Volume 4, Number 11, December 2005

Quote From Moshe: “Two states of existence are commonly distinguished: waking and sleeping. We shall define a third state: awareness. In this state the individual knows exactly what he is doing while awake, just as we sometimes know when awake what we dreamed while asleep.” Awareness Through Movement, p. 31

To Try or Not to Try

There’s an unusual game I play when I’m going up a hill or up some stairs. I’ve been playing this game since the beginning of my Feldenkrais training. I was always curious if the Method could give me a way to effortlessly climb slopes that ordinarily make my thighs ache. Is there a most efficient way to climb, and can I discover it, so that I float up the hill or the staircase? In this game, if my thighs ache I’m doing it wrong. I use all my “Feldenkrais tricks.” I play with my eyes by looking at different things, I swing my arms, change my breathing, relax, tense… you name it.

I never really found the answer until one day I was climbing the stairs at school and it occurred to me that by wiggling so much, I was probably interfering with my ability to push into the stair with my foot. So I simply pushed down on the stair as I climbed and, voila, it was easier.

In case you’re not noticing the sarcastic tone in my textural voice, I’m so sheepish about this “revelation” because, of course, it’s ridiculous. “Climbing stairs is easier when you press into the stair with your foot.” No DUH. That’s essentially saying, “If you do what you’re supposed to do when you climb stairs, it’s easy to climb them.”

But I wasn’t doing what I was supposed to do until that moment. Instead I was trying to be clever, spacing out, experimenting, “dancing the stairs,” etcetera. Don’t get me wrong. All of these ways of thinking are very valuable and the Method cultivates them. Often we are unable to solve problems because we are using habitual means of thinking. But when non-habitual thinking becomes habitual, we find ourselves becoming a parody of the “think outside the box” thinker! We outsmart ourselves, decide we’re too clever to do things the way other people do them, go around the world to visit our next door neighbor.

Feldenkrais wrote a book called The Elusive Obvious. I quote from it sometimes. I absolutely love that title because it sums up the prime attribute of obviousness so nicely. If you want to hide something, hide it in plain view. The more we want to discover something, the less we are willing to believe it’s easily revealed.

“Trying” is a funny concept. One of my trainers told us that if you ask someone to “try,” you’re setting them up for failure because the word “try” implies that you cannot do it. If you could, you’d use the word “do” instead. “Try to catch me” suggests I’m too fast for you. “Catch me” indicates you’ll win in the end. Similarly, the instruction “Try to bring your foot to your head” is a set-up. Don’t try to do it, do it. If you don’t get the foot all the way, who cares? The process is highlighted and not the result.

I’m happy to point out the danger in the word “try,” but as a writer I have to also point out the other side. “Try” is a word, and words are slippery little creatures. They can mean more than one thing, and very often they insist on meaning more than one thing, even to the person using them. “Try” is a very useful word, when it’s kept on its leash. It represents discovery, the act of curious inquiry, and not giving up. It indicates that you should make an effort.

In Feldenkrais, do we believe that effort is bad? When we’re talking to you as you squirm down there on the floor, calming you down, reassuring you, we often ask you to make less of an effort. There’s a powerful reason for us to do that: habitually many of us are taught to make more of an effort every time we are faced with a difficulty. If you can’t do something, make an effort. Try harder. Push. You’ll get through.

This really isn’t the solution to every problem, though, is it? As a matter of fact, you can’t make a constant effort. Any effort at all requires periods of rest. A mature person comes to realize that these periods of rest are as important as the effort and that one is actually learning, sensing, solving when one is not making an effort. Always paying attention is not the same thing as always trying. If you want to know what I’m talking about, go and try to push the wall down. Go on. Get up and push your living-room wall down. You can do it. Try harder.

If you’re optimistic enough to follow that silly instruction, you’ll realize in the period of rest between pushes that the wall isn’t going anywhere. You can try all you want, but the wall won’t come down…that way. There is a way to bring the wall down, of course. Know what it is?

Yes, if you want to bring the wall down, you will have to make an effort. But it’s obvious that not any effort will do. It is slightly less obvious that a sledgehammer, swung in a wide arc a number of times, will probably bring down a plaster wall to your satisfaction. This is effort, but it’s a refined effort (if you can call a sledgehammer refined). You’re paying attention to the situation and making only as much effort as the situation requires. You’re not going to squeeze the sledgehammer, or throw it in the air before swinging it. That would be a wasted effort. If you’re smart, you’ll use the weight of the hammer in its arc to hit the wall in its most vulnerable spot. Then you’ll be using the right amount of effort in the right way.

Now. Imagine you’re trying to get your foot behind your head. You can make an effort if you want. Try try try. Unless you’re a very limber person, pushing and pulling harder isn’t going to get your foot back there. Not if you do it for a thousand years. So what should you do? Can you get your foot back there without effort? Can you just relax and “zen” it back, float it like your joints aren’t even there, like your bones and muscles are made of shaving cream?

No. That’s ridiculous. You’re going to have to make some kind of effort. But what effort? Which muscles are going to have to contract? Which are going to have to release? There’s a very precise coordination of all your limbs that’s necessary to do this pointless but interesting movement. Your job is to pay attention, to go slow enough that you can feel where effort is required and where it’s not. Don’t take one extreme or the other. Be active and assume that as an active being you will have to use some of your energy to instigate this movement.

When you start to put the pieces together you suddenly find that putting your foot closer to your head is pleasant, not because this movement contains the secret of the universe, but because you are actively engaged. You are not distanced from your body or your mind. You are undergoing a process of selective effort guided by calm attention. This process will serve you, not just here, but in all situations from public speaking to downhill skiing. And when you have to climb back up, that process will be there to remind you, “Push into the stairs!”