Floating Toward Bridging
Back-lying, knees bent, feet standing, variations on lifting and lowering the pelvis, and eventually bridging the arms, to improve upright organization and balance.
58m
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Thanks Nick, I did this this morning, I felt wonderful afterwards and enjoyed the lesson a lot. I live in Brisbane, Australia, and discovered your online lessons about a year ago. I have done lots of them and loved them, some I didn’t finish but will go back to at some stage. I like your style of teaching and instructing, and am looking forward to trying your newest additions.
Thanks so much for your generosity in making such a fantastic resource freely available online.
Warm regards, Marie
Very nice lesson Nick. Thank you
I move with such grace afterwards,
hi nick,
i would say, for my feedback as an elderly Feldenkrais prax, this was 4 great lessons in one. at this point i move even more slowly and do fewer “reps” with more attention. i had plenty to work with in a deeper way in the first 20 minutes. my honest opinion is that lessons should be slower, especially when there are so many different phases, joints/muscles involved. there is so much to notice and sense. my feeling is also that pupils are better served when they learn in smaller chunks, before putting it together. perhaps your students are more advanced or else need more stimulation. no disapproval intended. much gratitude intended.
bonnie angelie, tucson
I also am older and have lots of experience with ATM. I also work more slowly and with fewer reps. I think it took me a long while to learn this and when I started, I needed more bits in a lesson.
I use the pause button quite a bit. I’m thankful for recorded lessons that allow me my own personalized lessons.
It is true for me, and perhaps true for you, that my need for slow and gentle is a sign of experience.
I have been on an adventure with frozen shoulder on both sides. This lesson was remarkably helpful. I’m very excited to see that as a patron, I can access a further lesson in the series specifically with freeing the shoulders as a focus. Thank you so much!
Thanks Nick, just did the lesson and much enjoyed it – it’s interesting and varied, and I feel taller with longer limbes, and more spacious inside.
Warm regards from Tel Aviv
I feel energized because the intermittent chronic pain that I’ve had for years in my right hip area has been released. I am pretty sure it will return , but with less severity because I plan on doing this session many times to establish a new norm in order to break the dysfunctional patterning my body has been used to for so long. This session is a full body, powerful yet gentle work-out. Wow!!!
Wonderful Nick! just was my back needed. My hips are no longer achey and the who spine feels freed!
I have lots of difficulty with my hands. Lots of pain, loss of function and very deteriorated joints and soft tissue. I have had surgery which was only partly successful and therapy with an excellent hand therapist. This lesson has done more for my hand health than everything else I have done, even though I did all the hand exercises in the past in a very Feldenkrais way.
Thank you so much! At the end of the lesson I feel amazed.
I did this lesson again today. It was clearer but not necessarily easier.
I remember as an undergraduate many years ago coming into a bridge and racing my fellow students up and down the gym. This seems like a fantasy now but this lesson gave me access to this in my imagination and I feel happy with this. So I don’t actually have to be able to physically do a movement to make it mine. Such a revelation!
I did this lesson again today and once again remember coming into a bridge and walking backwards and forwards. Today my memory and imagination of this , without coming anywhere near a bridge allowed me access to movement in my chest that has changed my standing and walking.
I found the bridging position of the hands difficult to do – I can’t seem to generate any force when I keep my hands flat and press into the floor to raise the upper body. If I let my fingers tips instead press into the floor, I seem to be able to generate a sufficient force to lift. Why the difference?
Fingertips is a reasonable adaptation if that’s what’s possible right now, as long as it’s comfortable. Palm, if available, can eventually create a muscularly and skeletally simpler organization, but that’s (as always) something to find your way not force your way towards, doing only what’s easy for you. It’s likely one hand is easier to approximate more closely to the directions than the other. See if you can sense some details why.
I’ve been coming back to this weekly for the last few weeks, just as much as it feels good to do. It has some fascinating mechanics! The press-foot-on-knee one was actually easier for me than some of the other variations – I think it forces me to use the front and back of my body together in ways the others don’t. Balance is a bit of a challenge but the lift is noticeably easier. I’m nowhere near being able to bridge the hands while keeping the elbows vertical-ish but I’m going to see what happens as I keep working with this.
I really loved this lesson. So much tension left my body in various places. I had a little difficulty placing my palms flat but managed very well just usi g my fingers pressed onto the floor. I have osteoporosis and related to the tapping on the floor. I was wondering Nick if you can recommend a link for Bones for Life please. Thanks again for the wonderful lessons.
Glad you enjoyed this lesson! I don’t have a BFL certification but I do recommend Cynthia Allen’s BFL programs: find her online at Future Life Now.
Hi Nick. Thanks so much for the recommendation. I’ll definitely look it up. All the best for 2023 to you and your family.
Very nice! I like that the theme still feels recognizable. A friend found that being able to speed up the lesson let them manage their attention better and actually finish a full one – neat to hear.
Upgrade bug report: https://feldenkraisproject.com/collection/learning-limbs-from-center/ lists the lessons twice. The other collections only list them once, as expected.
Thanks for the feedback! The upgrade was a lot of hours for me and Barbara, so your words are music to our ears! I’m intrigued to hear about that use of the new lesson speed control. Feldenkrais is about creating options, and it’s so cool that the lesson speed option already had a positive influence on someone’s learning. Finally, thanks for reporting that bug. I just squashed it. 😁 Please let us know on our upgrades roadmap if you find more.