“What’s Feldenchrist?” I asked my friend when she said she was going to a class at NaCoMo, and did I want to come?
“It’s Feldenkrais,” she corrected.
Oh.
Created by Moshé Feldenkrais, the eponymous exercise is a system of movements designed to increase awareness of the body and how it works.
If you go to Feldenkrais with Tyson in Nakusp, you’ll soon discover what that means in practise. Each class focuses on a particular set of muscles and movements which students are instructed to pay close attention to. The exercises encourage an attitude of experimentation and exploration of one’s own body, seeing how it works and fits together.
Arriving at the studio, I lay down on a mat in a class with about a half dozen students. Tyson Bartel, our instructor, narrated the way through our experiment in movement, beginning with an overall stock-taking of how our bodies felt, where it contacted the floor and how evenly it lay.
Next, he instructed us to become aware of our shoulders and move them in particular ways, following the movement closely with our minds. As we worked through different movements noticing the changes and relationships between different muscles and structures, Bartel told us that Feldenkrais was designed to reorient the body and mind relationship to teach increased flexibility to both.
Over the course of the class, the simple isolated movement of a single shoulder blade up and down the back increased in complexity, and the movement slowly became an effort of both concentration and coordination involving shoulders, hips and head moving in time with each other.
The degree of mindfulness required to follow the physical movements with the mind was almost enough of an effort on its own to create some sweat. Bartel explained that by involving both mind and body in the exercise we were repatterning habits of movement as well as increasing body awareness.
Feldenkrais exercises involve several different muscle groups and types of movement; the shoulder and hip exercises we were going through in the evening class was just one of many. Bartel is responsive to students, so if there is a consensus from the students that a particular area of the body needs some work that day, he can tailor the class in that direction.
At the end of the session, the students once again examined their overall position and sense of their body lying supine on the mat, investigating if there were any changes now the movement was over.
Lying on my back, my shoulders felt as though they were now further away from my ears, and tension in my neck had diminished. It felt as though more of my body was on the floor than before, and I did have more of an appreciation for where my limbs were in space and how they related to tension in the centre of my body.
The manner in which the class was taught and the difference from start to finish encouraged a mindfulness of movement that continued on even after leaving the exercise mat on the floor.
I also noticed that I was very relaxed, and ready for anything, which was perfect. The class had ended, and it was time to take my re-educated bones, muscles and mind out into the world.
If you’re interested in trying Feldenkrais with Tyson, classes are Wednesday mornings at 9:15 a.m. at NaCoMo (90 5th Ave SW) in Nakusp.
For more about Feldenkrais teacher Tyson Bartel, see page 5.