The Feldenkrais Method®
with Ralph Strauch

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Managing Action
Deepen skills and sensitivities you
may not realize you possess

Advanced Training in the
Feldenkrais Method®

with Ralph Strauch

Vancouver, British Columbia
May 21-24, 2011
NEW LOWER PRICE -- 25% OFF

Intended primarily for Feldenkrais Practitioners, this training is also open to practitioners in related disciplines with Feldenkrais experience who feel these ideas might enhance their practice. For more information please .


Logistics and registration

Action is what you do -- how you interact with the world around you. Intention is what you want to do. Action is the manifestation of intention. This workshop will explore the relationship between intention and action, and influences that facilitate or impede that relationship.

The processes through which we shape our actions are complex, multi-faceted, and distributed throughout the nervous system. Conscious voluntary action is directed primarily from the cerebral cortex, but is heavily supplemented by subcortical control of supporting activities such as coordination, balance and, overall organization.

Understanding Cortical/Subcortical Coordination

We will examine these two components of motor control and the interactions between them. They support each other when they function in an integrated way, and get in each other's way when they don't. Well-coordinated cortical and subcortical control results in integrated and effective action, while poor cortical/subcortical coordination leads to inefficiency and cross-motivation. Awareness provides a major integrating agent, so Feldenkrais work can significantly improve integration.

We will explore the cortical/subcortical relationship from two different but interrelated perspectives

Poorly coordinated cortical and sub-cortical controls operate at cross purposes, contributing significantly to limitations such as stiffness, limited range of motion, and even chronic pain. It's like driving with one foot on the brake; you can do it, but it's a poor way to operate the vehicle.

These limitations are deeply rooted in lack of awareness, making the Feldenkrais Method a highly effective tool for addressing them. As a practitioner you work with cortical/subcortical coordination whether you understand that or not. But the better you understand it, the more effective your work can become. As Moshe often said, "If you know what you're doing, you can do what you want."

Enhancing your Feldenkrais practice

The quality and effectiveness of your ATM instruction -- your ability to create nuanced experience rather than simply deliver a preprogrammed set of instructions -- depends on the connection you make with your students both cortically and subcortically. This is true whether you understand what you're doing or not, but understanding it can make your job easier and your teaching more effective!

What you achieve in Functional Integration will ultimately depend less on technique than on sensitivity, and the connection you create in your interaction with clients. Your ability to connect subcortically can significantly enhance your FI, allowing you to function in concert with your client as a single conjoined system rather than as one person doing something to another. We will explore the subtle communication that this makes possible, through both what you take in as practitioner and what you transmit back through your connection to your client. This is what Moshe referred to as merging with your client's nervous system.

The training will include Awareness Through Movement lessons and other experiential explorations to clarify these concepts and Functional Integration practices that utilize them, as well as lecture and discussion. You will learn to deepen skills and sensitivities you may not even have realized you possess. You will leave the workshop knowing what you are doing, as well as being able to do it, with a new sense of confidence in your ability to work at ever deeper levels!

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LOGISTICS AND REGISTRATION

The training will be held from Saturday, May 21 through Tuesday, May 24, 2011, from 10am-5pm. Participants will be notified of the location and other relevant information shortly before the workshop.

We've been receiving feedback that the price is too high for today's economy, so we've reduced it by 25%. The new price will be $430, in US or Canadian Funds. Cancellations up to one month in advance will be charged a $50 cancellation fee. No refunds less than one month before the workshop.


May 21-24, 2011
REGISTER NOW!!

You may register online with any major credit card using Paypal (US$ only), or by sending a check (US$ or CDN$) to

Katarina Halm
Box 71069,   3552 West 41 Avenue
Vancouver B.C., Canada V6N 4J9

Online registration


Register for Managing Action -- $430 USD
Vancouver, BC, May 21-24, 2011



If you have any questions, please contact

Ralph Strauch by email or by phone at 310-454-8322. or
Katarina Halm by email or by phone at 604-263-9123.

Thanks for your interest.

Ralph Strauch, Ph.D., practices the Feldenkrais Method in Los Angeles, California. He trained with the founder of the Method, Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais, and brings to his practice a wide range of insight and experience. He was formerly a Senior Mathematician with the Rand Corporation where his research focused on choice in the face of uncertainty, and has been exploring the mind-body relationship through the internal martial arts and related practices since the late 1960s. He has presented advanced training for Feldenkrais Practitioners in the United States, Canada, Australia, and Great Britain. A more complete description of his background can be found here.

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