Functional Integration™

In a session of Functional Integration™ (FI™) I gently guide the individual student in movement lessons, using gentle, non-invasive touch as the primary means of communication.  This touch reflects back (like "bio-feedback" from a real person!) to the individual how they are currently organizing their body and actions. Memory, emotion, trauma, illness, all are a part of how The Body Keeps the Score, the title of a wonderful book by a psychiatrist who has discovered his body, at long last, is more than brain chemistry!  

During a session, I will suggest, through gentle touch and movement, expanded possibilities for new movement patterns which are more comfortable, efficient, and useful.  Each Functional Integration™ session relates to a desire, intention, or need of the individual.  You set the agenda. Some people work with issues that arise in "talk-therapy."  We work with your goals, with what arises spontaneously, bringing your nervous system to a state of ease, calm, curiosity, and greater vitality. This is how new neural pathways, new options, are built in the brain and nervous system.

Awareness Through Movement™

As the central practice of the Feldenkrais Method™, Awareness Through Movement™ (ATM™), often refers to the group classes taught by practitioners.  These can be 30-90 minutes, and can be on the floor or sitting.  Awareness Through Movement™ also refers to the library of over a thousand lessons that Dr. Feldenkrais deveoped, refined, and taught to his scores of patients and students.  Similar to Tai Chi or gentle yoga, ATM classes use slow, mindful movements to achieve powerful effects in terms of strenght, flexibity, and holistic integration of body and mind. Unique to the Feldenkrais Method™, these lessons tie directly into more functional movement in daily life, such as walking efficiently, safely lifting objects, improving posture and range of motion, managing and recovering from neurological conditions, and re-conditioning after trauma.

During a class or session, I use my voice to suggest and guide you through a sequence of movements, encouraging and directing you to move your attention (often with eyes closed), within a comfortable range.  As you actively attend to yourself, unnecessary muscular  tensions release and people are often amazed at the quick and clear changes that occur through the neuromuscular repatterning that happens.  Feeling and emotions can also become part of these lessons, but as you learn to attend to yourself, the management of strong feeling in the body, trauma, and memory, can be released, reprogrammed, and more consciously integrated, helping you become a more resilient version of yourself by learning to self-soothe, co-regulate, de-escalate, and change your state, contributing to life time neurological learning.