shifting happens
by lavinia plonka and anne lowry parr

We’ve all experienced shifting to some degree or another. 

The transition from wakefulness to sleep, for example, or the shift in meditation when, in one moment you’re in normal consciousness, and at some undefined moment, you’re in a meditative state.  Many shifts of a mental, emotional, physical AND spiritual nature have occurred for us through movement.  Some movement techniques have been designed specifically to facilitate shifts in the body-mind system in order to more efficiently promote greater health and wellbeing.  Among these are The Feldenkrais Method® and The Nia Technique.

The moment of a shift is always a nebulous, magical thing.  The person experiencing the shift may not even be aware the shift is occurring until afterward.  SOMETHING has happened, but it isn’t yet clear just what has changed.  Later, the realization comes… EVERYTHING, with regard to a certain issue or state of being, has changed and will never be the same.The synchronicity of their upcoming joint workshop and this issue’s theme prompted the following dialogue between Nia instructor Anne Lowry Parr and Feldenkrais teacher Lavinia Plonka on their experiences as teachers of Nia and Feldenkrais, as well as their own learning “shifts” as each others’ students.


PARADIGM SHIFT

ANNE:  That’s how it was when you, Lavinia, worked on my shoulders during a Feldenkrais lesson.  For my whole life, I have held my shoulders in a hunched position and jutted my chin forward, closing in my heart and solar plexus and depleting my energy by holding unnecessary tension in my brow, scalp, and face.  It’s a pattern learned from my family… you can see it reflected in my sister, my mother, and my aunts.  As a Nia teacher I learned to let this pattern go in class, but the moment I resumed unconscious moving patterns, the holding, hunching, and clenching always returned.  During my first Feldenkrais session, you used paradox to re-teach my body a new option.  You held my shoulders in that hunched-together position, and for the first time without my conscious intervention, the shoulders were able to release their grip and let go on their own.  That was such a shift for me!  Nothing short of a miracle!  THAT was a paradigm shift AND a body shift for me, and it has since led to many subsequent releases of the emotions held in place by that old hunching posture.

LAVINIA: After years as a performer and a Feldenkrais teacher, I had an intuition of my link to others, as well as how I create boundaries that separate me.  I first came to Nia wishing to return to dance in a way that was not performance-oriented, and not a club scene.  To my delight I discovered that Nia, like Feldenkrais, is designed to provide a safe environment for learning and experiencing the self.  As you began to introduce imagery into the movement, my body became freer.  We were dancing with imaginary scarves, we were starlight, not in some airy-fairy fashion, but deeply connected, like Carl Sagan’s famous quote, “We are the stuff that stars are made of.” This shift, from having an idea of what I am and what my limitations are, to the infinite possibility of connection with others, helped free my movement from a traditionally trained ballet/jazz paradigm into something much more authentic.

BODY SHIFTING MADE EASY

ANNE: I think it was this aspect of Nia that created a dramatic shift in my body.  Ten years ago, before I discovered Nia, I was overweight and out of shape, and I attempted to shift my shape by forcing my body into activities I did not enjoy.  Needless to say, this attempt failed dismally.  But in Nia, I was having so much fun I actually forgot to be critical of my shape.  And I kept going because my body LOVED moving that way!  Then one day I looked down and Wow!… my body had transformed… shape-shifted! Now that I’m fifty, I have more curves and roundness than I did in my twenties and thirties, but they are the firm, strong curves of a body that loves to move.

LAVINIA: Sometimes people call me and ask me if they’ll lose weight doing Feldenkrais.  Truth is, when you become more integrated, you suddenly don’t feel as compelled to eat.  And if you are a body type that doesn’t fit in with the Victoria’s Secret “paradigm”, it doesn’t matter anymore - you feel good and move well, so you’re beautiful.

"WE NOW INTERRUPT THIS PATTERN TO BRING YOU GREATER HEALTH!"

ANNE: My experience with feeling my shoulders release in Feldenkrais is a great example of this method of shifting.  It led to the interruption of a lifelong pattern of muscular holding, and allowed something more healthy, and more natural to me, to emerge.

LAVINIA:  The entire premise behind The Feldenkrais Method is the notion that its carefully designed movements interrupt our habitual patterns.  While some habits are important (try driving your car without the habit of shifting into drive, or stepping on the brake when someone cuts you off!). Some habits become “parasitic”, actually interfering with more effective functioning. But these habits are usually so ingrained that a direct approach only serves to reinforce the habit.  So I take the indirect route.  If someone comes to a (Feldenkrais) lesson with a pain in their neck, I might begin working on their feet.  Or, like in your experience, instead of trying to get your shoulders to relax, I exaggerated it.  This alerted your system to a parasitic pattern, which made it let go. If I had tried to force your shoulders down, they would have resisted, since they believed that was where they belonged.  Someone with trauma in the neck would unconsciously protect the neck, but every step I take in Feldenkrais connects through the spine to the neck, so I can address the pattern from a safe distance.

ANNE: In Nia, we use visualization to occupy the mind and connect it to the body in different ways.  When I observe tension and holding in students, I’ve noticed the same indirect approach usually works best.  For example, I often see holding and tension in the neck and shoulders or overall stiffness in the legs and torsos of students in the class.  If I suggest they relax their shoulders or let their weight drop down into their feet, nothing much happens.  It’s as if the body doesn’t understand how to be any other way.  But, if I suggest, instead, to relax the elbows, suddenly I see the shoulders relax too.  If I suggest relaxing the knees, suddenly the torso relaxes and surrenders the body weight down into the legs.  These are called “pearls” in Nia… words or phrases that bypass the mind and speak to the body.

PARADOX

ANNE: I once heard that two gargoyles guard the entrance to the halls of wisdom and knowledge.  Their names are Paradox and Confusion.  In Nia, one great paradox I see is that less is truly more.   I teach a class called Nia Nice & Easy, in which we take Nia moves, which in the world of fitness are already slow, circular, smooth and grounded, and we slow them down even more.  The paradox is that in this class, heart rates generally rise to our target rate, and consistently stay there, just as effectively as in a more vigorous Nia class. People tell me they can’t believe they’ve achieved the heart rate they have, can’t believe they are sweating so much, because the movements are so grounded and they are having so much fun! We call this the “Pleasure Principle”… do what feels good and you get the results without effort or strain. Radical, huh!Lavinia: Feldenkrais takes the “less is more” theory even further, encouraging smaller and slower movements in order to experience even greater shifts.  People are constantly amazed when they stand up at the end of a class and feel completely different.  Often they say, “But I didn’t do anything!”  Another paradox that I find in both Nia and Feldenkrais can be summed up by The Feldenkrais Guild’s bumper sticker: Less Pain, More Gain. 

Instead of trying to push past the pain, both disciplines encourage a deep listening to comfort.  Feldenkrais used to say, ”Learning should be a pleasurable experience, if you’re not having fun, you’re not learning.” And I am all for having fun! When I embrace the paradox, confusion disappears.

ANNE: Amen to that!

Lavinia Plonka has been a student of movement—from the performing arts to the healing arts—for over 25 years. She is a former artist in residence for the Guggenheim Museum, associate director of Summer Theater Institute in residence at Columbia University and a Guild Certified Feldenkrais® Practitioner with a private practice in Asheville. Her book, What Are You Afraid Of? will be published by Tarcher Putnam next April. [ laviniaplonka.com ]

Anne Lowry Parr is a certified Nia teacher and co-owner of Move Intuit, a holistic studio offering Nia and yoga classes, and events. Anne has worked as a television writer/producer, public relations specialist, freelance writer, aerobics and yoga instructor, and professional rebirther. She began her joyous journey with Nia in 1997, after a soul-searching quest to find and express her unique purpose through her work.

The Feldenkrais Method is a gentle, yet sophisticated way to re-educate the nervous system through movement.  Using small, gentle movements, often lying down on the floor, students learn about how their habits interfere with optimal performance and discover new, more functional ways of moving through life - without interference from our ordinary thinking process.

Nia , Neuromuscular Integrative Action, combines the principles of many healing arts such as Feldenkrais and yoga, with martial arts (Tai Chi, Tae Kwondo, and Aikido) and dance arts (jazz, modern dance, Duncan dance) into a complete, holistic workout for body, mind and emotions.  Each class explores a theme that literally “integrates” the nervous system with the body, blending the various movement disciplines with music and imagination into an exhilarating choreographed routine. Both approaches can be enjoyed by anyone—from people with no movement experience to people who perform at their peak, like athletes and professional dancers.  The safe, integrated nature of both disciplines also makes it possible for those suffering from injuries or long-term illnesses to once again partake in the healing properties of gentle movement.