The Art of Moving in Any Direction

February 18

One of the Feldenkrais concepts that I have always loved is the notion of “equal ease”. Equal ease is the hypothetical concept that from a neutral state of standing, sitting, or walking, you could move in any direction easily and instantly.  This obviously comes from Moshe’s background as a martial artist, where you have to adapt to the actions of your opponent with many possibilities, lest you get forced into a corner, but it is broadly applicable across many disciplines and many life situations.  A dancer must be able to have equal ease to adapt to complex choreography with direction changes; a basketball player must have it to flow through defenses for a layup; a person driving their car must have it so that they can swivel their head both ways and avoid an accident.  

Of course, perfect equal ease is somewhat hypothetical, but you can feel, even without moving, how available different directions are within yourself.  Take a moment to stand in a relaxed manner and just feel yourself; do you feel that you could turn and step to the left just as easily as you could turn and step to the right? Do you feel as though you could step forward with you right foot as easily as with your left? Could you move forwards and backwards just as quickly if you had to?  As one of my mentors Carrie Lafferty would always say: if you were a primitive human in the stone age and the sabertooth tiger showed up, which way would you move to escape without thinking about it? If some directions in space do not feel as available, the interesting question yourself is; why?

Some of these limitations have to do with out habitual ways of moving, dominance of one side over another, and lingering injuries.  But sometimes these limitations are simply from not being able to let go of a pattern that served us in one moment but does no longer.  In Awareness Through Movement®, we practice resting through a lesson, stopping and taking a moment to truly let go of the action and state of mind we were engaged in moments before.  This tiny moment of pause and conscious letting go is what allows us to then reorganize in another direction.  One cause of injury is when we don’t let an old pattern go and we carry it into the next thing we are doing.  

A gross example of this would be a ballet dancer who insists on maintaining an erect spine and turned out feet even when they are walking around on the street after class.  These habits are essential for performing as a skilled dancer. But they don’t necessarily serve the person as they move out of the studio and go on with the rest of their day.  For instance, if this person were to go snowboarding, a stubborn insistence on maintaining a ballet stance might result in a real difficulty in accomplishing the task at hand (and a lot of time spent sitting on cold snow).  Snowboarding well requires one to maintain a grounded, somewhat crouched position with parallel feet.  To be clear, neither the snowboard posture nor the ballet posture are better or more correct - they are just different patterns which are more suited to one task more than another.

This ballet stance is essential for turning and long lines, but how quickly can we let it go when we step onto the street?

Our habit to hold on past the point of usefulness sometimes applies to movement patterns we have adopted through social and emotional conditioning as well.  For instance, if you felt shy in middle school, you might have adopted a pattern of collapsing and rounding the chest, a classic, protective posture that feels like it’s helping you disappear and stay safe.  15 years later, you might be an adult with a career and a family in a very different context than middles school, and yet, you have not let go of this pattern from adolescence, even though you have moved far beyond it emotionally and it no longer serves you.  In this case, holding that old, unconscious pattern might inhibit your ability to adopt a new stance that can help you go in a different and more powerful direction.  Often, we don’t realize that we are still holding on to a pattern that is holding us back; we have just grown used to the feeling of "how we are." As they say in Zen, the fish don't notice the water.

Taking this idea deeper, equal ease then applies not just to our ability to move freely through space and posture, but also to our internal movements of thought and emotion.  How quickly can you move from one language to another?  Are you able to change from one opinion to another when enough evidence is presented?  Can you move between rage, sadness, and a calm meditative state as you are genuinely moved to by the events in your life?  Can you forgive someone? As children, we move freely and authentically between emotions, but as we grow older, we are often rewarded for being less emotion, meaning that we may get stuck in a certain way of holding our emotions in. Many of us are also taught to hold our ground, stake our beliefs, and not budge, and we receive praise for that stubbornness, even when we are wrong and could benefit from adjusting our opinions. “Apologizing is a sign of weakness," says John Wayne, propagating the idea that backing down or changing your “stance” (physically and mentally) is somehow weak.  

How quickly are we able to move between these different mental and emotional states?

Even if we do not intentionally dig-in to our ways out of stubbornness, we often have unconscious habits that keep us from being able to truly shift and change as life demands. These resistances to “what is” keep us trapped inside of our own negative emotions and self-defeating thoughts.  Buddha famously stated that, “Life is Change;” but how many options do we allow ourselves when change arrives at our doorstep?  The practice of equal ease is in finding a balanced, neutral state within ourselves in order to have many options and move in many directions. Equal ease is a practice of resilience, optimism, and creativity.  

In Awareness Through Movement® and Functional Integration®, it may look like we are simply moving the body. But really, we are training whole-person adaptability—physically, emotionally, and mentally. Over time, this can mean fewer injuries, a feeling of calm, and a greater sense of choice in how you respond to life.

If you’re curious to experience this for yourself, take a class or book a private session and start cultivating more equal ease in your life.