| This past December after one of the many North | | | | job." My inner critic had taken a vacation along |
| Carolina snowstorms, we had no power for four | | | | with the electricity. I didn't even realize until then, |
| days. No phone, no water, no light. No computer, | | | | that some little girl in me always felt a pressure |
| no TV. It was hard to read by candlelight. So I | | | | to perform, even in doing art. In that pressure lie |
| decided to do something I'd been avoiding since | | | | the roots of failure. I've met people who are |
| the New Age Movement began. I was going to | | | | afraid to cook for others for the same reason. |
| make a vision board. | | | | Others have even given up yoga because they |
| A vision board is a collage of sorts. You gather | | | | weren't "good at it.". And yet this compulsion to |
| images and glue them to paper - like a visual | | | | perform comes from my own habitual behavior, it |
| statement of goals or a non-verbal affirmation. | | | | has nothing to do with the people we think we |
| Mind you, I had nothing against vision boards. In | | | | are performing for, or competing against. One of |
| fact, I thought the idea was kind of cool. It was | | | | the things I love about the Feldenkrais Method is |
| the cutting out and gluing part I was avoiding. The | | | | that it interrupts this habit. Instead of asking |
| joke, "I flunked art in kindergarten," was no joke | | | | students to perform, it asks students to |
| for me. Give me a bottle of Elmer's glue and | | | | investigate, to explore, to experience. There is no |
| within minutes it's all over my clothes, the desk | | | | one watching how well you raise your head, or lift |
| and of course, rippling up the images that are | | | | your leg. There is no one judging if you have |
| glued to the paper. Scissors, look out! I can cut | | | | "succeeded" at rolling up the "right" way. A |
| myself on children's scissors. And it never fails | | | | teacher of mine once challenged the class to free |
| that my hand slips and slices off a part of the | | | | itself from "the stench of striving." And Moshe |
| picture I was so carefully trimming. I pored | | | | Feldenkrais would often advise his students to |
| through every magazine. I snipped images, words, | | | | "Try not to try!" It's a paradox, that when I try |
| icons. I layered them, re-arranged them and | | | | less, but with more attention, more ease and |
| finally, after two days, had my vision board. | | | | presence, I accomplish much more than by |
| My husband Ron, who is an amazing fine artist, | | | | straining, pushing and trying to perform. |
| came over and stared. "Wow," he said. "It's | | | | Feldenkrais lessons can help us interrupt not just |
| so....neat." It was. Pieces fit together. No jagged | | | | our movement habits but our behavior, to allow |
| edges. Cool ideas. I realized in that moment that | | | | enjoyment of every activity, not just what we |
| as I had been working on the vision board, I | | | | are "good" at. And magically, we improve! |
| hadn't felt any rush. No compulsion to do a "good | | | | |