Body-Mind Centering® Programs in Berlin and Freiburg

Senses & Perception

Our senses begin as potential and develop in response to stimulation and experience. We will explore the senses of touch and movement, vision, hearing, taste and smell. It is through our senses that we receive information from our internal environment (ourselves) and the external environment (others and the world). We filter, modify, distort, accept, reject, and use that information as part of the act of perceiving.

Organs provide with their fullness and three-dimensionality support for movement and presence. They are vivid, keep us alive and decide what we need or not. Our many diaphragms create space and connectivity, the breath animates and nourishes us in turn.

Ligaments & Fascia

Fascia provides the tensegrity matrix of the whole body. It wraps around all other structures as one continuous spiraling, multilayered, and multidimensional network of expansive sheaths, enclosed containers and specialized attachments. These specialized attachments are the ligaments.They set boundaries of movement between the bones. They coordinate and guide by directing the path of movement and provide specificity, clarity, and efficiency for the alignment and movement of the bones.

Endocrine Glands

The endocrine glands are the major chemical governing system of the body and are closely aligned with the nervous system. Their secretions pass directly into the blood stream and their balance or imbalance influences all of the cells in the body. They create crystalline psychophysical states through which we are able to experience and understand the universal aspect of self.

Primitive Reflexes & Ontogenetic

In our human development we pass through certain stages of movement, articulation and presence. We begin in fluid environment, later earth, space and our social environment are our partners. We bond, yield, push, reach, pull, grasp, hold on, let go. Conscious and unsconcious movement shape the patterning of our relation with ourselves and the world. It is a dynamic process. How do we orient? How do we filter, accept, defend and learn?

We will explore certain milestones of our movement development. We will explore our inherent alphabet of movement, – the reflexes  – a beginning vocabulary of movement that allows growth and interaction in this world. The readiness for relating, weight bearing, rolling, locomotion, equilibrium. Exploring and moving through theses stages can offer ease, lightness, stability and freedom in our dances.

Bones: structure & ground

Bones provide our movement with supportive structure and clear inner organization. They support us in inner alignment and orientation. They are alive. And provide leverage, form and clarity. Woven into the three-dimensional tension network of fascia, ligaments, tendons and muscles, they provide structural integrity.

Movement development: from a single-celled organism to a walking being

We explore movement from single-celled organisms to walking beings. Different movement patterns interlock, overlap, and provide the ground for further development. We start in a fluid environment, then “land” in contact with the ground. We are always in contact and exchange with our environment and develop through it and with it.

Fluids: flow & rhythm

Fluids are like a transport system, they connect and move us in many ways. Within us they create space for freedom, letting go, suppleness and ease in movement. Through them we experience different rhythms and dynamics, as well as deepest inner peace and presence.

Nervous system: regulation & balance

Experience first takes place at the cellular level. The nervous system registers, regulates, classifies and forms patterns that can be retrieved. Through autonomic processes, the nervous system also creates the basis for our alertness and calmness, our thinking and conscious acting and reacting. It forms the perceptual basis from which we view and interact with our inner and outer worlds.