Counterbalance 2: More rolling

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This is one of my favorite lessons. Use this to clarify balance as you roll. The trick is to use the limbs without contracting the belly muscles to hold you in place.

Training to find the precision of the weight shift helps you use the muscles to their fullest advantage. If they are not hijacked by needing to balance, they are accessible for you to use.

(Amherst, week 4, 28 June 1980)

The counterweight in this lesson comes from noticing the back leg behind and the torso in front of the pivot point, which is the hip. Again, less muscular work and more weight shift will serve you here. The ease of movement when all the limbs are balanced is a joy.

Once the swivel factor emerges through the variations, the movement can feel nearly weightless. I love the intentional use of the eyes to guide the center of gravity over the pelvis and hip.

Excellent for upright posture and easy walking.

For more tilting leg lessons, see:
78 Low back strength, tilting legs on stomach
80 Arms frame head
326 Slow tilting of legs
9 Tilting legs on stomach to locate your center

This lesson helps you find the power in the pelvis and low back. My students report a kind of luscious ease in the spine as they learn to access their heavy center of mass in more efficient ways.

As you lie on your front with one arm standing, you bring the leg out to the side and direct the face toward the knee. As the head goes under the standing arm, it goes “through the gap” and gets closer to the knee, not by straining of course, but by reorganizing the shoulder, ribs, and upper back. By swinging the pelvis, the legs get lighter and lighter. Many people love this lesson because it demonstrates that skill, not will, is what improves our movement.

(Amherst, week 7, 22 July 1980)

For a more detailed exploration of this pattern, see the seven amphibian lessons under longer series from trainings.

In sitting, tilt to the side, feel the counter-balance with one leg in the air, and eventually roll around on your round spine while holding the feet. It’s a super fun lesson, even though it will hold up a mirror to your habits if you don’t know where your chest is….

(Esalen workshop)

This lesson is for everyone who thinks they have “tight” hamstrings. Feel how deep your spine can bend to help you straighten the leg. Moving the leg away from you is a global function, not an act isolated in one muscle. Through many variations, the whole back becomes bendy and supple. By the end, the legs are integrated and self-organizing in response to the spine.

This lesson applies profound weight-shift as you roll to sit without tension, strain, or stretching. As Moshe Feldenkrais says, “if you strain you won’t feel what can happen.” Use this lesson to be kind to yourself as you find creative strategies.

(SF evening classes, Rolling to sit)

An insightful, careful explanation of how we learn, Moshe Feldenkrais uses this lesson to illustrate how we can integrate new information and change our patterns very quickly, without much work. There’s hope for us all!

The variations and improvements of lifting the head and knee and feeling the weight of the pelvis is carefully explained. It’s like shining a flashlight on your ability to re-set the entire musculature of the back. This lesson has lots of tilting and pelvis rolling. At the end, you tilt the legs and roll to sit—with a new variation if you’ve done something like this before!

You’ll feel more upright, taller, and more powerful as the rigidity of the ribs and spine yield to the changing tone across the back.

(SF evening classes, Rolling to sit from stomach in text version, Advanced rolling to sit in audio list)

This is from Moshe Feldenkrais’s judo background as it asks you to find the spiral movement through the entire skeleton by floating up from the floor. Using the strong, deep muscles of the trunk, you lift and press, bone by bone, until the muscle tone evens out and the whole self is proportionally engaged.

No matter how you explore this lesson, you will find easier movement, more upright posture, better sitting, and a nicer life just by asking the questions! Your nervous system will thank you for the experience.