FELDENKRAIS®
Learning Matters Ltd.

The Feldenkrais Method® is taught through two approaches...

Awareness Through Movement (ATM)

In Awareness Through Movement, the Feldenkrais teacher gives instructions verbally, generally to a group of people lying or sitting on the floor. Each lesson consists of precisely structured movement sequences that enable students to create new movement skills or improve existing ones. Students start with comfortable, easy movements, often based on simple activities like standing, sitting and reaching. From there you go on to gradually explore increasingly complex movements and skills. There are hundreds of Awareness Through Movement lessons, of varying difficulty and complexity, for people at all levels of movement ability.

Over time you will discover an increasing ease in forming intentions and acting upon them - what once seemed impossible often becomes routine. The process is gradual and supportive to ensure successful learning. Eventually, the lessons can be done alone, gradually building self-sufficiency and independence. ATM lessons are fun to do, instill a feeling of well-being and are always new.

In Awareness Through Movement you learn in several ways:

• You use slow gentle movements, avoiding pain and strain.
• You focus on the process of learning and doing, rather than on reaching a goal.
• You direct awareness toward perceiving inter-connected patterns in how you move.
• You find your own way, at your own pace, with each lesson.

Functional Integration (FI)

In Functional Integration the Feldenkrais teacher creates a movement lesson custom-tailored to the unique needs of each person. Each lesson relates to a desire, intention or need you bring to that moment.

As in Awareness Through Movement, teachers give you verbal cues and instructions. In a Functional Integration lesson the teacher also guides you through movement sequences with gentle, non-invasive touch. This communication enables you to experience and learn new sensory configurations and motor organization. You then learn to recreate these new sensory and motor patterns for yourself, gaining more freedom of choice and action.

Functional Integration is performed with the student fully clothed, usually lying on a low Feldenkrais table or in standing or sitting positions. The lesson is carried out without the use of any invasive or forceful procedure.

Unlike, for example, massage or chiropractic, Functional Integration is not a curative process. Touch is used to communicate movement so that after the lesson you learn to do a new movement or an old one with more ease and greater awareness. Functional Integration lessons are an intimate, and often delightful, process of self-discovery.