S2EP5 当一个禅修的按摩师妈妈开始学习费登奎斯【英文】
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Okay, we're doing this. Okay. Okay, so we have Indira here. Introduce yourself, maybe? Okay, my name is Indira Rampersad. I'm currently a practicing massage therapist. What else do you want to know? I don't know. How would you... What's important to you? What's...

part of your identity? What is your meaning of life? Oh, these are big questions. Wow. Okay, well, I also practice, I'm also a yoga instructor.

And I have a degree in psychology from University of Manitoba. I wouldn't say any of these are really part of my identity, but they're things that I've done. Experienced. They're things I've experienced. And I guess something that's really important to me is also just I'm a practicing meditator, like in Tibetan Buddhism. That's a big part of my life as well. Yeah. Yeah.

See, there's already a lot of information I never knew about you. Okay. Yeah. And we're in the same Kelowna Feldenkrais teacher training program. So let's start from how did you get into Feldenkrais? You said it's your father introduced you? Yeah. Yeah. I was in, I was starting massage school and that was 23 years ago. And my father,

invited me to this class. He said he thought that I might like it and my father rarely invited me to things like that. So I thought okay, I'm gonna go check this out and see what it's all about and it was a Feldenkrais class that Giselle St. Hilaire taught. She's my teacher in Winnipeg who is a very talented, skilled practitioner in Feldenkrais and

Yeah, so I went to the class and it was all, it was just very unique. I'd never experienced anything like it. And that was my introduction to it. And so I just went to that whole series and then I continued for a little while and I left for a little bit and got into the Alexander technique pretty deeply for a number of years. And then

But my teacher was in New York, so I decided to come back to Feldenkrais because Giselle was here. And then as I continued to study with her, I started to realize the differences between the Alexander Technique and the Feldenkrais Method. That's an interesting topic. Yes. Yeah? Yeah. And so...

Yeah, I just realized that it's so much deeper and the Feldenkrais Method is really about

understanding yourself very deeply and about learning how to learn. Yeah, yeah. I never attended any learning for Alexander technique, but there, Alexander and Moshe were like contemporaries and they talked to each other. Yes, well, Moshe Feldenkrais was a student of Alexander's. Oh, okay, yeah. So there are some similar principles in the Alexander technique.

one of them is in ambition so with a habit that you have uh-huh you can't just say I'm not gonna do it okay you have to stop bring awareness to what you're doing before you do it and have the new

action in place. So you can't just stop. You have to have a new way to do it. That's the inhibition. That's the inhibition. So there's that similarity and just that like the awareness aspect of it is also very similar. Well it is. That's the same. That's the same. And Alexander like Moshe um

They both healed themselves. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And it was through self-observation. So Alexander studied himself for like seven years in a mirror and came up with this method, which was huge, like life-changing for me too, in the sense that it helped with some hip pain that really nothing else was able to help me with. Okay. Yeah. So I'd gone, I'd had an accident and...

had this chronic hip pain and went to the physios and the chiropractor and nothing was helping it at all. And I intuitively, I just knew that it wasn't right. Like I would get exercises from an athletic therapy therapist from it and then I would do them and the pain would get worse. And I just thought, no, I don't think this is the right thing for me. This isn't really working. But so yeah. So then that's, um,

I don't know how long after you did the Alexander study did the hip pain really? Yeah. You know, it was basically I would do these week-long workshops in Nebraska. Oh, wow. Yeah. And it was like, it was so amazing because you just get completely immersed in it. Kind of like our training that we're doing right now. Yeah.

everything would be Alexander so I was constantly thinking about my head-neck relationship and the length and and man I was floating like I have never felt like that yeah light it was light it was light and everything was effortless so there is definitely some you know

very, very important principles in the Alexander Technique as well. It's helped me tremendously. But I didn't, you know, it was very simplistic. Like they're talking about the head and neck as the primary control, which it is, right? You want to have that free and long and everything long and wide. Mm-hmm.

And you refer to that before you go into any movement. So the way you do that is you have an awareness of the lens of your head and neck. Yes. And then you want to keep that awareness and keep the lens. Yes. And you notice what happens as you go into movement. So that very...

Place like where you begin to initiate a new movement you notice what you do with your head and your neck Yeah, and then most people have a subtle contraction So they like pull their head back and down slightly before every movement so you start if you like if you're able to

you know notice that and then continue to keep your head like they he would say forward and up as you go into a movement you're like actually lengthening and you're staying open and free and all your joints because the head and neck is the primary control as Alexander talked about it but does it have to be forward and up up like is that

Those are the directions. There's like very simple directions that he talks about. Okay. And that's one of them for the head and the neck. Like the neck is free. Yeah.

Head goes forward and up. Spine is long. The back is wide. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And that helps with your hip. And that helped. And that helped everything. Yeah. Cool. And I kind of got into like an altered state from doing that for a week. It was like really good. It was like that was the first time I had this experience of having no separation between me and the rest of the family.

the world was through doing these work week-long workshops with one teacher in particular who was a mentor of mine his name was Mio Morales who's also a really incredible teacher yeah yeah so yeah that was that part and then yeah coming into this it's really a different it's really different because my understanding is deepening right like at the foundation of

of the Feldenkrais method is the idea of relationship. The importance of relationship, understanding relationship.

relationship of different body parts yes yeah and everything it's everything so this is like for me once you start to understand how things work you start to see that this is it's all like all of life is about relationship right like right relationship yeah between one another yeah with the earth and nature like everything like what is right relationship

Yeah, I think I started with the simplistic idea of its relationship about your body, like what you just said, your head and neck, and maybe your hip and your shoulder. But then there's also more abstract bodily relationship of like, we talked about diagonal of your shoulder to the opposite hip.

But then there's also even more abstract relationships like your forward and back side, which part is in your attention and how your relationship is with the environment, the air, the temperature, the sunlight and the ground is a super huge one.

Right, relationship with the ground. My understanding about the relationship thing is really expanding. And then when you're entering into the FI, function integration side, it's one person's relationship with another person. And that is a really huge difference than what I'm used to. It's so profound, right? And learning...

like developing that sensitivity and the ability to make finer and finer distinctions and to be able to stay right so this idea of neutrality to be able to stay neutral in any situation and then be uh spontaneous right like if we're with ourselves then we can in any moment if we're present and in neutral

which is available, we can do anything we want. We can move in any direction and really respond to what the environment is asking of us or what, you know, like what we want. You're relaxed, but it's the...

Giselle was saying like relaxed alertness, right? You are relaxed, but you have the alertness to move, to do whatever movement you need. And that's kind of related with Moshe's martial art background of like self-defense and reaction. And

And also he would say like lovemaking. Right? Like it goes into like every, how do you, how does that happen? Yeah. Like these most, what did he say? How did he say it in one of his videos we watched? It was like one of the most disgusting things.

wonderful, incredible things that we could ever do in our lives. Something like that. I didn't remember the disgusting part. Something about how every child never wants to think about that with their parents. But that relationship to the other. In that way too, it's like how do we move in that dance of

of relating to one another. Right, right, right. I think it's the potent self in the book. In the end, there's a case study of a man who has trouble with his sex life. That's right. Yeah, and it's about like compulsive sex

behavior that is like a really a pattern of living that he has. But then you got to start from this movement side of noticing when are you doing something out of compulsion rather than your spontaneity. Right. And then your own agency. Yeah. Yeah. And wasn't it, wasn't there something about how he had to have like, he felt like he had to have like these

very specific conditions for it to happen in. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And if those conditions, if anything wasn't quite right, that he just wouldn't work for him. Yeah. And so he was never able, those, he was never able, he was never able to come into that place of potency in a sexual way and then

But then Moshe took him into that. He was like, okay, he stopped him. He's like, okay, you can't have sex. You don't do that. You just like do what his regular thing. He took him into that pattern of like, okay, don't do it. You can't. And then he was able to just relax into his own pattern of like never going all the way. And then that it's almost like reverse psychology. Hey,

It's also this thing about how to stop your old habit because the old habit of compulsive sex, compulsive lovemaking is actually inhibiting him from getting what he wants. Right, and his wife too. Right, the relationship again. So the stopping of the old habit.

It's interesting, like Feldenkrais goes into marriage counseling. Does he? Yeah! Like this example, right? Yeah, in that book, there was lots there. There's so much there. And he understands the human psyche so deeply, right? Like, it just astounds me all the time. He really understands the human psyche and the body. Yeah. Yeah.

Now I want to go back to your timeline. After you started doing regular ATM with Giselle, what was the turning point? Like, "This is huge, this is so different." Do you remember any moment like that?

Oh, it was, I think, yeah, that's hard to, it was 23 years ago when I did my first class. So I can't really remember other than like what I do remember really standing out for me. Yeah.

what's her enthusiasm like Giselle's enthusiasm yeah was incredible so I loved that and I got this sense of like learning something completely new like what I liked about it was that these movements were something that I had never ever done in my life yeah and it was almost like this really cool puzzle that I had to discover like you

you know, you're giving verbal instructions on how to move your limbs and then you have to kind of translate that into an action. Yeah. So there was something really pleasurable and fulfilling in making those translations within myself. But what I did start to notice like over time is that, um,

there was a real correlation to my mood like the more that i did them so i remember one time she did like i think it was like a 15 day challenge okay and we would wake up every morning we'd do atms every morning it was like seven in the morning yeah and that was horrible for giselle because she doesn't like waking up in the morning and i would walk there i'd get up early and i'd walk over and

to the yoga studio and I just remember like how how good I felt like my mood and the feeling of stability and then what I started the more I did it like the more I realized that I can be the master of my own destiny and that I can learn things like whatever it is that I want I actually I'm developing the skills to learn what I want yeah and I'm learning I'm

um like about my own agency you know and learning about self-respect and what that really means like coming from like a from the inside of like what does it feel like to really respect myself and to not not be looking externally for affirmation um

And to really listen, just deeply listen to myself and what's enough, what's far enough. You know, it's like everything's a process. And we're so... I find, like, in our culture, we are very...

goal oriented. Yeah. And this, so it's hard to let go of that ambition to just accomplish whatever it is. So this has been like a real process of like, yeah, you can have your goal, but the process is really, really important too. And staying in that process. So yeah, I feel like I'm still learning like this, you know, like standing on my own two feet, seeing where I've been dependent or leaning too much on other people and,

Right? And just finding where is that balance where I'm actually supporting myself. Right? Like really supporting myself, standing on my feet, knowing where my pelvis is. Yeah. And like...

we did in that contact dance class. Contact improv. That contact improv was so cool, right? Finding that place where you have the support of someone else, you commit, but you're not burdening, right? You commit to your partner, but you're not burdening your partner because you have support for yourself. You know if they can't take it, you can get yourself out of it. Yeah. And you always have the freedom and respect each other for that. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, so you're talking about ATM in a more

It's a psychological way. It's not just like a practical utility of stopping this pain or getting stronger to do certain sports. You really were experiencing this internal change. Yeah. And it goes together, right? Like I talk about this, I talk about the psychology of it more than the physical aspect of it because...

The physical is the obvious part. Like everyone, I don't know. For me, my psychology is more...

I don't know what it is. Like, yeah, I feel better physically, but really it's like the whole, there's a reason that I feel better psychologically. It's because of the physical use in it. It's one thing, but I like that part. Yeah. You know, I've got a psych degree, so. And, and like maybe for listeners who don't quite know about ATM, I'm guessing that what brought you that sense of self-respect, those, the sense of agency and like of ambition is the way, way,

the way we learn in ATM lessons where you are like instructed to rest as much as you need you don't always need to follow the instruction you take care of yourself do things as little as you can because we know when you start with little but clarified movement we can in the end learn the bigger more challenging things so it is like the

methodology of how we do ATM that brought you that way. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And the instructions, right? So like something that Giselle will always say is, you know, okay, so notice your, you know, notice how you're standing, right? And then, okay, so, and then notice if you, you know, say you, are you standing evenly on both feet? Yeah. Notice your breathing. Notice if you change your breathing.

when you notice you're breathing. Right. Notice if you change your standing when you start to begin and try to balance it. Are you trying to even yourself out? Are you judging? Like, are we judging ourselves? So this is something that's come through...

Like, I think I attribute that to Giselle's teaching. Yeah. That I started to learn, like, to see all the judgments, right? Mm-hmm. Like, and to be able to... And then through the practice of the doing it as well. Yeah. Right? Like, the more ATMs you do, the more you start to let go of that. It's like...

Yeah, so what? Like, that's my habit. And so what? I can change. Like, I'm not like that forever. Yeah. And, you know, and so that's where I also feel like, okay, I start to have more compassion. I can have more compassion for myself. I can have more compassion for other people because we're just all doing the best we can with our conditioning, really, and our habits that we've picked up from ourselves.

from our lives, right? And we all have different traumas in our life. Everybody, you can't get out of this. You can't get born without that. Yeah, I think the social norm is pretending everyone's healthy and capable and should do all these goals and achieve and able to compete with peers when in reality everyone's different and we're hiding all this trauma and struggle and pain

to appear normal, right? Yeah. And then it's so easy to judge other people because they're just so messed up. Yeah, right? But I'm good. Yeah. So did you see how that, like, in any...

situation in life that you were like what you just said this when you notice you're judging others yep yeah any other example of how this kind of experience just spill over to your daily life out of the classroom yeah I think with parenting parenting yeah yeah with parenting so and I'm still working on that sure that's like

the hardest job that I've ever... It's not a job. It's like, I don't know what it is. It's a role. But like, so for me in parent, like I, I guess the way I was raised, there was a lot of, um,

discipline and a physical discipline. And so I would find, and I had this idea like the children are just supposed to be really obedient. Like that's just the way they are. Like, and so my kid wasn't at all. Uh huh.

Obviously, like I'm finding out that that's really normal, like he's just normal. Yeah. But so, you know, being able to regulate myself like as so the more that I'm able to come into my own sense of self,

and feel stability in my system, I don't have to freak out anymore because it's like I'm in my own power. Yeah. So that's been huge. And that's just coming in this last, like this last year of training. And I've been working on this for a long time because there's like triggers, right? Like there's certain triggers that come and then all of a sudden I'm like just a maniac. Yeah.

Why are you doing that? Yeah, I'm just like screaming and you know, I'm just this crazy person that's like it's super embarrassing and horrible and humiliating and like terrible, right? Like as a parent, you never want to be doing those things or yelling at your kid or... But...

Yeah, so that's one of the things that's come. Yeah, just like more, I think it's just pervading every element of my life. And then I'm still learning like so much, right? Because I'm really like learning how to relate to other people. Like I feel like I'm still learning, right? Because there's so many, so much armoring that I have that I didn't know that I had. Like I thought I was all good in like so many ways. And then that last segment or two segments ago,

where all of this stuff came and I like had that I had a breakdown in class one of the one of the ATMs and it was really intense and about after I was done

I noticed all of these things that I do with my shoulders, right? The second I get so close, certain distance from another person, all of a sudden I'm contracting, right? You get closer to other people, your self-defense. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right? So learning, I'm practicing all the time.

to just try to stay open. But that's like, those habits are harder to break through. Yeah, this segment, actually before segment, the advanced training with Giselle, I had a moment in the lesson, ATM lesson, we were talking about like how

feeling the ground is like water floating you and you're having this kind of floaty relationship with the ground. And when I got up, I feel I'm having this floaty relationship with the air and like everything around me. Like I feel I'm being surrounded by a membrane of water.

water floating me and then there's people like after the class people were walking around right and then I I was in such a sensitive state of my body that I could actually feel when a person getting closer to me maybe like five meters away from me then

I feel a nervousness. Yes, that's what I'm talking about. And if this person comes from the left side, my left body is nervous a bit, and a person from the right side, and I feel, yeah, in that direction there's some nervousness. Yet, with that sensitivity,

I could still kind of keep calm because there's this water membrane between us that I feel when this person is approaching me, I still have some space to choose how I react to like if I don't want to engage, I cannot engage. If I want to engage, I can walk to them with my own pace and not

fully being driven by this external. Like even after the class, I was walking on the street and crossing the red line and people walking towards me, next to me, and I was feeling this wave of emotional change and bodily change. But then I was still, I was actually not being too antisocial, but instead I became more open when talking to other people. Yeah.

I don't know, just a kind of calmness making me feel I won't freak out saying whatever I say or whatever they respond. Yeah, that was a pretty rare experience, but I think it's so real. It's just I don't always have that sensitivity of,

all the things happening around me how my body is actually reacting but after that class i had that clear sense yeah yeah that's so profound when we have those yeah experiences what's the word you use like alternative state yeah yeah like an altered state yeah yeah yeah yeah it's kind of and there's something about a flow state too that happens like i remember

One of the Alexander workshops that I did, and we were doing stuff in a class together, and we were doing, like, he was partnering up people. Okay. And this was happening to people where they were, like, taking on the other person's thoughts. Like, they melded.

And, like, it was, like, this boundary between the two people. They were, like, they were totally freaked out because, like, there was a moment where they were each other. Like, they were looking at each other. What are they doing? I can't remember what the class was. It was, like, I don't remember what. We were doing some stuff where you...

i don't know look at your hand i don't know what it was i don't remember but these things were happening it was all exercises with each other and then things would just happen like things would just fall into place like this one woman she was looking for a wool rug and she walked across the street and there was a garage sale and the exact kind of rug she was looking for was right there and she got it for five bucks like the super expensive wool rug like things like when you get into the flow state things start

falling into place in like the most unique way. Wow, I haven't yet experienced that, but sounds wonderful. Yeah, it's like manifestation. It's like magical, right? Because you're like aligning with everything like once we align with...

Yeah. Is there any spiritual component in Alexander Technique? Or it's just like teaching movement and awareness? No. Yeah, there's nothing spiritual about it. And there's nothing spiritual about the Alexander Technique either, per se. It's just physical. But it's like, how do we stay open and how do we stay present? I mean, that's the practice. I mean, that's like any meditation practice, really, is being present moment to moment and making finer and finer distinctions.

And in fact, the word Buddha, like, comes from, like, it means to learn. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Interesting. I know. I was just reading this book. There's a synchronicity. So I'm reading this book called The Paleochora Discourses, and it was written by a man named Namjel Rinpoche, who was a great teacher in Canada. Okay. He was recognized as an awakened being by some people in, like, in...

in Tibet, like by the Karmapa. He was recognized. And he remembers being... We're getting off topic here, but I'll just tell you the story. He remembers choosing being born. Like where... He wanted to choose a family in the States and he picked this family. And they were actually this couple, but they were honeymooning in Niagara Falls. And they were actually... They weren't American. They were Canadian. But he was on the other side. Anyway...

So he couldn't choose the right, he didn't choose the right country. But anyway, he ended up being Canadian. And he's actually the man who brought Cho Gyeom Changpa to North America. Okay. However, I was reading his book and after this last workshop that we did, the last segment, and I was reading that part about like Buddha and how it, that's what it means to learn. And we are learning to learn. So I think that's like, we're Buddha-ing. Yeah, we're Buddha-ing. Okay. For Paul.

Yeah, I want to also ask you like how do you compare or what do you see the relationship between Feldenkrais and meditation? How can I compare it? Is that what you said? How do I compare it? Well... Or how do they relate? How do they relate? Yeah, there's a lot. Okay, well...

Your posture has a lot to do with your ability to concentrate. Okay. So you'll see people that have a really hard time sitting or, you know, upright or fidgety. It's because they're not comfortable in their body. So there is a relationship between our physical and our mind and our ability to concentrate are completely connected, right? So there's that relationship. In meditation, like there's so many different practices, but you're basically...

Training your mind you're you're constantly you're directing your awareness to a specific thing sure and you keep your awareness on that thing Sure, so that's I would say that's a relationship Yeah, like it's a similar similar practice attention. It's like awareness and attention Like some meditation is just on your breathing. So, you know, that's that could be like a whole, you know, we do that and

But some you require visualizations. So we also do that. Imagination. Imagination in the Feldenkrais method. So you use your imagination in some meditations. In some meditations, they have walking meditations. So you're noticing your body, how you lift your foot, move, step, you know. So you're doing everything with awareness. I think that, I think there's, and then making more distinctions. I think that is also a part. And also meditation.

changing up your patterns. Like my teacher, you know, would tell me, well, do it, you can do it this way or you can try doing something a different way, like try doing it multiple ways. Like say you get stuck in a pattern, you could try doing it another way in meditation. Well,

This is another story, but like on one of these retreats that I did, my body started doing these things, repetitive like movements, but it wasn't like I wasn't doing it like with my mind. My body was doing these things and I was like, this is really weird. Like,

I'm doing these things and he's like, "Okay, well that's..." He's like, "Can you control it?" I'm like, "Yeah." He's like, "Okay, well just do it a little differently the next time." Like just control it. Don't do it the same, but do it a little differently. So like, yeah, it's... I guess that's... Yeah, what else? I don't know. It's hard to say. Do you find meditation helpful with Feldenkrais?

I think that they help each other. Yeah, I think so. I think Feldenkrais helps my meditation. Yeah. I think more than anything. Okay. Just because of my body, I'm able to stay easy in my body, which makes a difference in my ability to be calm. But they kind of build, they help each other, I'd say. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I'm asking because I kind of sometimes jokingly advertise Feldenkrais as a movement meditation. Yeah. Because I have trouble just sit there and meditate and concentrate. It's...

I can do it, but I don't enjoy it. And therefore it's hard to continuously doing it. Versus Feldenkrais, it's much more fun, more variety, but still I'm in this high quality attention state and getting back to my body and not being bothered by all the monkey thoughts. So, yeah. It's way more fun, I think. It's way more fun. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So why...

What took you like 20 years before starting the teachers training? Oh my gosh Yeah, I wanted to do the training a long time ago and there was yeah, and there was a training in Quebec So that was probably maybe 15 years ago. Okay, and there was a training in Quebec and

I don't remember the name of the teacher, but then they were only doing it in French and I don't speak French. Yeah. And then there hasn't been another one till now that I've known about. Okay. So, and yeah, so that's why maybe there has been, but I don't think there's been one for a really long time in Canada. Yeah. Yeah.

I think there was like something in Vancouver a while ago. Jeff Holler. Yeah. Jeff Holler was, he did one in Vancouver. Yeah. Okay. I don't know. What was that? Geez. I missed that one. Okay. So you were just waiting for a chance. But I was kind of like, I was hoping, I was really hoping that they would do one in Winnipeg. Yeah. Like I kept asking Giselle, well, you, could you think we could do one? Like, you think we could have a training? And I actually emailed Julie before I even knew who she was. Oh, I asked her to come to a training in Winnipeg.

Why did you ask her? Why? Because Giselle really, that's her teacher. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. Really admires Julie Peck. Yeah. So, yeah, so I was kind of waiting. I thought, okay, because then I had to, like, I was waiting and waiting and...

Then I had a kid and I'm like, oh, well, I'm not going anywhere. Right. And then, yeah, but that never happened. Okay. It never happened in Winnipeg, but it happened in Kelowna. So this is pretty sweet. Got you. Yeah. So you first became a massage therapist just because the training was easier to get? No, not at all. No, I was a massage therapist before I knew. I was in my training when I discovered Feldenkrais. So I actually wanted to be a massage therapist. Okay. Okay.

And I chose that, like, so I, you know, I studied psychology and I'm like, oh, it's just missing something. Like, it just didn't, it seemed like, oh, it's trying to be a science, but it's not really a science and it's not really, this doesn't make sense to me, like their approach to a human being. So then I was like, I went traveling for eight months through Central America and then I thought, no, I want to use my hands in my profession. I'm going to use my hands. Oh, wow.

And so then I went into massage school. Was anything in Central America in that trip that inspired you? Like did you... Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just... We went on this hike and...

we got lost and I was it was like crazy my boyfriend cut his foot opens and I was like terrified that we were gonna die and then we and that we were barefoot we came down and I just we made it back and I was like sitting I was like just so relaxed and I was sitting in this hammock and I just remember like looking at my hands I actually they actually had deer ticks on them they were they had like these little ticks someone showed me anyway but it wasn't good but

And then I just realized, I was like, I want to use my hands in my profession. And that's how I decided to do that. I didn't decide on massage school right away. I thought I'd maybe go into making furniture. Okay. And then I thought, oh no, I'll feel bad about all the trees I waste trying to become a carpenter, like a furniture maker. But I also decided during that trip that I wanted to learn how to drum. So it was kind of like

you know what, that whole trip, that eight months of traveling without working was kind of like a deconditioning program where I started to learn what I liked because I had gone to university after high school. I didn't really know who I was or what I liked or what I wanted to do. And then, so I realized that I wanted to drum. And then I ended up drumming in an African percussion ensemble for 10 years. And that was really great. It was so amazing. Met so many very beautiful people. And I decided to go into massage school. And then I did massage and,

And I was still felt like there's something I don't understand, like something just doesn't, it just didn't quite, it didn't make sense. It was like the whole, there was missing the whole, like I'm kind of, I don't know, intuitively it just didn't, it was like really dissecting and doing special tests and like it didn't make sense.

Is it like it's not as effective on your clients as you want? Yeah, it's like you never know if it's gonna work or if it's not gonna work and like I don't know. It just I didn't understand I didn't understand what I wanted to understand in the way that I wanted to understand it But I didn't know what it was that I was missing you were just not but I just felt like I'm missing something and then I went and studied in Thailand and

and like learn Thai massage and there was something more there for me like that was like that made a lot more sense because you do the whole body and there's lots of mobilizations and it's connecting like but I didn't again I didn't know like what it was that I preferred about that other than it's like more holistic like you're working on the whole person not just one shoulder or something explain how is Thai massage different than the massage you were doing before so like in massage school

You you know you're using oil and you're so say someone comes in with a shoulder problem You're gonna you're gonna look at them. You're gonna test their shoulder. Oh, it's like maybe you know, um, oh you identify Okay, it's supraspinatus. Okay, it's supraspinatus. I'm gonna just work on that muscle Of course, I'll warm up everything around there, but I'm gonna work on that muscle and then it should get better. Okay, but I

Yeah, it just didn't make sense. And it didn't really like it just I mean, sometimes it would work, but then they would come back and like, okay, it just wasn't like I think massage for me, like massage therapy is great if you want to relax and you want to come in and like feel nice. That's great. But if you want to like heal something, I don't know if it's really that effective. I mean, it helps lots of people. I shouldn't say that. But I think that there's more.

I think there's more effective ways like Feldenkrais. So like seeing Giselle for an FI is so much more profound. Like I learned so much more and I feel so much better than after going for a massage. So that's why. And then, so yeah, so I went into that and then, you know, I just studied so many different things. Like I was, I've been like searching for,

Like learning how to help people better. Yeah. Yeah. And like I studied yoga and I was like, no, there's something I don't understand. Like I studied all different kinds of yoga, did trainings. And what I realized is that I didn't know how to customize a yoga class for everyone.

individuals like I didn't have the ability to see oh that person that's not going to work for them like I didn't know how to do that I couldn't see that I don't know any yoga teachers that actually can because I did an experiment and I studied with one like great yoga teacher like who started Ashtanga yoga in the city of Winnipeg and he couldn't see that in me so he obviously couldn't teach that and then you know I studied yeah I've studied with lots and so that's where

with the Feldenkrais method it's like actually the person is seeing me they're seeing what I do they're seeing my body and how it moves and what's okay and what's not okay because we're developing like such fine-tuned sensitivity and ability to see people and their skeletal their skeleton and their patterns right yeah

There's nothing as profound that I've ever found as far as understanding a human being. Right. That ties back to what we talked about earlier. It's not just a movement.

It's your relation of different parts of body, your relation with environment and people. And then there's this psychological side of how it change how you perceive yourself and how to do things. And yeah, it is profound in many different ways. Yeah. It's like, how do we become the best person that we can? Right. Yeah.

I guess probably in yoga you would kind of talk about that the spiritual side of how to become better version of yourself

Well, there's lots of rules and lots of precepts. And, you know, don't steal. Don't do, you know, like, be honest. Oh, okay. Be generous. Okay. And be clean. Okay. And, you know, like, there's that. A little bit like religious rules. It's like, yeah. It's like, okay, yeah, that's great. That's very true. Those are really, really good things. But, I don't know. There's just something about...

being able to be flexible and making our own rules and like listening to our own moral compass because maybe there's a time where you can not going to shower every day or like and not and you should you feel bad about that or that your room's a mess right or you're tired and you're not waking up at five in the morning and I mean I do believe in the importance of discipline um and I also think that there's room for us to also

figure that out for ourselves like what's the right for ourselves and I There's nothing really that's like kind of honed me into that process as much of like my own process of growth and understand self understanding as much as this has and

Because everything else comes from the outside. Like all the other things, it's like, do this, do that, do that. It's like, but wait, but like, okay, so now tell me what to do next. Right? Okay, well, now what do I do? I don't know what to do now. Well, okay, who needs to tell us that? Yeah, it's kind of dependent on authority. Right. That's it. And that's like...

Yeah. We need to, like, I think, you know, for us all to really become, like, masters of our own destiny, our minds, and make decisions based on what's right for us. Mm-hmm. You know? And what does he say? Feldenkrais says, um...

like one of the biggest things that we can do is to know what we want to do. Right? You know what you want, then you can do what you want. Yeah. And, but to even like in your profession, like to know what it is, what do you want to do with your life? Right? Like that's the hardest, I think the hardest, biggest question that many of us face.

need to figure out it's like what is it out of all the millions of options that we have like what is our what is your real calling like what's your yeah yeah I think what you're saying there are actually two steps the first step is allow yourself to do your own thing like regain this agency for yourself instead of following the rules or authorities and kind of relaxed about being disciplined

which is kind of scary for from my cultural upbringing like what i can just sleep on this class and the teacher will accept that like that's ridiculous yeah it's like i'm paying for this yeah just creating a bunch of lazy ass on the floor but then once you have that stuff and there's some deep

about like self-acceptance, accepting what your limitations are, accepting the circumstance, accepting the world is not always perfect and don't fight with it too much. And then the second step is what you're just saying, get to know what you really want because now all this cultural programming and conditioning can be removed or at least relaxed a little bit. And then you have the freedom to

explore this is what i want this is something that i actually feel good about i still feel it's

Like what I just said, it's kind of ridiculous that we just allow people to sleep there. Like the class today we were doing the ATM, like maybe in 30 people only five were actually following the instruction from beginning to the end. And all the other people were just laying there and resting, resting in different ways. Will you be able to achieve anything?

Well, no. Moshé Feldenkrais achieved something. So many Feldenkrais practitioners achieved miracle results for helping people. For now, I'm still having a little bit of self-doubt on that, like, "Am I just gonna make me lazier?"

I think it's not the only thing, right? Like you are lazy for a good reason, but you're not stuck at your lazy habit, lazy pattern. And is it lazy or is it just listening to yourself? Like this, you know, this, this judgment of not doing what we're not doing. Cause part of the lesson, right? Like in Feldenkrais is you rest when you need, right? Yeah.

And so like is that lazy or is it that you just need a rest? But like don't you think there's sometimes it's hard to for yourself to even tell am I lazy or am I needing a rest or like... Like I feel recently when I'm more becoming more and more Feldenkrais-y in my life like I'm doing things so slow I stopped planning a lot of things which makes trouble for other people to coordinate, right?

I can push my head, I can really push it to plan things and arrange things better and do things faster, scoop everything into my bag then go. Slowly paying attention to my movement and not stretching and just do one thing at a time. I enjoy the slower pace of life but then am I being less productive than I can be?

I don't know. It just feels still a little bit panicky for me to adopting this slower rhythm for my life. You know what's interesting? So when you're talking about it, I'm seeing you get panicky when you talk about the way that you're supposed to be going. But when you talk about like the relaxed and you're enjoying like filling your bag, you look like really happy. So like, I guess my question is, is like,

How do you feel? Like, how are you enjoying your life right now compared to the way you enjoyed your life before? Right. I think in my mind there's a little bit of

programmed conflict of if I'm enjoying it, that means I'm not doing enough. If you're enjoying it, that means you're being lazy. You're not living up to your full potential. You're not using all your abilities. And what else can I say?

I think you're having this really good observation. And that's funny, like we're doing this thing of not only listening to the words, but also observing how this person is saying it. That's what Julia said in the class. You're really reading a lot from another person's body language. I think there are several things of concern. Like, can I just be selfishly, quote unquote, selfishly only paying attention to what I feel good?

Because I can feel good, maybe, by doing something that is counterproductive, that is harming others or not good for the environment, and I feel good about it, right? So it's feeling good enough to justify what I'm doing here, including being lazy, being slow, being lack of planning. Well, I think there's a moral compass in there. That's where we have to refer to our own moral compass, because only we can know

whether what we're doing is right or wrong, right? And, like, that's where those decisions have to be made. And, of course, like, you know, I don't think that it's a good way to go, like, just to only think about ourselves, right? Like, I know it's good for me, but there's, I think, something that happens, like, reciprocity when we're open and we want to...

Like, I'm assuming that you're in this because you want to help other people. Sure. So you're already like on the right path of like wanting to support other people, right? So then...

I don't see that as being a problem if you learn to make, if we learn to make ourselves happy and find that balance of like, then only, we can only just like set a really good example of what living a good life is. Yeah. Like a good, happy, healthy and productive life because you,

You know, the more that I do this work, I find that I can actually hold a lot more things at the same time. Like before, I'd be dropping a lot of balls. Let's put it that way. Okay. And now I'm able to, I don't drop so many balls, like being more clear about what I can, what I can't, and like following up and remembering the other, like actually bringing, keeping those other things

Parts right those other parts keeping them unaware my awareness enough to make that phone call like oh actually that's not gonna work or You know to just make the phone call like so I think yeah I don't know. I don't think I think that I think that that's maybe just a process of

of like what you're going through is a process of exploration of finding what that balance is for you yeah yeah that feels good and where you can relax into just being just being you just being with you and letting go of all of those like all of the the the cultural

conditioning yeah yeah yeah we've all been through right we've all had that conditioning yeah and we're still unraveling all this yeah yeah i i don't i said i'm a little panicky but on the other hand i also know like it's just starting this is just the start of this experiment i don't know exactly is it going to be a total failure or not so for now i'm just

opening my eyes and see what is actually different. Like what you just said about this used to be dropping balls. I think that's

can be improved by now when someone asks me to do something or like do you want to go to this and that and I really take time to feel like do I really want to do it and if I'm not sure I'll say let me tell you tomorrow yeah like make decision later rather than just answering a quick response

That's the social conditioning like yes, of course. Yes. I'd like to yes I'd like to support and or join you and be a good friend and blah blah blah But then towards there I'm dreading like I don't wanna do you're like, oh, I know. Yeah. Yeah. It's like oh no Do I have to go now? Oh

yeah I know I'm finding out that too it's like okay like there's a part there's like this fine balance right of like committing because there's something that really is beautiful about committing to something even though and I often don't want to do but then I go and then I'm like oh I'm so happy that I went yeah right there's this balance about that and like and then giving giving ourselves enough space hey yeah and it's also and

I think I'm in the process of letting others know. I start from my partner. I'm more and more telling him like, I don't know exactly what's going to be. I don't know exactly if I want to do that. I'll let you know later. Yeah. And letting them know that I'm in this kind of a slower process. Yeah. Yes. You got to deal with this thing.

messy uncertainties but when I say I'm gonna do it I'm actually gonna do it so yeah that's right certainty there yeah yeah yeah yeah I know we're like those annoying people it's like uh but yeah but also great because you know

When you're out, you're really fun to be with. I'm fully in there. There's no conflict in my mind. I shouldn't have come. Why did I? Yeah, exactly. You're there. You're ready to be there. Yeah.

It makes it better. It's like more quality, right? Or quantity. Yeah, and we talk about quality all the time. Doing ATM, like you don't want to just do the movement using your old way and forcing it and all that. You want to do it really in a light way. Like today when we're doing FI and one part was like lifting the student's leg and Julie is like, do you feel light? My partner is like,

it feels lighter. And she said, do you feel light? Meaning you don't hold any breath. It's not enough to just be lighter. You're really, really going for that super...

easy, easy quality of movement without effort. And you want to have a clear idea what that is, which is hard. Like when I started doing FI, I usually just tend to overwork and lift. It really takes time to first learn from doing ATM of how I can move myself really, really lightly. And then going into FI,

trusting that that quality exists even if i can't find it right right now yeah but i'm not stopping there yeah yeah as or as moshe would say as if being lifted by angels wings like what if what would that feel like oh you know that's so easy to imagine yeah like that's uh that's i think the effortless lightness that is possible that i've had experience with you know that i haven't

I haven't learned it, but like to know that this is possible to feel that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That light. So do you feel being a massage therapist, it helps you to do FI because you're used to touching people and moving people? I think maybe in some respects, yes. You know that I, you know, I'm at least comfortable with people's bodies and I've manipulated them and, um,

Yeah. And then there's also, but then there's also the drawback of like having bad habits, like different habits and ways of working with people. Okay. Right. Like where you're not really, you're not working skeletally. So that's been more like, that's been a real learning curve for just to learn, to connect with the skeleton and another huge one. And it's not just for me. I know it's for everybody, but it's like the idea of going to,

with what works okay right like because what do we do as massage therapists or everybody oh that's broken that's not working i'm gonna go right there and i'm gonna make that part work yeah well that doesn't actually work it's like here's a little secret everybody

i remember this you got to go to the place that works really well and help that expand that out so that's like the hugest like for me like the hugest revelation and the work there yeah that right yeah this expanding out is really the process we're looking for it's not just mirroring the left to the right if the right side is a better side but instead

what Julie used to wear was like coloring. So you feel the right side, this very easy, light, powerful quality. But then you imagine it is like spreading out the color towards the left side. Instead of just making the left side doing the thing that the right side is doing. Right. That won't work. Yeah. Yeah. And then the connection, right? Like staying connected to the whole person. Like in massage, you don't do that.

yeah you just like focus on in on like one part or whatever part you're working on that's where your awareness is right what about Thai massage Thai massage is different you're definitely like you're thinking there's energy lines that you're working on and actually what's really cool about Thai massage um Tom Myers he works with fascia he's a fascial guy and he's actually like dissected all these you know dissect done tons of dissections and he's found

that there's fascial lines that actually follow the energy lines like the sen in the Thai massage. So that's really, I mean, I don't need to know that to believe it or to understand that, but many people like to know that, that there's a science behind it. Yeah.

But yeah, so you're working energy lines. So you're like working along all these lines and you're mobilizing everything. So that I think actually has been like very helpful because you start to feel different people's hips, how they move and you move them around and you start to see the limitations of like, you know, what different...

bodies have based upon how they use you know how they're arranged on the ground and and you've kind of seen that before when you were doing massage and now in Feldenkrais I said oh I know this yeah a little bit a little bit it's a it's a different lens you know I feel like there's still so much to know you know but sure yeah but maybe a little bit so do you feel after doing the Feldenkrais training you change how you do massage now

Yeah, definitely. I'm thinking about the whole person when I massage now. I'm working on the whole person. I'm thinking about their whole skeleton when I work on people. As much as I can. And with that thought, how would your hand work change? They still go the same, but I'm engaging with more.

So I'm trying to, I'm feeling, I'm intending to feel the whole person when I'm like using my hand and I'm massaging a leg, for example. Like I'm thinking about that through their pelvis and up through their spine and like all of that or like how their shoulder connects to their spine. Like if I pull their shoulder out, see how that relates to their neck and their spine. So I'm definitely working differently. Julie gave me that tip actually because I'm like, I don't know how to...

I don't know how to do massage and still do this. And like, I'm working at Thermaea, so I don't have the ability to, like, mostly I work there to just like play around with people. It's a spa. Okay. Yeah. So I can't just like change what I do. People are coming for a massage. They're like, what the hell is this? Yeah. But yeah, so I do it like that.

And then I add in some FI stuff in there sometimes. Or like an ATM, I'll put in part of an ATM if I think they need it. I'm basically experimenting. I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing. Yeah, I know many of our classmates are in this process of merging the new thing into their old system in their previous career. And yeah, how to do methods.

blend or just separate them yeah yeah so I get there will come a time when I just are you know I'm doing more pure pure functional integration yeah work do you see that like after graduation do you think you're gonna do some pure I really hope so yeah I really hope so yeah

I don't know if it will happen. You say hope. Yeah. Where is this hesitation from? Well, I mean, people need to want to come to me for that. Okay. Right? So it's a matter of like, yeah, like having the clientele that want to receive that. Yeah. Well, how did you build up your massage clientele? It was word of mouth. Okay. But then when I had Nathaniel, I let it go. And now it's been, it's a different, it's a different thing.

Like you kind of gave up your previous practice. Yeah, when I had Nathaniel, I let it go and then I went and then I started working because I had a child, like a baby and it was hard to work from my house. Okay. So then I started working at Thermaea. With the spa. That's the spa. Yeah. It's a Nordic spa. And so I have a few clients that I see at home. Mm-hmm.

But yeah, so a transition needs to happen where I start working more at home, less at Thermaea, getting more clients at home, you know, so. And then transitioning into Feldenkrais, like I don't even know how to do that yet. It's still in the process, hey? Yeah.

Well, you started teaching ATM and you got some students. I did. Yeah, I sure did. Yeah. So that's a good start. It's a good start. You know, you are capable of that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. I have some good friends that are really supportive. Is it compulsive or spontaneous? And they like it. Like, I might. Yeah. Yeah. They do like it. They do enjoy it. So, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, we'll see. We'll see what happens. I mean, all I can do is just keep putting it out there, right? Yeah. Yeah, hopefully. And maybe like Giselle has some clients and she cannot take... Yeah, she's like, I'm too busy. Right. Yeah, maybe. That'd be a way. Or at least from her perspective.

practice like advertised for you there's another practitioner Intel yeah maybe we'll see there's actually quite a few Feldenkrais practitioners in Winnipeg oh cool yep yeah yeah there's a couple more and then there's like an in that bun yell practitioner okay so there's some there's already some people that are doing the work in Winnipeg but yeah there's room I think there's room for more especially now as awareness grows and you know do you think you'll be much happier doing Feldenkrais more

Yeah, I think I will enjoy it more. I don't know if I'll be happier, but I'll enjoy doing that work more. What's the difference? Okay, continue, please. Yeah, I'll enjoy it because I think that it's more...

effective and it's more fun. It's like way more fun for me to do. Don't you think? It's kind of like this puzzle. Like it's like, okay, I'm get the puzzle. I'm like figuring this out and I'm learning about this person and I'm moving them and I'm feeling and yeah. So it's really like, I think it's really fun. And yeah, so it's just not so, it's not like, I feel like, yeah, it's just different. It's a different way of working where I'm engaged, more engaged and,

Yeah. What do you say you don't know if you'll be happy or not? I didn't say that. I said I don't know if I'll be happier. Happier? I don't know if my happiness, how dependent it is upon on what I do. Okay. I don't know about that. What is your happiness dependent on? I think it's my relationship to myself.

My relationship to creator, like the greater. Yeah, I don't think it has much. I don't know how much it has to do with what I do as my profession. But it does make me happy when I can help people. And I think that changes your relation with yourself, right? You're like feeling more like of service, right? Or like more, what is it? Yeah.

For sure. Yeah, I think if I'm just stuck with my previous job of like doing whatever data modeling,

I'm serving myself in terms of providing financial income and some intellectual stimulation and maybe providing clients some value, maybe not. And whether that value is really in line with my value, I don't know. Versus doing Feldenkrais, I know it's totally in line with my own value and

helping other people either making their body feel better and make their mind feel freer like all of that is so in line with my value that I think I'm not just working using work as an instrument for life it is actually something in reaching my life in itself

Yeah, it's like concrete. It's like concrete. So you have a PhD in what? Neuroscience. In neuroscience. Right. So that's like incredible, like the amount of education, knowledge that you have. It's not that much. Well, maybe...

Like, it's not a breadth of knowledge. I don't know too much, but just in one or two things that I know a lot. It doesn't really satisfy me as knowledge. So this is what, this is really interesting, right? Because this is like, I would say, in academia, right? This is like the pinnacle, like there's nowhere else to go.

from this place, right? You've like, you can do all the research and you're creating like, like you said, like data modeling. Sure. And then, but what I'm hearing you say is that it's just like, it's just a model. Like, what is it that's like that you feel is missing in that? I guess this is my question.

Like a lot of it is how much like our understanding in Feldenkrais of another person's body you can say it's a model that we're analyzing the relationship, the ground force, the mind-body connection. These are all models just meaning a pattern of how you see things and categorize things. But then with that do you only just add a little bit

Affirmation of this certain neuroscience theory and applying to certain specific experimental condition or it actually just help this person's hip feeling better or help this person having a better mood and facing challenges in life in a more relaxed way, whatever like those are much more tangible results using the knowledge you have plus some other like hands-on service, whatever versus

just contributing to abstract knowledge of certain theory that

I don't even know when will it be useful for real life and how much is it useful or it's more playing an intellectual game. That's the difference. And of course, like just in this current society, somehow people value the process of building this kind of math probability theory, programming, modeling. It sounds like something needs...

more sophisticated brain than doing bodywork, but not necessarily. It's just our bias of what is more difficult. Like to me Feldenkrais is seldom a fold more difficult than the PhD for me. And it is like this is what's so... I mean, I've never done a PhD because I don't want to. Good. You know what you want. I didn't quite. I'm like, I am not doing that. But...

It is... this work is deep. It's like way more than what physiotherapists know. Like how many physiotherapists are in this training, you know? We have a few. Giselle is one and Julie, our trainer, and Chris is a physio. And Cindy is a physio. This work is deeper than any doctors understand, any physios, any psychologists. It's like... it's really, really... it's very complex.

Yeah. And I think it's like a spectrum of in academia, people really value things that are repeatable, reproducible and well controlled and you clearly know the cause and effect.

versus in real life like when we're doing Feldenkrais this person might feel better but not it won't necessarily work on everyone because we just talked about everyone's different yeah and once necessary be clear that it is definitely Feldenkrais causing this like you have to do a lot more clinical research on that so I think for some kind of

preferring simplicity and certainty rather than really embracing this complexity of a whole person's body. That people would sometimes prefer this more so-called empirically based

evidence-based approach for health rather than Feldenkrais. And we do have a lot of us studying it. We see people benefit a lot from it. We ourselves benefit a lot from it. But at the same time, we're always in the struggle.

other people challenge us: "Is it really scientific? Is it really proven? Is it just a hoax? You're just believing it, therefore it works." I know, it's so crazy. But how else can we know something unless we have the experience? So all of this data collection and all of this, what does it mean

Unless you can have an experience, right? Like for an individual. Yeah, yeah. That's what I'm saying to people who's questioning Feldenkrais, like try it on yourself. And if you feel like it, then you benefit from it. Good. And if you don't, well then... Maybe another time, maybe a different practitioner, maybe just, yeah. Or maybe you're just not going to, you're just not...

ready. Yeah. Or you just, you know, maybe you want to prefer Pilates class. Yeah. And that's okay. Like not everybody's going to have that sensitivity to sense things.

And that can be some kind of a defense mechanism or survival skill that you don't want that much sensitivity because that's what we were just talking about. Then you step into this empty space of I need to make decision for myself. Yeah. Yeah. It can be scary if you're not ready for it. Yeah. Yeah. Have you seen the Wikipedia definition of Feldenkrais? Oh, yeah. There's a war on it.

It's horrible! What do they say? It's not, there's no evidence that it works and like blah blah blah. I'm like...

Whoever wrote this, you need to watch a video of Feldenkrais working on a child with cerebral palsy. Or someone that's just had a stroke and see them walk before and after. And that's all you need to do. No, no, it's not. It's not. Because I imagine those people will say, "Oh, there are so many other woo-woo-woo masters that somehow claim that and they can in a video appear as a miracle, but you can't really trust that."

But in reality, there are so many research has been done about Feldenkrais method on different population. And I saw there's something a lot of like about Parkinson and cerebral palsy and also something about eating disorder, even that there's study on that. When do you say there's evidence? This claim itself is kind of vague, right?

It's terrible. Yeah, there's a war I heard Rob talking about. They were fighting this one person who just keep editing the Wikipedia page into this more negative narrative and stuff. Like who is... Anyway, yeah, that's a whole other thing. But it's easy to be a skeptic.

well it's important to be a skeptic but then right yes you're right you know okay that reminds me of something the person who developed homeopathy the doctor okay that developed it he was a german doctor and he'd heard about this i think that i don't know where it was developed like maybe india i know they use it a lot in india anyway

He set out to disprove it. Like any true science, that's what you do. You try to disprove the thing. Anyway, what he ended up finding out was that it actually worked. Right? So that's what we do. So that's in progress. And we all see the significance of...

really understand why self-founding crest works and how effective it can be right even though we're convinced it could be more useful than other modalities that are more popular right now we still don't know sky's the limit how much more it can be yeah so yeah it can i think yeah like we can change we can there's so much potential for us as a society as a culture with this if we can

open up to a different way of being hey and as you said we become model of modeling this way of living ourselves yeah sounds like a place to stop yeah awesome yeah i enjoyed it yeah thanks nice talking to you