ON COMING TO TERMS WITH THE “D” word ….
The “D” word? I am referring to “diagnosis”. This is something we don’t talk about much or at all in Feldenkrais® trainings. There are clearly good reasons for this.
The Feldenkrais Method can be described in many ways. That being said, in the big picture it is about maximizing human potential. As Moshe famously said, his hope is that those engaging in the work would “live their avowed and un-avowed dreams”. A diagnosis is a label and often a limiting one. The two are somehow incompatible.
More practically, many diagnoses focus on a problem part- an aching back or a frozen shoulder. Implicit here is that the part needs to be fixed. As Feldenkrais practitioners, at least on a physical level, we are looking to help our clients discover what we call better organized ways of moving through life. Non-Feldenkrais folk might better understand this as making all of our parts work better together. We learn that a difficulty in one area may be well be the result of what is going on elsewhere.
Following this train of thought, how could there be a “Feldenkrais protocol” for shoulder pain when there are many less than optimal ways of moving could be contributing.
I have to admit that entering my Feldenkrais training as a physical therapist- even one specifically looking for a “more holistic” way of working – it took me a while to be able think in a Feldenkrais way. I am sure one obstacle was that most clients who came to see me typically had some diagnosis and were expecting “to be cured”. To this day, on some level, I still prefer to work with clients who want to improve or learn, or re-learn some sort of skill. For me this more easily and directly fits into the Feldenkrais learning oriented model. Pain becomes something of a “middleman”. Still many of the people who seek my services and those of other Feldenkrais practitioners, have pain complaints. Over the years I have developed ways of helping folks expecting their “broken part to be fixed” to embrace an alternative process, the Feldenkrais Method.
How have I done this?
Two key ways follow …
by learning how to have a first conversation that both acknowledges where a new or potential client is coming from- often seeing a Feldenkrais practitioner as their “last resort” in dealing with what they clearly perceive as a medical problem – and introducing a more Feldenkrais way. Typically, clients have the expectation that a practitioner is familiar with their diagnosis. If it is something I am not familiar with, I will learn at least the basics ahead.
by learning that despite the fact that in trainings we are taught to stay away from the area of complaint, part of what makes folks feel you “get them” is to “touch their pain”. There is a proverbial “middle way”.
What kind of initial conversations do you have with the folks you are working with, especially one on one? Is this process easy and enjoyable or more of a challenge?
You have a client with shoulder pain. You decide that working with the ribs is a good place to begin because improved participation of the ribs in reaching will spare the shoulder from overworking. You begin to work and the client says- “there is nothing wrong with my ribs- my shoulder hurts?” What do you do? What do you say? Can you come up with a way to do what you want to do and avoid this situation?
Although this is not my personal experience most of the time, I hear over and over again about folks who go for a Feldenkrais session and don’t go back because either they don’t feel like the practitioner understood their problem, or the whole thing seemed sort of weird. Have you ever had that experience? Do you then ruminate about what went wrong?
I’ve been a Feldenkrais practitioner since 2003 and have seriously mentored trainees for the past 8 years. I see and have taken numerous advanced trainings where a group of people study something specific in depth. I see plenty of business coaching out there including an excellent program aimed at hands on practitioners.
What I have not seen offered is individual coaching where you get personalized support in becoming the confident and competent practitioner whose clients come back again and again. And so, I am launching my “A Second Approximation” coaching program to meet that need.
You can read more about it here.