Gravity: How Does the Body Organize Within It?

I was recently shown this page on Laban Movement Theory, developed in the early 20th century.

And yes—gravity is right there. The framework discusses movement as “giving in to gravity” or moving “against gravity,” alongside direction, space, time, flow, energy, and relationships.

 

That history matters.

 

 

But it also illustrates an important distinction in my work with Movement Lesson™. I am not introducing gravity into the conversation about human movement. Gravity was already there.

 

How does the developing human body organize Movement within gravity?

A baby is not simply moving against gravity or giving in to it. From birth, the developing system is establishing relationships among gravity, rotation, buoyancy, midlines, vision, balance, counterbalance, acceleration, proprioception, spatial orientation, and other sensory and Movement information. That distinction changes what we assess. When a baby cannot organize a particular Movement, I don’t want to immediately label what we see as weakness, behavior, preference—or even compensation.

 

What does this child currently have available to organize with?

That is especially important because, in my Movement science, developmental deviation and compensation are not the same thing. A young child who has never established a Movement relationship is different from an adult reorganizing previously established Movement around pain, injury, or another constraint. They may produce similar-looking positions. But the visible outcome does not tell us the organizational history that produced it.

 

 

That is why Movement Lesson™ goes beyond describing what the body is doing. We are examining the relationships that make the Movement available in the first place. The body will organize with what it has. The more precisely we understand what it has available, the better we can understand development.

 

Movement is the Language of Development.™

 

Michelle M. Turner

Founder & Creator, Movement Lesson™