New client info sheet
Welcome!
This document clarifies the services I provide in private Functional Integration® lessons.
In partnership, we will create a custom experience that best fits your needs through in-depth exploration of your movement patterns and habits. In this process, we will always work within your comfort, and we will measure your experience with clear sensory-motor benchmarks.
What is Feldenkrais?
Functional Integration is a unique form of hands-on neuromuscular reeducation developed by Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais. It is based on the idea that most people function at only a fraction of their capacity, and can significantly enhance their functioning through new ways of moving.
In these lessons, my hands give you feedback about yourself and how you move, helping you discover new options for the organization and use of your body. Subconscious patterns of holding and interference can be brought to awareness and released, allowing new, more efficient, patterns of use to be learned.
Because Feldenkrais integrates sensory experience into your nervous system, it helps align external changes with internal functions. This allows you to respond to the external world with less dysregulation, either physiologically or emotionally.
My training
I completed my four-year practitioner training in 2001. I have taken numerous advanced trainings in sensory-motor development and I have taught advanced trainings and mentored new practitioners for many years. I was trained by Dennis Leri, who studied extensively with Moshe Feldenkrais both in the US and Israel.
Feldenkrais is not medical treatment or therapy
Functional Integration is licensed in the state of Colorado as movement education. I am not a licensed physician or health-care provider, and I am not authorized to diagnose or treat medical conditions. This work should not be considered "treatment" in the medical sense, and should not be used as a substitute for medical treatment when that is what is called for.
Nonetheless, Functional Integration may prove useful to people with conditions for which medical treatment might be sought, or as an adjunct to such treatment. The limitations and discomforts associated with such conditions often result as much from how you respond to the condition, as from the condition itself.
Through Functional Integration, you can learn new ways of responding to and being in the world, with greater ease and comfort than you have previously experienced.
Most forms of therapy involve things the therapist does to the client to bring about change. That model is not appropriate here. Rather than a therapeutic treatment, this is a learning process where you are the change agent and I am the facilitator.
My objective is not to create any structural change or correction, but rather to help you uncover new functional possibilities within yourself and to incorporate those possibilities into your life.
Private lesson rates
All private lessons include free audio lessons to keep so you can practice at home.
Single lesson - $145 (50 minutes)
Four lessons - $520 (50 minutes, $130 each)
Eight lessons - $960 (50 minutes, $120 each)
To provide maximum benefit, packages must be used within two months. It is better to do the initial lessons close together. Continuing students receive an additional discount.
How often?
To be effective, it’s ideal to do initial lessons close together, such as four or five within two weeks, if at all possible within the parameters of your life, of course. Spreading them out is less effective.
Many people continue with maintenance lessons once a week, every other week, or once a month, depending on their needs. Often these are combined with a home practice.
Reset your life with the FeldenkraisTREASURY
A key to making a meaningful change in your life is to commit to a movement practice for at least six months.
I recommend combining a home program with private lessons. I have developed an online library with over 800 Awareness Through Movement® lessons to explore. If you choose to sign up for the Feldenkrais Treasury, I will provide a personalized curriculum for you.
Learn more at FeldenkraisTREASURY.com.
About working with me (the fine print)
Payment: I accept checks, cards, cash, and venmo to @zoebirch. There is a 3% fee for card transactions.
Schedule: I see a limited number of private clients at my office in North Boulder on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday morning, and Friday. There is plenty of parking and a ramp if you need to avoid stairs.
Lesson expiration: For new clients, lesson packages must be used within three months. Ongoing clients may schedule as needed. All sales final. You may gift unused sessions to another person within two months from the date of purchase. Transfers are final and may not be transferred further.
Cancellation: If you cancel with less than 24 hours' notice, there is no refund. Weather- and covid-related cancellations are exempt, and there is flexibility at my discretion for emergencies and illness if you notify me as soon as possible and reschedule.
Disclaimer: Feldenkrais practitioners are not medical professionals and we do not treat or diagnose medical conditions. Somatic education helps you develop your kinesthetic awareness and improve motor-control learning. As your ability to sense and discern movement improves, musculoskeletal symptoms often decrease or disappear.
Vaccination: I am fully vaccinated and boosted, I keep my office immaculately clean, and I run an air purifier. If you have any health concerns, please contact me.
Thank you again for choosing to work with me. I look forward to helping you achieve your movement goals.