At the end of her session, Frances described the feeling she had, not as deep peace or quiet tingliness, although those are great descriptors, but she said she was feeling a profound stillness.

Dr. Milton Trager was himself a longtime practitioner and student of Transcendental Meditation. 

Early in my exploration of Trager, I practiced Zen Meditation, or sitting Zazen, but I found it out of harmony with some of the principles of movement and touch exploration central to the Trager Approach.

I begin with a pause. 

Pausing is full of opportunity, full of rich sensation, full of possibilities to pay attention in a new way. Pausing gives me a chance to sit back and reflect.

When I sit for my meditation time, one of the first things I want to do is get comfortable—reduce distractions in my outer world and in my body. I arrange myself in an easy, upright, supported sitting position.

• just a simple interruption

• the end of a phrase -- a cadence in the music of the session

Ever wonder why you can recognize your friend from way down the street, long before you can see his face? And why you don't have to think about how to brush your teeth, you just do it? 

Excerpts from Todd Hargrove

Children don’t learn to move through work or instruction. Instead, they learn through play, exploration and experimentation.

This morning, like many mornings these days, I wake up, get going, and head out for my walk. Once again, I find myself in a body offering reminders of its aging. There’s a kind of achiness in my ribs. My right foot carries its usual morning discomforts.

I am aware of how and where I make contact, “casual/conscious/caring”

I stay aware of where in my body I feel the weight

I actively spread the weight throughout my body structure all the way to the bottoms of my feet, distributing it as evenly as possible

What do we mean by healthy soft tissue? The soft tissue of the body has many qualities—different qualities in different parts of that tissue. But when we touch another human body, we have an instinctive sense that healthy soft tissue in adults is very similar to what a child’s body feels like in our hands.

Feeling for softness in the tissue—or what we sometimes call “feeling for soft”—comes from Milton Trager himself. Broadly speaking, soft tissue refers to everything in our body except the bones. It encompasses fascia, muscle fibers, blood vessels, lymph vessels, organs—everything with a texture softer than bone.