Ruthy Alon (born January 25, 1930, Cali), is a senior Feldenkrais Method Trainer and the developer of Mindful Eating, Walk for Life, and Bones for Life programs — the latter of which combines the Movement Intelligence of optimal weight-bearing posture and the springy pulse of a dynamic, rhythmic gait in the service of osteoporosis prevention and reversal.
At the age of three Ruthy Alon immigrated with her family from Colombia to pre-state Israel. Her father was originally from the Ukraine, her mother from Morocco. From the age of 11 to 13 she lived on a kibbutz, which had an idealistic influence on her personality. Following the 1948 Israeli war of independence, during which she worked in radio communication codes for the Israel Defense Army, she returned to David Yelin College, Jerusalem to complete her training as an elementary school teacher in 1950.
Ruthy Alon was among the first students of Moshe Feldenkrais, whose method of somatic education she began learning in 1958. A graduate of his 1969 training, she participated in the expansion of his Method around the world, contributing to the development of professional Feldenkrais Method practitioners throughout Europe, the United States, Australia, and Israel.
In her 1990 book Mindful Spontaneity she explains the Feldenkrais Method’s basic principles for the neuro-motor re-education of dysfunctional habits, and presents numerous Free Your Back exercises. This book has been published in English, Italian, German, Portuguese, Hebrew, Russian, Spanish, French and Polish. In 1992, the Italian translation won the Premio Nazionale del Libro di Medicina Naturale by Associazione C.G. Jung. In the mid-1990s Alon made a 30-minute video about the Feldenkrais Method called Movement Nature Meant.
Since the 1990s Alon began developing her Bones for Life program, which is based on the Feldenkrais approach to somatic learning. This self-improvement program is designed to safely stimulate bone resistance through well-coordinated springy movement in the presence of optimally organized weight-bearing posture. Walk for Life, a follow-up program using Nordic walking poles, debuted in 2011.
After preliminary testing in Israel in 2004, the Bones for Life program was presented in the United States at NASA’s 2005 AsMA conference in Houston, Texas, and at the 2007 NOF conference in Washington, D.C. In its first year, Alon’s Walk for Life program was investigated by researchers from the University of New Hampshire’s Department of Kinesiology. They found that — after attending a five-day workshop — “Walk for Life participants improved their walking speed, step length, and time spent on each leg during walking. They also experienced an improvement in their overall balance confidence.”
Alon is the founder and president of the Foundation for Movement Intelligence (FMI), a North American non-profit organization dedicated to the prevention and reversal of osteoporosis through “natural movement” means, and spreading the word about her other Movement Intelligence offerings. In October 2010 she was the featured presenter at an FMI-sponsored five-day conference dedicated to her work — the first international Osteo~Blast! — which was held in Greenfield, New Hampshire, USA. In 2013 she obtained a PhD in Mind-Body Medicine and Holistic Psychology from Mind-Body Medical University.
Read more about Ruthy Alon: Published Works, Articles About Ruthy Alon and Her Movement Intelligence Programs, External Links