Learning takes time

As a  movement educator/therapist, I would like to learn new movement patterns quickly and would like my clients to achieve that quickly as well.  However, watching my 6 month old son grow and change everyday always reminds me that learning takes a lot of time.  Learning involves lots of trials and errors.  I never knew that newborn babies have to learn how to latch onto mother's breast.  I thought they are born with that skill wired in.  I was wrong.  My son struggled to do that for about a month.  We all got so frustrated because we were doing out best (although I wasn't much help).  We saw lactation specialists several times, read books, watched DVDs, asked friends, and tried everything people suggested.  Still no luck..  My wife almost gave up after a month of struggles.  However, one day a miracle happened.  My son successfully latched on and he had a full meal for the first time.  That was a big day for all of us.  Ever since he had no trouble.  I don't know exactly what happened to my son that one day, but everything must have come together at the right moment.  Maybe he just learned to organize the movements of mouth, jaw, and tongue.  Maybe he found a perfect position. Maybe it was just the right time for him.  Whatever it was, I learned that learning is unpredictable, non-linear, and needs a plenty of time and experimentation.  This was a really good lesson for me as a parent as well as a movement educator.  It's good to encourage my clients to explore lots of movements and make mistakes and learn.  And it's important to remind people that it's okay to make mistakes and sometimes take a step back because that's how learning takes place.  

Awareness Through Movement classes are designed to provide such learning opportunities.