In our society, there are many who suffer from longstanding musculoskeletal disorders and/or have psychological complaints. The challenges are many in the everyday with many tasks. Over time such challenges may lead to tensions, inhibited movements and tightened breathing, a feeling of discomfort and also pain. The aim of Basic Body Awareness Therapy is to promote new movement habits, insight and knowledge about how you can discover your body’s health resources through simple every day movements. Balance, breathing and awareness are integrated in the movements to encourage a more functional movement quality and create improved health to best prepare you for every day challenges.

The movements included in Basic Body Awareness Therapy are designed for promoting health and an experience of wellbeing. The therapy is intended for development of your own movement awareness and movement quality by practicing towards improved stability, presence and freer breathing for everyday actions.

The movements included in the videos, and presented as exercises, are part of ordinary, everyday actions such as lying, sitting standing, walking and also relational movements. Each movement is focused on basic functions of the way we move. The movements are simple, small, gentle and focused on function and can easily and safely be transferred into daily life. A comment that is often repeated is: “The movements are good, if you do them!”

To reinforce the process of learning, influence the movement pattern and promote health, the movement should be repeated both while practicing and while “being in” the movement, and by regular practice over time. We recommend two ways of practicing:

1) Create a small “practice time” in a space where you are by yourself. It is recommended that you repeat the movements about 10-15 times every time you practice and that you practice every day, preferably in the same space. You can plan a practice time of about 10-15 minutes where you concentrate on a selection of BBAT movements.

2) In addition you bring some of the movements “into” the everyday and seek to adapt the everyday movements at home, at work, in your spare time or what may be suitable for you.

When you practice the movements, you have chosen to concentrate on, you can start to direct your attention towards purely “being in” the movement as described, i.e. being open for what you might notice without thinking that you need to achieve something or to judge. If you are comfortable with this you may “go on” and seek to find elasticity in the movement, a rhythm in the movement and an intension/meaning in the movement. Intension in the movement means that you for instance direct attention at what is described as “the aim” of the movement.

It is recommended that you use a log book and note the movement experiences. For instance, you can write what movements you choose to practice on the side of the logbook and on the right side you write your experiences connected to how this was for you and what you noticed in the movements when you simply “were in” movement for a while: what happened? Were you able to just be in the movements without any thought of “right or wrong” and without any judgement of the way you moved? What can you notice if you only – simply – seek to find the quiet in “this” movement and are not struggling towards a goal? Also, experiences from transferring and actively using the movement principles in everyday actions, when lying, sitting, standing, walking and so on, can be noted and in this way gain meaning.

Responsible for text: Liv Helvik Skjaerven, physiotherapist, authorized teacher of BBAT, Norway

Aarid Liland Olsen, physiotherapist, clinical competency in BBAT, Norge

Translator: Anne Reitan Parker, physiotherapist, authorized teacher in BBAT, Scotland, UK

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