Feldenkrais
mozgásterápia
a könnyű elegáns legyen.”
Moshe Feldenkrais
An interview for the Budapest Sun, May 2007. by Richard Bruner
The Feldenkrais Method® is a powerful way to unlock the secrets of our bodies. It allows the linking of movement, expression, and spontaneity, as well as providing an approach to healing physical and neurological injuries James Oldham, M.D.
Moshe Feldenkrais (1904-1984) was born in Russian Poland and at age 14 emigrated to Palestine.
István Heimer attended Eötvös Loránd University in 1972-77 where he received a Masters degree in English language and literature. He taught high-school English in Hungary for a year and in the early 1970s, with a friend, he opened one of the countries rare private schools. He left the school and became an educational-travel organizer in 1989, putting together excursions to places like the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. He was the first Hungarian who went to work in the USA as a Camp Counsellor in the early 1980s and subsequently helped some thousand Hungarian students to follow in his footsteps. István has also been organizing trips to South East Asia for small groups and has climbed int he Rockies and also in the Himalayas both in Nepal and in India. He has translated Peter Gethers best seller, The Cat Who Went to Paris into Hungarian.
Feldenkrais left Israel in his 20s to study engineering at the Sorbonne in Paris where he earned a doctorate in physics in 1933 and subsequently worked as a research assistant with Frederick Joliot-Curie. He was also the first European to earn a Black Belt in judo. During World War II, he escaped to England and worked in the anti-submarine branch of the British Admiralty. Later, an old soccer injury to his knees flared up. Rather than undergoing surgery, with little chance of success, Feldenkrais resolved to teach himself to walk again. He immersed himself in the literature of anatomy, physiology, and anthropology of his time. Integrating these studies with knowledge of body mechanics and his own internal awareness led him to the discovery of a way to improve the use of his knees. He expanded the system into what is today the Feldenkrais method. This process of self-rehabilitation was the initial step in the development of movement education. He continued to refine and teach his new technique to thousands of students throughout the world for the next 30 years. After the war, he went back to Israel and became the first director of the electronic department of defense. He quit his job in the 50s to spend full time practicing and teaching his method. His most famous pupil there was Israel’s first prime minister who had severe back problems. Moshe taught him how to stand on his head when Ben Gurion was 76 years old!
István Heimer discovered the Feldenkrais Method by accident.
„ Even while teaching English, I was always interested in somatic education and movement awareness. Discovering the Bodys Wisdom is a passport to begin your journey of exploration and discovery in the most fascinating, miraculous, and meaningful land you’ll ever traverse.” he said. „ Even in the 60s, I was doing yoga and reading about the Alexander method and Eutony. I was lucky finding Feldenkrais because for me it is really special. Even after a few lessons I experienced substantial changes. ”
An American woman practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method, Pamela Cordell, lives and works in Austria. When István heard she was coming to Hungary to treat a stroke patient, he arranged to take lessons in the method from her. He found the experience exhilarating.
„After a few lessons, I was walking in the street and I thought I was walking on air; everything was so easy, so right. I had never had that experience before. And now it is the same with other activities or when I have to stand or even sit on an aeroplane for 24 hrs as iz happened when I travelled to Maui, Hawaii. Twice actually. My colleagues and now also my clients have similar experiences. Pamela encouraged me to go into the 4 year Professional Feldenkrais Training. When I told her I simply want to learn the method for myself, she said, it is something you can teach until you are 90. And it is a rewarding and enjoyable way to earn a living. It wasn’t difficult for her to persuade me, because I enjoyed the lessons so much.”
Feldenkrais personally trained 13 people in Israel (1969-1971), then 65 in San Francisco (1975-1978), and in Amherst, Hampshire College there were 235 participants. Today there are over 7,500 certified Feldenkrais practitioners in the world. The method contributes to the development of the new field of somatic education and influences medicine, gerontology, education and psychology. Feldenkrais is geared to help those experiencing chronic or acute pain of the back, neck, shoulder, hip, legs or knee caused by stress, misuse, accident or illness. Professional athletes who have used Feldenkrais include basketball star Julius Erving and PGA golfers Rick Acton and Duffy Waldorf. Celebrities who have used the method include Norman Cousins, Margaret Mead, Helen Hayes and Whoopi Goldberg.
István Heimer went first to Santa Fe, New Mexico for his introductory training. After that, he continued training in Maui, Hawaii and subsequently in Munich, Germany. He finished his studies in Vienna, Austria with Jeremy Krauss who is considered to be one of the most eminent Educational Directors of the method. The entire course took four years, at the rate of two months per year and his trainers were all originally trained by Moshe Feldenkrais.
„ Spending January in Maui was like a miracle! A Feldenkrais practitioner warns on his website that you should be careful before beginning the lessons because of the changes you will experience. You may only want to paint the kitchen and end up in Hawaii. That was very true for me! I thought it was an experience for once in a lifetime, but a fellow student told me, 'once in a lifetime sometimes happens twice.' That stuck in my mind and I went back for a second time also that was even more fun than my first stay. ”
Istán Heimer's training improved his own physical well-being. „My father was a medical doctor and he also believed that back problems were the result of humans having to walk on two legs, rather than four. But its not true, because, if you are well-balanced and well-aligned, you have no back or knee problems. I had problems with my feet and one of my teachers told me, ‘Oh, it will be all right.’ I did not take it seriously. Then, in the third year, I looked down and saw that my toes are nicely aligned; the problems disappeared. ”
There are over a thousand different lessons in the Feldenkrais Method and they deal with every aspect of human functionality.
What exactly is the Feldenkrais Method? An exercise? A therapy?
Without categorizing it, Istvan Heimer describes its consequences. „It helps you live with less effort in your daily life. And, as important or more, you overcome life's unavoidable problems and difficulties also easier. Feldenkrais preferred to call them lessons rather than exercises.” he said. „These are not physical exercises such as calisthenics; they are somatopsychic explorations which foster improvements. Gradually students become aware of how their musculature, skeleton - indeed their entire selves - are involved as an inextricable whole in every action. From small, slow beginnings, larger movements emerge entailing greater complexity, power and speed. The result is learning to move with greater efficiency and satisfaction, and improved well-being. The Feldenkrais Method is a unique approach to improving body motion which in turn alleviates pain, enhances self image, minimizes work-related stress, enhances personal growth and a sense of well-being.”
But István insists that the Feldenkrais method is definitely not a fad.
Feldenkrais was a scientist; that is what distinguishes the Feldenkrais method from all the others. He was an engineer, a physicist. His scientific background made his method more credible.
The wonderful thing about it, that its easy to do, although there are also some more demanding [lessons]. . . and it involves great changes. You are getting more flexible and what is even more important, your movement becomes more coordinated. It is achieved with continuously reducing your effort. You experiment with different movements and it gives you more possibilities. If you over-exert yourself, all you do is confront your limitations. But if you make little movements, you will feel more and then the brain takes the opportunity to explore alternatives. You are becoming more aware and as one of my eminent colleagues wrote: "Awareness Heals".
As Feldenkrais said: "To be healthy is to live for the realization of your avowed and unavowed dreams".
And possibilities in your movement may open up possibilities in your life. According to Feldenkrais: ‘You can realize what you dreamed about when you were a child. To make the impossible possible, the difficult easy and the easy elegant. Sometimes even the difficult can become elegant!’