Our senses begin as potential and develop in response to stimulation and experience. The senses of touch and movement are located throughout the body -- in every cell. The senses of vision, hearing, taste and smell are located in the head. It is through our senses that we receive information from our internal environment (ourselves) and the external environment (others and the world).

How we filter, modify, distort, accept, reject, and use that information is part of the act of perceiving. Perception is a global experience. It is the psychophysical process of interpreting information based on past experience, present circumstances and future expectations.

When we choose to absorb information, we bond to that aspect of our environment. When we block out information, we defend against that aspect. Learning is the process by which we vary our responses to information based on the context of each situation.

This course will include:

• Exploration of the six senses (movement, touch, taste, smell, hearing and vision).

• Analysis of the perceptual-response cycle as the process of perception.

• Bonding, defending and learning as psychophysical processes based on your perceptions.

4 days; 28 hours

Our organs are vital and alive. They provide us with our sense of self, full-bodiedness, and organic authenticity. Organs are the contents within the skeletal-flesh container and carry on the functions of our internal survival -- breathing, nourishment and elimination. Organs are the primary habitats or natural environments of our emotions, aspirations, and the memories of our inner reactions to our personal histories. They support our postural tone and our feelings, and give volume to our movement.

This course will include:

• Initiating breath, voice, movement and touch from the organs.

• Analyzing imbalances in individual organs and the organ system as a whole.

• Techniques to facilitate access to and balance in the organs.

7 days; 49 hours

This system provides us with our basic supporting structure. It is composed of the bones and the joints. The bones lever us through space and support our weight in relationship to gravity and the shape of our movements through space. The spaces within the joints give us the possibility of movement and provide the axes around which the movement occurs. The skeletal system gives our body the basic form through which we can locomote through space, act on the environment, and sculpt and create the energy forms in space that we call movement. Through embodying the skeletal system, the mind becomes structurally organized, providing the supporting ground for our thoughts, the leverage for our ideas, and the fulcrums or spaces between our ideas for the articulation and understanding of their relationships. It provides the foundation for the psychophysical qualities of clarity, effortlessness and form.

This course will include:

• Skeletal principles that enhance effortless movement.

• The relationships between bones and joints and how they integrate through the whole body.

• Evaluation and repatterning of skeletal alignment and movement imbalances.

• Techniques for facilitating the repatterning of the internal structure of bone.

9 days; 63 hours

The Basic Neurocellular Patterns are the words of our movement. They are the building blocks for the phrases and sentences of our activities. They also establish a base for our perceptual relationships (including body image and spatial orientation) and for our learning and communication.

The BNP are one of the foundations of Body-Mind Centering® and are interwoven with the Embodied Anatomy (body-systems material) in later courses. The BNP have extensive application in the areas of movement and psychophysical expression. Done in sequences, the BNP can also form the basis for a deep and ongoing per

sonal movement practice.

This course will include:

• Exploration of the prevertebrate patterns: vibration, cellular, sponging, pulsation, mouthing, and prespinal.

• Exploration of the prevertebrate patterns: vibration, cellular, sponging, pulsation, mouthing, and prespinal.

• Exploration of the vertebrate patterns: spinal, homologous, homolateral, and contralateral.

• Distinguishing and integrating the actions of yield, push, reach and pull.

• Combinations of the vertebrate patterns that facilitate their integration.

• Facilitating developmental repatterning in yourself and others.

7 days, 49 hours

If the Basic Neurocellular Patterns are the words, the Primitive Reflexes, Righting Reactions and Equilibrium Responses are the fundamental elements, the alphabet, of our movement. Underneath all successful, effortless movement are integrated reflexes, righting reactions and equilibrium responses. The reflexes are the most primitive patterns that occur in response to specific stimuli, and they establish basic survival patterns of function. The righting reactions are important in establishing a vertical or upright posture against gravity and a continuous head-torso axis. The equilibrium responses are patterns which maintain balance of the whole body in the dynamic relationship between the shifting of one's center of gravity through space and one's base of support.

This course will include:

• Fundamental building blocks of human movement (the alphabet of movement).

• Postural tone and physiological flexion and extension.

• Differentiating the RRR in relation to the three planes of movement (horizontal, vertical, sagittal).

• The roles of the RRR in readiness for relating, relating to earth and heaven, gathering and reaching, taking hold

• and letting go, weight bearing, rolling, vertical uprightness, locomotion and equilibrium.

6 days; 42 hours

The period from intrauterine life through approximately 12 months of age is an extraordinarily formative time for humans. Our basic movement patterns emerge in utero, are present at birth, and develop through the first year of life. It is during this time that we build the groundwork for our movement and perceptual skills and pass through the milestones by which we mark our development.

This course will include:

• Developmental milestones including: fetal movement, nursing, head control, eye-hand coordination, rolling, cricumduction, belly crawling, quadrupedal creeping, sitting, kneel-sitting, kneel-standing, half kneel-sitting, half kneel-standing, squatting, standing, cruising, walking).

• The sequence of development that allows the infant to progress through each and all skill levels during its development process.

• Patterns of movement that inhibit more integrated skills from developing.

• Facilitating integrated movement skills and inhibiting patterns which limit full development.

• 5 days; 35 hours