Essence for “Experts”: Flexors and Extensors from the Hips and Waist (33m, Patrons)

Prerequisite: You should be familiar with Coordinating Flexors and Extensors (Patrons) or Simple Twisting before doing this version. Learn more about Essence for “Experts” lessons in the lesson notes tabs below.

A distillation of Moshe Feldenkrais's classic Coordinating the Flexors and Extensors lesson. Great for review and for finding a more specific understanding of the role of the hip joints and waistline muscles as conductors of turning actions. When we listen deeply to Moshe and ourselves, we learn that tipping triangle arms and crossed legs further and further is not the point of this famous lesson. The most profound benefits for spinal health, posture, and gait are hidden in the details.

Average Challenge   back-lying 

33m
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Before you begin read this for practical tips and your responsibilities, and check out Comfort & Configuration below.

Recorded live in a Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement (ATM) class, this lesson is copyright Nick Strauss-Klein, for personal use only.

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Tip – Complete the Movement

Study tip: Complete one movement before beginning the next. You’ll improve faster if there’s enough time between movements that you feel fully at rest.

Tip – Rewinding

Study tip: Many instructions are repeated. If you get a little lost, rest and listen. You’ll often find your way. Or use the rewind button on the page or your mobile device.

Tip – Directions are Relative

Study tip: Directions are always relative to your body. For example, if you’re lying on your back “up” is toward your head, and “forward” is toward the ceiling.

Tip 5 – Discomfort

Study tip: If a configuration or movement causes any increase in discomfort, or you feel you just don’t want to do it, don’t! Make it smaller and slower, adapt it, or rest and imagine.

Tip – Pause the recording

Study tip: If you’re really enjoying a movement and want to explore longer, or you just need a break for a while, pause the recording!

Tip – What’s New

Community tip: See what Nick and other Felden-fans are interested in right now. Check out What’s New at the bottom of our homepage for recent blog posts and listener comments.

Tip – skip a lesson

Study tip: If you can’t find a comfortable way to do the initial movements or configuration of a lesson, it’s ok to skip it for now and go on to another lesson.

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Tip 1 – Interrupted?

Study tip: Interrupted or don’t have enough time? You can return to the lesson later today or tomorrow. Read how best to continue your learning on our FAQ page.

Tip 4 – Padding

Study tip: Comfort first! Carpeted floors usually work well, but it’s great to have an extra mat or blanket nearby in case you need a softer surface in some configurations.

Tip – LESSS is more

LESSS is more: Light, Easy, Small, Slow, & Smooth movements will ease pains and improve your underlying neuromuscular habits faster than any other kind of movement, no matter who you are or what your training is!

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Tip – what to wear

Study tip: Wear loose, comfortable clothes that are warm enough for quiet movement. Remove or avoid anything restrictive like belts or glasses.

Browser/device size and audio player

Tech tip: On mobile or tablet? Once you start playing the audio, your device’s native playback controls should work well.

Tip 3 – Head Support

Study tip: It helps to have a large bath towel nearby when you start a lesson. You can fold it differently for comfortable head support in any configuration.

We offer over 50 free lessons, but this one's just for our Patron-level donors. You can learn about it in the free lesson notes and comments below, but to access the audio you’ll need to join The FP as a Patron. Learn more

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  • Comfort & Configuration
  • Curiosities
  • Context
  • Related Lessons
  • Source

Many people like having extra friction under their feet for this lesson, so there’s no fear the feet will slip while tipping crossed legs.

You’re always welcome to lengthen your legs in the rests.

If you’re confused by the early cues to lengthen your pubic bone, you might also explore Long Belly, Strong Back (short or full-length) before this lesson.

You are an “expert” if Feldenkrais ATM study is a regular part of your life, and you’re familiar with the source lesson: you’ve explored and valued the full-length version (even if it challenged you) at least once, and you have some memory of it.

You don’t have to be a pro, or feel like you’ve mastered the lesson. Rather, this version is a chance to review and learn more, for people who are familiar with it. Learn more in the Curiosities tab.

About Essence for “Experts”

As we add more lessons like this later this year I’ll expand this into a blog post:

  • Essence means these 30-minute versions review the essential learning of a particular lesson, and use it to illustrate the essence of Feldenkrais ATM study.
  • You are an “expert” if Feldenkrais is a regular part of your life, and you’re familiar with the source lesson: you’ve explored and valued the full-length version at least once (even if it challenged you), and you have some memory of it.
  • You don’t have to be a pro, or feel like you’ve mastered the lesson. Rather, this version is a chance to review and learn more, for people who are familiar with it.
  • Your familiarity with its movement cues and images allows us to get more directly to the essence of the lesson—and emphasize the essence of the Feldenkrais Method in it.
  • It’s also assumed you know how to be kind to yourself and explore thoughtfully, no matter what’s asked of you. You know how to respond to challenge and discomfort with wisdom, patience, and curiosity, instead of cultural conditioning to use force, speed, or self-judgment.
  • Finally, it’s assumed you know and love the space between stimulus and response in which action is composed. You can hear an instruction, then feel and shape your intention as it propagates from your imagination throughout your body…all the while inhibiting the urge to immediately “perform” what was asked.

 

Feldenkrais essentials emphasized in this lesson:

  • Expanding the self-image, here to include more precise awareness of the structure and function of the external and internal oblique muscles, and to compose action from the hip joints, pelvis, and spine.
  • As Feldenkrais wrote, “Imagination is more important than willpower” in self improvement. When we study, we widen the gaps between intention and action and “observe into existence” new ways of behaving using our sensory imagination (thanks to Andrew Gibbons for this great verbal formulation).
  • Using constraints to prompt novel behavior.
  • Reversal of proximal and distal: “hip flexors in reverse” and moving the distal from the proximal: the tip of the triangle is not the source of the action.

 

Lesson discussion

Some Patrons and I reflected on this lesson in a 15-minute discussion right after it was recorded. Please comment below to participate in the discussion!

Patrons only. Login above for access to this Zoom replay.

This lesson is found in Patron Treasures, our collection of lessons exclusively for Feldenkrais Project Patron-level donors.

It’s designed for review and refinement of Coordinating Flexors and Extensors (Patrons) or Simple Twisting.

It was recorded in a Patrons Quarterly meeting on May 1, 2025. There is a discussion with students from after this audio was recorded accessible through the Curiosities tab.

Members and Patrons. Learn more or login:

Members and Patrons. Learn more or login:

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2 Comments

  1. Jody Dixon on May 8, 2025 at 11:46 am

    Nick,
    You have an uncanny knack for sharing a lesson that speaks directly to what my ever- evolving body needs at the moment. 2 years ago, an “ancient” adhesion that had glued my small intestine to the abdominal wall was surgically removed. Prior to that, I practiced Feldenkrais (one-on-one as well as your ATM lessons) to bring awareness to deep sensations and reduce tension and pain throughout my body.

    Post-surgery, Feldenkrais has been equally critical as I have regained movement that had been restricted by this 50-year-old adhesion. Recently a Fascial Counterstrain therapist released restrictions all around the Mesentery Root (fascial restrictions that likely protected my intestine during all this) and my body is attempting to learn so much more, now that my abdomen moves more freely. The pelvis, the long belly, the hip extensors and flexors are just starting to “coordinate.”

    So when this morning’s email included the Essence for “Experts”: Flexors and Extensors from the Hips and Waist, I knew that you shared it for me! All I can say is, Wow! And, thank you!

    Reply
    • Nick Strauss-Klein on May 8, 2025 at 4:48 pm

      Love these moments of synchronicity, and glad to be helpful to you! This topic has been really consuming me lately. I’m working slowly toward a new Deep Dive incorporating all the Long Belly, Strong Back material, this lesson, and a few more like it. Stay tuned!

      Reply

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