Copy
I hope you enjoy this Stones in Water™ Newsletter with an Exploratorium article on Wholeness, a "locating" practice and information on a variety of lessons, classes and workshops. If you are reading this on a phone  please note that there are 2 columns after the first article. Please scroll to the right to see right column. Thanks.
Greetings from the Stones in Water™ studio,
What follows is an Exploratorium article on Wholeness, information on a new on-line class about Performance Anxiety, an August Immersion Learning class, VoiceCare Network workshops and more. Enjoy!
Exploratorium

How’s your Wholeness?
Wholeness of being is our nature. Culture, science, and our perceptions split us apart from the world and ourselves. When we live from this split-apart perspective we become vulnerable to a host of struggles like pain, stress, fatigue, anxiety.

It can be a challenge to change our split-apart way in the world. Below is a stepping-stone tool to help you reconnect with your inherent wholeness.

The first set of questions are feeling & sensing in nature. The second set of questions are open-ended and invite inquiry.

Feeling & sensing questions:
(These are yes/no questions that have a preference embedded in them.They are a good first step.)
  • Am I floating?
  • Am I aware of the world around me?
  • Am I calm?
  • Am I free and balanced? 
    (If you mimic bouncing a basketball, that’s the feeling.)
If you answered “no” to one or more questions then inquire further by asking : “Why does it make sense that I am as I am in this moment?”

Inquiry questions:
(These are open questions that don’t imply a preferential way to be. They develop your self awareness. It can help to think of a continuum of possibilities, suggestions below.)
  • What is my relationship with the planet? (On continuum of heavy to floating)
  • On what is my attention? (On a continuum of narrowed and/or inward attention to open attention to the world around me or attention out ahead of me to attention present in the world)
  • What is my state of being? (On continuum of terrified/rageful to peaceful/joyful)
  • What is my sense of my body? (On continuum of compressed or tense to free or light and open)
As you answer these inquiry questions notice connections between them. For example in a moment you might feel heavy, inward, tired and compressed or perhaps floating, in the world, peaceful and open. Making the connections gives you a sensory picture of your wholeness.

My work delves into these 4 aspects of your wholeness:
  1. Your relationship with gravity
  2. Your attention
  3. Your state of being
  4. Your physical balance.
When you understand your floating relationship with gravity it changes your entire coordination; when you understand how your attention organizes your system, you become more mindful of what you choose to focus your attention on; when you understand how your state of being works, you have a doorway to gaining freedom from useless or painful mental chatter and hair trigger reactions; when you understand your physical structure, you have access to a feedback system that can liberate you from destructive, painful habits. Seeing how these four are one whole system gives you an internal compass, and a direct line of knowledge built right into you. It feels like a conduit with the Universe built right within you.
stonesinwater.com
On-Line Summer Class
Free to Sing–Unraveling Performance Anxiety
Getting Out of Your Head and Into the Music
2 hour class once a week for 6 weeks. The day and time will be determined by the group. Maximum 6 people. $150

The class will be an on-line class for a small group. This is a LearningMethods™ class focused on performance issues. Topics covered will be determined by the interests of the group. You’ll have your concerns addressed and have the opportunity to observe others unravel their particular performance issues. You’ll learn about some of the most common roots of performance tension and anxiety, and you'll gain strategies to make changes.

This is crucial material for music educators. We examine how the language and framework of teaching contributes to ease or to stress in performance. Recognizing the fear traps your students get caught in can help you help them perform with ease and confidence.

Please email, call or text me to register and arrange class timing.
babette@stonesinwater.com
612.729.7127

We’ll use uberconference to meet.
Summer Classes at The Marsh,
A Center for Balance and Fitness, Minnetonka, Minnesota
to register for any class listed below call The Marsh at 952.935.2202

Talking about Falling: The Fundamentals of Safe, Efficient Human Gait.
Doug Merz Physical Therapy and Babette Lightner Alexander Technique
Wednesday, June 24th, 1:00-2:00 p.m.
We are co-presenting about walking biomechnics and how they relate to managing our risk of falling.
$10members/$20 non-members

Preventing Falls with Alexander Technique
Wednesday July 1st & 8th, 1:00-2:30 p.m.
We will work with you on techniques for falling safely and getting comfortable with the ground again. We will do specific balance and flexibility work including at-home preventions tips (such as, "Where are your handrails and scatter rugs?") We will address unraveling fear and rushing habits that are major contributors to taking a fall. These are personalized hands-on small group classes appllying Alexander Technique and movement principles. $35/$45: 2 part series.

Upcoming in August:
Unraveling Anxiety – Deconstructing Misconceptions/ Hard-wiring Joy

This is a 2 part workshop to help you get out of anxiety/stress patterns and gain tools to allow peace and ease in your life. It is like seeing two sides of the same coin. One side is about uprooting the conceptions that drive fear/stress. The other is being able to access the perspectives that drive joy when you need it.  It is like changing a vicious cycle into a virtuous cycle; gain clarity, practice peace; see the pattern, pause and make a different choice.

Day 1 is rooted in LearningMethods™ (see learningmethods.com) which is a profound cutting edge approach to cognitive clarity in the moment of living life. It gives you tools to pinpoint your attention to uproot misconceptions that cause problems. Day 2 is rooted in Patterns of Joy™ an approach Babette Lightner has developed for physically anchoring ourselves in perspectives of health. Many of us can clearly describe what we need or want to do, but in the moment we actually need to take a different path to get a different result we end up back in the same old pattern. Patterns of Joy™ is a powerful tool to be able to access and apply what you know when you need it most.

Dates TBA – feel free to contact me so I can let you know the day and times for this series.
 
Ways to Learn
Individual lessons, Phone Sessions, Classes and Workshops
Schedule individual lessons with Babette in the Twin Cities or River Falls, Wisconsin. Phone lessons are an effective way to do LearningMethods™ for problem solving, performance anxiety and stress reduction work.  I conduct workshops and residencies anywhere in the country or abroad. If you are interested in discovering more about Alexander Technique, Wholeness in Motion™, LearningMethods™  or Patterns of Joy™ please contact me: 612.729.7127 or babette@stonesinwater.com.
August Immersion Learning
5 days of daily lesson and daily class
August 3-7
Rural Retreat Option August 10-14

The story goes that FM Alexander worked with pupils daily for weeks at a time. I have always noticed how people make big changes during workshops in which they immerse themselves in the work.
I am offering a combination of the two. Take daily lessons and a daily class. Start the day with a 2 hour  Wholeness in Motion™ class in which you'll move, do experiential anatomy and explore principles of Alexander Technique.  Then have an individual lesson later in the day to deepen what you learned in class and address your particular concerns.

$400 for the week of classes and lessons. Classes and lesson will be in the Twin Cities. To register contact me by email, text or call. babette@stonesinwater.com or 612.729.7127

Rural Retreat Option:
I am considering a rural retreat version of this format August 10-14 in my Western Wisconsin studio, between River Falls and Spring Valley, Wisconsin. There are nearby accommodations and I could arrange a few activities like a folk-sculpture garden walk, an evening LearningMethods™ class and many lovely walks. If you are interested let's talk so we can adapt to a retreat structure. 612.729.7127
VoiceCare Network Summer Workshops
St. John's University
BodyMind and Voice Course, July 9-16
Conducting Continuing Course, July 19-24

The Bodymind and Voice course continues a 30 year tradition of presenting materials that are on the cutting-edge of voice education. The understanding of the human system is exploding with recent developments in technology and neuroscience. This course introduces a radically new way of scaffolding voice training away from parts manipulation. This mirrors research in motor learning and skill acquisition with athletes and applies these insights to voice training. The material is presented in a practical, accessible and engaging approach that models the science it is based upon. Science describes what is. When we teach according to the way the human system works, teaching becomes efficient and effortless and voices remain healthy.

COURSE TOPICS

  • Personal Voice and Voice Health
  • Conducting Gestures and Voice
  • Teaching and Learning
  • Child Voice
  • Male/Female Changing Voice
  • Older Adult Voice
  • Human Movement and Coordination
  • Voice Health
Conducting Course: Conducting
This course is an immersion course in the effects of conducting gestures and verbal-nonverbal communication on singers and their voices. The course will begin with brief "re-entry" experiences in how voices are made and "played" and in human-compatible learning. Human Coordination and Movement work as applied to conducting is woven throughout the course. Everyone will have several opportunities to conduct the entire group and will be given feedback by Axel Theimer and Babette Lightner. Each participant has one voice lesson with Liz Grefsheim during the course. These sessions may be recorded for study, and taken home at the end of the course.

To Register go to voicecarenetwork.org

These courses can be taken for graduate credit and are the cheapest credits you can get at $90 a credit. BMV is 4 credits, Conducting 3 credits.

Locating Practice

Here I am, as I am
In the world, as it is
Supported by the planet
Floating in the multiverse
Awake
To my state of being
sigh-exhale to ground and up

 
These are the words to a movement sequence with which we start class. If you'd like to see the movement text me and I’ll send a clip.
Would you like to get personalized help with pain or stress issues?

Contact Babette Lightner to set up your six week series of individual sessions.  There is a 10% discount when you choose a series of sessions.
Her work brings together Alexander Technique, Anatomy of Wholeness™, LearningMethods™ and 25 years experience helping people change unhealthy habits and movement patterns.




Special thanks to Victoria Radar and Tim Peterson for Exploratorium editing help!
 
Our email address is:
babette@stonesinwater.com
Phone contact is:
612.729.7127
Copyright © *2015* *|Stones in Water, Babette Lightner|*, All rights reserved.
Stones in Water™ and Wholeness in Motion™ Patterns of Joy™are trademarks of Babette Lightner; LearningMethods™ and Anatomy of Wholeness™ are trademarks of David Gorman, All rights reserved.
Plant and water photos by Suzanne Baker. LM logo used with permission.