A Celebration of Moving Relationships

By Jill Ableson- August 2011

Somatic Pattern Recognition, Private practice and instruction

I believe the more we reach for and rely on our electronic devices the more necessary authentic connection with another person has become. Culturally we understand that if babies and the elderly are isolated their survival rates decline. The same is true for people of all ages; humans need physical proximity, touch, and a nourishing emotional connection in order to achieve satisfying attachments and therefore health. It is my hope to build a greater appreciation for what can be accomplished by working with an empathic and skilled movement instructor. Simply put, the person interested in getting to know me will also be the person who can best grow my potential. That is, to take part in the evolution of a physical structure that supports me and is a constant source for authentic living.

I understand that when we walk into a movement or exercise space each of us brings our entire history of how we feel about our bodies. We bring our successes, if we’ve had them, and we bring our insecurities. The truth is that we bring with us our unique history and our body or structure that represents it. The history of your body is represented from its inner most regions to its outer form. Just as the rings of a tree’s trunk holds information about the trees history and health. Therefore, it is important to work with an instructor that begins with a reverence for your experience. This is a simple yet profound understanding - although we are anatomically similar, each of our anatomies has been animated differently, no two people share the same ‘bicep’ history.

The skilled movement instructor is curious about how your system is organized. What areas of your body are working too hard and which areas could participate more to support you. An example of how structure and experience are related can be illustrated by familiar high school stereotypes. Think of the shy person, their shoulders are probably rounded and forward and their head is likely ‘heading’ downward. The bully, may have their shoulders pulled back, inflating or exaggerating the chest, trying to be a ‘head’ above everyone else. These two extremes show that the shy posture doesn’t allow the muscles in the front of the body to support that person and in the bully posture, the muscles in the back are shortened in service of putting on a ‘front.’ Again, movement is a function of how your unique life has been experienced and organized in your body. It reflects the successes and the challenges of each individual.

It is also my hope that we come to understand that the body isn’t against us. Our aches and pains are not a revolt to our greater intentions. They are our mammalian way of communicating with ourselves. I use mammalian because anyone who has been around babies knows that they communicate clearly without using words. If you have lived with other animals, dogs, cats etc. You understand when they are tired, hungry, hot, scared, all without words. Our bodies are the same. The body can’t text you, “hey, I’m overwhelmed and could really use some soothing” but it can offer up a headache, sore back, or other communications that ask for your kindness and care. Yes, disease and bugs exist and no one deserves illness. I am describing a communication style that happens all throughout the day if we are willing to listen-in the same way that we are willing to listen and appropriately respond to babies and other nonverbal communicators.

When we bring our bodies to a movement instructor and ask to be somehow ‘improved’ what many of us are really saying is, please understand my unique form and help me become a more fully expressed, healthy and mobile me. Only someone who is willing to invest in the fullness of that request can begin to attend to it. That person is much more than an abdominal crunch observer; they are a participant in your own evolution.

It is my hope that we actively pursue the profound and empowering ways the mind body connection serves us. A connection to the body is a connection to a constant source of information about your-self. It requires the willingness to include the nonverbal communication in daily life and interpret and respond to the messages you are sending to yourself. It has been called gut instinct or even intuition which literally means inner knowing.

Actors are practiced at creating and embodying different forms to represent the characters they are playing. We too are in the body that represents the character we have been ‘playing.’ Sometimes our shape is more a response to childhood conditions and less about who we actually are. Again, in the extremes it may be easier to illustrate; people that have been repeatedly overwhelmed or traumatized can be ‘stuck’ in shapes that would represent, reaction instead of response or resignation instead of engagement. A skilled and empathic movement instructor works with you to shed the skins or forms that no longer represent you and works towards inhabiting your authentic self.

There are many types of movement and movement instructors and I wouldn’t want it any other way. Personally, I’ve been to large gym aerobic classes, I explored power lifting, Bikram yoga, Pilates and am currently enamored with the GYROTONIC® Movement System. It has been my experience that when a movement instructor has matched my investment in the process of self growth and discovery, I have experienced my own revolution and evolution. For me, it has been a two person process that recognizes the relationship between psychological awareness and how it facilitates an authentic, dynamic body, and vice-versa.

Jill Ableson has been applying the rigors of depth psychology and its relationship to our physical-body organization since the early 90s. Her clients come to her when something feels ‘stuck’ in their bodies and, or in their lives. They are often at a crossroads and recognize a need for change.

SPRebodywork.com

Please phone 206-957- 7773 to schedule an appointment.

Mind Body Healing
by Martha Hope
July 2005

The DFA Movement
by Jill Ableson & Martha Hope
from Structural Integration, Sept 2002