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What the Body Knows Before We Have Words
On movement, the psyche, and why learning to recognise one another may be one of the most important things we teach.
I spent much of today teaching children, and something kept revealing itself through the simplest moments.
In ballet, I was teaching them to stretch. You know that first little sensation of discomfort when you enter a stretch? Not pain. Just that initial resistance. I told them it was the body speaking, almost like its way of saying hello. They didn’t have to react immediately. They could simply breathe, listen, and give the sensation a moment.
And then something rather amazing happened. Their bodies softened. They could feel the difference, and one child exclaimed, “Oh wow. That works!” They could remain in the stretch, even move a little deeper, without forcing anything.
Such a simple concept, but think about what they had just experienced. The first sensation wasn’t the whole experience. Something changed in the interval between feeling and responding. The body communicated. The psyche attended. And the breath created enough room for another possibility.
I couldn’t help thinking about how often we encounter something similar psychologically. We experience discomfort, uncertainty…
