Solstice is a time for reflection, celebration and introspection as we welcome the birth of longer days. The following is a passage from Helen M. Luke’s essay The Bridge of Humility in her book Kaleidoscope: The Way of Woman And Other Essays. Blessings on this dark night.

“…And then came the image of that most fascinating of toys—the kaleidoscope, and I saw all those tiny bits of colored glass jumbled together meaninglessly until I looked through the glass at the end of the tube and saw them in beautiful mandala patterns through the process of “reflection.”  “Reflection”—of bending again—a looking anew from a different angle. The word Kaleidoscope is made up of kalos, beautiful; and eidos, form; and scope, outlook or view. Our view for most of the time of all the little colored chips of life is meaningless, has no form, but if we could only “reflect” thus, re-bend them, then we should see the beautiful form in them with the eye of the Godhead in whom they are whole, and we should recognize at once the great mandala pattern in which the ego’s hubris and inertia disappear.

Meanwhile, the reflecting, the re-bending in search of the beautiful form must be worked at consciously little by little, again and again, without pride in achievement, without despair in failure. Indeed, then, out of our sight the seed may sprout, the flower may be drawn upwards to the light of the sun, and the roots may reach down into the soil to the waters under the earth; and then at last water, sand, soil, seed and flower and the fruit of human consciousness itself—all become the humus of God; and so humility can be born.”

I am offering a class called Happy Feet starting just after the Solstice this month. This will be a fun way to get your summer feet ready for the warmer months ahead. In this six-week series we will explore the dynamic potential of the feet. Lessons will explore the structural integrity of the foot and its relationship to movement. I invite you to bring your curious toes and expand the intelligent nature of your feet.

When are your feet happiest? Do you have a happy feet story to share? I’d love to hear it! Please visit The Nature of Movement Facebook page to share your happy feet story. Go to the Classes page for further information about this class and more!

There is a great documentary on neuroplasticity called The Brain That Changes Itself. This is a 45-minute video based on the book by Norman Doidge.

The Nature of Movement is currently looking for practitioners and therapeutic professionals who are interested in contributing to this eclectic initiative. If this is you, here are some options to consider:

• Offer your services on a weekly basis with a group of other professionals who form and support the heart of the initiative—rates to be determined.

• Host your monthly event (up to 4 hours) by investing a fee to guarantee a consistent space conducive to your needs—$50/month.

• Rent by the hour as required—$20/hour.

The Nature of Movement provides you with promotional and marketing opportunities through both its website and studio.

Feel free to contact me, Amanda Lynn, by phone or e-mail with questions or to arrange a viewing. I look forward to connecting with you.

amandalynn@thenatureofmovement.com
250-661-1887

In a time when stories were still written in stone, a great deity was revered. Inanna, queen of heaven and earth, chose to give up everything in her descent to the underworld. Through seven gates, she was stripped of all accomplishments from her fruitful life and left with nothing but the choice to be reborn.

I am hosting this event through the West Coast Women’s Empowerment Network in Victoria. The intention of this gathering is to share Inanna’s story and its influence on my own descent into the underworld of loss, recovery, and renewal. As I share with you how her story has influenced my life and my work, I hope to hear how her story touches you. I invite you to come gather with other women to celebrate all aspects of the feminine experience. As the solstice approaches, I can think of no better way to celebrate the return of darker days. I invite you to celebrate with me and Inanna in all her beauty.

 Admission is by donation. Tea and delicacies will be provided. Please let me know if you plan to attend. Her story is dark, erotic, and ripe.

 I hope to see you there.

What I tell you
Let the singer weave into song.
What I tell you,
Let it flow from ear to mouth,
Let it pass from old to young.

—from Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth by Diane Wolkstein and Samuel Noah Kramer

I’ve just revisited Lewis Carroll’s timeless tale Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and was inspired to use the story as an analogy of Feldenkrais^®. I see it like this: In Wonderland the ordinary rules of the everyday world are nonexistent and habitual concepts dissolve. Alice shrinks to the size of a bird on the ground, grows taller than a tree, and is continually being stretched out of her comfortable convictions.

This is like a Feldenkrais lesson. Well, maybe you won’t grow as tall as a tree, but Feldenkrais classes can change the way you view yourself in the world and also how you relate to yourself within. Lessons are designed to continually direct your attention to new possibilities of sensation, action, and perception. Sometimes you feel taller, shorter, softer, stronger, or just plain different from how you started.

Alice bravely attempts to make sense of all the odd logics and strange sensations she experiences, and she echoes the voices of many Feldenkrais students after a lesson when she says, “How queer everything is today! … I wonder if I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think: was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I’m not the same, the next question is, ‘Who in the world am I?’ ” Lewis Carroll adds, “Ah, that’s the great puzzle!” That it is. When you stumble down the rabbit hole and commit to the adventures of a lesson, you dive into the matrix of your nervous system and access the potential to change its shape.

In January I am offering a new class series inspired by these adventures in Wonderland. Classes will investigate the curious perceptions you carry and will explore movement through a different kind of looking glass. After all, life is kind of like a Wonderland, isn’t it? Feldenkrais is a tool you can take with you into the changing world. You may leave your pocket watches at home and join me for a timeless hour outside the everyday world, down the rabbit hole and into the unknown territory of your nervous system.

I cannot guarantee that you will find the magic potion or the white rabbit. I can say that something curious will take place, which I hope will inspire creative ways for you to explore this Wonderland and perhaps discover dynamic ways to move in your life.

Please contact me if you are interested. I hope to see you in class!

Tuesdays 6:30–7:30
January 11–March 1
Heart and Hands Health Centre
#6–2020 Douglas Street, Victoria

Hallows’ Eve is upon us. This celebrated day is an ancient festival dedicated to the end of the harvest season and to the dead. I follow the Pagan calendar and call this celebration Samhain: I consider it to be the birth of a new year. At this time it is said that the veil between the world of the living and the world of the dead is thinned. I think this time is ideal for bringing the skeletons out from the closet and reconsidering priorities, intentions, and commitments for the year ahead.

What Is Your Skeleton for? Why Bring It out of the Closet?

Moshe Feldenkrais stated that the purpose of your skeleton is to make you feel weightless. In other words, your skeleton negotiates your relationship to the forces of gravity that you feel every moment of every day. The skeleton provides you with support and allows you to transmit force through your bones to act in the world. The work begins with going inward—into the closet so to speak—to sense your internal experience and to better refine your actions and eliminate unnecessary activity. Feldenkrais® lessons offer an opportunity to engage in this process. Through movement you discover how to take full advantage of your skeletal structure and its ability to support your actions and transmit force through your orchestra of bones for dynamic locomotion. What better time could there be to dig out your own skeleton deep within your fleshy closet and find new ways to harvest its brilliant capacity to help you move through the world?

On Tuesday evenings at 6:15 I am teaching a class called Unearth Your Spine. This class will investigate the “slender pillar”¹ of your spine, which connects your pelvis to your head, and will explore the agility, strength, and power the “spinal engine“² provides for movement. I invite you to come to class, bring your skeleton, and celebrate the fruits of what you harvest from within.

1 Moshe Feldenkrais, The Potent Self
2 Serge Gracovetsky, ”The Spinal Engine”

I do not claim to have the answers to how to reweave the body back into societal value, but I do have some tools to share with individual pilgrims who embark on this journey. I invite you to join me in class. Coming Home is a series of classes devoted to exploring the spaces you occupy and the options for re-stitching your important relationship to the body you call home.

I leave you with an excerpt from Rumi’s poem “The Pickax”:

tear down

this house. A hundred thousand new houses
can be built from the transparent yellow carnelian

buried beneath it, and the only way to get to that
is to do the work of demolishing and then

digging under the foundations. With that value
in hand all the new construction will be done

without effort. And anyway, sooner or later this house
will fall on its own. The jeweled treasure will be

uncovered, but it won’t be yours then. The buried
wealth is your pay for doing demolition.

“The Pickax” is from The Essential Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks.
“The Body and the Earth” is from Wendell Berry’s book of essays The Art of the Commonplace.

The Nature of Movement is rooted in curiosity about how we humans are connected to the animate world around us. Every moment of our existence, we experience the living environment we inhabit. As we move through life, we are constantly interacting with the elemental world, whether sitting at our kitchen table, taking a walk, climbing a mountain, or playing with our children.

We do not live separately from the natural cycles and elemental landscapes: we are made up of them. Our lives as humans wax and wane through the seasons as part of the birth-death-birth cycle. When we celebrate these changes in our lives and seek a conscious relationship with the world around us, we reclaim our potent animal nature. We move through the world and the world moves through us. It is The Nature of Movement.