Jul 14, 2026 · 22 min · 12 segments
Send Mary a message What do you believe about your body? That you're not coordinated? That you're too old for this? That stiffness is just how it is…
What do you believe about yourself? What do you believe about your movement, about your body? You know, I often hear people say, "I'm just not coordinated.
I'm never gonna be coordinated," or, "I'm just not athletic" or, you know, "I've always been stiff.
It's just the way, just the way I've always been." And they don't expect anything different.
Or this is one, again, I hear a lot, "Oh, my family, we all have bad knees," or, "We all have bad backs," or bad shoulders [laughs] or whatever it happens to be.
Of course things are going to fall apart." And as a matter of fact, I have personal experience with that belief because I started saying to myself, you know, I, I was having severe carpal tunnel syndrome in both arms.
Well, I had had, by that point, years of pain in my hip and limitation, and I remember saying, "Well, I have to expect this.
I'm getting older." And I was in my late 20s when I said that, and I believed it.
But fortunately for me, I learned about the Feldenkrais Method, which is something, uh, that now I've been teaching it for over 30 years, and that turned me right around.
It gave me what we call biological optimism, that I could look at these beliefs and change them.
I could have different experiences that would just totally change my mindset about aging or about coordination or about athleticism, about flexibility, all those things.
So because we really need to, to, to, to question these things that we think are facts about us.
Are they really facts, or are, are they simply beliefs that we've con- convinced ourselves are true, right? That's what, that's what beliefs are.
And, you know, our brains naturally create beliefs, right? They help us make sense of the world, and they can come from personal experience.
What do you believe about yourself? What do you believe about your movement, about your body? You know, I often hear people say, "I'm just not coordinated.
I'm never gonna be coordinated," or, "I'm just not athletic" or, you know, "I've always been stiff.
It's just the way, just the way I've always been." And they don't expect anything different.
Or this is one, again, I hear a lot, "Oh, my family, we all have bad knees," or, "We all have bad backs," or bad shoulders [laughs] or whatever it happens to be.
Of course things are going to fall apart." And as a matter of fact, I have personal experience with that belief because I started saying to myself, you know, I, I was having severe carpal tunnel syndrome in both arms.
Well, I had had, by that point, years of pain in my hip and limitation, and I remember saying, "Well, I have to expect this.
I'm getting older." And I was in my late 20s when I said that, and I believed it.
But fortunately for me, I learned about the Feldenkrais Method, which is something, uh, that now I've been teaching it for over 30 years, and that turned me right around.
It gave me what we call biological optimism, that I could look at these beliefs and change them.
I could have different experiences that would just totally change my mindset about aging or about coordination or about athleticism, about flexibility, all those things.
So because we really need to, to, to, to question these things that we think are facts about us.
Are they really facts, or are, are they simply beliefs that we've con- convinced ourselves are true, right? That's what, that's what beliefs are.
And, you know, our brains naturally create beliefs, right? They help us make sense of the world, and they can come from personal experience.
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