In Feldenkrais’ own words
… what an enormous variety of movements separate the head from the shoulders and from the arms. … when we keep the arms and the head always going together in almost every movement – that’s looking for trouble! How on earth else would you have the neck stiff and the shoulders getting knots if out of a million possibilities you only use five – and those constantly. It means that all the other cells in the brain are constantly inhibited. Therefore the muscles which they command get thick and you get the feeling that they are impossible to move, the feeling of getting old, of losing your grip on life – which is correct! (Esalen Workshop, Lesson #23)
Note the trademark Feldenkrais focus on the nervous system. It’s not the muscles themselves that are the source of problems. It’s the severely reduced range of commands from the nervous systems. Over a course of our life we have unlearned to use many possibilities.
ATM classes target nervous system, they challenge it to recall the full range of possible movements. This leads students to feeling young instead of feeling old, feeling like regaining their grip on life. Rejuvenation starts with the motor nervous system and triggers changes throughout the rest of the body and mind.
Acture FM 