Awareness Through Movement® Class Series/Workshops Topics

These topics, a sampling of our offerings over the years, are suitable for a custom-created class series or workshop. You can also, of course, suggest your own topic!

BACK into Action
Designed for those who experience back discomfort or pain which interferes with daily activities, this series will explore movement sequences designed to develop kinesthetic aptitude, improve coordination, and alter ingrained movement habits. You will explore basic functioning of the spine, in small sequential steps, performed in a comfortable and safe way. The lessons improve the effectiveness with which your brain coordinates movement. As your ingrained movement habits begin to shift and you discover new ways to move, you will bring ease and comfort back into your daily activities. Let spontaneity and freedom back into your life as you spring BACK into ACTION.

Compute in Comfort
Operating today’s office and home technology requires marathon fitness – not of how far you can run, but of how long you can sit. You’ve had an ergonomic reorganization of your office furniture, and still you are uncomfortable. So it’s time for some "personal ergonomics" – how to adapt yourself to an unchanging environment. We’ll teach strategies to improve your sitting, the use of your arms and hands, and the use of your eyes in looking at the screen. Try this series and turn stressful postural habits into the ability to work at your computer for hours in ease and comfort.

Aging Gracefully: Learn to Move Younger as You Get Older
What is the difference between a 70-year old who moves as if she was 40, and a 70-year old who moves as if he were 70, or 90? Our habits of movement, thinking, and feeling create how old we feel. When we unlearn these habits and make new ones, we make our bodies and minds younger, stronger, and more flexible. Come learn to enjoy qualities of ease, exploration, variety, and joy in your movements that will de-age your muscles, your joints, and your brain. The habits you create as a 30- , 40-, or 50-something year old have a tremendous impact on your quality of life as a 70-, 80-, or 90- year old. You can learn to move with greater agility, balance, and coordination and feel younger again!

Exploring Balance: the Interplay between Stability and Mobility.
Balance is a feeling of stability, a feeling of being comfortably and easily upright around the vertical axis of your spine and legs. But is stability derived from “not moving”, from using strength to hold yourself upright? No. Balance is a dynamic equilibrium. The more of yourself you can move around your central axis, the more stable you will feel.

This series explores how allowing freedom of movement in the spine, hip joints, knees, ankles, neck and eyes can improve your balance.

Explore Your Core
Core training is all the rage these days, prescribed for people with back pain as well as for athletes wishing to improve performance. Yet, in the minds of too many people, core training is still synonymous with abdominal strengthening exercises. The abdominals are only one set of muscles important in coordinating the movement of your trunk – that is, your core. In these lessons, you will journey throughout your core, exploring the function of both the deep muscles and the superficial muscles of your trunk. Aided by anatomical discussions of the location, shape, and function of the muscle(s) of the day, you will then explore movement sequences designed to clarify the muscle in action in your sensation and experience. This will not be strength training per se, but rather coordination training in the context of functional movements relevant to daily life. Along the way, we will explore some common misconceptions about “core training”. Join us, awaken your core intelligence, and feel the difference in your day to day life.

Transitions
Life is a process of growth and change, yet change can be tough. Finding a way from “here” to “there” in your life can be an expression of creativity or it can be a struggle. Moving from one position to another in space can be done haphazardly with great effort or with simplicity and elegance. Overwhelming effort can decrease your sensitivity to finding the easiest possible way from here to there. This class will explore simple physical movements of transition from lying to sitting to standing as a metaphor for moving through transition more easily in your life.

Becoming Hip to your Hip Joints
Where and what are your hip joints? Are your “hips” your hip joints? Your hip joints are the junction between your legs and torso. Their job is to transmit power as you walk or run, and they provide support for your torso and head as you stand. Unconscious patterns of habitual self-use can reduce your ability to tap into your hip joints power and flexibility. This class will help you discover your hip joints, and bring their power and flexibility to whatever you do. The health and proper function of your back and knees is dependent on the hip joints functioning as they are designed to do. Become “hip” to your hip joints – the results will astound you.

Constraints
Using exploration of simple, fun, and provocative movement sequences, we will explore the notion of how constraints can lead to freedom. How can “the state of being restricted or compelled to avoid some action” lead to liberation in another as yet unanticipated dimension of movement (or life)? Can we feel in our sensation how “when one door closes, somewhere a window opens”? Let your sense of awakening freedom in movement be the catalyst for more freedom in your life.

Born to Run
Developing a kinesthetic sense of whole body co-ordination is the key to efficient and joyful running. What role does the spine play in running? How can your shoulders co-ordinate with your hip joints to lengthen your stride? What is the relationship between the movement of your ribs and the health of your knees? This course will re-train your brain and stimulate your neurological intelligence to find this whole body coordination. Learn to run with greater speed and for longer distances with less effort and fewer injuries.

Your Ribcage is NOT a Cage
Your ribs provide structure to your torso and protect your internal organs. They are not, as commonly conceived, like the immovable metal bars of a cage. Each rib is capable of independent movement, acting more like the bellows of an accordion or like the spring of a slinky. In this class, we will explore movement sequences to awaken the forgotten flexibility of your ribs. As your ribs become more fluid, you will experience more freedom and ease in breathing, turning, reaching, bending, walking, and running.

Foundation
Do you “hold yourself up” or “hold yourself together” or do you support yourself from underneath? How does living in a gravitational field effect your movement and comfort? Where is your base of support? As toddlers, we could sit, stand, or walk with easy elegance. Over time, we’ve lost that ease and now over-use our muscles to provide internal support in a way that is counterproductive, tiring, and even injury-producing. Come explore strategies for regaining the strong skeletal foundation in relation to the ground that can help create simpler, more efficient, and more comfortable movement in day to day life.

Moving from Your Center
Martial artists call your center the “hara” or “dantian”. The ability to move from your center makes for better balance, more coordination, and greater power with less effort. Whether you are a martial artist, a dancer, a yoga enthusiast, a runner, or someone who wants to do housework more easily, learn to waste no energy, waste no force as you develop coordinated whole body movement powered by your center.

Standing on your own Two Feet
For a person born with no arms, the feet function with the dexterity of hands. For people in an indigenous society, barefeet adapt fluidly to the unevenness of the terrain. However, that is not the experience of those of us who have spent our lifetime with our feet locked into shoes while walking on flat surfaces. This class will awaken the potential of your feet to respond to the environment and to support you in standing, walking, and running as they are designed to do.

A Call to [Your] Arms
This series will explore the connection of your arms to your core. The power of your arms as well as the finesse of your hands derives from the support of and the coordination with your torso. This series of lessons will be of interest to you if you are a musician, massage therapist, computer user, artist, or someone who lifts and carries frequently during your daily life. ANY BODY who would like to experience more ease and clarity in the use of their arms and hands will benefit from these lessons.

Moving from “The Dowager’s Hump” to Effortless Upright Posture
When you look in the mirror, do you see someone with a "dowager hump" or someone who looks like the "hunchback of Notre Dame"? This postural shape - of a very rounded upper back with the head carried forward of the body – is classically associated with osteoporotic old women. Yet these days, in our culture of sitting for hours in front of the computer or television, it is common in people of any age and either sex. Come explore the myriad factors that contribute to this posture, and discover strategies to move toward uprightness. With uprightness comes fuller breathing, greater comfort throughout the back and neck, and more freedom and ease in daily movements.

Breathing Freely
When your breath is restricted, your performance is impeded (as is your health). We will explore the dynamics of the breath: the role of the diaphragm, the ribs, the spine, the belly, the low back, the lungs, and the shoulders. Come develop an intimate and inspirational feel for the spaciousness that is available within you to welcome your breath. This series of lessons will be of particular interest to you if you are a singer, musician, meditator, yoga practitioner, martial artist, athlete, or someone with low back pain. Of course, ANYBODY who would like to breathe more fully will benefit.

Head, Neck, and Jaw
How we use our head, neck, and jaw has a dramatic impact on our ability to perform our daily activities with comfort and ease. Do you enlist the support of your head, neck, and jaw before engaging in a challenging activity, or do you mobilize this area as a reaction to a challenge? We will explore the head, neck, and jaw as a "locus of control". These classes will be of interest to you if you know you create tension in your neck or jaw, are someone who has TMJ syndrome, or if would like to improve your comfort or performance in daily activities.

Back to Upcoming Workshops