Book Description:
Engaging the Movement of Life is an invitation to discover
new ways to experience health and embodiment. Osteopathic physician and Continuum
Movement teacher Bonnie Gintis offers an approach that encompasses fluid movement,
open attention, and awareness of sensation and breath as empowering practices
to enrich all aspects of life. She presents a philosophy in which the body is
a portal to “something greater” – an opportunity to join a
grand experiment in deepening consciousness and connectedness. Moving fluidly
increases our vitality, just as water in the natural world is vitalized by flowing
freely. Chronicling a path that encompasses views of body, mind, and spirit
as a self-healing intercommunicating whole, Engaging
the Movement of Life is equally useful for medical
professionals, bodyworkers, exercise enthusiasts, and spiritual seekers.
About
Bonnie Gintis:
Bonnie Gintis has been in private practice as an Osteopathic
Physician since 1986 and currently lives near Santa Cruz, California. She has
taught Osteopathic Principles and Practice and manipulative medicine worldwide
for many organizations including the Cranial Academy, the Sutherland Cranial
Teaching Foundation, the American Academy of Osteopathy, the European School
of Osteopathy, the New York College of Osteopathic Medicine, and with James
Jealous, DO. Dr Gintis is Board Certified in Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine
and is an authorized Continuum Movement teacher who has taught in collaboration
with Emilie Conrad since 1997.
About Classes With Bonnie Gintis:
Classes with Bonnie Gintis, DO explore the common ground
shared by Continuum Movement and Osteopathy. A variety of workshops are offered
for people who are interested in exploring the vast possibilities for the full
expression of health and embodiment. Classes are valuable as a form of self-treatment,
and as a way for people involved in any aspect of health care to develop and
deepen diagnostic and treatment skills. Most classes are open to people of all
levels of function and ability, including those with disabilities, or limited
movement and exercise ability. Some courses are tailored to the needs and interests
of people with particular health concerns. Others are oriented to Osteopaths,
MDs, and other healthcare practitioners. Please go to www.bonniegintis.com
and read the descriptions to choose a workshop or course suited to you.Please
mention that you heard about the classes through Soul Flares.
About Continuum Movement:
The basic principles and practices of Continuum include:
- Movement – creating new ways of moving our bodies, and participating more fully with the intrinsic movements that are always expressing themselves through the body.
- Exploring the qualities of fluidity in all aspects of life and embodiment.
- Increasing the variability & capacity of our breath. Giving ourselves the opportunity to change the way we breathe offers our system options we might not otherwise find.
- Exploring sound as a vibratory quality of breath, and experiencing its effects on us.
- Refining attentiveness, mindfulness, and consciousness of our relationship to our body, our health, our environment, and the world in which we live.
- Becoming aware of habit patterns, and exploring alternatives to them.
- Considering what we call the “body” as a creative process, rather than as an object.
- Finding pleasure and enjoyment in our experience of moving, breathing, and being embodied.
- Cultivating curiosity and a sense of open-ended inquiry.
So many of the problems I treat in my Osteopathic practice could
be easily remedied by my patients themselves if they could re-learn to interweave
their bodies’ natural tendency to breathe, move, and rest into their busy
lives. Development of our kinesthetic sense—the sensation and awareness
we have of our own movement—is the key to this process. Continuum
explores movement and somatic education based on intrinsic felt movements, rather
than on imposed exercises or prescribed routines. Participants cultivate a refined
degree of attention, and learn to trust that there is deep wisdom that guides
the body to self-correct, if given the opportunity to move freely. Stepping
outside of our preconceived notions and the popular cultural models of what
we think of as “the body” we can discover the deep inner world that
is an unending resource for healing, adaptability, and change.
In a Continuum class, the arena is set for exploration
by presenting an idea, an image, or a theme. Sequences of motions are combined
with breath and sound that encourage exploration of the theme. The pace of a
Continuum class may be slow and meditative, with
nearly invisible micro-movements; or fast and lively with large wave-like motions
and aerobic activity using weights or a variety of other exercise props and
equipment. A class may be composed of a group of any size, ranging from two
to a few hundred. Ideally it becomes part of a person’s daily reality,
practiced for some period of time each day, and integrated into the way all
movement is approached. Any exercise or activity can be influenced and enhanced
by the sensibility of Continuum.
Continuum contributes to the field of health and
movement education by providing a rich spectrum of modalities for all people.
The application of Continuum philosophy and practice
continues to expand in countless arenas of personal and professional life: health
care, science, bodywork, meditation, psychotherapy, spiritual practice, business
organization, group dynamics, education, dance, artistic creativity, performance,
sports and fitness, and all fields that value participation with embodied life
in a passionate and intimate way.
Praise for Engaging the Movement of Life:
“Engaging the Movement of Life offers a revolution of thought and purpose in the exploration of embodied health. Our fragmented understanding of the human body dissolves in Bonnie Gintis’s much broader view of our biological intelligence. This book could not be more timely in providing us with a guide for health in the twenty-first century.”—Emilie Conrad, founder of Continuum and author of Life on Land
“With accessible, evocative writing Bonnie Gintis interweaves the potent discoveries of Continuum and Osteopathy to reveal complex truths about the nature of life, health, the fluid dynamics of creation, and especially how we can creatively participate with them. Full of insights and practices, this book is a resource for seekers of life in our modern dissociated civilization. This is a radiantly clear and sensuous call to deepen our embodiment, daring us to inquire with innovative attention as we engage life.”—Susan Harper, international teacher of Continuum Movement and creator of Em’oceans and Sensations Trainings“Bonnie Gintis straddles the seemingly different worlds of intuitive body truths and information from the scientific point of view. She provides tools and suggests ways of looking, feeling, knowing, and thinking that are the currency of those of us involved in the world of the body. Gintis’s message that everything is interdependent and mutable is a ray of both hope and clarity. With Continuum as the medium, she gives us both the permission and the keys to begin a lifelong journey of independent exploration of our bodies.” —David Brown, founder of BodyRecoding, an integrative Pilates, yoga, and Gyrotonic studio in Hudson, New York
In Engaging the Movement of Life, Bonnie Gintis, one of the world’s leading authorities on Continuum Movement, offers Osteopaths a special opportunity to experience Osteopathic principles at work within ourselves rather than just within others. This is a rare guide toward our own personal development, from within.”—Nicholas Handoll, DO, MSCC, author of Anatomy of Potency
Bonnie Gintis, DO
Osteopathic Physician,
Authorized Continuum Movement Teacher, &
Author of "Engaging The Movement of Life"
3233 Valencia Avenue Suite B6
Aptos, CA 95003 USA
(831) 688-4201
www.bonniegintis.com
