Moshe Feldenkrais (1904-1984), doctor of engineering, created the Feldenkrais Method and The Feldenkrais Institute in Tel Aviv, Israel and authored several books on his work.

The Feldenkrais method bases on a "non-verbal" pedagogically designed neuromotor communication between the teacher and the pupil's central nervous system (CNS) via the kinaesthetic sense (the proprioceptors).

Feldenkrais uses scientifically known techniques such as Weber Fechner's law. It says that to communicate with the central nervous system, the resistance in the execution of the movement must not exceed 2.5% to show a difference in the action. To perceive this difference, he lets the pupil sense the movements from within himself through the kinesthetic sense (the proprioceptors). She is then allowed to perceive how it affects. For example, there may be difficulties in performing and sensing different body parts or pain and resistance.

With this teaching technique, the pupil gets help to (consciously) solve various problems she encounters. She can then use her action patterns more freely and functionally.

With this unique method of having no role model, the pupil meets herself and leads her into the world of feelings and thoughts. She uses her senses and becomes aware of how the body acts in all life situations, which gives her a greater understanding of herself and how she acts towards the outside world. It makes her more aware and gains a deepened self-image and independent thinking.

The Method can be performed in two ways:

Functional Integration, FI. The teacher performs non-verbal communicative action patterns (manipulons).

Awareness Through Movement, ATM. The teacher gives the pupil communicative verbal instructions of action patterns.

Yochanan Rywerant (1922-2010) Feldenkrais Trainer with a background as a teacher in Mathematics and Physics. He participated in Moshe Feldenkrais' first professional training in Tel Aviv between 1969 - 1971 and worked as his assistant until Feldenkrais died in 1984. Together they developed the practical applications of the Method.

Through their intimate working relationship, he received a comprehensive understanding of the Method, embraced the idea that the Feldenkrais Method is reproducible, and wrote the book “The Feldenkrais Method, Teaching by Handling,” published 1983; with the intent to describe the manipulative teaching Feldenkrais Method scientifically.

With his book, he has, in the most detailed way, documented the manual part of the Method, Functional Integration and names the manipulations that Feldenkrais created as manipulons. They are small units of movement meant to communicate with the CNS. In his book Yochanan Rywerant writes:

”I have coined the word ”manipulon” in analogy with terms used in particle physics, such as proton, neutron, electron, photon, and so on. Some of these particles are said to be ”exchanged” between interacting particles.”

After 1984, Yochanan Rywerant was repeatedly engaged as a trainer by The Feldenkrais Guild.

With the experience mentioned above from the standardized guild-education, Yochanan Rywerant decided to develop a slightly different educational concept. In 1986 he was invited to direct the first training of Feldenkrais practitioners in Stockholm, Sweden, called Stockholm 1, and decided to conduct this training in line with the revisions of the standardized training he had envisioned. Since the mid-90s and until he died in 2010, he trained students at The Feldenkrais Institute in Tel Aviv, Israel, according to the same concept.

Moshe Feldenkrais grew up with the Chassidic religion. It does not differentiate between the secular and the religious world. Patriarch Rabbi Pinha's son Abraham Abba Shapiro, the ancestor of Moshe Feldenkrais, taught that God is within us. The step is, therefore, not far from the idea that body and soul are one.

In the book Moshe Feldenkrais- A Life in Movement, Mark Reese writes: "It is folly to separate body and mind."

Yochanan Rywerant writes in his book The Feldenkrais Method, ”Even the classic controversy between body and soul is often mainly an indication of the inability to understand both terms as different ways of describing the same complex phenomenon.” (Rywerant 1983, p. 22.)

Thomas Hanna (1928-1990), Ph.D., was a student of Moshe Feldenkrais during his education in California in 1975, began to describe "soma" in the ancient Greek meaning that refers to as body, soul, mind, psyche, thought, sensing, feeling, consciousness and the unconscious, in other words; all that constitutes man. Based on this, he began to use the term Somatics and defined it as the discipline of the body's motor functions, components, and neurophysiological makeup and function.

“There are two ways to look at and influence a physiological process. One is to look at the body objectively in the third person (outside, linear thinking). For example, a doctor, naprapath, chiropractor, physiotherapist, or physical trainer looks at the body objectively (cause and effect). The second way is to regard myself as a first-person. I consider myself subjectively (from inside) - here, namely of myself, of my very own self whose process I can influence (lateral thinking).

The Feldenkrais Method is also described as Somatic Education. The Somatic pioneers William Horatio Bates (1860-1931, Georges Gurdjieff (1866-1949), Frederick Matthias Alexander (1869-1955) and Mabel Todd 1880–1956, Elsa Gindler 1885-1961, Heinrich Jacoby 1889-1964, Nikolai Bernstein 1896-1966 et al. Their followers were also developing new approaches to mind-body awareness and personal growth. Since Thomas Hanna began describing it, Somatics has become more widely used in various body works, pedagogy, and dance.