Keys of the Alexander Technique (part 3): Powering up your THINKING

To “think ourselves into movement” we first need to clarify our thinking.

This means first stopping to give ourselves the chance to “say no” (inhibit) to our habitual way of moving and reacting. This habitual way is made up of our ongoing and ingrained tension patterns which make for an inefficient “starting place” or “set point”. 

So, after recognizing the stimulus to action, you give yourself a little pause, some space to stop your habitual reaction and really consider “how” you want to respond.

What you want is a better starting place; so you get your “primary movement” going. This “primary movement”, which concerns itself with the dynamic relationship between head & spine, leaves you in the best possible conditions for any action: a dynamic sense of poise and balance.

Still, you haven’t yet gone anywhere. And it’s the getting going, and the continuing to go, in the manner you decided that is the issue at stake here.

You’ve got to get the primary movement going first. But then you need to keep it going as you go into movement, when your brain recognizes what you’re up to and wants to insert the old habit of tension.

So how do you keep the primary movement going during all subsequent movements? You need to use your mind: mindfulness of movement and awareness of the body as a whole throughout all movements. In Alexander jargon this is called: “keeping your primary directions going”. F.M. Alexander himself once said, “You think that the Alexander Technique is a physical thing; I tell you it’s the most mental thing that’s ever been discovered.”

It’s a persistent, continuous state of monitoring progress, of mindfulness of movement and awareness of yourself and your relationship to inner and outer space. You want to catch yourself when the habit pricks up its ears, so you can let it go before it completely takes over your system. Your persistent, continuous monitoring gives the drive, the force, the energy to the new way.

This is how you build a new “habit”.

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Keys of the Alexander Technique (part 2): THINKING yourself into Movement.

The Alexander Technique deals first with clearing your thinking so that you are able to move in the direction that you wish to move, and not where your unconscious habit would take you.

So, before setting out, you pause to remind yourself to let go of your habitual tension patterns. And then, after the pause, it is a matter of committing to your new direction.

Ultimately, direction is a movement from point A to point B. But, in the Alexander Technique, we’re much more concerned with how we travel that distance.

In bodily terms this “how” is determined by a “primary movement” that comes before any actual step we take in the direction of point B. This “primary movement”, which has its definite physical manifestation in the dynamic relationship between head-spine-ribs-girdles-limbs, is governed by two “mind” aspects.

The first “mind” aspect is body awareness (body map). During lessons we strive to raise our sensory appreciation of our body parts, and their relationships to each other and to the whole.

The second, and most important “mind” aspect, is perhaps unique to the Alexander Technique.

Having determined "how" we want to travel from A to B, the Alexander Technique concerns itself with making sure we start and keep moving in said direction in the manner that we decided. What we don’t want is our habitual tension patterns to sneak in on us the moment we spring into action and undo our “primary movement”.

There are infinite ways of getting from A to B. The “primary movement” ensures that we do so in such a way that we’re not interfering with our natural postural reflexes. Alexander called it “lengthening (and widening) in stature” which is akin to “decompressing your joints for movement” or “creating space for movement to occur.”

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Keys of the Alexander Technique (part 1): Clearing up your THINKING

Two of the top benefits of the Alexander Technique are health and posture. These are, however, not exclusive to the Technique.

The objective of the Alexander Technique could be described as “lightness and freedom of movement with minimum effort.”  But here once again the Alexander Technique does not hold a monopoly.

What distinguishes the Alexander Technique from other mind-body disciplines isn’t so much what comes at the end of the process, but rather the emphasis it puts on how we get there. And the key is in the THINKING PROCESS involved.

During Alexander Technique lessons you get to learn some of the anatomical and physiological aspects of movement, but this is not where the true core of the work lies. When we think about the structures that we’ll be moving, we’re not as interested in the actual movement as we are in the clarity of the thought and intention behind the movement.

The learning process in the Alexander Technique centers on clarifying the thinking process that gets you into movement. Alexander called it “quickening the conscious mind.” It’s about working with the reasoning, discriminating, creative and decision making capabilities of our minds.

If our bodies are not responding to our conscious wishes perhaps it isn’t because they are structurally unable to do so, but rather because we’re having unconscious wishes that conflict with our conscious ones. These “unconscious wishes” are made manifest in our muscle tension patterns.

We fail to realize this because the unconscious wishes have been there for so long they have become part of our “self-definition.” To go in a new conscious direction, we must first become aware of what direction we’re already unconsciously heading in… and let go of the conflicting wish.

This is really what the Alexander Technique is about: If you wish to go left, you’ve got to first pause and remind yourself to stop your habit of always going right. Because if you rush left without thinking, that is, without “inhibiting” your tendency to go right, you’ll end up going nowhere fully or satisfactorily.

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