Mia Segal passed away on February 15, 2025. Mia was the first person trained by Moshe Feldenkrais. In the words of Elizabeth Beringer,
Elizabeth Beringer Remembrance
Mia Segal was the first person Moshe Feldenkrais authorized as a practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method® of somatic education. She was trained individually by Moshe before his first training in Israel, with the original group of 13. Thus, she was the person who had worked the longest with the Feldenkrais Method, before her passing. Mia, along with Gaby Yaron, Yochanon Rywerant and Ruthy Alon, acted as assistants in the San Francisco training. When Moshe let a group of new students into the third year of the program, he put Mia in charge. I was one of those students. We were called “lepers”, as the other students didn’t want to work with beginners and initially shunned us! Mia worked with the lepers as a group individually, instructing us in the basics of Functional Integration® lessons. She was a generous teacher, demonstrating on more than one person and then often allowing us to practice with her directly! I remember very clearly the first time she demonstrated rolling the head, and then later lay down and directed me as I rolled hers. She was very encouraging! At the time I did not realize how unusual it was to have a senior teacher work in this way with beginners. As the youngest person in the room, her encouragement was thrilling and essential.
Some years later David Zemach-Bersin and I founded Feldenkrais® Resources and began organizing advanced trainings. Mia came frequently in those early years and was a generous, positive and artful teacher. As time passed, she became annoyed with the structures that were gradually being set up. Eventually she broke away from the international Feldenkrais organizations to partner with her daughter and work in her own way. She inspired countless practitioners over many decades, and her influence will continue in a myriad of ways, through those who knew and studied with her.
Ellen Soloway Remembrance
I, as well as many other people, will miss Mia Segal. She died recently on February 15, 2025. Her presence and teaching had a profound influence on many people in our Feldenkrais® community. Practitioners who never had the pleasure of learning from Mia or meeting Mia, I hope, through these vignettes, to give you a glimpse of this complex remarkable woman and her skill at teaching the Feldenkrais Method® of somatic education.
Mia gave me my first Feldenkrais lesson at Esalen in Big Sur and opened a whole world of perception and sensation. That first lesson created a profound feeling of returning to myself. I still do not know what happened in logical terms. I have a vague memory of her pressing hard on my clavicles and feeling my eyeballs gradually sink deeper into their eye sockets. When she took her hands away, I knew myself differently. It was more than being flatter on the floor. It was a sense of being myself in a way I never thought possible or could understand at that moment. My world was rocked. I could not be the same. When I stood up, I seemed to reach the sky. This was the wonderful gift Mia offered to people around her — a chance to grow into the person you could become, if you wanted to put forth the effort.
Sometimes growth was prompted by these phrases, “You can do better” or “What is stopping you?” When she used those simple sentences, her timing created an internal dialog that prompted change, if you wanted it. This was another interesting facet of Mia’s personality and teaching style. She would give a person a hint, a clue, a pathway to follow and then, step back. She would issue her challenge to “do better” and leave the outcome, the decision, to the individual. The effect was a powerful learning tool, if the person wanted it.
I sponsored many advanced trainings for Mia after she moved to the United States. (I regret that Mia would not permit those to be recorded.) Her acute observational skills guided practitioners to sharpen their own. Her breakdown of Awareness Through Movement® lessons provided a series of sensations that could be translated later into FI® lessons. Her background as an Alexander teacher blended with her long-term friendship and working relationship with Moshe into a potent teaching environment. Growth and understanding of the Feldenkrais Method would blossom in the days after attending an advanced trainings. This happened because of her absolute insistence that participants focus their attention.
For many years Mia taught Feldenkrais trainings in Holland. The best advice she ever gave me was not to go to Holland as her assistant. Her advice was to go as a student, as a beginner. I huffed and puffed at this unexpected, imagined insult. (After all, I attended Amherst. I was a frequent assistant for Anat Baniel and others. I sponsored Mia’s advanced training. I assisted for her in Japan. I was, I was, I was…) I was caught up in my own importance. True to form, Mia, paused, smiled, and said, “You can be an assistant, no problem. However, if you come as a student, you will learn more.” Then, she waited for me to make a decision. And, she was correct. I went as a beginning student and it was just what I needed for my growth. This anecdote is just an example of how she would guide her students toward growth. When she taught, she could be uncompromising. It was more than learning the next technique or the newest move. The Feldenkrais Method was about helping a person “do better” in more ways than just physical coordination. Mia, you enriched my being in many ways. Hearing that you passed on brings great sadness because you influenced my life profoundly. I can only be thankful that I knew you as both a person and as a teacher. Mia, your sharp, insightful, often funny comments will continue to echo in my mind and others. You are missed by many. Rest in peace, Miss Mia.
Cynthia Allen Remembrance
I confess: I barely knew Mia Segal, but after we completed three video interviews for the Move Better, Feel Better Summits, I felt I knew her essence—and I fell in love with her. It started as a single interview, but within hours of the first one, she contacted me through her daughter, Leora, to say she had more to say. Again, after the second interview, the request to speak more arrived. Thus, three fabulous sessions were recorded for all to enjoy:
Each time, she remembered more of her years with Moshe Feldenkrais and her personal development as Mia Segal, practicing her understanding of somatic education. Yes, she often retold stories she had told before. She wandered around until she found what she truly wanted to say in this repeat opportunity. It was always a lot of fun to chat with her. I had hoped to visit her while she was still alive, but we have never had an in-person meeting. What I share here is based on my limited experience with her. I recognize that others will have different ideas, so please accept these as my own interpretation.
Her relationship with Moshe had been unique. She provided a connection to a family with children, food, and gatherings often filled with intellectual discussion for Moshe. The image of time spent hanging around together for hours stays with me. That is a special kind of intimacy. Mia provided a witness to his process, which I believe we should take seriously and not discount. I suspect Moshe very much needed her. She was an already qualified somatic movement practitioner, not someone off the street fascinated with his work. At first, she was reluctant to even take the time to observe. Moshe undoubtedly saw in her a protégé, but I believe he also excelled through the mirror she provided. Mia, for her part, was not interested in being his protégé. As a very busy mother trained in the Alexander Technique, she had no intention of stepping into that role.
She wonderfully describes how, once she observed Moshe in action, she knew she wanted to observe again. But a year passed, and suddenly, she realized that she had left observation and was “working” with clients. “When did that happen?” she mused.
Moshe later wrote to her in a letter that her observation had made him a better teacher. These were Moshe’s formative years in his hands-on technique. Together, they had a unique and multi-faceted relationship. The falling out when Mia left to study martial arts in Japan demonstrates her strength of character—a time when she staked her independence from Moshe. It was difficult for both of them. Yet she later bridged that gap by helping Moshe fulfil a dream of his own: to come to Japan and study with martial arts masters. I found this inspiring, as many of us have broken free from our valued teachers but cannot elegantly integrate such a key moment in growth. I would describe Mia as delightful and humble but sure and warm. In the small Awareness Through Movement® series for practitioners that I took online with her, it was as if she had stripped down the Method to a bare elegance. Nothing extra needed. Just the very beginning of any movement was what she encouraged. Nothing more. And I can surely say that anyone in their eighties sitting on the floor to provide Functional Integration® lessons is an inspiration.
I will close with this tidbit: I asked Mia to share a time as a young practitioner when she was embarrassed about what she did/understood.
She told me the most revealing story. And then asked, “Is that embarrassing enough for you, Cynthia?”
It was indeed! She showed me that we all begin somewhere. We deleted that from the interview, at her request, because she thought people might think poorly of practitioners.
But if you see me at a conference (yes, I long for an in-person event), I will happily relate it to you over tea or coffee.
Thank you, Mia, for adding joy to my life by chatting with me for those few hours.