Demystifying Feldenkrais

"We act in accordance to our self-image."

That's the opening sentence to Moshe Feldenkrais' book Awareness Through Movement and one of the main tenets of the method he developed. It means that what we do, the very way we move through life, is based on our conscious perception of our bodies, not on our structure.

With this notion comes the idea that the self-image can—and does—change as we grow and develop. Recent reserarch in neural plasticity has proven overwhelmingly that this indeed is just what happens. That's the good news of modern neurophysiology: your brain isn't set, it can change.

But what about illness or injury? Can life's difficulties also alter one's self-image? An interesting study in a 2008 issue of the journal PAIN shows that answer is "Yes, pain distorts the self image."

http://www.painjournalonline.com/article/PIIS0304395908004442/abstract

Five out of six patients could not clearly delineate the outline of their trunk, stating they couldn't “find it.” A two-point discrimination test showed greatly decreased tactile acuity in the same zone as the absence or disruption of body image, which is also the area of chronic back pain.

What a great demonstration of the relationship between pain and perception! Of course, it would make sense that this is a two way street: if pain changes self-perception, then learning to perceive yourself differently can change the pain. Indeed, the study concludes that "training body image or tactile acuity may help patients in chronic spinal pain, as it has been shown to do in patients with complex regional pain syndrome or phantom limb pain."