Fran Lavendel

Fran Lavendel began work with Janet Adler in 1992, discovering the Discipline of Authentic Movement as ‘home’ in embodied being and as an opening to the possibility of direct experience of boundless being. She worked with Janet individually and in groups from that time until Janet’s death in 2023, during which time the Discipline of Authentic Movement became central to her life and work.

Other teachers have been significant along the path. Fran’s encounter, in 1984, with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen and her teaching of Body-Mind Centering® was the beginning of a 5-year experiential study of the physical body. This work led to deeply knowing the felt sense of embodiment, affirming that our perceptual, emotional, and spiritual experiences derive directly from our physicality.

Fran has been teaching the Discipline of Authentic Movement to individuals and small groups since 1995. For those who live far away, the work, at intervals, is intensive for several days at a time.  Fran offers several 4-day non-residential group retreats each year in her studio in Penicuik (close to Edinburgh).

For many years, Fran worked as a somatic and movement psychotherapist – always informed by the practice of witnessing and often incorporating authentic movement in various other ways -- alongside her teaching of the Discipline of Authentic Movement. While practice of the discipline can unfold deep layers of our psychological history, she no longer holds the particular role of therapist, now choosing to focus on accompanying her students as teacher of the discipline. 

Her commitment to the Discipline of Authentic Movement infuses all of life, bringing consciousness to the present-moment embodied experience of all relationships. Central to this awareness of relationship, for Fran, is attention to the language we use – to practice, always, the speaking of one’s own experience, as witness, as therapist, as mother.

Fran Lavendel, MA in Dance Movement Psychotherapy (Hahnemann/Laban, London), is a Registered Member, Private Practitioner and Clinical Supervisor with the Association for Dance Movement Psychotherapy (ADMP UK). She is also a Registered Somatic Movement Therapist (RSMT) with the International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association (ISMETA).