Yes folks, Alexander himself has appeared in two works of fiction:
the best known is Aldous Huxleys’ Eyeless in Gaza. You can read all about this and others at http://alexandertechnique.com/ats/fiction/
One day there will be a book or play all set around the work. But I haven’t finished it yet….
You can also see a short film excert of Alexander on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbeXjewVmME Very raunchy picture behind him!
in which Richard Armitage describes his routine of lying down in semi-supine every morning as part of his healthy life style:
‘It’s a way of helping my voiuce production and control, but when my stress levels are high during filming, it gives me a break. I lie on the floor with a book over my head….(SURELY HE MEANS UNDER??)…….while I focus on the exercise. On the shoot on South Aftica I fell asleep pretty much everytime I did it.’
It is true. if I am in need of sleep, and I lie down in semi-supine on the floor….well it’s the best cat nap I ever have, and my back is soooolong and wide when I wake up.
The picture is of Misha a theatre student of mine lying down in the dressing room at the Criterion Theatre in London’s West End before the ArtsEducational Showcase this March.
Bit cramped but still possible for getting the voice and the nerves sorted.
http://www.thoughts.com/shinetruth/blog/Practicing-the-Alexander-Technique-560609/
This is very well written and observed, particularly useful if you are still thinking Alexander is all about posture!
Very pleased to hear from Peter a long term student of mine that he knocked off a further 15 minutes from his time in the London Marathon this year. Here’s what he said last year…
‘Thanks for all you your guidance and help over the past few months leading up to my London Marathon run – I was delighted to have got round in 3h 16 minutes and beat my previous time by a whopping 41 min. I came to you in search of advice on how to move my limbs more naturally but I have benefited from you teaching in a much wider way. Not only can I run now faster, longer, with less pain and more enjoyment but I’ve also learnt how to focus on the present moment in all aspects of my life, removing the stresses and strains that previously occupied my mind and making me feel more energetic. I always look forward to our weekly sessions as a chance for relaxation and learning more about the technique……
It’s all true! Thanks again, you’ve really revolutionised how I look at the mad world which I live in!’
This is Faye. She is two years old and the sister of one of my theatre students. Scarlett was lying down in semi-supine as part of my Facebook Event. Faye wanted to know what Scarlett was doing and insisted on joining in……..Faye is not so much a student but a teacher of the Alexander Technique. I was watching 3 children all under 5 on the Tube with their mother. They were so easy in their movement, so There, so non-doing, without guile, without trying, without trying to get anything right. They were just there.
Like Faye – just lying there, and her shoulders so wide and open….widening, lengthening……although I gather from her big sister she can be a bit of a pickle too!
Well if you are a fan or member of my ‘I like lying down in semi-supine’ group on Facebook, you will have got the invitation already. Let’s all lie down from 2pm this Sunday March 28th, no matter where you are for 20 minutes and feedback, report with photos if poss to the group wall. …lie down with friends or on your own….invite all your friends and family…maybe we’ll get a world record number! Have fun!
My colleague Robert Rickover has got a site up dedicated to auido interviews on different aspects of the AT – acting, music,performing, swimming etc etc . This latest is an interview with Paul Little, who lead the research on the Back Pain Trial in 2008 which proved 24 lessons in AT to be very effective in combating back pain. Quite extraordinary results published in BMJ , I am surprised that NHS and private health insurance companies etc haven’t taken it up yet as a cost effective way to deal with chronic long term pain.
Alan Watts said in his film on YouTube, Conversations with Myself Part Three from 1971 :
..’and when we stop, we find a world that is happening rather than being done, being shoved, and that happening as distinct from doing is our fundamental self. And our fundamental self is not something just inside the skin, it’s everywhere around us with which we connect. When you look out of your eyes at nature happening out there you’re looking at you.’
W.H.Davies said:
What is this life if full of care
We have no time to stand and stare
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows
No time to see, when woods we pass
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass
No time to see in broad daylight
Streams full of stars, like skies as night
No time to turn at Beauty’s glance
And watch her feet, how they can dance
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began
A poor life this if full of care
we have no time to stand and stare
FM Alexander said to change our habits we need to stop, to create a gap between stimulus and response. Frank Pierce Jones (Alexander teacher) wrote in ‘Freedom to Change’ of ‘an expansion of the field of consciousness in space and time so you are taking in yourself and your environment……..in my experience the field cannot be maintained for any great span of time – it fades in and out. When it has faded out for any length time, its absence manifests itself by a nagging discomfort… ‘
This is a fabulous head-neck-back relationship! A natural primary control. My friend Chris took this in January when in South Africa
Wilfred Barlow wrote something of this in his book The Alexander Principle (used copies available at www.amazon.co.uk)
My colleague Chloe did a study some years ago, asking teachers and trainees how they felt the Alexander Technique had affected their sexual experience. The results, if I remember correctly, were that the women found they were able to articulate more confidently what they wanted ,thereby gainiing mmore satisfaction, and that the men found that they had sensual pleasure throughout their whole body, rather than just the sexual organs. So, the conclusion was that yes, AT can help change your sex life! Less end-gaining and being more in the moment. You can read an extract of this is Direction Journal www.directionjournal.com/journals Volume 2 Issue 4 – Sexuality
I had a student some years ago, an older woman, who had come for lessons after tearing her psoas muscle and was walking gingerly, legs first. Together we reorganised her balance and disovered she could walk quite safely without tipping backwards. One day she arrived beaming from ear to ear. She confessed that since her accident she had been afraid to have sexual intercourse, but that last night she and her husband had had a glorious time!
So, you may find that the indirect approach of reorgainsing your balance and increasing your flexibily may have all sorts of other unexpected but welcome effects in your life.