Movement learning and comprehension, like the English weather, require an appreciation for subtle changes and understated nuances, rather than a vulgar obsession with assessments, strength, and range of motion.

„Reading instruction from Greek and Roman times has focused on letters and sounds, despite continual efforts by critics to emphasise the vital role of meaning in reading and to demonstrate that letters play only a small, redundant, and often confusing part. Letters have become a fetish.” – Frank Smith, from the book Understanding Reading

A lot of research has happened in the past 50 years or so. And a lot of brilliant educators worked and thought hard about the necessary conditions for human learning and development.

„Movement” still lacks behind, as predicted by Moshé Feldenkrais. The closer something is to ourselves, the more difficult it is to grasp and handle. Movement seems to be even more elusive than speech and reading.

Luckily, in my search for meaning, understanding, and inspiration in the field of movement, the sciences concerned with teaching and literacy are close enough. I find these fields highly fascinating, and a lot can be learned and transposed into the field of movement.

Physical movements are not only about flexion and extension, hip flexibility and core strength. If they were, they would have become just a fetish.

I’m flipping through stacks of books lately. All epub and pdf. Some I keep, some I drop.

I stopped holding back my bright, yellow marker. Books aren’t shared anymore. Everyone downloads fresh ones. Now I highlight a lot. I can feel very clearly which thoughts attract me, and which don’t. I’m quick to judge: „Oh that’s well written”, „Oh that’s boring.”

Never before have I tossed a book into a trashcan. Now it’s a simple press of command+delete and it’s gone. „Good bye book, I won’t miss you.”

But if needed, I could download it again.

I seem to know what I like, and what I don’t. How can I be so certain? I’ve hardly ever felt so certain before. I’m surprised by myself.

How short can a posting be, but still have meaning inspire?

I do re-read my writings. I read them out loud to hear if they it flows well. Usually there’s a lot of words that don’t do not survive.

Writing a blog post is a funny sort of thing. Throughout the day I scout for relevant, meaningful, communicable thoughts. Now I wonder: what is the style of my blog? Should it be personal stories? Professional information? Or about my creative process as a somatic movement teacher?

All the while I know that – first of all – this is a practice for myself rather than for anyone else – and secondly – every day, the moment I start to write, all my planing and scouting falls to pieces. Right from its start, the blog post develops a life on its own, and demands to be treated as such.

Strangely, the writing always brings forth things that I have not planed to write at all. Does it bring forth things that were hidden? Or things that were actively in hiding? Now drawn to light through the process of writing? How much is hidden inside of me then? And where else is it coming from? The Internet? My immediate environment? Or, does it bring forth things that are inside of you, who is reading this? Is there a magical connection between you and me, some sort of beautiful, quantum mechanic intermingling that casts life into these posts?

Or is writing more like embodied thinking? Conscious and active. A cognitive process that makes new connections and creates meaning? An internal conversation between different perspectives, a give-and-take between mind and „paper”, resulting in an etched out flight of diction, that now lies prey to being read by anyone who stumbles upon it?

It is a funny sort of thing. A strange thing. Delightful, too. More again tomorrow.

My plant grew strongly slanted to one side. I’m wondering what made my plant do this. The environment, the light? Or the way I put it into its new pot? Or maybe, is it its character? Would any other plant – of the same variety – do the same?

„The way we think of ourselves, and thus the way we act, the way we eat, drink, walk, sleep, make love, is conditioned in varying degree by three factors: heritage, education, and self-education.” – said Moshé Feldenkrais in his book Awareness Through Movement (I paraphrased).

I could turn the pot around, and watch what my plant would think about that. Is it a plant that seeks the light? Is it a plant that is strong willed, not easily discouraged? Ready, again, to change directions? Does a plant think about itself? And if it does, does its self-image govern its every act? Or is this just a thing we mammals, and more broadly speaking we species with a beating heart and nervous system, do?

I know of several people who seem to be more at ease at night. They seem to enjoy themselves more, seem to feel saver, less pressured. I’m actually one of them.

I always thought that’s because most people around me are off from work at night. The pressure from the collective mind, the human morphogenetic field, is missing. Permission to enjoy the free time. And all that.

But there might be something else at work, or better, off work: solar pressure. Light from the sun is not merely radiation, but exerts pressure on matter.

„For example, had the effects of the sun’s radiation pressure on the spacecraft of the Viking program been ignored, the spacecraft would have missed Mars’ orbit by about 15,000 km (9,300 mi)”, to quote Wikipedia.

Maybe down here on our planet’s surface we can feel that solar radiation pressure too. And when it’s absent, we feel more at ease. But then, after a while, we need it again. In fact, maybe we might only feel at ease at night if we had enough pressure from our sun that day. Or at any some days before.