Looking for Clues: Mystery Novels & Functional Integration
Sherlock Holmes was one of Dr. Feldenkrais' heroes. Moshe enjoyed reading Conan Doyle mysteries, and Sherlock's devotion to clues. I'm into my fourth John Le Carre book now, with George Smiley. Agent extraordinaire Smiley makes inferences from tiny fragments of evidence and gathers clues not only by observing the environment and the people in it but also by listening to his own sensations and feelings. Smiley allows himself to trust his intuition in search of information. He goes to places without knowing why he is going there and lingers in places allowing his sensations and perceptions to coalesce, in search of clues. Since reading Le Carre, I've been watching strangers on trains differently, and thinking about the interviews I saw Moshe conducting with people before giving them their first Functional Integration lesson. They were a marvel of curiosity, investigation, compassion, and reframing.
Moshe often said that the FI lesson begins when the person walks in the door and that the interview is an integral rather than separate part of the first lesson. My first-lesson interviews with people are usually 30-40 minutes, with an intention to create a narrative; almost a natural history of the person’s difficulty before I begin gathering kinesthetic information by moving them.
Since reading Le Carre, I think I'm making observations about clients that I might not have made two months ago. Last week, while giving lessons to someone with right brachial plexus difficulties, I noticed that their voice sounded a little bit raspy. As I listened, I realized that the roughness in their voice was coming only from the right side of their larynx. This suggested that the trouble with the brachial plexus might be originating from higher up, perhaps from the 9th or 10th Cranial nerve. I am not sure I would have heard that little rasp and recognized it as useful information a few months ago.
If you're curious to explore what piqued Moshe's interest about the series, I hope you'll enjoy this free downloadable copy of ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES.
If you want to contact me directly, you can reach me at [email protected]
-David Zemach-Bersin
David Zemach-Bersin
David has maintained a Feldenkrais practice for over forty years, and has taught in Feldenkrais Training programs for 35 years. He studied directly with Moshe Feldenkrais and graduated from the first US training program in 1977.
