Feldenkrais: Moving into the Unknown

Passionate about the pedagogy of delivering Feldenkrais to an open audience, Andrew Gibbons is intent on refining his craft. Andrew sees the potential for using Feldenkrais as a practice to level up your biological fitness to perform in all areas of your life. In introducing his explicit style of investigation into finding efficiency in movement quality, Andrew is not shy of designing lessons offering challenge to those willing to “engage” in the rigour of a learning experience. Far from just having an “experience” in a lesson, or even enjoyment in learning experientially, Andrew brings a desire as a teacher to provide a context and scaffold whereby the student begins to understand for themselves what the benefits of this practice can be. Andrew exploits the ATM context to build a movement experiment with specificity which asks students to engage in a way that heightens their responsibility as learners. He helps them to sense biomechanical principles for themselves, to make clear and deliberate movement choices and to learn to trust their own experience.

Andrew unpacks what it means to understand how to reflexively deliver ATM, in not only offering lesson structure but having the sensitivity to perceive the potential diversity of student response and experience requiring lesson adaptation. He discusses the layers of skill teachers need to refine to adapt and change delivery to make the precise details of how a lesson works accessible to as many people as possible. He does not hide from the need to give inherent value to each student ready to apply themselves within each lesson, demanding presence from both teacher and learner.

He gives a healthy blueprint for successful self-motivation as young ATM graduate teachers in bringing to life this ingenious Method of orienting people clearly and attentively to the way we “use” our bodies in movement - for whatever purpose we desire. Andrew’s enthusiasm brings richness to the conversation, challenging us to develop both with and within the Feldenkrais Method.

People discovering how to help themselves is Margaret Mayo’s passion.  And for over 35 years she has helped people find more of themselves through the powerful medium of Awareness Through Movement classes. Even after all this time Margaret can’t believe how simple Feldenkrais concepts such as knowing where your hip joints are can have such a profound effect. This lively discussion weaves insights about teaching Awareness Through Movement classes with wisdoms for ATM participants. For Feldenkrais Practitioners Margaret shares how she prepares her lessons, the importance of language and how to make lessons accessible. For all of us who do ATM lessons Margaret’s valuable reminders and insights offer ways of “helping us discover more of ourselves”.

A delightful and warm conversation that reminds us of the power of thinking and listening to ourselves from the inside.

Anna Yen, a highly trained and well accomplished performer, theatre producer and Feldenkrais Practitioner shares her passion for play, presence and rhythm.

Play she enthuses shows us the wonder of possibilities and the delight of learning while highlighting our blind spots. Her passion for play invites us to experiment in Awareness Through Movement classes. Using light attention we can discover different qualities of movement, interact more powerfully between internal and external, to become more present. Anna’s mentor, Monika Pagneux, one of Europe's leading exponents of movement in contemporary theatre, who integrates Feldenkrais into theatre schools terms this, “waking up”.

Anna also introduces us to the musicality of movement, so we can see more of and flow with the the natural rhythms of life and to play with the timing, emphasis and patterns in Awareness Through Movement classes.

“Play Moves” and “Wake Up”, are Anna’s ATM series that use imagination, theatre skills and games to expand awareness, options and engage us with the subtleties of our surroundings and to become more aware.

Explore more of Anna Yen: 

Jenni Evans reminds us that there is always possibility for improvement. Our body is where we live but we are not just our bodies. We are our life experiences, contexts, communities, relationships and more. By bringing us back to the fundamentals of ‘what is Feldenkrais’, Jenni assists newcomers and seasoned veterans to understand the expansiveness and potency of the Feldenkrais Method.

Offering specific examples and real-life stories to demystify the Feldenkrais Method, Jenni helps us to realise that it is in patiently listening to and honouring our ‘self’ as a whole system that we learn to allow and trust our innate intelligence to move us into a more potent way of being in and engaging with the world. The Feldenkrais Method resources us with increased awareness, a learning process and gives us an empowering framework to uncover options to meet the moment between thinking and acting in a new way.

Through our discoveries and learnings in Awareness Through Movement Classes or interactions in one-to-one Functional Integration sessions, Jenni demonstrates that small changes have a rippling, profound impact on all aspects of our self, our relationships and the world around us.

Explore more of what is Feldenkrais:

The Australian Feldenkrais Guild offers a few different videos

Connor Voss brings both a personal and wide lens view of how the Feldenkrais Method® can help everyone potentiate their own authentic self-expression, at whatever level or in whatever context we experience ourselves dancing. He invites us to take a fresh and fluid look at how we experience ourselves in the world by interweaving intersections from his deep loves of movement, modern experimental and improvisational dance, practice of Feldenkrais, and social activism. Connor also gives great advice for practitioners on building working relationships with community to make Feldenkrais accessible to more people.

Connor finds language to disentangle the ‘push-pull’ relationship between dance and Feldenkrais. He elucidates for dancers how a supportive and reflective Feldenkrais environment can deepen and validate their qualitative somatic experience and can individualise their own internal creative experience of what dance can be beyond choreographic score and structure. Connor also introduces how individual introspection in Awareness Through Movement® can deepen our understanding of the world around us and the play between constraints and freedoms in both human body and larger societal systems.

Irene Lyon, nervous system expert, teaches people around the world how to work with the nervous system to transform trauma, heal body and mind, and live full, creative lives. After graduating as a Feldenkrais Practitioner Irene went deeper into the somatic world, studying the work of Peter Levine and Somatic Experiencing and Kathy Kain's Somatic Practice. Using this unique blend of understanding, Irene assists people to address stored trauma and build their own capacity.

Through this “capacity building” Irene offers ways Feldenkrais enthusiasts and Practitioners can use ‘Trauma Aware’ practices to create a safer more inclusive Awareness Through Movement and Functional Integration experience.

Irene’s insights suggest the majority of people experience dysregulation of their nervous system in some form and believes that education about the nervous system such as the hierarchy of freeze, fight, flight and social engagement can assist in engaging more fully in the Feldenkrais process and engaging more fully in life. A truly remarkable conversation!

Irene's website and resources:

David Zemach-Bersin gives a deeply philosophical, beautifully paced and moving account of his personal relationship with the work of Moshe Feldenkrais. Simultaneously unravelling some of the ingenious logic and acknowledging the art form of the Feldenkrais Method, David uses an example of a pivotal Awareness Through Movement lesson and underscores some of the finer fundamentals of Functional Integration. In his desire to understand the rewards of Moshe Feldenkrais’ insight, intelligence and teaching methods, David reflects on his years of observing Moshe with awe for the unending optimism this extraordinary man had for the potential for humans to change, to improve and to feel and be our whole selves.

David’s conversation flows around the deep beauty and fine subtlety of how integrated our whole body systems are in how we relate to and harmonize with our environment. He tells poignant and powerful stories to paint a rich landscape on a Feldenkrais canvas he envisages will continue to spread and impact our world in our quest to know ourselves better.

Molly Tipping specialises in working with people experiencing anxiety and associated issues. In this lively conversation Molly shares her wisdom interlaced with Dr Moshe Feldenkrais’ extensive references to anxiety. She takes us on a fascinating journey describing the repertoire of Nervous System responses available during our ‘apprenticeship’ to mature adulthood. Molly normalises our Autonomic Nervous System responses of fight, flight, freeze and describes ways to help clients gain awareness and alter their internal environment to ‘show up’ in ways they need or want to in their varied daily contexts.

Molly takes the same lens Moshe Feldenkrais used to understand biomechanics and the development of movement and applies it to emotional maturity. In her client led practice Molly unpacks the musculoskeletal system and deliberately maps it along side the emotional or qualitative states we inhabit in the world.

Working with the nervous system and spectrum of emotions is Molly’s forté. Listeners will be inspired by Molly’s methods developed from her Feldenkrais Training and extensive research. She integrates other somatic methods to help her clients and students build skill, enhance their life experience and effectively move towards maturation.

As Professor in Neuroscience and Rehabilitation at the University of South Australia, Dr. Susan Hillier explains the term “neuroplasticity” and how directly experiencing the Feldenkrais Method parallels evidence from neuroscience. Susan discusses current scientific research in how the role of body awareness and the impact of training sensation, perception and awareness can re-establish meaningful function for the whole person after stroke and other movement disorders.

Sharing her personal journey into the Feldenkrais Method, Susan tells of discovering profound personal change along the way to becoming an Educational Director of the Feldenkrais Training Program in Australia. She derives enjoyment in witnessing how the intrigue in Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement lessons, Functional Integration lessons and in Feldenkrais Trainings helps people feel agency and autonomy to put choices into practice to improve their own functioning.

Outlining some structure and functions of the neural connections in our changeable brain, Susan points to how scientific inquiry into strengthening physiological and behavioural feedback mechanisms for learning are vital in evidence-based research, clinical therapy and Feldenkrais practice. Susan lauds the rich international Feldenkrais community now in supporting the emergence of new pedagogy to find ways we can teach, learn and deliver the Feldenkrais Method successfully.

Mia Segal was Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais’ first observer, protégé and trusted collaborator in perpetuating his masterful work. Mia is joined by her daughter Leora Gaster in recounting moments from their close personal relationship and home life with Moshe. This has afforded them unique insight and perception into the spirit of Moshe's artful attitude and approach to improving human ability. Mia and Leora speak passionately of the importance of the work for teaching responsibility and autonomy to children, its ground in Judo principles and the art of gentleness. Mia, together with her daughter Leora, still loves actively teaching and sharing the system of questioning and refinement of learning evolved by her close association with Moshe Feldenkrais. Mia’s work over seven decades has enriched the lineage of already potent teaching and learning of practitioners today. Leora and Mia support how research is widening to encompass the interlacing of individual aspects of cutting-edge science as we contemplate how humanity fits with our environment. They conclude by highlighting the importance of research in confirming Moshe Feldenkrais’ work today. 

As a trauma-informed integrative physiotherapist, Paul Watt offers Feldenkrais and Tension Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) alongside physiotherapy. He accompanies clients of all ages on often difficult journeys of exploration towards harmony, balance and self-love to come "home" to themselves.

Paul's discussion of TRE offers great parallels and insights into a deeper understanding of Feldenkrais as well as how TRE can be taught as a self-educative technique used to complement Feldenkrais to unpack accumulated stress, unresolved narratives and chronic holding patterns. He recommends trying TRE in the process of continually re-orienting to our environment with kindness.

You can contact Paul Watt via:

Deborah offers insightful expertise on chronic pain and pelvic floor health coupled with simplicity of process. Initially enticed by Moshe Feldenkrais’ theory of the mind and body connection, Deborah embarked on a personal journey of emotional and mind transformation. With more than 34 years as a revered Feldenkrais Practitioner and Trainer, Deborah has developed a unique style engaging people in a gentle, safe and pleasurable process of self discovery. An inquisitive scholar, Deborah has delved deeply into pelvic floor health and chronic pain research and has keenly refined a distinctive, highly effective style which has enhanced the quality of life of thousands of clients throughout her career.

As a Feldenkrais Trainer, Deborah continues to inspire students and graduates to develop and gain confidence to pursue their passion as practitioners. Deborah’s authenticity shines as she explains how her unwavering curiosity has allowed her to explore and develop deep understandings. She shares practical, easy to implement strategies and techniques for the path she has grown to love, that of working with people with chronic pain. Deborah helps listeners understand through evoking curiosity, we can interrupt our patterns and that pain can change as people alter their self image. This is a delightfully personal and practical conversation with a highly respected Feldenkrais elder. 

Deborah's website:

Leora Gaster brings Moshe Feldenkrais’ background to the foreground with a fresh sense of aliveness and gives colour to the creative environment she experienced growing up through the formative exploratory years of Moshe Feldenkrais' work with her mother, Mia Segal. It’s an uplifting account of the vibrant experimentation and cross-pollination of ideas with eminent thinkers influencing the human potential movement. Leora expands on how the synthesis of Moshe Feldenkrais’ work was based on questioning with respect - all the science and philosophy of the time.

Immersed in the influence, observations and teachings of Moshe Feldenkrais since childhood and emerging with wisdom and clarity of her own, Leora is embracing a new generation of practitioners with Mia Segal in Mind Body Studies Academy and is ready to impart with simplicity the tools and techniques everyone can use to improve the whole of life. MBS Academy teaches an accessible language of communication between our brain and body using movement-thought exercises to empower self-knowledge and self-mastery. Leora gives a practical example for understanding the essence of this effective work in a simple precise blueprint.

Leora affirms the continuity and relevancy today of the ways Moshe Feldenkrais was seeking to further develop the intersection between disciplines discovering the connections between movement, thoughts, emotions and self-image. She further distills and succinctly expresses the simple ways we can identify and change the seemingly inseparable physiological and psychological aspects of life to improve our human ability, movement and behaviour.

Links for all Leora’s resources and Mind Body Studies Academy: 

It’s not just about the body! Body language expert Lavinia Plonka brings recognition of the fullness of expression of our emotions into relationship with our body posture, gestures and breath using the lens of the Feldenkrais Method® with her signature Emotional Body® techniques. Lavinia has always been attracted to the expression of self through her love of movement and recognises the role her extensive creative life in mime, dance and theatre has played in her own conscious evolution. Integrating all the elements of her own deep humanistic quest towards self-actualization and creativity, Lavinia gives us a sense of embracing the wholeness of ourselves, helping us recognise our passions and fears in identifiable archetypes of human behaviour.

Lavinia explains for everyone how from within a place of personal safety in a Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement or Functional Integration lesson, we can begin to explore and recognise not only physical and movement habits but patterns of emotional expression. Here we can use the power of where we place our attention to discover our unseen emotional habits, uncover our biases, and see for ourselves the stories our bodies tell to find more congruency, capacity and resilience to channel more efficacy into our lives. We can find links between our physical and emotional discomforts, learn from these expressions and reorganise to release ourselves from many fears or other self-limiting emotions. Lavinia champions that finding creativity within ourselves is accessible to all of us.

For practitioners, Lavinia suggests that using the Feldenkrais Method as a means to develop our authentic professional path includes following Moshe Feldenkrais’ lessons for ourselves. In integrating what we know of our emotional as well as cognitive and physical “self”  with ongoing discovery and interoceptive perception, we can give the best representation of our authentic selves to simply BE with our clients to help them to do the same for themselves.

Tara Eden, Feldenkrais Practitioner, began her Somatic Movement Project as a child and continued her innate life journey as an observer and student of the human condition. She travelled an intense route of self-expression via the heat and power of yoga, striving to overcome frustration, anxieties and burnout – society’s common symptoms of chronic disconnection to self in a saturated life chasing improvement, betterment and existential change. Tara explains how we have tried to form and conform ourselves to not only yoga but society’s poses and postures without reference to the individual self.

Moving from the frenzied pace of New York to exploring a spiritual path in Chiang Mai, Thailand, Tara found personal vulnerabilities were exposed in the energetic exchange of Thai massage. Leading herself with this newfound “feeling” and beginning to differentiate uncomfortable choice points led to the discovery of limitations in yoga for options of choice, rest and adaptation. Tara transitioned into a Feldenkrais immersion of authenticity and acceptance of self, and now offers this window to others wanting to see themselves clearly, discover healthier self-use, empowerment to trust and learn from their own embodied experience and to discover a unique inner calm, stillness and self-knowing that arrives spontaneously in an embodied state change.

Tara suggests strategies to have this container of Feldenkrais for yourself, as a structure and a lens for being able to support yourself and other people in their authentic experience of themselves, to literally and metaphorically “come to the floor” and reconnect with themselves.

Tara is a Feldenkrais Practitioner and member of ISMETA (International Somatics Movement Education and Therapy Association) offering individual, group, online and face to face Functional Integration and Awareness Through Movement lessons and Somatic Movement Mentorship.

You can reach out to Tara:

Taro Iwamoto meets people at exactly the point of understanding of their own movement or life challenges, responding and making connections with them via his YouTube channel “Feldenkrais with Taro Iwamoto”. He takes great pride in making simple, practical and useful YouTube videos using the Feldenkrais Method that speak to people of diverse ages and abilities. Taro has found a way to make an impact on how people connect with themselves to improve their own performance beyond the limitations they perceive, expanding individual human capability not just in the functional actions of everyday life, but in shifting ideals of perfection in favour of recognising that other options exist.

His unique Feldenkrais learning framework on YouTube takes inspiration from his background in athletic training, physical therapy and martial arts to use clear, elegant messages to engage people to discover their own solutions to movement within their own safe environments. He is inspiring people daily with Feldenkrais principles to be comfortable on solid ground, be able to find their way to stand, to overcome the fear of falling and to use the adaptability of their own nervous system for better balance, independence and ease of existence in many areas of life.

Feldenkrais with Taro Iwamoto

Russell and Linda Delman encourage us to bring warmth, humour and kindness of heart and mind to the exploration of our intimate inner selves and the “feeling states” of being human. Together they explain “embodiment” and introduce to us a simple and powerful practical taste of the Embodied Life School™️. Via Feldenkrais Method, conscious movement and meditation using precision specificity of feeling and sensing, grounded presence is created in your own immediate experience. Russell and Linda discuss the meaning of “integration” of feelings, sensations, emotions, thoughts and convey how using principles by which our nervous system learns to grow our awareness beyond our physical body can be used to awaken to our individual and collective human potential. This awareness may be a tangible doorway to enter new states of consciousness available and useful to all of us, to a larger experience of spaciousness and deeply connected relationship to ourselves, to others, to our environment and our earth.

Embodied Life™️ evolved from Russell and Linda’s extensive personal explorations and experience with Moshe Feldenkrais’ teachings, with Moshe himself, giving Functional Integration lessons to Moshe and in giving numerous Feldenkrais Trainings together, as well as Russell’s longstanding Zen meditation practice, somatic psychology and Focusing studies and Linda’s Sacred Dance, spirituality and conscious movement studies and deep appreciation for nature.

Sustaining awe, wonder and curiosity in how we deeply listen to ourselves in the present moment can grow our own capacity and resourcefulness in moving beyond our self-limiting habits and beliefs to find the possibility of expressions of freedom, wisdom and love Moshe Feldenkrais’ teachings were leaning toward. Russell and Linda have taken the Feldenkrais Method to another level, truly evolving their own handwriting in their offering to humanity.

Libby and Dale chat with Kate Tremlett, a Melbourne Feldenkrais practitioner, and her client of 20 years, Kirk Aaltink, with his mother Angie.  In their synergistic journey of Feldenkrais inquiry and growth Kirk’s natural curiosity, drive and immersion in life-long learning and self-motivation has resulted in “Team Kirk” – a group of people dedicated to assisting Kirk to live his life with the intention of co-ordinated whole-body movement.
Kirk’s desire for freedom and speed in movement has surpassed all expectations, culminating in free skiing the Australian downhill slopes. His story is one of ultimate independence of spirit, fun, focus of mind and versatility in how our body and brain can mature together through adulthood when given a nurturing learning environment.
Join our conversation with a story of community and commitment, self-empowerment and developing human potential.
Watch Kirk fly!

This episode opens the year inside the theme of Somatic Learning.

Highly recommended: See Kirk Aaltink’s skiing achievement video's on FaceBook:

Zoran Kovich elaborates on teaching and learning in Feldenkrais practice and Professional Training and explores how we can know ourselves better in the clarity of ‘present moment’ experience through sensorimotor understanding and our perceptions of our embodied self. Zoran offers insight into how Awareness Through Movement lessons engage us in inquiry into human embodiment, cognition and learning. He elucidates what Feldenkrais espouses at any level - to care for yourself and find what you are looking for in your own human capacity, choice and potential. Compiling his expertise in Feldenkrais, cognitive science, learning pedagogy, somatic experiencing and dance, Zoran explains the continual evolution and refinement of Feldenkrais Professional Training. He is rising to the challenge of offering consistency in a safe self-learning environment, balancing experiential and social learning with conceptual academic inquiry whilst maintaining the integrity of Moshe Feldenkrais’ Method.

Molly Tipping and Brigit Cosgrove explore the association of habitual body postures with expressions of anxiety and trauma, using the Feldenkrais Method to assist with adaptation and regulation of our autonomic nervous system in mitigating the effects of anxiety. Discussing the impetus for their audio series 'Move Over Anxiety', they give professional and personal examples of Feldenkrais applications to create conditions favourable for learning ways to self-manage varying degrees of anxiety. Questions are invited into the importance Moshe Feldenkrais placed on his definition of anxiety and the relevance of his seminal texts in understanding our physiological response to today’s somatic, cultural and psychological environments.  

Cynthia Allen shares top tips for sustainable business success in the Feldenkrais world, including establishing and maintaining an online Feldenkrais presence. Foregrounding the importance of the practitioner-client relationship and drawing on her considerable management expertise, Cynthia applies business and marketing acumen to demystify some common fears of starting out or taking Feldenkrais business to the next level. Covering some pitfalls in navigating this path, Cynthia inspires confidence in building viable Feldenkrais communities and collaborations.

Julie Peck and Lesley McLennan give a fascinating insight into the creative process of inquiry in both the writing of their new book ‘Moving from the Inside Out: 7 Principles for Ease and Mastery of Movement-A Feldenkrais Approach’ and in their individual styles of approach to learning, practising and developing good use of the self with the Feldenkrais Method. The quest to articulate their 7 organising principles is achieved with immense finesse, making them understandable with real life examples useful for the beginner, the movement enthusiast and Feldenkrais students and Practitioners alike across all learning styles.

Jeff Haller offers a rich and profound understanding of what is the true nature of the Feldenkrais Method; expanding human potential. He discusses the Feldenkrais 1981 Amherst training, Moshe Feldenkrais, how to overcome a habit, emotional intelligence, the secret to teaching an Awareness Through Movement Lesson and a whole lot more.

Jeff’s Links: