Why do cats and dogs always look so supple, while humans grow stiff with age? Thomas Hanna, philosopher turned movement educator, had an answer: our brains forget how to let go. By identifying and naming pandiculation, the body’s built-in reset, he showed how this natural act could be harnessed for lifelong flexibility and healing.
When you wake up and instinctively stretch your arms, yawn, and arch your spine, you’re not just limbering up. You’re performing pandiculation: a built-in movement that resets muscle tone and restores balance to the nervous system.
Thomas Hanna (1928–1990) devoted his life to understanding this simple, universal act. Trained first as a philosopher, Hanna studied existentialism and the lived experience of the body before meeting Moshe Feldenkrais in the 1970s. From philosophy, he shifted into practice; teaching people how to feel and reshape their own inner experience of movement.
Hanna coined the term Somatics, from the Greek soma: the living body as experienced from within. He observed that many of our aches, pains, and postural distortions come not from aging itself, but from what he called Sensory-Motor Amnesia (SMA). This is the brain’s habit of “forgetting” how to relax certain muscles after years of stress, injury, or repetitive posture.
His insight was deceptively simple: pandiculation is the body’s natural way to reset itself, and when practiced consciously, it can reverse SMA. Instead of forcing a stretch, the process is:
1. Gently contract the tense muscle.
2. Slowly release it under awareness.
3. Rest, letting the nervous system relearn what relaxation feels like.
Hanna Somatic Education was born from this understanding. Through floor-based movements and guided awareness, he showed that we can reclaim control of our bodies at any age. Sadly, Hanna died suddenly in a car accident in 1990, just as his work was beginning to spread. Yet his legacy lives on through practitioners around the world, and through anyone who discovers the magic of a mindful yawn and stretch.
In my own somatic practice, I see how this principle weaves naturally with breathwork, bodymind integration, and touch: when we wake up the nervous system’s forgotten pathways, the whole person comes alive.
Next time you feel stiff, don’t force a stretch. Try a pandiculation: contract gently, release slowly, and notice how your body thanks you.
Haiku
Contract, then release,
ancient knowing wakes again:
movement teaches ease.