30 days. 30 Exercises. 30 minutes each day

Go at your own pace
OR
Join the live community led events for Live for 30 days consecutively or 6 weeks Monday-Friday

Currently (2022/2023) all enrollments are for going at your own pace.
The next community led event is happening now, January and February 2024
When live, the only difference is that there are daily resources sent by email each day, to help deepen your personal research experience

A 30 day challenge, leading us through the evolutionary sequence of the exercises from Bothmer® Movement philosophy, an embodied movement practice born out of Anthroposophy (wisdom of the human being). There’s a nice introduction to it in this article here, and in this challenge we'll track through the development of the human being (and human consciousness) from child to adult, using 30 movement sequences, from 'Opening' to 'Closing'.

Who’s it for?

We’re assuming most people joining are already involved with Bothmer® Movement, either because they've graduated from a 500 hour training and are a teacher or practitioner. Or, because they're currently in-training. Or, perhaps they're involved with Anthroposophy and/or Waldorf-Steiner Education and have heard about it through friends, family or colleagues. All the resources were made in May 2020 with the assumption that participants already have a basic understanding, and therefore need reminders and pointers, rather than taught lessons.

However, we know of many people who would like to know more about Bothmer Movement, and in the current climate it's not possible to offer in-person workshops. So, for this reason we invite everyone and anyone with an interest to participate, to get an entry-level introduction (and also to offer an integrated movement practice that can support you during this unusual time). The Challenge has been joined by non-Bothmer movers in the past (in May and November 2020) and it was a very positive experience for them, so if that sounds like you, we warmly welcome you to explore and experience it for yourself.

For everyone: Please note that this Challenge is for your personal use only. It is not designed to be used with groups. You are welcome to share your experiences and insights with friends or family, however this Challenge course is not a qualification, and therefore does not enable you to teach Bothmer® Movement to others, either adults or children. If you love your experience and wish to pursue a qualification, or receive more training, we will gladly support you online or in-person, and we encourage you to contact us and find out more.

The challenge: what is it?

30 days, 30 exercises and 30 minutes of your time each day. There’s no group zoom call, or set time to do this. It’s up to you where, when and how you engage with the challenge, but signing up gives you access to each day's resources online or in the Zenler mobile app. Then, when we run live community led events, you'll also get a daily email/message to remind you of the day's resources and tasks, and support you in your process. In those community-led sessions, you'll also have the chance to connect with others via the discussion forums or WhatsApp.

Each day, we’ll focus on one exercise, from Opening to Closing, in the order of the evolutionary sequence, mapping the development of human consciousness through movement. We invite you to do this as a research process, to deepen your relationship to yourself, your movement, each exercise, and to the evolutionary sequence as a whole. For those new to Bothmer who have a grounding in Anthroposophy, this can be a great way to explore the philosophy through movement.

The 30 minutes is arranged as follows:

 >> 5 minute audio introduction from Martin Baker, reminding us of the principles of each exercise in the context of human consciousness and human development (childhood to adulthood and beyond)
 >> 20 minute individual movement practice: (no zoom calls, this one’s for you to do on your own). There’s a question format below, to help deepen the experience
 >> 5 minutes reflection: note-taking and sharing with the community via Email, WhatsApp or Telegram (you choose which one you prefer), to share insights, discoveries and learn from each other= 30 minutes daily

Additional resources are also included to support your experience: a short guided audio from Susan Kelly to remind us of the internal movement pictures, and an example video from Katie Brayne to visually remind us how the exercise goes. These are intended to remind you and help you, rather than teach)

We all know that the real benefit of Bothmer Movement lives between these exercise ‘gems’, however the exercises themselves are packed with opportunity to explore and discover ourselves more, and what we’re offering here is an in-depth enquiry into one exercise each day, with a research question format to help in the process.

Why the challenge? Where did the idea come from?

Katharine Brayne answers:

The past few years have been very unusual (coronavirus, lockdown, world changes and a transforming landscape of society and climate) and during that time the Bothmer Community has come together online in such an inspiring way, that I’d like to see this grow even more to foster collaboration, conversation, research and enquiry, for ourselves and for our community as a whole. We’ve got so much to offer, and I want our movement to thrive, supported by strong personal enquiry research and ‘listening’ together to the impulses that arise from openness, presence, community and curiosity within our practice.

I came up with the challenge for myself in 2019, and in a smaller group we created the research format below. It was hugely inspiring, I learnt so much, and it created a new wave of inspiration for me in how Bothmer relates not only to my life, but to how the future of our world can be created. I encourage you to allow the movement to speak to you, and give it the space and presence to be heard. You never know what inspirations you'll receive!

The 20-minute research question format: 20 minutes, broken down into 4 five-minute sections:

  -- 5 minutes: Focus on the physical form, are you doing it correctly? Arms horizontal, shoulders relaxed etc.
  -- 5 minutes: Moving the space correctly [Am I allowing the space to move me?],
  -- 5 minutes: Experiment! … hands in different positions, change the rhythm, do it backwards, whatever you like, whatever you feel drawn to experiment with in the moment, note how it feels, is it different? Why? How?
  -- 5 minutes: Ask questions: e.g. What is this exercise teaching me? How can it help me to live fully and become more conscious in a way that I can, in turn, help others?

After your movement each day, we encourage you to make notes and share your experience with the community. Within this course platform, there is a 'discussion' section every day, as well as a dedicated Community group, and all reflections are welcome!

How to take part, and what happens next?

Simply sign up below, choosing which payment option you prefer, to become part of the Bothmer® 30 Day Challenge community. For November 2020, we'd like to again offer the shared experience of a large number of people all doing the movements on the same day (although in your own time). In May 2020, when this challenge first took place, we had more than 180 participants in over 30 countries around the world and it was fantastic to feel part of something so global! This time, we have in-house discussions and an in-house community platform where we can all engage, collaborate and grow our understanding alongside others.

In May 2020, we had a 'May we Bothmer' WhatsApp group. This will still be available for those who wish to use it, however the 'Discussion' within the day's resources page will also be a great place to share and connect, as not everyone has WhatsApp.

We're looking forward to moving and connecting with you!

Notes on Translation and Payment and Translation

Translation: The language for the challenge is currently in English only. There are plans to translate to as many other languages as possible, and we wish to make this possible for future challenges. If you are confident in English and another language, and would like to help, please let us know! You can contact the team at bothmer30days@gmail.com, and please put 'Translation' in the subject line.

Payment by Bank Transfer: We acknowledge that some countries do not easily have credit or debit cards for online purchasing. It is therefore possible to pay by international bank transfer if you prefer. If you wish to do this, please email bothmer30days@gmail.com and we will be happy to support this.

Technical considerations: We have heard from some that the Safari and Firefox web browsers do not support this platform's payment procedure. If you use these browsers, please copy the website address from this page, and paste it into an alternative browser, such as Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge. Thank you.

Love to join, but can't afford it at the moment? You can still join!

No worries! There are many payment options to choose from, allowing for different tiers, paying in installments, and you're also welcome to join for free or by donation. We would like this to be available for everyone, and we don't want finances to be a barrier. Please get in touch!

Can you afford to pay more? Here's how you can help others:

Likewise, if you are someone who can afford to pay more, please consider paying a higher tier as this offsets and enables more to join for free or at lower tiers. If you'd specifically like to sponsor someone, we have 'Scholarship places' available which you are welcome to purchase instead. This adds one 'Challenge Only' purchase to your account, and is designed so that someone can benefit who would otherwise not be able to. Thanks for considering supporting in this way!

Additional questions you might have:

What happens after the challenge? What will happen to all the ideas, insights and discoveries we share?

The Challenge is hosted by Bothmer UK via this online platform (Bothmer Movement Online), but is available for everyone’s benefit, and the content you contribute is not ‘owned’ by anyone. It is an open platform for communication, encouraging discussion, updates and the sharing of ideas/impulses. At the moment, it has been created to give a space for us to communicate, but it could form something useful and helpful for the future. We’ll see!

Intentionally, the idea is to create a space that easily collects all the input from challenge members, to support our Bothmer Movement community in the future, enabling us to collectively use the ideas (generated from inspirations gained during the challenge) to continue collaboration and really grow what we’re able to offer. Ideally, many ideas and inspirations will come from this experience which we can build on in the months to come, and bring Bothmer Movement out into the world in the way that is being asked for and in the way that, perhaps, the movement itself wishes us to do.

The question I ask each of you to consider (who already know Bothmer Movement) is this: What is your relationship to Bothmer Movement? What is its place in the world? What are you being called to do? What can/do you wish to offer? What does the Movement itself want us to do?

In May we Bothmer,  in November we reMember, sometimes we reVerse and in the New Year we reNew and reView!

Much love,
Stay safe, stay light, and Shine your Love out Bright!

Katharine Brayne,
on behalf of the Bothmer Movement Online Team