Lavinia Plonka grew up as the oldest child of Holocaust survivors trying to figure out what it meant to be American. Starting with mandatory accordion lessons, she went on to become a street mime in NYC and has continued her unconventional life teaching the Feldenkrais Method®. Meditating With My Hair On Fire weaves together autobiographical stories with weighty philosophical questions in a uniquely hilarious way: Are aliens stealing our time? Can one find enlightenment at Sam’s Club? Are nail salons a galactic conspiracy? This compilation is a fraction of the monthly columns Plonka has written for Western North Carolina Woman over the past 12 years where she has developed a devoted following. It's a short book, Lavinia believes in leaving people wanting more. But in her 33 essays she rescues hummingbirds stuck in her husband's chainsaw oil, ponders the geography of dirt, meets her doppleganger in Iowa and so much more.

Meditating With My Hair On Fire

Humor & Entertainment

Plonka, Lavinia

Humor

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

Falls are the leading cause of death due to injury among the elderly. And one of the biggest causes of falling is fear of falling. The ability to "fall well" and get up again is a skill every child has that becomes more elusive as we age. Recent studies measured the morbidity rate of people who cannot get up from the floor. The greater the difficulty, the shorter the life. There is a way to improve one's chances. While many studies point to the importance of maintaining mobility, there are very few programs that actually teach people how to fall, and more importantly, how to recover. Falling is an inevitable part of life. This book teaches people how to use the intelligence of the nervous system to train the body to fall more softly and offers strategies for learning how to get up off the floor with less effort. The Little Book of Falling offers exercises and lessons based on the Feldenkrais Method® of Somatic Education. Moshe Feldenkrais was a physicist and a martial artist. A Feldenkrais training includes extensive study on "the art of falling". These lessons are designed to be safe for anyone. The book offers illustrations as well as links where readers can watch short demonstration videos of the various movement strategies offered in the book. Lavinia Plonka is a master teacher of the Feldenkrais Method with over 25 years of experience teaching internationally. She has offered "Falling" Workshops to many retirement communities and is an active member of the Western North Carolina Falls Prevention Coalition.

The Little Book of Falling (and Getting Up)

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Aging

What Are You Afraid Of? A Body/Mind Guide to Courageous Living

Utilizes a combination of step-by-step exercises, informative advice, and engaging lessons to help readers identify and understand the sources of their fears and work with their bodies to overcome them. 10,000 first printing.

Tarcher

The ordinary manner in which we carry ourselves physically, our automatic gestures, and the accustomed comforts of our bodily habits inadvertently reinforce fear's hold on our lives. What Are You Afraid Of? explores how our fears often arise from physical and mental triggers that have been learned over the course of our early lives-and can be un-learned. Fear, explains award-winning movement teacher Lavinia Plonka, is not the product of intractable psychological demons; instead, it often revolves around repetitive body/mind cues. By teaching the body new habits through a series of exercises and postures, the cycle of fear can be broken.

Mental Health

Penguin Publishing Group

In every movement of our bodies, we express a world of emotions. But our movements don't just reflect our emotions-they directly affect them. In Walking Your Talk, Lavinia Plonka explores the connection between how we move and how we feel. Our movements and body posture are more than just simple expressions of our feelings-they are a powerful factor in our well-being. And changing them can be a crucial first step in altering our emotional behaviors. Drawing from her years of experience as a movement teacher and Feldenkrais Method(r) instructor, Plonka provides simple exercises, thought-provoking lessons, and real-life examples that help readers better understand the relationship between their movement patterns and their emotional state. After beginning with an overview of both historical and modern ideas about the correlation between bodily movement and human emotion and expression, Plonka turns theory into practice by addressing each major area of the body-and the emotional baggage held there. Through exploratory exercises, we learn more about: - how we carry stress-from responsibilities, family issues, and financial burdens-in our shoulders; - why we "freeze" the pelvis-the bodily center of personal freedom, power, spontaneity, and sexuality; and - the self-confidence (or lack thereof) we convey through our carriage. Whether she is examining how a depressed chest can make us feel psychologically depressed, how body language is used to deceive others, or how loosening our pelvis can help us break a lifelong cycle of self-destructive behavior, Plonka is always caring and insightful, guiding readers to a deeper awareness of themselves and how changing their posture has the potential to change their whole lives.

Walking Your Talk: Changing Your Life Through the Magic of Body Language

Reference

There are so many paths towards realizing our dreams, towards untangling the web of sabotaging habits that keep us from being our best selves. However, very few approaches look at how you literally move through life. Every breath, gesture and facial expression are (usually unconscious) choices that influence how we navigate life's challenges. While talk can often lead to paralysis by analysis, listening to the body is a direct line to the instant messages being sent every second by the brain and nervous system. 
The saying "we contain multitudes," while true, can disempower us from the possibility of ever attaining satisfaction. You've Got The Power! offers readers four paths: the way of the warrior, teacher, healer and visionary. These four cornerstone archetypes live in mythology, history and in our own stories. Using her lifetime of research in movement, this book offers a revolutionary approach to getting out of your way by utilizing humanity's forgotten sixth sense - the power of sensation and embodiment. 
Using pleasurable movement explorations, self-inquiry and practical life exercises, You've Got the Power! introduces readers the the wisdom of the body. Each archetype has a physical "center of presence." Readers will learn how to use these centers: The Warrior: pelvis, Teacher: chest, Healer: hands and Visionary: eyes to develop embodied presence and use it for personal mastery. Each archetype also has a "superpower" and a "kryptonite." Learning to develop the superpower, while acknowledging the potential pitfalls are part of the journey towards realizing our dreams - whether it's for healing, learning or achieving. 
The four archetypes embody our potential to be the change we want to see in the world. By reconnecting with the intelligent nervous system and developing our kinesthetic sense, we become more aware of ourselves, how we impact others and how others influence our actions. The ability to stand our ground, connect with compassion, heal old wounds and envision our possibilities will be the takeaway from this ground breaking look at body/mind connections.

You’ve Got the Power! Four Paths to Awaken Your Body’s Archetypal Energies

Religion & Spirituality

BookBaby

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Plonka, Lavinia. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Plonka, Lavinia

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Plonka, Lavinia. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Meditating With My Hair On Fire

The Little Book of Falling (and Getting Up)

What Are You Afraid Of? A Body/Mind Guide to Courageous Living

What Are You Afraid Of? A Body/Mind Guide to Courageous Living

Walking Your Talk: Changing Your Life Through the Magic of Body Language

You’ve Got the Power! Four Paths to Awaken Your Body’s Archetypal Energies