with the fingers interlaced and not having a hand to lean on makes the movement much more difficult and this is why (I think) Moshe spends so much time encouraging people to play, to keep it light; it's a way to try to convince the system that it should stay in learning mode while doing something that's somewhat stressful. Toward the end of the lesson Dr. Feldenkrais says, "If there is freedom in the back--which is why we did all these movements… so the back will be able to move.... Later you will see the difference in other movements." (AY pg. 749) It's always great when he tells his students (and us) exactly what the lesson is about. For me, I felt a huge difference in my lower rib cage. There was an opening around the 8th, 9th and 10th ribs that caused me a bit of pain the morning after the lesson (obviously, I was trying to accomplish something and I wasn't being quite playful enough). It's a good lesson that would work very well as part of a series with AY 41, "Basic bending" and AY 94, "Twisting right and left."

AY # 114 Four diagonals in folding

This is a terrific lesson. On the back, the student lifts, one at a time, each of the four limbs straight into the air and moves it across the body in the direction of its diagonally opposite limb. The lesson progresses to lifting both arms at once and moving back and forth across the opposite diagonals, then doing the same with the legs and finally raising all four limbs, folding up to take hold of the ankles and, in this position inscribing a circle (clock) with the relatively small area of the back that's left on the floor. Speaking about drawing that circle at the end of the lesson, Dr. Feldenkrais says, "It is very difficult to do because it is necessary to hold [contract] the abdominal muscles powerfully so the back doesn't soften…. All the work is done in the abdominal muscles." (AY pg. 757). Pilates has nothing on this lesson, baby! Sometimes I think in our work the notion of "letting go" is stressed so much that we forget that a cornerstone of the Method is learning to work efficiently which does not necessarily preclude working hard when hard work is called for. That's what I remember about doing this lesson in my training--it was very hard work. Doing it again yesterday was one of those revelations with respect to what happens when you lead a "Feldenkrais life." The lesson was so much easier to do than it was five or six years ago. Don't get me wrong, it's still a strenuous lesson, but the degree to which I've learned to work more efficiently during the past several years was made manifest in a very satisfying way. Also, everything sinks into the floor by the end of the lesson; the shoulders open (yoga folks: when the teacher comes around at the end of class and tries to flatten your shoulders to the floor--this will show you how to easily find that feeling) and the whole back flattens deliciously.

Lesson #111: Painting with the soles of the feet

Lying with knees bent, the student slides the foot on the floor, forward and back, then side to side, then in circles. The lesson progresses to moving both feet in circles together. Then the student moves to lying on the stomach and does essentially the same movements with the feet held in the air. Obviously, it's a lesson about freeing the hip joints, right? At the end of the lesson, Dr. Feldenkrais says, "The bulk of the work, in a kinetic sense, is in the pelvis." And then he says, "All these circles make light movements of the spine between the shoulder blades and at the base of the neck. There [you] should feel the greatest difference. That is why it affects the chest so much… in order to soften it." (AY Vol. 3, Pt. A, pg. 733.) The lesson is another concrete demonstration of how moving just one thing, or a limited number of things can have a dramatic effect in an entirely different area of the body; we are each an inextricably connected system. The lesson can be done by anyone who can comfortably lie on both their back and their stomach.

A side note: if you've been following along with us, you're aware that some lessons don't seem to have much to do with those lessons that come immediately before or after. In this third volume, however, there has been a pretty strong thread from lesson to lesson. In this lesson for example, a movement is encouraged (though not specifically mentioned) that is very similar to pushing the heel down in lesson 110. And here, toward the end of the lesson, there are some references to becoming aware of where one's "middle" is in terms of right and left which becomes the theme of the next lesson.

Lesson # 112: A plane dividing the body, part 1

This is a very literal lesson about defining the self-image. There is relatively little movement; most of the lesson involves various internal sensory and visualization techniques designed to help the student to kinesthetically define and come to better know him/her self by mentally establishing a plane that divides the body into its right and left halves exactly in the middle. Anyone can do this lesson and, while I probably wouldn't teach this as a student's first ATM lesson, this is a lesson that every student of ATM should take at some point. The experience of being guided to concentrate one's complete awareness in the very specific ways that the lesson dictates is invaluable, both for the pure joy of self-discovery and as a tool to illuminate one of the most basic principles of the Feldenkrais Method®. This lesson is not to be missed.