Booklets & Audio Lessons

Download [use right-click (Windows) or option-click (Mac)] whichever booklets or audio lessons interest you. After you have downloaded what you wish, please pay what you are able either by clicking on the Paypal buttons and paying via credit card or sending a check to: Jeff Bickford, c/o Peak Performance, 1015 North Weber, Colorado Springs, CO 80903.

Booklets

Seeing with Magical Eyes

Practices to Revitalize Your Experience of the World – read an excerpt from this booklet. Download the full document (pdf) [To download use right-click (Windows) or option-click (Mac)]

Feldenkrais® Awareness Through Movement® Audio Lessons

If you think it might be helpful, email me a paragraph or two describing what you’ve been experiencing and what you’d like to experience and I will suggest lessons to try.

Please download How to do Awareness Through Movement Lessons and consult it frequently. How you do these lessons will determine what you get from them.

If you have any health problems please consult with your health care practitioner before doing any of these lessons. Though they are very gentle, some lessons may not be beneficial for you.

*If you are unable to download mp3's over the internet, let me know via email and we will work something else out.

To listen to the lesson without downloading it press on the black 'play' button. If the audio player fails to start, please ensure that you have Flash Player 10 installed. To find out what version you have installed, visit Abobe's site.

Organizing your back and neck for greater freedom of movement

Potent Flexion (A1)

This lesson can help you release tight muscles in your lower and middle back and help soften rigidity in shoulders, chest, and hips, bringing greater fluidity of movement in general and greater ease to being vertical - sitting, standing, and walking.
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Tilting Bent Legs with Triangle Arms (A2)

Twisting, flexing, and extending your spine can result in unwinding the tension in your torso giving you greater suppleness in everything you do.
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Tilting Crossed Bent Legs with Triangle Arms (A3)

Similar to ‘Tilting Bent Legs with Triangle Arms (#5), but a little more advanced.
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Carriage of the Head (A4)

This lesson brings a new sense of how your head can rest comfortably on your spine and bring greater ease to the movements of your neck and upper back. (This lesson is done laying upon your stomach.)
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Head to Knee with Pushup Arm (A5)

This lesson is done on your stomach and works with the actions of folding/flexing, rotating, and twisting your spine. The result is surprising, as you’ll find that your spine will extend much more easily, allowing your chest to open and letting your head ride more easily on your spine.
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Returning Movement to the Base of the Neck (A6)

This lesson brings awareness to a part of ourselves we've often lost contact with, the area where upper back and spine meet the base of the neck. It can help in finding balance while standing and walking and help connect the movement of our arms to the movement of the spine. This lesson can also greatly reduce tension in one's upper back and neck. Proceed carefully - don't do large movements, as in this area small changes have large results.
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Connecting Through the Diagonals (A7)

This is a deceptively simple lesson that will leave you feeling connected through your trunk and into your arms and legs, making walking, reaching, running, and doing every day tasks freer and easier. (Some of the movements are done on your stomach.)

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Bringing movement to your sternum and ribs to free your back and relieve joint pain

Returning Movement to your Sternum (B1)

Returning movement to your sternum can have repercussions throughout your life and your experience of movement. Restricted movement in your chest prevents movement of your ribs which often results in neck and lower back pain and dysfunctional use of the joints of the arms and legs. It can also open up locked up emotional experiences, so proceed with care.
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On Side, Sternum Becoming Flexible (B2)

Freeing the movement of your sternum will positively effect your experience of movement. It can help to reduce the stress on all your joints, as it helps to distribute the stresses of movement throughout your skeletal system. It can also open locked-up emotional experiences, so proceed with care.
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Freeing your jaw, eyes, mouth, and neck

Eyes, Neck, and Pelvis (C1)

This lesson can be very helpful for people who spend a good deal of time in front of the computer or reading. Often one's eyes get locked in to a relationship with the muscles of the neck that restrict movement of head and pelvis, leading to erosion of vision, neck and lower back discomfort, and joint problems. This lesson encourages differentiation in the
movements of the eyes, head and pelvis.
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Neck, Eye, and Spine Differentiation (C2)

Rotation, twisting, flexion, extension and side bending of the spine while differentiating the movements of your eyes - this is a wonderful lesson if done gently. Any lesson that involves eye differentiation can have great effect upon your overall co-ordination and sense-of-self, so proceed without undue ambition.
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The Relationship of Jaw, Tongue, Neck, and Pelvis (C3)

Many of us hold a great deal of tension in our jaw and mouth. This effects the movements of one's neck and pelvis which can result in a tight, sore neck and back as well as long term degradation of vertebrae. This lesson can help you bring attention to the movements of your jaw and tongue and how they relate to freedom of movement of your neck and pelvis.
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Jaw, Neck, Tongue, Pelvis (C4)

A variation of lesson #14. Some of us hold a great deal of tension in our jaw and mouth. This effects the movements of one's neck and hips, which can result in a tight, sore neck and back as well as long term degradation of the joints of legs, hips, spine, neck, and shoulders.
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Open Focus, Open Attention (C5)

This is essentially a guided meditation that can bring you to a greater awareness of how you can see the world with different eyes. For some it can change a habit of isolation from the world and the anxiety that comes with that.

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Coordinating your legs, feet, hips, and balance

Frog Legs (D1)

This is a great lesson to help integrate the movement of legs, spine, and hips. The movements you will learn can become a great way to gently and easily warm yourself up before walking, climbing, or running.
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Getting to Know the Hip Joints (D2)

This is a deceptively simple lesson that can be a great help in releasing tight ham strings to provide greater ease when standing or walking. It's also very helpful for those of you who practice sitting meditation
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Spinal Chain; asymmetrical and rocking (D3)

We often forget that we are held up in gravity by the pressure of our feet against the ground; this lesson helps to re-establish our ability to press our feet against the ground and connects that pressure all the way through our skeleton.
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Spinal Chain; Arms Reaching (D4)

This lesson is very helpful to find greater balance in standing and walking. It provides the grounding that spinal chain brings as well as connecting movements of the upper back and neck to the reaching of one’s arms.
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Painting with the Feet while on your Stomach (D5)

This lesson helps integrate movements of your legs and hips with movements of your spine and ribs.
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Circling the Feet while on your Stomach (D6)

This lesson is similar to ‘Painting with the Feet’, with a bit different approach.
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Toes and Feet (D7)

Doing this lesson can lead to the surprising discovery that bringing greater awareness to the movements of your toes and feet can lead to greater vitality and calmer energy.
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Standing on Crossed Legs (D8)

A great lesson to help with balance and coordination. It also functions as a tonic for your entire organization for walking (or dancing!).
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Hips and Trunk (D9)

Another good way to integrate the movements of legs, spine, and hips. The movements in this lesson can be larger so it is best to start with a less advanced lesson, like Frog Legs.
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Hips and Trunk, Holding Knee (D10)

A continuation of #21, Hips and Trunk, this lesson brings a great deal of side bending and arching movement to your spine, helping to free the movements of sternum, ribs, pelvis and legs.
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Straightening the Leg by Retreating the Hip (D11)

This lesson is done on your side and will help integrate the relationship of legs and spine. It can result in a great feeling of openness across the upper back.
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Freeing your breathing

SeeSaw Breathing (E1)

If you find that your breathe is shallow, or frequently find yourself holding your breathe, this lesson can be very helpful. It works with the parts of ourselves that move while we breathe. It does not teach a ‘right’ way of breathing, but creates the potential of breathing freely in all situations.
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Radial Breathing (E2)

During periods of stress our breathing can be thrown off and lead to disconnected movement. This lesson helps connect movement with the action of breathing, reintegrating a way of breathing that is fundamental in all healthy movement.
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Improving your use of arms and shoulders

Arm and Shoulder Comfort (F1)

Distress in arms and shoulders usually comes from isolating arm and hand movements in one’s arms and hands - which though sounding logical works best in machinery. The more your whole body is integrated in movement the easier everything becomes. You become supple, limber, more aware of how to make movement easier and comfortable. This lesson helps you learn to involve your whole body in movements of your hands and arms which can help you gain greater arm and shoulder comfort.
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Sitting, Turning Around Hand (F2)

Another lesson that approaches the distress in arms and shoulders that can come from isolating arm and hand movements. This lesson is done sitting, preferably on a bench, or on a flat bottomed chair or stool with a chair or stool of equal height on either side where you can place your hands. It helps you learn to allow chest, ribs, spine, and sternum to move with the movements of your arms and hands.
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Hand to Mouth, Mouth to Hand (F3)

This lesson uses the basic function of bringing your hand to your mouth to focus on how the neck, spine, and belly are involved in movements of the hand and arm. It can relieve tension in the upper neck and between the shoulder blades as well.
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Working with the Dominant Hand (F4)

I first used this lesson to help people who had trouble sleeping - in fact, it’s a great lesson to do in bed, as the movements are fairly minimal. It can help calm your whole nervous system down while helping you learn better use of your hands, arms, and shoulders.
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