Make 2020 the Year of Reaching for An Excellent Life!

3 Steps to Unlimited Learning

A Simple, Do It Yourself Process to improve the Quality of your life!

What’s the most rewarding work you can do? Attain mastery and skill:  when you learn to master the process of learning easily, so that you can apply it to whatever you want. Reach for the stars!

Time to reset your thermostat! You’ve already become aware Step One, which is to notice that limitations seem to be creeping in as the years go by. But what can you do about it?

The range of what you do every day over years sets your unconscious thermostat, meaning it creates a set-point for what is “normal” for you. But when you consider the difference between the range of moves that children make, and the range of moves that adults make, it becomes clear that the sheer diversity of things we do in a day diminishes as we move into adulthood. From childhood to young adulthood, you are expected to expose yourself to new situations which always promote new learning. As an adult, however, most people contract in terms of what they expose themselves to, if only because most work environments are repetitive.

What happens when we stick to a routine? Some things get easier, it’s true. Those are the kinds of things that we need to be able to do without thinking. But just like it’s good to do the dishes and clear out the cupboard once in a while to inventory what’s useful and what’s not, you need to do the same thing with yourself at least once a year. This allows you to make sure you are doing what you intend, what is most fun, and what feeds your soul as well as your wallet.

For example, in the hurry and scurry of life, it’s easy to forget that we work to live well, not the other way around…How can a movement class such as Awareness Through Movement (ATM) improve Quality of Life (QOL)? It’s an opportunity to check inside, to assess if you are living with as much freedom as you would like. Movement is just the canvass for learning. It’s just a very concrete way to learn the process of ATM which allows you to assess, improve and refine anything you wish to learn.

Some might say that it’s better to focus on helping others than on yourself, but if you allow yourself to get depleted, it becomes a catch 22 situation. When your life has become a series of choices that diminish your options out of habit, rather than expanding your range of options, you become more and more stiff, sore and irritable over time. This is a sure-fire way to land in a state of burnout. In that state, no one has anything much to offer when it comes to being of service to others…

When you don’t take time out periodically to renew, to refresh, to assess, it leads to a life lived on autopilot. This is like making NO decision to take care of your own wellbeing. The consequences of making no decision to alter things or to look at what and how you do things is that your self-image of what is possible for you either remains static or diminishes over the years. Because whether you are conscious of doing so or not, you HAVE made a decision about what you can and cannot do, about what’s possible for you. Think about some of the things you used to do that you miss, but somehow don't even consider doing now! When you take the time to reassess, you don't loose so much of yourself along the way.

To enter into this process of resetting your internal Thermostat of what you assume is possible for you, take a brief trip back to beginner’s mind.To enter into the process, have the humility to get comfortable with being uncomfortable for a short period of time while you are exposing yourself to new understandings. This is a pre-requisite for any kind of learning.

If you want to expand your limitations, it’s as simple as being willing to do what you ask any high school student, or any student to do, for that matter: be willing to sit in the momentary discomfort of not-knowing, trusting that the discomfort will go away quickly as the learning is initiated, as understanding dawns.

Understanding is actually a very rewarding feeling and satisfying in its own right. But what’s really rewarding is mastery and skill: learning to master the process of learning easily, so that you can apply it to whatever you want.

The Steps of Unlimited Learning:

1. Awareness - of a limit to understanding (be it how to move more freely after injury - or in any other realm – as mentioned earlier, movement is used in ATM because it is more concrete than ideas. Movement offers a topic to practice with that yields concrete results: you feel the improvement in your body. You feel lighter, more grounded, more secure. Your mind also participates. It calms itself through focus on movement, which is much easier than focusing on not thinking the way mindfulness meditation stipulates! You slip easily into a state of receptivity: which makes fun, love, inspiration and spontaneity much more openly accessible.
2. Differentiation - is the act of noticing a difference between what works, and what does not work, instead of mindlessly doing things one way because that's what you always do...This is done by exploring different ways of completing the task, whatever it might be. The best learning happens in an environment that is safe, comfortable and without pressure. Then, when you do the task under pressure, it’s easy, because you have allowed some time for it to become habitual on some level, requiring much less thought to accomplish than ever before.
3. Processing Time: is the key element that allows the brain to make sense of the data, or the experience you present it with, so that it can assimilate the new into the already known. This is where the neuro-plasticity of the brain takes over, but it must be given that time and quiet to work quickly and easily. The biggest mistake people make when teaching or learning is to just cram in as much information as possible as if the goal was to just get it over with. This actually impedes learning because it kills the requisite time-out for assimilation. 

Thus, the process of Unlimited Learning is superior to random learning that is done without understanding how the brain works. Unlimited learning evolves from an awareness of a need, to a curiosity about how something could be done differently, to a willingness to sit temporarily with not-knowing, while trusting the process. From this place of opening, the mind will run over options automatically, because the mind runs through open questions until it finds some explanation or solution. When you add awareness to the mix as you try new options and new possible ways to do something, an easier way is found more quickly. It is assimilated more easily and with fewer repetitions. It quickly becomes part of the unconscious repertoire of known skills or understandings.

Find a Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement Class near Medford, Oregon:

ATM classes meet on Tuesdays in Jacksonville. Classes resume on January 7th, 2020.

In only a few lessons, you can discover a whole new world of enjoyment: a process that allows you to learn from your own experience. You can learn to tune in, to refine, to hone the perfection of your own pitch-perfect ability to discover new ways to access ease, comfort, freedom and joy!

Are You Response-Able?

On the surface, FELDENKRAIS seems to be about mobility. Fundamentally, it's about stability. The misconception is that stability is static, like a rock. This may be so for buildings, yet the architecture of a living structure is completely different in it's requirements than an inanimate object. The foundation of stability in living beings is mobility that is free enough to allow for constant, immediate responsiveness to the surrounding environment.

To make this idea more concrete, imagine being a little grey sports car riding down a country road. If your driver does not constantly adjust the steering to the twists and turns as they arise, the car will run off the road. As we age, over time, we become numb to our experience, we tune out our own bodies, we let go of our ability to move by discounting it's importance. Gradually we loose the ability to respond readily to the road. We start responding by rote, without really perceiving the road. Our vehicle, that was once amazingly fine-tuned, gradually turns into this Stephen King version of the same sports car, a vehicle out of control, veering dangerously close to missing the curves and seemingly responding only to it's own agenda.

Like a car whose shocks are defunct, we move through space and time in a lurching manner, reacting ever more slowly to our own reflexes. The impulse is still there, but the ability to be present is dull and the body's ability to respond is slow and limited. Then we retire.

Note to myself: if I want to retire in a state of restriction, ignore the warning lights on the dashboard. If I want to retire in a state of mobility that is so responsive that my reflexes are as sharp, both physically and in terms of mental acuity as they ever were, then FELDENKRAIS is like the nectar of the Gods, a delicious elixir of longevity. Especially if I am interested in being more than I was when I was young and agile by default. FELDENKRAIS is a magic carpet ride towards being more able, more intelligent, more accomplished and - what? you say this sounds like an ego trip? - I am merely referring to being more than I was, not more than you are! Try it, and then you'll know what I'm talking about! These lessons are like a primer in how to expand who you are, not to mention becoming more readily maneuverable - often in the most unexpected ways. It's perfect for me. I get bored easily. Why limit myself to linear learning, when in fact, I am a dynamic, multidimensional being existing on several planes of experience at once? Hello, friends, I'm baaaaaaack!

Warm virtual hugs and thanks to all of you who have emailed and encouraged and cajoled and requested more of my nimble fingers (after all these years of working with my hands!) on the keyboard - as a means of providing the stability of concrete words to stimulate further expansive adventures in experience a la FELDENRKAIS.