Ethan Cowan

Finished reading: One! Hundred! Demons! by Lynda Barry 📚 Lynda Barry makes cartoons and One! Hundred! Demons! contains a good number of them. Some of Linda Barry’s recent books give self-help-ish advice about being creati... https://ethancowan.com/2026/10/05/finished-reading-one-hundred-demons.html

Finished reading: Charmed Life by Diana Wynne Jones 📚 I am reading a children’s book, why? Because I looked up Hugo winning podcasts, and there’s one called Eight Days of Diana Wynne Jones, and I listened to some of it, and ... https://ethancowan.com/2026/09/18/finished-reading-charmed-life-by.html

Review: https://ethancowan.com/2026/09/16/review.html

How do books work?: https://ethancowan.com/2026/09/01/how-do-books-work.html

Finished reading: The Life and Letters of Tofu Roshi by Susan Ichi Su Moon 📚 At the Ocamora Library, my eyes were scanning the spines of the books when this one jumped off the shelf. When I saw the name on the spine, Tofu Roshi... https://ethancowan.com/2026/08/20/finished-reading-the-life-and.html

52 Buckets: https://ethancowan.com/2026/08/17/buckets.html

Finished reading: The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads by Tim Wu Like 30 related New Yorker pieces all strung together, this book is mostly a series of easy-to-read, quickly told stories... https://ethancowan.com/2026/05/14/finished-reading-the-attention-merchants.html

Finished reading: Dopamine Nation by Anna Lembke Compulsive overconsumption. That’s the phrase. That’s what we do with almost everything now, including digital drugs like youtube and “social media.” The companies that be... https://ethancowan.com/2026/05/05/finished-reading-dopamine-nation-by.html

How to Become a really good ATM teacher in 2026?: https://ethancowan.com/2026/04/29/how-to-become-a-really.html

Transcribing Esalen 4 - Tilting Crossed Legs: https://ethancowan.com/2026/04/16/transcribing-esalen-tilting-crossed-legs.html

Attensity!: https://ethancowan.com/2026/04/13/attensity.html

I just gave a lesson at the Stroke Support Group at Lutheran Hospital in Denver, my first time presenting Feldenkrais to adult stroke survivors, who seemed to enjoy the lesson, and the broadest idea I shared was: We, as a community, can set aside time to do less and try softer, and it’s worth it.

Went on a hike this morning then vibe coded a map making script that puts together gpx and heart rate data.

I just finished reading: Shu Ha Ri by Richard Griffiths @writingslowly I liked how short it was. I think it would fit in well with other books from Tracy Durnell’s In praise of the hundred page idea. Shu Ha Ri is about learning ... https://ethancowan.com/2026/03/29/i-just-finished-reading-shu.html

Attention is Precious

Turns out I started blogging in 2007: https://ethancowan.com/2026/03/26/turns-out-i-started-blogging.html

I’m thinking about retro-actively assembling my personal website as an archive of lots of previous stuff I did, including stuff I already posted online, which is what Lisa Charlotte Muth did bringing everything back to her website, but ALSO maybe some stuff I haven’t posted before.

Esalen 2 - Scanning and 5 Lines

The habit of asking myself at the end of each day, What did I do to serve others today? is helping me see that I’m more self centered than I realized

I came across an older text "Access Intimacy: The Missing Link" by @miamingus.bsky.social a few days ago. It's not often that something resonates with me so much, suddenly piecing together long-standing, vague feelings like a puzzle. 1/7

if U could dance with anyone, living or dead, from any time, who would U choose? I would choose some prehistoric group, Fred Astaire and 1960s Judson Church

I’ve been reading The Empowerment Path by @tasshin.com and @marybajorek.bsky.social and did the values exercise this afternoon. These are my core values today.

Sometimes nothing stands between U and Ur goals except an inner tension that holds you back. U can learn to reach Ur truth thru inner resolution.

Reading James Carse thinking we should change the name from “Feldenkrais Method” to “Feldenkrais Culture”

To the experience of shifts in self-perception just bc I apply awareness to insignificant muscular actions, and the concomitant improvement of body stuff I didn’t know needed improving, I give the name Feldenkrais and declare, I’m doing Feldenkrais, as if that clears up wtf is going on

Stephen Nachmanovitch says, “You don’t have to practice boring exercises, but you have to practice something.” #feldenkrais #skeletonschool

Turning the toes under #feldenkrais #skeletonschool

“You’ve been swimming in gravity since the day you were born. Every cell knows where down is. Easily forgotten. Your mass and the earth’s mass calling to each other.” From “The Small Dance, The Stand” by Steve Paxton #contactimprovisation #stevepaxton #feldenkrais

I love that bluesky lets me see posts from people I follow in chronological order without adding anything else.

Everyone is a dancer. Everything is dance. These are useful, not true statements. Gravity is a law to which we are all subject. How you interpret the law of gravity is up to you. I suggest you use the interpretation “I am a dancer.” open.substack.com/pub/skeleton...

Forward and up for the head. Backward and down for the tail.

"How many dance students dance alone uninterruptedly for at least 40 minutes daily, outside of rehearsing, choreographing, or physically stretching? Why is this not a 4-year requirement for every college dance student? How else can a person develop an intimate dialogue with the body?" Deborah Hay

That the eye sockets "rhyme" with the hip sockets, and the ankle joints at the bottom rhyme with the first neck bone at the top, is human skeletal poetry.

There is an epic text waiting to be written comparing Ido Portal to Moshe Feldenkrais. I don't currently have the skills to do it, but it would be a kaleidescope of movement, martial arts, media, celebrity, guru, philosophy, Jewish-Israeli-ness, and the blurriness btwn mass and counter cultures.

Leaning head against the wall #feldenkrais