In his essay, “The Rhythm of Effort and Recovery,” Laban concludes by noting that “the ideal is that harmonized effort should penetrate work and sleep as much as possible.  But art in leisure-time remains indispensable.”  Consequently, my final holiday selection is Creativity: A Short and Cheerful Guide by comic actor and writer John Cleese.

Initially aiming to be a lawyer, Cleese stumbled into writing comic sketches while at Cambridge and discovered, to his surprise, that he could be creative.  Defining creativity as “new ways of thinking about things,” Cleese notes that creativity “can be seen in every area of life.” … Read More

My third holiday book selection is The Power of When by Michael Breus, psychologist.  This book addresses the importance of understanding your own circadian rhythm and using that knowledge to maximize how you organize your daily schedule.

According to Breus, “not every person’s biological clocks keep the same time.”  Consequently, the book opens with questionnaires that allow the reader to find his/her “chronotype.”  Breus has expanded this typology beyond “larks” (early risers) and “owls” (late risers) to four types.

Once your individual type is established, the book is chock full of advice for how best to schedule your day. … Read More

My next holiday book recommendation is Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker, professor of neuroscience and psychology at UC Berkeley.  This authoritative tome unravels the mysteries of sleep and provides persuasive scientific evidence that sleeping well is the foundation of physical and mental health.

Contemporary neuroscience is now able to chart the differences in brain wave activity between wakefulness, deep non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREM), and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, when dreaming occurs. … Read More

Breathing is free, and how we breathe is under our control.  Yet 90 percent of us are breathing incorrectly, and this has a negative impact on our overall health.  Thus my first holiday book suggestion is Breath:  The New Science of a Lost Art by journalist James Nestor.

Prompted by his own respiratory difficulties, the author set out to discover how and why breathing in different patterns can enhance wellbeing. Each chapter focuses on an aspect of breath, beginning with Nestor’s own experiment, under a doctor’s supervision, of breathing only through his mouth for 10 days. … Read More

MoveScape Center usually features Santa’s “holiday hacks” in December.  But this year the jolly old elf was too busy securing hazmat garb and making backup plans for gift delivery with Amazon to grant us an exclusive interview.

So instead, this month’s blogs will focus on great books to get and give —  reading material to help you look after yourself during this stressful period.

In selecting books, I turned to Rudolf Laban for advice about finding a healthy rhythm of exertion and recuperation.… Read More

Pandemic constraints have disrupted normal rhythms of day and night for all too many of us, leading to disharmony and lack of balance. In his discussion of effort and recovery, Laban suggests a four-part rhythmic pattern of day and night as a point of departure for restoring harmony and balance.

Laban’s pattern contrasts day, which consists of wakeful work, with night, which consists of restful sleep. Between these two periods he inserts connecting links – leisure activities and dreams.

Leisure-time activities link working and sleeping by providing a period of recovery through pleasurable, playful, and creative activities in which “rhythm is practiced and experienced.”… Read More

Laban makes the following points in his discussion of the rhythm of effort and recovery.

Effort is the active exercise of any power or faculty. Yet exertion need not be vigorous or laborious (a.k.a. comprised of fighting qualities); it can take a calm and almost strainless form (a.k.a. comprised of indulging qualities).

Recovery is the restoration of health. Recuperation does not imply absence of effort or a simple-minded use of only indulging qualities. As Laban points out, “many actions in sports of a fighting character can serve recovery.”… Read More

Postmodern life during a pandemic is complex. Yet, even by the middle of the 20th century when Laban was writing, finding a healthy balance between effort and recovery was not easy. As he noted, the complexity of life is so great that it is hard to tell at first glance if an action is serving as exertion or recuperation.

He goes on to write that the fundamental alternation between effort and recovery, which can be observed in work during the day and sleep during the night, can give some general hints.… Read More

Defined most simply, rhythm is a strong repeated pattern of movement or sound, generally considered to be an ordered alternation of contrasting elements.

As regular and natural patterns of change, rhythms are everywhere – in the cycle of seasons, day and night, waking and sleeping. Beyond natural manifestations, rhythm characterizes human expression and is inseparable from speech, music, dance, and all forms of art.

As Alan Lomax affirmed, “Although rhythmic behavior has been observed in many animal groups, none of them…matches human rhythmic systems in precision, flexibility, number of levels, or elaboration.”… Read More

As the pandemic worsens, most regular activities have become laborious and cumbersome. Once there were natural divisions between work, school, and home that provided times for transition and refreshing change. But now these activities and arenas are overlapping, and they have become spatially and temporally blurred. In addition, the options for restorative recreational and social activities are limited.

In short, the current conditions require more effort and offer fewer opportunities for recuperation. Consequently, the rhythms of normal life have been severely disrupted as we struggle to stay healthy and productive.… Read More