Body Wisdom: The Bridge to Animal Connection #109

Mary Debono reveals how your body wisdom (aka your inner authority) serves as a powerful bridge to connecting with animals. Through the Feldenkrais MethodⓇ, you'll discover how to access your natural physical intelligence – that innate sense of what feels right and harmonious in movement. Mary explains how our animals read and respond to how we move, feel, and breathe, making our body wisdom essential for deeper animal connections.

This episode explores the crucial difference between true physical comfort and mere habit, offering practical insights for breaking free from restrictive movement patterns. You'll learn how the Feldenkrais Method's gentle approach to self-awareness can enhance both physical ease and mental flexibility, ultimately creating a clearer channel for animal communication. Mary shares how her Debono Moves for Animals builds on these concepts, helping both humans and animals move and feel better together.

Key Takeaways:

• Body wisdom(aka your inner authority) is your natural guide to easier, freer movement
• Animals naturally read and respond to your movement patterns and tension
• True physical comfort is different from familiar but restrictive habits
• Developing self-awareness naturally enhances animal communication
• The Feldenkrais MethodⓇ improves both physical and mental flexibility
• Releasing habitual tension creates better "feel" and sensitivity with animals

Resources:
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Effortless, Balanced Sitting: A FeldenkraisⓇ Movement Series  ⬅️⬅️⬅️

💥Learn how the Feldenkrais Method can help improve your seat, position, and balance on your horse! Free rider videos: https://www.marydebono.com/rider 💥

Grab your FREE video training to help your dog. 🐕 https://www.marydebono.com/lovedog 💥

Get Mary’s bestselling, award-winning book, “Grow Young with Your Dog,” for a super low price at: https://tinyurl.com/growyoungwithyourdog. Demonstration videos are included at no extra cost. ⬅️⬅️⬅️

All information is for general educational purposes ONLY and does not constitute medical or veterinary advice or professional training advice. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider if you, your horse, or your dog are unwell or injured.  Always use extreme caution when interacting with horses and dogs.

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TRANSCRIPT:

Welcome to Easier Movement, Happier Life, where we explore how to create more freedom, joy and connection and movement for you and your horses and dogs. I'm your host, Mary Debono, and today we're talking about something that's truly life-changing. And it's how to develop your inner authority using the Feldenkrais Method and how it can deepen your connection with yourself and your animals and allow you to move more freely and to help your animals move more freely as well.

So let's start at the beginning. What the heck is inner authority? What do I mean by that? Well, you know that feeling when something just feels right? It's like, that feels right with me. It like resonates with you. That's your inner authority speaking. But too often we override those signals, right? It's like we fight against our own bodies and minds. Through the Feldenkrais Method, though, you can learn to tune into this innate wisdom that we all possess.

It's like we all have this. So you can think of inner authority as like an internal compass. It's telling you what feels right to you. And this is different for everybody. Okay? So if you take something simple. As you know, in the Felt of Christ Method, we use specific movements done with a high degree of attention to improve how we move, how we feel, how we make decisions, how we expand our creativity, etc.

But, so for example, if I'm leading a Feldenkrais class, I may have the class, you know, move their right arm in a certain way. But what I do is I, I encourage every participant in that class to do it the way that feels right for them. For some, they'll. They may put their arm up higher, some lower, some will extend it all the way. You know, it's going to be different for each of us.

So what I love so much about this method and why I use it so much in helping people and their animals is it's not about following a prescription. It's not about, you know, me demonstrating. This is the way you do the movement. Watch me and imitate me. No, no, no. We don't imitate in the Fallen Grace Method. And that's because we're all different. We all have different histories, we have different injuries, we have all kinds of different things.

Our bodies are different in many ways. So you develop this ability to sense what feels right to you through the sense of ease of movement. And that's an incredible skill. So I'll keep helping you understand how you can apply this then to helping your animals as well, because it's really, really important. It's a cornerstone of the work that I teach with the animals as well. So the Feldenkrais method was developed for humans.

I developed an approach called De Bono Moves that's been informed by the Feldenkrais method and helps you use your hands to improve how your animal moves and feels as well. So let's so again, think of your inner authority as this compass that you have, this internal compass. And it's not at all about being rigid or controlling. In fact, it's quite the opposite. It's about developing such a clear sense of yourself that you can move through life with more ease, more grace, more harmony.

Because you're making choices that truly align with who you are. So here's what's fascinating. It's like when we fight ourselves physically, right? We're holding unnecessary tension, we're forcing movements, we're you know, moving with strain, right? You know, or maybe we're, which is very common as well. We have this muscular armoring. It's like we just habitually tense our muscles is like an armor around us, right? So what's happening is we're, we're fighting ourselves, right?

So for example, if I go to reach into a cupboard to grab a mug, I can do it in a way where I'm using my whole body harmoniously, right? And I just simply reach in. There's no unnecessary strain anywhere. So no unnecessary wear and tear on my body. I just do it simply. You know, my whole body is working cooperatively, heart and harmony. But if I have habits of restricting areas, and this is super, super common, right?

Maybe I'm tightening my lower back, maybe I have tension around my neck or shoulders. My ribs are, are, are tense and stiff, you know, the muscles around them, any number of things. Maybe my eyes, you know, there was something about how I'm using my eyes in a way that restricts my movement. So now when I go to reach into the cupboard for that mug, I'm like literally fighting myself because I'm trying to get the mug.

But other muscles are working against the muscles that are trying to reach for the mug. So instead of my whole body working to align my actions with my intention, I'm fighting myself. So think about that. We often do that mentally as well. It's. We may want a certain thing, but we have habits of thinking of thoughts that create then behaviors that work against us. Okay? So again, this developing, this inner authority helps us with our physical well being and our mental and emotional well being.

Our entire life it's we're really just, obviously there is no body mind distinction. Right? We're all one organism, one being, if you will. You work more in harmony with yourself. Okay. And I love how the Feldenkrais method, through developing a sense of ease in your movement, helps you with your mind as well. Moshe Feldenkrais said it beautifully. He said, what I'm not after is flexible bodies, but flexible minds.

But he knew you got there through having more flexibility or more options in your movement. Now, it doesn't mean you have to be super flexible in your body, but you have that sense of options, that sense of improvement, right? And knowing you're not stuck in how you move. And it's amazing. So even without thinking about this intentionally, like, consciously, you'll notice. So, like my Feldenkrais students, because I've been teaching the Feldenkrais method for more than 30 years, you, they.

My students will just tell me, like, all these things in their life improve because they improve their movement. They may not put it together at first. Like, they know. They know physically they feel better, and they could move more easily, maybe ride their horse more effectively. That's a common one. Walk their dog more easily, hike, run, you know, turn around in the car to see what's behind them, all those things.

And they also, also report other improvements in their life. And I love that so much. But I know you're here because of your animals, too, so I'm going to address that in just a moment. So again, it's by developing this sense of what's truly comfortable for you, you'll literally become more sensitive, and so you can better read your animals and you can better help them. And I want to make a distinction here, too, about what's truly comfortable for you and what just simply feels familiar.

Because many of us have learned, you know, again, we all developed habits, and many of our habits are not helpful. They're often unconscious. We don't even know we're doing them. So, you know, we're tensing certain areas, we're restricting ourselves, and we just feel like that's normal. We don't know we're doing it because it's. Your brain has tuned it out because you're doing it so long. So you just think, oh, yeah, I'm comfortable.

I'm comfortable sitting here. So you might sit, you know, in a lopsided way. You're straining your neck, you're straining your shoulders, straining your back. Your hips are tight. Oh, I'm comfortable. I'm perfectly comfortable like this. Oh, I watch TV like This all the time, you might say, okay. And really, it's just familiar. It's not comfortable. It's not comfortable. It's just what you've been doing. And so when you learn gently, easily, to have more awareness about what you're doing, you suddenly find what true comfort is and you can discard what's familiar and unhealthy.

And of course, you keep what's working for you. So that's what I mean by inner authority. It's a, it's a. It's really feeling yourself connecting more deeply with yourself, not following some outside expert. Yes, you can, you can be educated by other people. You know, you can learn lots of things, but you then run it through your own filter and, and adapt it, modify it to what works for you.

So, so again, it's not just about the physical movement. It's about your thinking and your resultant behavior that's so important. So let's try something very simple right now. So wherever you are, if you can do this safely, just take a moment and notice your jaw and notice if there's any tension there. So very common place for us to, you know, have a habit of tensing. Just notice. And of course, in the Feldenkrais method, I have lots of different ways of helping you release tension.

There do a lot of things with the eyes and, you know, the neck and the, the ribs, I mean, all kinds of things in the tongue, etc. But just even bringing gentle awareness, there is a good first step in letting some of that tension dissolve. Think of it as just melting away. And if you'd like, if you're in a place you can do this, maybe slowly open and close your mouth, think of relaxing your tongue, and maybe take your lower jaw side to side in a very slow, easy way.

It's really important to stay within your range of complete ease so your nervous system feels that sense of safety. And then it'll want to do more. It'll like that feeling. You start to associate movement with ease and pleasure, which is what we want. So that simple awareness exercise is kind of like the beginning of developing your inner authority, right? So it's a good first little step and you start to notice more subtle signals from your body.

And then you start to become more sensitive and more aligned in all areas of your life. So now let's talk about applying it to your animals as well. And this is where it's really magical for those who, which I imagine if you're listening to this, you care about your horse or your dog. When you release Unnecessary tension, You literally develop more sensitivity. You can feel more. In the horse world, we call that developing feel.

You just can notice more. Your timing is better, your mechanics are better, you can sense what your animal is doing or how they're feeling, and then you respond, often without even thinking. It just becomes this natural response. Okay? So that is why it's so important to develop that sensitivity within yourself, because you will help your animal much more effectively as well. And if you think about it, horses, dogs and other animals, they are great at reading tension or, you know, your energy even, right?

They know how you feel sometimes before you do, right? They're so good at that. And when you're holding unnecessary kind of muscular armoring, you know, those habitual patterns you may have, they feel it, they notice it. And when you let that go, oh, they notice that too. I always say how you. How you move, how you feel and how you breathe are all felt by your animal. And they all influence and shape the interaction you have with your animal.

Something to really consider. It has a big effect on your animal and on your interactions with your animal. So it's like by developing this increased sensitivity, you become like a clearer channel, you know, like, if you want to communicate more effectively with your animals, you can certainly feel more. And this allows you to use methods like the De Bono Moves method that I created for animals. You're able to do it more skillfully because you can literally feel more.

That's why, you know, I teach people how to do this work with their horses, their dogs, their cats, etc. And I never teach the work with the animals without also guiding you through work in the Feldenkrais method. So in other words, you also do these movement lessons, these gentle or awareness through movement lessons that we do, because by developing this sensitivity, it will allow you to be a more skillful the Bono Moves practitioner to be able to help your horse, your dog, your cat more effectively.

You'll be able to feel changes in your animal's energy, in their. In their responses much more clearly. You know, your timing will improve, your touch becomes much more informed. So again, you become a better partner for your animal. And that's all because you developed a clearer connection with yourself first. So as we wrap up today's episode, I'm going to invite you to do one little thing. So let's start small.

Just notice one area, either in your body or some other part of your life that you feel like you might be fighting yourself. Maybe you have an area that always feels restricted or sore or tight. Somehow or there's something in your life that you're not advancing the way you would like to that's not feeling good to you. So just start. Start with one area. So choose something. Choose something and then just bring some gentle awareness to it.

1. I use what I. I like to call compassionate curiosity. And that's when you become curious about something. You bring that gentle awareness without any commentary, like, no internal commentary, no judgment. That's why it's compassionate. It's just. You're just noticing. You're just being more aware of something without judging it. So bring some gentle awareness to whatever part of your body or some other area of your life that you like to see changes, you'd like to feel differently.

And just notice, like, start. Start to think like, that you trust yourself more. You trust this inner authority that you're developing, your inner wisdom. And we all have this amazing intelligent nervous system, that inner wisdom. So you trust it more. And I'm gonna guess that you'll also find that your interactions with your animals will become more harmonious. So I'd love to hear from you. I'd love to hear from you.

Let me know what area of yourself or your life that you'd like to have more help with, and I'll do a podcast episode for you. So until next time, remember, you and your animals deserve to feel great together. Thank you so much for joining me. I love sharing this work with you, and I look forward to talking to you again soon. Bye for now.