STUDY WITH ALFONS

Researchers have put The Word Gap of children from different social backgrounds somewhere between 3 million words and 30 millions words. How many millions is it?

Officials might throw such big numbers around just in order to collect money for their NGO programs (and of course, probably more importantly, for their management fees). Just saying. But that’s another story. There’s strong arguments for the existence of The Word Gap. It is real.

I looked up some numbers: 130 words per minute is a very comfy speed for speaking, listening, or reading. That’s 7800 words per hour. All seven Harry Potter books combined contain a total of a bit more than 1 million words (1,084,170 words to be precise). You do the math.

That’s something like five months of daily reading out loud for one hour.

I’m pretty certain that such a gap exists for movement too.

However, the currency seems to be a different one. In The Word Gap we’re looking at life chances and most importantly The Income Gap. With movement, I guess, the currency is not „money” but „wellbeing”.

In terms of closing The Movement Gap by systematic, guided means, looking at my numbers I can report this:

Movement sessions work both as a) DIY approach from my videos or audio recordings, or b) as personally guided sessions – or as a combination of a) and b). Especially with hands-on the second approach might be faster, a bit more efficient, and probably more personal.

My clients are usually at least 25 years old. And equally distributed over all age groups above that. I guess below 25, movement related problems (as in „mathematical problems” and as in „medical problems”) are attributed to a lack of sleep, drugs, choice of friends, or luck. Once a critical threshold is passed, people find out that it’s 1. something else 2. they can do something about it. Some people realise that before 25 years of age, or at any age above that. And some, obviously, never.

It usually takes 5 to 10 of my guided movement sessions to be able to see significant improvements in overall movement patterns and movement quality. Clients feel these differences usually in (or after) the first session, in the form of much reduced pain and much elevated comfort. But it usually takes 10 or more sessions before they realise they have improved in very deep, significant ways.

Some clients get hooked on this realisation and do many more sessions. Which, of course, sets them significantly apart from everyone else. It’s like the seeing walking amongst the blind. Although, obviously, the blind couldn’t care less.

There’s more to it. There’s a big cultural component.

Usually children are inspired by the people around them. They learn to move like „them” – like the people around them move. They become part of a family, „he walks like his father”, or they say „she has the smile of her mother”.

They also become part of a location based culture. People from Italy, in general, walk differently to people from (just for example) China, Cambodia, Japan, Germany, or England. These differences in movement are so significant that forensic experts can attribute the shape of human bones to their respective culture of origin. I don’t think it’s genetics only. I assert that form follows function, to a significant degree.

Now. If (for example) 90 % of an adult population has acquired spine deformities and faulty movement patterns through a lack of movement or an overemphasis on specialised movement (such as sitting), then their children will still learn from these adults, and copy their problematic patterns.

Yeah. This sounds bad. I wish I could say „April Fool’s”.

There might be a safety layer in between though. Maybe it’s like with overfishing: if we would just leave the Oceans alone for a bit, they would recover. Maybe it’s the same with children. And adults. If we would just allow them to move a bit, and not confine them to indoor space and chairs all day, then they might recover.

„Mature people need to discern by themselves what they are doing, how they are doing it, and what it is doing to them. They must decide if it is good or not good.” – Dr. Moshé Feldenkrais

In 1902 the Federal Council issued binding „Rules for German Language Spelling” for the entire German Empire. The new spelling was introduced by decree on January 1, 1903 in the authorities and on April 1, 1903 (not a joke) in schools. It was also complied to in Austria and Switzerland.

Before 1903 everyone would write pretty much in any way they could, found fit or found pleasing. What a time to be alive!

After 1903 in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, what is correct spelling and what is incorrect spelling has been defined. And went straight up to debate. Since that time people have been arguing vigorously, heatedly, some respectful, some full of anger, on what is correct and incorrect. #oxfordcomma

I feel for every child that went through a decade (or longer) of compulsory schooling. For having had to sit quietly at the mercy of whomever was in charge of their factory-like processing at any time. I understand that this might have wiped some children’s personality clean of the ability to protest, freed the brain of quite a bit of its original creativity, destroyed dreams, and wrapped and invisible iron cast around the children’s bodies and minds. In some statistics less than 5 % of children graduate without spinal deformities. These deformities were acquired while in school. But who is measuring deformities in their feeling and thinking, in their creative abilities?

For a great many children, long before the end of their schooling process, one main, fearful question was already successfully imprinted into their brains, whatever the task at hand may be:

„Am I doing it correctly?”

Did Picasso ask this question when he painted? Did Bighead and Lil Pump check with their music teachers if the lyrics in their song Gucci Gang are correct? (Youtube flagged their mumble-jumble as age-restricted) Does Plasteed check if his dance moves are correct? Does Lil Buck worry if he uses his feet correctly?

In recent years Austrian writer Wolf Haas became very famous in German speaking countries. For his crime stories. The stories itself are great, but what is remarkable is the language he uses in his books. He omits words, cuts sentences shorts, uses spoken language in writing. This makes his writing very easy to read, and his words come alive vividly.

Technically it’s all wrong. Writing like this? He would have failed to graduate from school. But now he’s a bestselling author. That’s a bit of a problem for the system. Thus, a lot has been written about Wolf Haas’s writing. Linguists went full throttle at it. A whole bunch of academic papers have been published about his use of language.

To me Wolf Haas is a national hero. Not because of his bestselling books. I love his books. But they don’t make him a hero. Wolf Haas is a hero because he had the nerves and the guts to stand up against the schooling system. Wolf Haas is a hero because he gave millions of children, all generations to come, the permission to write in novel ways. To invent their own style of writing. No matter what the overlord teachers in charge of the processing-of-children are saying. Because they, too, read bestselling author Wolf Haas.

Btw, I certainly do check if my spelling is correct. And I do check if my movements flow well, and connect well, when I’m rolling on the floor.

„Please hold your leg below the knee”, trips up many beginner students in Feldenkrais lessons. Whose fault is it? The student’s? The teacher’s? Or may we blame language itself?

The famous psycholinguist Frank Smith said, „Nothing is neutral; there is no room for free or idiosyncratic variation. With language every difference makes a difference.” The longer I ponder and play with this statement, the more I can relate to it.

„Last night I saw an elephant in my pyjamas. How he got in my pyjamas, I’ll never know.”, Groucho Marx’s classic joke, a prime example of syntactic ambiguity. „When the alarm sounded, I saw her duck. How her red-billed teal duck got into our house we’ll never know.”, to expand on Richard Nordquist’s textbook example. He said, „I know a little Greek”, while he watched her paint with enthusiasm.

Ambiguity can be used for laughs; and it needs to be precisely put in this regard. We can only truly laugh at a joke when we understand it.

„She opposes rules which hinder personal growth”, does that mean she opposes all rules in general? „She opposes those roles which hinder personal growth” would make it more specific. Was the ambiguity simply an oversight? Or on purpose? An omission in favour of brevity? We need to know, what is she up to?

The Devil’s representative in Goethe’s Faust, Mephistopheles, is especially fond of ambiguity, and uses it often.

Martha: „Speak frankly, sir, none is there you have met? Has your heart ne’er attach’d itself as yet?”

Mephistopheles: „One’s own fire-side and a good wife are gold and pearls of price, so says the proverb old.”

Trying to get a straight answer from Mephistopheles is a hopeless endeavour.

This was a long excursion.

Which knee is it now? The left knee or the right one? And which hand? And where is „below the knee”? How far below? Provided that „behind” and „below” are two different locations. Behind and in front, above and below. As they are so well aware in the business of Real Estate: „location, location.”

These differences do make big differences. Not just physically, but also culturally. People take such things very seriously. Think of the difference between writing with either the left hand or the right hand. In his 1914 textbook, The Hygiene of the School Child, Stanford University psychologist Lewis M. Terman concluded that up to half of all stuttering among school children resulted from attempts to transform left-handed children into right-handers. It’s outrageous.

Sometimes there’s ambiguity in my movement classes simply because I made a mistake. But if I use ambiguity on purpose I would, for example, do it for such reasons:

• to challenge students to keep the context in mind,
• to provide a wide variety of options, spur creativity, leave things in the open, maybe in order to drive students towards self-proficiency, help them to improve their process of self-inquiry, and ultimately, opening a road towards a feeling of mastery

It’s like giving students paper, colours and a topic, „Let’s draw raindrops on a lake”, and let them explore, find, try, learn, have an interesting time. And also let them decide if and how they want to critique their movements and movement qualities. I will observe how they calibrate, or not, before I provide more specifics towards the achievements and objectives I had in mind.

In November 2017 (for the record) I attended The Comedy Workshop with Leanne Davis, at the formidable Youtube Space London. These studios are located directly under Google, in the same shiny new building. High security measures upon entering. For pre-registered, background-checked attendees with 10k+ subscribers only. Gave it kind of a VIP feeling. Cheerful crowd of Youtube professionals and high performers. Made me feel 10% VIP and 90% unbaked cookie dough.

One of the assignments was to create some funny sketches, and then perform them for the other participants. I preferred just to watch and cheer, because for my life I wouldn’t be able to come up with an impromptu sketch.

Three weeks later, in the safety of my home, inspiration finally came upon me. This is what I wrote (again, for the record):

Scene 1. Fisherman I

A fisherman at a small lake, sitting on a mini-chair, fishing. He’s waiting patiently, when suddenly the line catches. He howls in his catch: a small fish. Carefully, not to hurt the fish, he removes the hook. While throwing the fish back into the lake he says: “I let you off the hook this time”.

Scene 2. At a market

Someone strolling by a small fruits & veggies market stand. She looks at a bowl of apples. She likes what she sees. Next her gaze falls onto some oranges. However, the oranges do not look fresh, one even has a mouldy patch on it. She complains to the shop owner: „Why do these [pointing at the apples] look so fresh when those [pointing at the oranges] look so old?”. The shop owner replies: “Sorry madam, you can’t compare apples to oranges”.

Scene 3. In an apartment

A home-owner type of guy comes home with a big bag flung over his shoulder. He walks through the living room and passes by his wife. They kiss Hello. She asks him about the bag over his shoulder, “What’s in there?” she asks, „Nothing really”, he answers, „just a couple of sports clothes”, he lies. He seems to be relieved when she lets him go and he continues his way into the bedroom. He closes the door. He sits down onto the bed.  He opens up the bag and there it is: a very cute, little kitten. Meow. The guy says: „I let you out of the bag now”.

Scene 4. Fisherman II

A fisherman at a small lake, sitting on a mini-chair, fishing (just like in the previous fisherman scene). He’s waiting patiently, when suddenly the line catches. He howls in his catch: a small fish. Disappointedly he looks at the fish in his hands, then the camera zooms out and we can see two more people: a bystander, and another fisherman, a few feet away, who just pulled out a much bigger fish. The bystander points his finger at the other fisherman and comments: „He has a much bigger fish to fry”.

Scene 5. Ice skating on a lake

Close-up of a woman’s face. She’s shouting: „I told you once and I told you twice. If that happens again there will be trouble! Just think about what your father would say. It’s really time to pull yourself together! Take this as a warning! …” While the shouting continues the camera zooms out further. Now we can see her shouting at her little boy, who’s in skating shoes in front of her on a frozen lake. Camera zooms out some more and a sign becomes visible, saying „Danger – Thin Ice”.

„The job isn’t to catch up to the status quo; the job is to invent the status quo.” – Seth Godin

In my hometown, Vienna, Austria, there’s a particularly beautiful building, a pavilion with a golden leaf dome. It’s located just a short walk afar from the very center of the city. The building’s name is The Secession Building (Secessionsgebäude). Inside, on permanent display in a specially built, climate-controlled basement room, it features the Beethoven Frieze by Gustav Klimt, one of the most widely recognized artworks of Secession style (a branch of Art Nouveau, also known as Jugendstil). The building was financed by Karl Wittgenstein, the father of Ludwig Wittgenstein (the philosopher).

The motto of the Secessionist movement is written above the entrance of the pavilion: “To every age its art, to every art its freedom.” Der Zeit ihre Kunst. Der Kunst ihre Freiheit.

Okay. Now. This blog post is a string, woven into a quilt, a puzzle piece in my blog, and as such part of my previous and future blog posts. I need to think and talk more about language and reality. When I lie awake at night I often think about language, and how we use it in reality. It’s genetic. Being Viennese, an Austrian born human, language skepticism is part of myself just like the wings are part of a chicken, or the appendix is part of the human intestines.

Language skepticism is a form of doubt. To the philosophers rooting for it, it’s the deeply seated doubt that reality can be represented with linguistic and literary means. The traditional role of language is put on trial.

Historically (and theoretically), language skepticism is based on the theories of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Fritz Mauthner. Friedrich Nietzsche (although not Austrian) also played a role in this, above all with comprehensive critique of perception and knowledge.

When language skepticism first became a thing it was so profound and serious, that consequently some of the great poets and writers of the 18th and 19th century gave up writing literature altogether.

Now, almost 100 years later, the great marketeer and cultural icon Seth Godin – and his millions of followers – swung in the opposite direction: They use language as a tool to describe the world. Seth Godin very obviously took language literally as what he found it: something he can work with. To identify, name, and talk about things we find remarkable. Seth Godin, and many modern marketeers alike, make the elusive obvious. With their particular use of language they enable us to see cultural trends, better, to navigate the world, better, to survive and to thrive, better. Seth Godin observed, critically: „Never in doubt is more important than being right.” Quoted from Seths.blog, March 24, 2021 „Certainty, accuracy and leadership”

We, the people, we humans, as a cultural whole, thus went through two extremes: Language Skepticism on one end and Language Ultra-no-doubtism (or whatever future historians will call this) on the other end.

And thus we defined the middle grounds.

It’s almost poetic, beautiful.

But I won’t end today’s writing just yet. Here’s to language skepticism, my translation of Rainer Maria Rielke’s poem „Ich fürchte mich so vor der Menschen Wort”:

I’m deeply scared of how they use their words 

I’m deeply scared of how they use their words.
They’re too certain in how they make them sound:
This they call house and that they call hound,
This is the start, and that is the end, their precision almost hurts.

I’m scared of their intentions, the contempt they maintain,
They know it all, the past and all things that will be.
To them no mountaintop is mysterious to see;
Their possessions are much alike God’s own domain.

Pay heed to my warning: from this do retreat.
The real things, not words, they are what’s sweet.
Through being defined they become mute, rigid and grey,
their spirit crushed, murdered and drained away.

Rainer Maria Rilke, November 1898, translation by Alfons Grabher in 2021

Jay Heinrichs book „Thank You for Arguing” has been translated into eleven languages. It has become standard reading in high school AP English Language classes, gets taught in thousands of college and law school courses, and became a New York Times education bestseller. Yet, Jay Heinrichs’s videos on Youtube, in which he teaches how to write winning essays, are getting a mere few hundred views.

Meanwhile, some college students and uni grads, eloquent with great hair, thick eyebrows and winning smiles, even though new to the field, are getting millions of views on their videos on the same topic. Some of these young entrepreneurs make 7 figure incomes from it. Mind-blowing, to my mind.

Why does a renowned expert get such low views, and a newcomer millions? Why is that?

Thinking about it, the original reason might not be a lack of marketing bells-and-whistles, but utterly human: maybe a lot of children didn’t get the attention, space, environment, emotional nutrition, and love they needed. And thus – maybe – they spend a lifetime trying to make up for what they have been missing (or have been denied) in their first years.

Maybe one kind of „therapy”, or a way to make up for what was missing,  is finding a colourful thumbnail on Youtube. With a man or a woman who looks friendly and healthy. In just the right age the parents could have been in the past. Someone who leans into the camera just like mama (or papa) never did – or failed to do so often. And makes a funny face. Or a laughing face. Or a peek-a-boo face. Or looks like she’s about to sing a song. Or tell a story. Or eat a big dinner together. And maybe the friend on the screen is then explaining the world. In very simple terms. Very colorful. She explains how to be beautiful. He explains how to be successful. She encourages. He comforts. She sings. He tells. She. He. They. We.

I. feel. accepted. I. deserve. to be. loved.

These marketeers, actors, singers, content-creators, funnel-managers have a gentle, calming effect on the inner child. For a moment the pain, the discomfort, the scariness of life is reduced. Maybe even the loneliness disappeared, for a moment.

That’s pretty good actually. Self-selected micro-therapy, free of cost (and commitment).

But: How much of this do people need? When can they finally move on, and live their adult lives?

What we call our coffee drinks says a lot about us. Cappuccino. Espresso. Caffè Cortado. Is your coffee order still beholden to the Italian craftspeople who invented espresso technology? Or do you prefer your cup of Java in a more historical built, for example in form of a true Arabian Mocha, which has its roots in Yemen? Or is it a Short Black, a Flat White, or a Skinny you pick up on your way to work?

„Nothing is neutral; there is no room for free or idiosyncratic variation. With language every difference makes a difference. And it all has to be learned. There is only one way to say anything, both verbally and nonverbally, in writing as well as in speech, and to say anything differently is, in effect, to say a different thing. Synonyms and paraphrases are not substitutable for each other. Choice of a particular synonym always says something about the speaker (or the speaker’s perception of the listener). Petrol and gasoline may refer to the same thing, but I reveal something of myself if I use one term rather than the other. Dogs chase cats cannot replace cats are chased by dogs in any meaningful context. The first is a statement about dogs and the second about cats.” – Frank Smith, Landmarks in Literacy

The same extends to movement. Not just to the obvious cultural dances, gestures and postures, but to all movement. Moving your face in your very particular, iconic way – which each and every of your close friends and relatives could identify as being „you” – is movement. Yes. Also how you hold your shoulders, when and how you rotate your arm through which trajectory, through space, in response to or as requirement to which situation. How you guide your leg in taking a step, and so forth… all is movement. Movement is not just how you are used to do these things. How you learned them once, by chance, or culture and deeply invested into a certain way of doing them. Movement is much more. It is a play of options and understanding.

From my perspective this needs to be addressed when people look for Mindfulness, Self Initiation, or „The embodiment of the full blueprint of being.” And such things. It needs to be addressed through movement. Not merely in form of non-judgmental observation, not merely in form of conscious breath-work, and not merely in form of Mindfulness Meditation. The brain is made for movement and learning. Move and learn we must.

50 years ago chasing the The Embodied Self was as simple as getting a few people together in a safe setting and to scream all fears off the hearts, or to follow breathing techniques for long enough periods of time until the divine came knocking. Some people still invest in and also market such settings nowadays. I guess because they have not found anything better just yet (or it makes them sooo much money that there’s simply no incentive to look any further). To me it looks like as if some of them are teaching to rewind a Swiss wrist watch with the help of a pneumatic jackhammer.

In January I was convinced that 2021 will be the year in which I will build an innovative online training course. A ground setting new way of movement learning, movement quality acquisition, and community building. I was highly motivated to make my ideas available to a larger public. I wanted to provide options, insight, upwards drift, progress, content generation, and set new landmarks in movement literacy. But it’s too big of a task for me alone. No funding, no team, no marketing department, too much work to produce the required content. Therefore: probably no online training course this year.

Now, by the end of March, it became apparent that my main focus in 2021 is on something very different. This is the year of extensive – and intensive – reading, listening, and writing for me.