Let go to let in

I got a lesson from a Feldenkrais trainer the other day and as I tracked what was happening, I said, "There, in that spot, I don't know that movement. I don't know how to do that!" It was just one direction through my spine from one place in my ribs, but I could tell it was confusing for my system to move through that area. The trainer commented that it was unusual to know what we don't know.

Perhaps that's true, but I've been studying what I don't know for a very long time! After years of Feldenkrais, one of the most important, and uncomfortable, things to contemplate is an awareness of what I don't know.

In my Feldenkrais training, I remember the unbearable, constant awareness of discovering that I had yet another pattern that did not serve me. My hip doesn't move well, my back is stuck in hyper-extension, my belly is held, my ribs collapsed, how much more is there to discover? I can tell you that there is still more, over twenty years later!

Living in a state of constant acceptance and re-acceptance that I am a shifting, evolving being is uncomfortable. I think we all want to fix our awareness, our understanding, even our moral landscape, and be done with it. It can feel relieving to nail things down.

Of course, that nail will dissolve into dust as we are left with having to disassemble, reassemble, and respond to something new yet again.

Depending on how you see it, it's either a blessing or a curse that life is a series of constant choices, not just one. This gives us tremendous freedom. At the same time...this gives us tremendous freedom. It's a double-edge sword.

This freedom ultimately allows us to move in any direction, but which one? How do we perceive our choices? Two choices is a constraint, three choices is an option.

After the lesson what I didn't know became integrated into the known. My movement, and my life, has another option. And then the next unknown thing draws my attention...