My name is Ben Parsons. I grew up in England, and I now live in beautiful Potsdam, just outside Berlin in Germany with my family and our boxer Nico.
I work using the Feldenkrais Method helping people find better health and ways to live. My oldest client is 89 and can still get up from and down to the floor easily. My youngest clients are new-borns with special developmental needs. Most of my clients are like me – normal people, looking for a solution to their own movement, posture, and mental well being needs.
My first contact with the Feldenkrais Method was in 1998 whilst retraining as a Shiatsu Massage therapist. I qualified as a Pilates teacher in 2006. From 2012-2016 I completed the four-year professional Feldenkrais training programme.
How it all began – getting ill before finding a solution
It was 1993 and I was busy sitting my university exams in Japanese Studies. After six hours of intensive writing, I emerged with my hand cramping and painful. I could no longer hold my pen properly. The next day, two days later, a week later … it had not got better. Over time I realised that these six hours had caused a permanent change in how my body functions and the course of my life.
I had developed writer’s cramp, a repetitive strain injury (RSI) or focal dystonia. ‚Focal‘ means localised, and ‚dystonia‘ stand for faulty muscle function. My broken function was writing. For other people it impacts piano playing, typing, using the mouse, playing tennis, etc.
No one I knew, not even doctors, could tell me what was happening, why it was happening, or how to heal it. Even today, the internet shows many different opinions about the casuses of dystonia, and no guaranteed solutions.
I was seriously afraid that I would be unable to hold down a job. Also, what if it spread to my other hand or other actions like typing?
It was clear to me that, at the moment leading up to this bodily breakdown, I had been very stressed and my body had become very stiff. I did everything I could think of to find a permanent solution (massage, physiotherapy, shiatsu, yoga, stress management), but they only brought temporary relief.
And then one day 15 years later I got lucky. I was introducd to a therapist, Veronique, in Geneva, Switzerland. She said, „Take a pen and feel what your body does“. To my amazement, as I began to write, my shoulder lifted to my ear. I had never noticed, never paid attention to that. Those ten minutes changed my life for ever. I learnt that where attention goes, change flows.
I started doing Feldenkrais courses. Even though the group lessons did not even focus on my hand, they had a holistic effect and changed my whole posture and movement. Without me noticing, my dystonia started getting better and better. Today, thanks to intensive Feldenkrais work, working on mental health and maintaining a healthy work-life balance, my RSI and dystonia symptoms are reduced by 99% and finally I feel that I am in control of my health and well being.
How did the Feldenkrais Method and somatic mindfulness create ‚healing‘ in my body?
What you can’t sense, you can’t change. But you can change things that you can sense or feel.
When we pay attention to our bodies, we see things for the first time, though they were there all along if only we had looked.
With self awareness, the intelligence of the human body automatically improves poor movement habits.
Mindfulness, embodiment and a healthy life style became a big part of my life. My son was born with an orthopaedic foot problem. When he received Feldenkrais sessions as a child, his walking and posture improved, the joint pain reduced, and as an unexpected side-effect, his mood became lighter, more easy going.
With such stong evidence of effectiveness, I decided to learn Feldenkrais and offer other people a short cut to help them with things that took me more than 15 years to learn. I did the four year, 800 hour professional Feldenkrais training program in Frankfurt am Main, and today I work with people with a wide range of ages and physical abilities.
Over 25 years of helping people to live a healthy life, I have had many experiences, including: yoga, pilates, ergonomics. Mental well-being, meditation, autogenic training, progressive muscle relaxation, breathing, stress reduction. Shiatsu massage, TCM (traditional chinese medicine), acupuncture, tuina (chinese massage). Mézières method, Eutony, Continuum Movement, Grinberg work. Anatomy, physiology and pathology.
I help people in multiple domains, including physical well-being, mental well being, embodiment and presence in communication.
My broad experience helps to see the whole picture and to work holistically with each person. When a person is better served by another professional, I make the necessary recommendation.
Not everyone is familiar with the Feldenkrais Method, but it has had such a positive effect on all my clients that it is always a pleasure for me to share my knowledge and help solve their movement challenges and take their first step on a journey towards better physical and mental health.
Contact me to join a class and to get an offer. Click here for times and prices.
Movement Solutions 