” . . . An organism to maintain itself must constantly transform itself into other than it was and into what it will be. In Awareness Through Movement, we are fusing our felt sense of the world with that which makes it possible to forge new modes of meeting the world and understanding ourselves and others. We actually find relief in the contingent nature of our self-knowing. What is could be different. What is different could be me.” ~Dennis Leri, “What Moves Me Keeps Me Here”
I recently came across this article by Dennis Leri, with the inspiring message quoted above. It couldn’t have met me at a better time. Wracked with indecision about how to proceed with my Feldenkrais practice, suffering from “fomo” about all the cool things others are up to, and I can’t seem to bring myself to do, I stumbled up these words which remind me why I do this.
I did not get into Feldenkrais to fix people’s pain, to make a career in movement, or to evangelize to as many people as I possibly can. I found something in the Feldenkrais Method very life-giving and complex. The method, particularly Awareness Through Movement, offered a journey simultaneously within and without, with no defined destination. It invited me to make myself at home in the unknown and to distrust big truths. It offered a frame through which one may look from many different perspectives toward multiple outcomes. I became a Feldenkrais practitioner in order to live in—and invite others in—to this beautiful messy process. It is my job to hold all this possibility for you.
And so, I offer something uncharacteristically paradoxical as a New Year’s resolution—to remain and move on at the same time. To do what I am doing, and to be open to what comes of it, from the mundane to the awesome; and to not be surprised if I end up back at the beginning again, the same but different.