the Feldenkrais Method with Emma Alter

This weekend I had a concert in Lichfield. It isn’t well connected in the late evening for public transport. It’s not alone of course. So I travelled by car, with a colleague. It took 2 1/2 hours to get there, and 3 to get home, with detours for roadworks, and a few wrong turns.

Habits of Thinking

When we got back to London, to the Victoria line, we made our way to the platform. (Thanks to the weekend Night Tube. My colleague asked me if I wanted to sit down. Which was interesting in the light of the previous three hours we’d spent together. Squished into a car. It was a habitual question. Without much thought attached. Of course, that is the definition of most of our habits. Something we do so often we don’t need to think about it. But it made me laugh. It was the last thing I wanted to do.

Since leaving home, at 9 am, and arriving home at 1 am, I’d been sitting for most of it. On the tube, in the car, at lunch, in the rehearsal, at dinner, in the concert, in the car again.It had taken me the short walk from the car to the platform for my legs to re-organise themselves for standing. For my back to alter itself back to its more mobile form.

The results of sitting still for long periods:

The following morning, I felt it. It appeared as sluggishness in the movement especially of my torso, and a small dull ache in the back.

And whilst you do or don’t play an instrument, most of us do spend long periods of time sitting. In a chair. Without much movement.

When we don’t move areas of ourselves, the brain starts to see them as one piece. There’s no feedback for our Nervous System to differentiate between joints or muscles. Slowly, it starts to see them, not as links in a chain, of moveable pieces that can move individually and together. But more as one chunk. The difference between a silver link-chain, or a bangle.

The substance that makes up bone, muscles, tendons, is made of the same base substance. When we don’t move a joint, the brain assumes there’s a good reason. It then stabilises the support structures, by sending more calcium to the area. The calcium adds solidity. This helps it for easier support, useful if you’re weight bearing whilst healing. So far so good, but…it also limits mobilisation. Which for the majority of you, in the long term, is not so good. Adaptations to events that don’t get undone completely build up. Over time they can easily add up into limiting movement habits.

When joints aren’t working well

If we can’t move a joint in most of its range, it stops being able to do its part in the symphony of our movement. Which then has a knock-on effect to the other muscles and joints. All the way through the whole body.

We tend to think of areas of ourselves as solo performers. But the reality is that its a more complex arrangement. Like a symphony orchestra. If you’re a concert goer, you might not know all the players’ names. But if the bassoonist isn’t there, you’ll hear the difference. There’s a part missing. Live orchestral music is many players responding to each other in the moment. So it will change the way that the whole orchestra plays. Even if most people don’t pay any attention to the bassoonist, or even know there is one. You’ll hear the difference. Like a favourite soup when the recipe is changed. You might not know which ingredients are altered, but you can taste it’s different.

It’s the same for our body, our physical self. One area can affect other areas. We might feel the pain in one area, but the cause is elsewhere. Which is good. It means we can widen our search for resources and solutions.