Secondary page banner V2 Eric Cooper Somatics


Group Classes
at
Any Level

‘by request’

 

 

“That was absolutely incredible; I’m so relaxed. Looking forward to more!”

-Zoom class attendee

I can give
a private class for two, or more,
at your location or mine,
with a theme of your choosing.


Realize a greater freedom.

 

Learn lifelong skills to feel more comfortable and at ease.


“I found something that’s been here all along, and yet I had to find it.” 


Feedback from  1 1/2 hour Basics class at Kalamazoo College:

Kalamazoo College Somatics Class 2019“Cured my headache.”
“My back no longer hurt.”
“I wasn’t aware of how stressed I was before.”
“I think everyone needs one of these classes.”
“The increadable releasing and freeing of some of my stress.”
“I loved letting go of all the stress in my body, it helped me relax the stress in my mind.”
“I gained so much more insight on my body and my patterns of tension that I can take home with me to practice on my own.”

 

side bend movement in Somatics Class with Eric Cooper

Join Eric Cooper in a low effort, stretch-free, class of healing movement.

 

 “I took your early November class. The following day my back was NOT stiff. Amazing! Thanks!”

 


 

  • Bring a yoga mat if you have one. Wear loose fitting clothing/yoga clothing.
  • You will need to be able to lay on the floor and be able to get up off the floor, too.
  • These are are not a drop-in classes. Please let me know if you will be attending. Class size limited.
  • Suitable for ages 12 and up.
  • Questions?  eric@InSpireSomatics.com or call (734) 436-1041
  • Important:  I have noticed that, occasionally, a person  with very specific pain problems comes to a group class expecting miracles.  What they desperately need are private sessions.   If you have any questions about this issue, please contact me.

 

“Each session or class I get more comfortable and confident in the movements. I notice that I can focus inward more quickly and efficiently. I have made some healthy changes in my life since starting this practice. I have become more myself and more peaceful. Oh and more fun.” -P. Event Organizer

Feedback from a recent Basics class:

“I feel so much more embodied than when I arrived, more connected to my body. What was particularly special is that I feel so much more connected to my left side. Now, understanding how my left shoulder discomfort is not just my shoulder, it’s connected to my lower back, my hip, my leg, in ways I wasn’t even aware of day to day. That’s important, to reconnect to my left side.”

“The yoga classes I have been taking are so intense and fast paced. It’s very nice to slow down and connect with your body, feeling the connections. [Sigh], This is a better pace.”

“I appreciated the reminder of Injury-Freeze, and the secondary effects of that. Each time, as you had us check-in [lying still and looking inward], I felt my body was more connected to the earth. How much more I felt. Everything felt like it was connecting.”

 

Photo from the first class in our beautiful new building. September 2018


More info:

The classes usually cover:

The classes usually cover:

  • What “Sensory Motor Amnesia” is and how it causes most chronic muscle pain.
  • How our daily movement habits and adaptations to stress contribute to chronic muscle pain.
  • How all humans respond reflexively to stress within three universal patterns of contraction. 
  • The difference between stretching and pandiculation, the technique used to restore voluntary nervous system control of muscles.
  • How to apply the movements to walking, standing, sitting.
  • A basic routine of Somatic Exercises when done regularly, will result in renewed muscle control and freedom of movement.


Isn't Somatics the same as Feldenkrais?

“Somatics is just a watered down version of Feldenkrais”
-a Feldenkrais Practioner I know


“I know as much about Feldenkrais as anyone else in the world, especially about his technique, his thinking, and such things like that, because I have made it my business to do so.”
-Thomas Hanna in 1990


In 1975, Thomas Hanna brought Moshe Feldenkrais to teach in the United States for the first time. Hanna revered Feldenkrais, and taught Felkenkrais’ Awareness Through Movement for 15 years. Thomas Hanna went on to developed Clinical Somatic Education, “Somatics“.

Somatics is optimized and targeted to
address how humans get stuck.


“What you do in 600 movements, I can do with 10.”
– Paraphrasing what legend recounts Thomas Hanna having said to Moshe Feldenkrais


Somatics specifically targets
how we really get stuck.

Hanna made three essential, and critical additions to the groundwork of Moshe Feldenkrais:

  1. The Three Stress ReflexesThese patterns of full body contraction that are the brain-body’s reaction to stress and injury. These reflexive contractions are how the human body gets stuck. These are the root of the tension problems people have with their bodies.
  2. S.M.A., Sensory Motor Amnesia,  When muscles are tight, they don’t give good sensory feedback to the brain. With this persistent tensions, the brain developes an amnesia these structures.  In both subtle and often profound expressions, SMA is expressed in muscles as weakness, persistent tightness, quivering under load, un-smooth in motion, and often with a total inability to feel and control related movement patterns. SMA is the result of the sub-cortical habituation of the stress reflex contractions. We are unaware of our SMA. By definition, we do not know the extent of how we are unable to sense our bodies.
  3. Pandiculation (and Practitioner Assisted Pandiculation), the natural way cats and dogs clear out their muscle tension. In its simplest form, a lazy yawning contraction followed by a slow taper to relaxed. This process allows the brain to re-learn how to sense and control our musculature. Basically: pandiculation resets muscle tension. When pandiculation is done with the assistance of a skilled practitioner, long lasting changes in muscle tension can be learned.


The pandiculation movement pattern creates a more vivid feedback for the nervous system in Somatics. Feldenkrais exploration is sublime, and very valuable. It is not as predictable in its results as Somatics. Pandiculation is more powerful in its ability to change involuntary tension patterns. In somatics there is more direction to regain this loss of control.

Hanna speaking about Feldenkrais in 1990: And everything that Feldenkrais did I absorbed and I have nothing but admiration for these things and I have no negative feelings about the Feldenkrais tradition because it’s unique.

And in the hand of a very good practitioner one can do things that no one else can do. But in practicing, and especially continuing to do research in this area, I realised that Feldenkrais had moved into a realm that he saw, given his own background, but he wasn’t able, given the way he got into it, to look beyond at other possibilities.

I being, in some sense, second generation, the second generation always carries it to a greater point of clarity than the first generation, or the third generation, because really Feldenkrais was in the second generation of Alexander [Method of Somatic] teachers you see.” –Thomas Hanna, 1990

 

diagram of influences on Thomas Hanna, Developer of Clinical Somatic Education, Somatics

Every time you take a somatics class, you dive deeper into sensing yourself.

In-person group classes
are
cancelled
due to Covid-19




Every time you take a somatics class,
you dive deeper into sensing yourself.

Escape from the automatic, unconscious tension patterns
that cause pain, aches and stiffness.
It is the perfect self-maintenance.

Escape the involuntary tensions that distort posture, and hinder movement.

 It’s not yoga. It’s not Feldenkrais.  It’s not stretching. Be empowered to take care of yourself.

Learn how to relieve your own pain. Increase your self awareness.

Join Eric Cooper in a pain-free, stretch-free, session of Hanna Somatic Body Movement. Release stuck muscle patterns throughout your body. Muscles often activate and compensate for misalignment. Pains of ‘old age’ and from injuries will continue to persist until we retrain the brain and body to release, realign, and reconnect.

Whether you are new to Somatics or have already had private Clinical Somatics sessions, you will enjoy and benefit from Somatics classes and workshops.

Each 90-minute class teaches several slow, pleasurable, very low-effort, pain-free, Hanna Somatic Movements to clear habitual tensions that cause pain, improve posture, increase range of motion, prevent injuries.

Learn how to create awareness within your body
and move freely with greater flexibility and ease.

The movements you will learn can become part of an easy low-effort home practice. Somatics workshops are highly informative, relaxing and enjoyable.

Unwind yourself.
Find yourself.