Feldenkrais’ martial-arts study helped give birth to the Feldenkrais Method, a philosophy of human movement. In Feldenkrais’ first four books on jiujitsu and judo, he began introducing concepts that would reach their apotheosis in Higher Judo. Social constraints, he wrote, have stunted our physical development. We are stuck in an infantile stage in how we use our feet predominately for upright carriage, how we react to falling which begs for a “more adult independence of the gravitational force”, and our lack of a more thorough “development of our space adjustment in all directions from the origins of our movable co-ordinate system.” What is the best way to overcome these liabilities? Judo, he argued, the way of gentleness.

via The Method – by Robert Slatkin > Tablet Magazine – A New Read on Jewish Life.