TRAUMA-RESPONSIVE FELDENKRAIS
With Dan Rindler, GCFP, SEP
Long before the language of “trauma-responsive practice” became common, Moshe Feldenkrais developed ways of working that honored safety, choice, and self-regulation. And yet, even with this holistic approach, many of us encounter students whose nervous systems remain organized around vigilance, protection, or collapse. For these students whose daily lives are shaped by past survival-reactions, our usual ways of teaching the method are not always enough.
In this workshop, we will explore how to develop a more trauma-responsive approach to practicing the Feldenkrais Method, both in ATM and FI. Through building upon the foundation of observation, touch, and understanding you have developed as a practitioner, you will learn to recognize and skillfully respond to protective autonomic nervous system patterns as they arise.
This isn’t a trauma-healing workshop. Instead, This Trauma Responsive approach to Feldenkrais Method will allow you to:
- Learn new language, pacing and approaches to working with clients who report traumatic stories or share a trauma history, or experience deep emotional reactions during lessons.
- Work more effectively with many clients who may not report trauma history at all, but for whom nothing seems to “land.” For example: the client who has a new pain spring up each time they begin to find ease in some area of the body.
- Gain a new viewpoint and learn new approaches for ATM and FI with these clients for whom there seems to be an invisible wall between what you’re offering and what they’re receiving.
- Learn how working in a trauma-responsive framework with your clients can help you continue to learn for your own self-development as well.
Together, we will explore:
- Recognizing, understanding, and working with signs of high alert, shutdown, or dissociation without overstepping your scope of practice
- Supporting a deeper sense of safety using language and touch that allows for clients protective responses
- Working in ways that honor survival strategies while gently inviting new options
- Practical ideas for how to respond when trauma reactions emerge in ATM and FI (while remaining clearly within the scope of somatic education)
This workshop invites you to look at your teaching with compassionate, curious eyes. We will deepen what you already know, address common blind spots, and cultivate confidence that we can more fully support our students whose lives are colored by patterns of trauma reactions.
Open to Feldenkrais, ABM, and other Feldenkrais-related Practitioners, and Trainees
Free Introductory Zoom Workshops
(Choose one)
Sunday November 15, 2026, 11am-12pm Eastern Standard Time
Sunday December 13, 2026, 11am-12pm Eastern Standard Time
Trauma Responsive Feldenkrais Workshop
Meets on two dates: Sunday January 16, 2027 and Sunday February 14, 2027. Meeting time 11am – 1pm EST
Covers applications for a trauma-responsive approach to ATM and FI. Recording will be accessible for one month after each workshop
Founding Member Pricing through 2026: $200 for practitioners.
(25% discount for current Feldenkrais or ABM trainees)
Training/Mentoring
One Sunday of each month, Beginning March 2027
Dates and Registration TBA. On Zoom
Trauma Responsive Feldenkrais Workshop is a pre-requisite, either attended on zoom, or via recording.
Coming soon!
Dan Rindler is a Feldenkrais and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner specializing in addressing chronic pain, trauma and anxiety, in private practice since 2006. He has studied with Jeff Haller in the IOPS Academy Feldenkrais graduate program, and has mentored extensively with Shel Wagner-Rasch in somatic trauma work.
Dan has offered somatic education workshops for the general public, trauma survivors, psychotherapists, for musicians at Yale University and Manhattan School of Music, and for Somatic Experiencing Practitioners through SEI. He has worked as a practitioner at the Feldenkrais Institute of NY, has co-taught the NYC Child’Space training alongside Barbara Leverone and Chava Shelhav, and has assisted in multiple trainings for Somatic Experiencing International.
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