My Summers in New Hampshire
Every summer now for over a decade I have had the great pleasure and honor of spending a few weeks teaching Feldenkrais at the beautiful World Fellowship Center at the foot of the White Mountains near Conway, New Hampshire.
One glorious week is dedicated to Early Music Week, where I teach music as well as Feldenkrais, and also get to perform with a wonderful group of talented and accomplished musicians. This year we will be joined by my friend Salomé Sandoval (voice, lute, vihuella and baroque guitar) as we explore the music of the Spanish Golden Age.
Using Feldenkrais to coach a viol player at Early Music Week
The workshop is geared towards amateur singers and instrumentalists at a variety of skill levels, and the environment is supportive and low-stress, which I love. There’s always an eager group of learners in my daily Awareness Through Movement classes, and it’s great to watch their delight as they discover easier and more effective ways to move, with each day’s lesson building on the ones that came before.
(Click here if you’d like to learn more about Early Music Week at World Fellowship)
Once the viols, recorders and harpsichords leave and the sound of live music begins to fade, I usually get a few days to switch gears and prepare for one of the highlights of my year as a Feldenkrais teacher: a four-day intensive Awareness Through Movement retreat!
If you’ve ever been to a Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement class, you’ve probably experienced the wonderful, and at times profound, changes that can take place through this method in your body and in your sense of self. Now imagine what could happen over the course of four full days, as you go deeper and deeper into your senses, and flesh out your self-image.
And now imagine that you are spending those four days in a beautiful location, exploring and improving your breath!
The Schmauch Meeting House, where we hold our Feldenkrais classes
The retreat is modeled on the process used in professional Feldenkrais Practitioner training. We do at least three Awareness Through Movement lessons each day, allowing time for both rest and discussion between lessons to help students integrate what they have experienced. The program takes place in the morning and early afternoon, leaving students free to enjoy everything else that World Fellowship has to offer for the rest of the day.
I hope you can join me for this liberating and invigorating retreat at the foot of Mt. Chocorua! Good people, good food, good views, and lots of great moving! Four whole days of rolling around on the floor, walking in the woods, swimming in the pond and feeling more and more like yourself as you knew you could be, but were afraid to hope for!
See you in New Hampshire this summer!
~Josh.