The Structure of Being In Movement®

Though private lessons and classes in BIM are infinitely varied, according
to what the students wish to learn, there is a basic structure which organizes
the teaching and learning:

1. IDENTIFY THE CHALLENGE: Students come for BIM lessons
   or classes because they are not handling some life challenges as well as
   they would like. However, challenges offer a wonderful opportunity to achieve
   a fullness and a presence which will transform life. Challenges offer us
   feedback about areas of awareness and skill that we need to improve.
2. DESIGN A MOVEMENT EXPERIMENT: Movement experiments are
   small-scale representations of life's challenges. Movement experiments offer
   safe ways of studying serious difficulties. The physical details of people's
   behavior in an experiment reveal their habitual ways of thinking and acting,
   and trying out new ways of using the body breaks them free from old habits
   and moves them toward new options.
3. USE BODY-BASED LANGUAGE: BIM starts from the idea that
   the mind and body are one and the same. It is helpful to describe actions
   and feelings by reporting the specific details of events going on in the
   body-instead of using language which refers to "mental" events such as emotions
   and purposes. This allows greater precision in self-observation and communication.
   By noticing and amplifying what they are physically doing moment by moment,
   people become aware of and feel much more of what is going on inside of
   them, and they can speak about it more precisely.
4. IDENTIFY RESPONSES: People generally respond to challenges
   and difficulties by constricting themselves and alienating themselves from
   their bodies and their environment. This involves tensing and constricting
   muscles, restricting breathing, and distorting posture and movement flow.
   Various elements such as anger, fear, confusion, shock, passivity and so
   on interfere with effective responses to challenges, and they can all be
   pinned down as body events.
5. SENSE INTENTIONALITY: Intentional projection is the process
   whereby an image of a movement and a commitment to doing that movement organize
   the muscles and set them in motion. By practicing exercises which focus
   on different forms of intention, people can come to discern the choices
   and decisions that operate to structure their energy fields, bodies, movements
   and actions.
6. DEVELOP POWER AND LOVE: Power derives from a particular
   way of using the pelvis. The pelvis is set firmly atop the legs and serves
   as a balanced foundation for the spinal column and head. Movement starts
   with the legs/hips. Love is rooted in a particular way of using the chest.
   Being warm hearted or tender hearted means having a soft, free chest and
   throat. Integrating power and love in the body produces awareness and freedom.
7. DEVELOP RADIANCE: By working to create a sense of symmetrical,
   radiant, expansive intentionality, which stays anchored within the body
   and reaches outward into the world, people can organize themselves for effective
   ways of meeting their challenges.
8. TEST BELIEFS: BIM looks at body use and movement as tangible
   statements of belief about the nature of the self and the world. By amplifying
   and examining physical responses in a movement experiment, people can pry
   out the beliefs that underlie their actions. By observing whether their
   movements are actually effective or not, people can test the effectiveness
   of the beliefs or feelings on which they are based. Adopting better movements
   both enables people to handle challenges better and also moves them toward
   a more adequate system of beliefs about the self and the world.
9. TRACE MOVEMENT PATTERNS: Often, in order to change a
   stuck belief or movement, it is necessary to trace it back to its roots.
   By going deeply into body sensations of physical/emotional patterns, people
   can become aware of their origin and meaning. Generally, stuck body patterns
   have a component of learned powerlessness and contain some unfinished action.
   Once people know what unfinished action they have been needing to take,
   by approaching the situation from an integrated state of power and love,
   they can perform successfully the action that they were previously unable
   to complete and thus resolve the body pattern.
10. REPLACE THE STATE: It is impossible to stop a feeling
    state or body action, but it is possible to replace one state/action with
    another. Negative feelings/actions such as fear and anger produce constriction
    and imbalance in breathing, posture, movement and intention. Creating the
    body action of power, love and radiance is a way of replacing negative feelings
    with a state of mindbody integrity. Studying the body and practicing mindbody
    integrity are the foundation for identifying negative responses to particular
    challenge situations and replacing negative responses with more effective,
    healthful and life-affirming habits. Whatever particular challenges you
    may face, creating a balanced, powerful, loving mindbody state will give
    you the ability to decide upon a course of action and carry it out.
11. APPLY AND SUCCEED: Effective action in the real world
    is the goal, and it is the foundation for integrating new learning into
    the self. By experiencing success in applying new skills and understandings
    in practical action-first in the lessons and then in real life-people strengthen
    the habit of using their new knowledge. Old, less effective habits of thought
    and action become weakened as new ways of living become anchored through
    success.

The end result of this process of examining challenges is an enhanced ability
to live and act from the whole self. That is what enables people to meet their
challenges successfully.