A title can look official and sound official. It can have a shiny gold seal that feels good to the touch.
But then one day you look at the actual history and think:
"Wait a minute. Who in the hell gave these people this authority? Who certified the certifiers?!"
The term “Guild Certified Feldenkrais Trainer.,” sounds impressive, right? Sounds official. Sounds like something Moshe Feldenkrais must have created...? After all, the Guild has his name on it. His picture. His service marks. His whole aura floating around the thing like nag champa incense at a Yoga retreat.
So it is very easy to assume that the original Feldenkrais trainers were chosen by Moshe.
ha!
It's a reasonable assumption that is completly and utterly false.
When I was younger, I was willing to be diplomatic and say it is a myth that Moshe chose a few of his young American students to become trainers. Now, screw it. Let's drop the diplomacy: It was a lie!
Moshe did not create a trainer certification process.
Moshe did not personally certify any of the Feldenkrais Guild trainers. Not only did he never use the term "Feldenkrais Trainer," he was dead when they started using it! Moshe did not sit in a room, observe them training practitioners, and say, “Yes, these are the people who should carry my work forward.”
The first so-called Feldenkrais trainers began using that title after Moshe was no longer alive to approve, disapprove, clarify, correct, bless, curse, or throw something at them and call them idiots (one of Moshe's favorite words.)
So what happened?
The usual human thing happened: A small group of people got control of the public structure around the work: The service marks. The institutional language. The fancy-looking doors with hieroglyphics and fancy locks.
And then some of them anointedt themselves. And then became the people standing at the doors stopping others from entering. (Feldenkrais Trainers don't wear funny little hats like the Pope and his Cardinals. But they did consider it.)
One of the key figures in all the nuttiness was Jerry Karzen.
He was Moshe’s organizer, secretary, and traveling companion.
Jerry described the early process in his own words:
“In January 1983, I was asked by the Directors of the Feldenkrais Foundation to become its executive director while simultaneously the North American Feldenkrais Guild established the Training Accreditation Board. Soon thereafter, I asked Mark Reese, Russell Delman, and David Bersin to serve temporarily as trainers in Foundation-sponsored training programs...”
Read the little word there. “I asked.”
Not Moshe asked.
Not Moshe certified.
Not Moshe evaluated.
Jerry asked.
And what the hell did Jerry Karzen know? Was he a Feldenkrais trainer himself? NO. Had he trained others to do the work? NO.
And yet this is where the title begins. Not with Moshe. Not with a transparent public process. Not with a demonstrated standard of competence. But with Jerry asking a few men from the inner circle to “temporarily” serve as trainers.
Temporarily.
That is another little word worth noticing.
Because temporary arrangements have a funny way of becoming permanent hierarchies where no one is allowed to ask questions. And that is what happened.
The temporary became permanent.
The permanent became sacred.
The sacred became protected.
The protected became dogma.
(In a future post, I will share some of the terms Feldenkrais trainers have said about my writings: Sacrilege! Abomination! Mentally deranged!)
But I digress.
Decades later, people are still bowing before titles that were not created by Moshe, not certified by Moshe, and not based on any clear competency requirement that anyone can point to. That does not mean these men knew nothing. It does not mean they had nothing useful to teach. It does mean that they got official titles that gave them the ability to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars for something that they were figuring out on the job. And it does mean that they had to lie to others - and eventually to themselves when they said, "This is what Moshe wanted."
And I don't think they realized it puts them below Moshe.
Puts them below a dead man.
Some of these men (and women) are in the 70s and 80s now and they are still not their own authority.
So yes, if you have had the feeling that something is not right in the Feldenkrais world, trust that feeling.
The hierarchy around the Feldenkrais Method is B.S.
It started as a poltical and myth-making hierarchy and not one based on skill
.
And no, it didn't descend from heaven or from Moshe.
It came from people with access, proximity and a willingness to use it for their own benefit. And once you see it - really see it - the whole thing starts to wobble.
Not the work but the "officialness."
The priesthood around the work.
The idea that some people are closer to the source and therefore get to decide who belongs, who speaks, who teaches, and who gets treated as legitimate. Ok, I could go on and on here...and I will. But that's enough for one blog post.
In the meantime, please stop and feel your contact with whatever chair, bed, floor or other surface you are in contact with right now.
Notice your contact.
Not the story about your contact with it, but your real lived contact...
That's real. And it belongs to you.
Peace.
Ryan
