When I recently visited Prague, I carried a map in order to navigate the labyrinthine streets. After getting helplessly lost several times, I realized that layout of the actual streets was more complex than it appeared.
In Budapest, we went in search of the Gellert Baths. The guidebook said it was only 2.5 km from our hotel, a 2 mile stroll. After what seemed like an eternity, we found a sign that said Gellert something or other and a staircase. Three hundred stairs later, someone informed us that this was Gellert MOUNTAIN, not the baths. A sign is just a sign if you can’t understand it.
I can read all the anatomy books in the world and still not understand how best to walk, reach, jump, turn. Scientists are constantly announcing new maps of the brain in order to explain our experience. But the map, as they say, is not the territory. We learn not by just by looking at self -help books and educational videos, but through experience. It does help to have a guidebook to prepare you for a strange city or a new business venture, but in the end, you have to walk the streets yourself in order to truly know the way.
One of the most fascinating “undiscovered countries” is the landscape of myself. The Feldenkrais Method allows me to travel from the known to the unknown to what I thought I knew but am now seeing from a completely different angle, like rounding an new corner and finding yourself on a familiar street. And maybe, instead of just making a new map of my brain, I’m actually improving the territory of the city called Lavinia.