Living the Questions - Part I

Living the Questions - Part I

Students and teachers of the Alexander Technique are all after one thing: CHANGE. But what does real change entail? The Nervous-Nelly-Know-It-All in me wants immediate change along with 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed. I want a detailed outline of how to get from point A to point B, to keep me contained in the illusion that I control my life. But in order to change and learn and grow we must inevitably go towards what we do not know. Otherwise we will repeat our past in various iterations over and over again, individually and collectively.

Stress Busting Tips for Fall

Stress Busting Tips for Fall

And we're off! The post Labor Day hustle is here, and with that transition out of summer’s leisurely pace I sometimes feel a little anxious and overwhelmed by all there is to get done. So how do I maintain some semblance of poise while charging ahead at full steam with a dream and an infinite To-Do List in hand? 

I Can't Get No...

I Can't Get No...

Human beings have been talkin’ about dissatisfaction for a long time.The grass is always greener on the other side. And we find ourselves thinking if we can just get to the next level where we make more money, have a bigger house, snag the perfect partner, THEN we’ll be happy and satisfied. From the somatic viewpoint of the Alexander Technique, this wanting to be in another place and time, or wanting things to be different than how they are, has strong physical correlates. Personally my chest gets tight, and though it’s still a great song by Duncan Sheik, I’m Barely Breathing . I lose any sense of the points of contact I’m making with the ground or my chair, and I often stare at one point in the distance with a furrowed brow. I feel anxious, and my attention span shortens as I flit from one busy activity to the next. 

Gokhale Method vs. Alexander Technique

Gokhale Method vs. Alexander Technique

NPR recently featured a story on Esther Gokhale’s method for helping people uncover their “Primal Posture™ for a Pain-Free Life”.

 

Since its publication, this story, entitled “Lost Posture: Why Some Indigenous Cultures May Not Have Back Pain”, was sent to me so many times by members of my community, a thoughtful response from my perspective as an Alexander Technique teacher seems appropriate and hopefully useful.

An Open Letter to Your Boss

An Open Letter to Your Boss

Google’s Senior Vice President of People Operations, Laszlo Bock, recently endorsed the Alexander Technique for helping with “desk bound back pain” in his new book Work Rules.

Oh dreamy Google, if only all companies could foster such awesome workplace environments.

My universal vision is that one day everyone with a desk job, or who uses a computer for long periods of time, would learn the skill of Alexander Technique to help them stay pain free and injury free, and reduce work related stress.

In my vision, I see open spaces with yoga mats and soft cover books where employees do Constructive Rest on their lunch breaks, or as part of their prep for big presentations, or even as a way to begin meetings.

That’s why I have drafted a memorandum below to be sent to your boss. That’s right, your Head Honcho, Chief Director President Executive Officer, Charles in Charge, Super-Duper-Visor, to let them know it’s high time some changes were made. Self-care is nonnegotiable. Because hey, we all deserve a chance to be as cool as Google. 

And if you already are the boss, this one’s for you.

How the Alexander Technique Helped Me Get Hired and Promoted Twice All in One Year

How the Alexander Technique Helped Me Get Hired and Promoted Twice All in One Year

It started as an entry-level position, transcribing raw uncut video footage for a television production company, Monday through Friday, eight hours per day. Having no dreams or aspirations to forge a career in television, it was just helpful to have a job that paid my bills as I finished my last year of Alexander Technique teacher training.

My friend recommended me to the hiring manager, which got me in the door, but the interview went well too. Grounded through my sit bones, and the contact of my feet on the floor, allowing the chair to support me, my breath moved calmly and freely. Staying open through my shoulder girdle, and long through my spine, I did not sink down or collapse into my low back and abdomen. Voice clear, eyes bright and open, I connected with the supervisor in an alert but relaxed way. These were my Alexander Technique skills in action.

I was hired.

How to Find Inner Peace Even While That Annoying Guy Next to You Screams on His Cell Phone (Hint: It doesn’t involve knocking him out).

How to Find Inner Peace Even While That Annoying Guy Next to You Screams on His Cell Phone (Hint: It doesn’t involve knocking him out).

The car alarm honks outside your bedroom window for hours at a time.
Around every corner another computer screen glares in your face.
Advertisements infiltrate your dreams.

We are a culture bombarded by stimuli.

So when we need to rejuvenate we tend to close our eyes.

New Year's Slow Change Challenge

New Year's Slow Change Challenge

This January ditch the tired rhetoric of "New Year New You." 

Are personal growth, change, and renewal worthy goals? Of course!

However, the instantaneous results we have come to expect from our self improvement efforts are often not achieved by sustainable means. 

$5 Lessons for Activists

Announcing $5 Private Alexander Technique Lessons for Activists on Wednesday evenings in Bushwick from 5-8pm.

It's too frequently forgotten that self care is of the utmost importance in order to be an effective catalyst for deep, authentic, and widespread change. Finding ways to access sustainable support in your body-mind-spirit will help you stay revitalized and balanced in the face of great demands.

From learning how to walk more efficiently for marches, to holding your protest sign with less tension, to using your voice healthfully to speak the words that need to be heard, may the Alexander Technique provide you with the tools you need to stand your ground, and find pain relief, space, and dynamic stability as you move forward seeking justice, peace, and equality for all.

Your activism can extend to any arena you find pertinent, as long as you are committed to a peaceful approach. Just send along one sentence of what you are currently doing to cultivate positive change locally, nationally, and/or globally, when you email redefiningposture [at] gmail [dot] com to set up a time for your lesson.

Get Yourself Together!

Get Yourself Together!

Try this:

  • Mentally, or out loud, tell yourself to “Get your $#!+ together!”
  • Say it like you mean it.
  • Without judgment, closely observe what happens in your body and breath for 30 seconds as you repeat that command.

 

If you’re reading this blog post chances are you have found a satisfactory, if not more than satisfactory, socially acceptable way to “Get your $#!+ together” in order to function in your daily life. You keep yourself together mentally, physically, and emotionally well enough to sustain some sort of a career, home and social life.

Stair Master

Stair Master

Using the Alexander Technique to Improve Stair Climbing Skillz

Whether you're living out your own personal Rocky Balboa "Eye of the Tiger" montage, the elevator to your 9th floor office is out of service, or you have to transfer from the A/C/E to the N/Q/R at Times Square, tackling multiple flights of stairs can be physically demanding for anyone. Here’s how to apply the Alexander Technique to take you from Stair Novice to Stair Master in 5 Simple Steps (pun intended).

Sustainability and the Alexander Technique

Sustainability and the Alexander Technique

You compost and recycle. You buy organic local goods. You ride your bike to work, and you shower in under five minutes. You make sustainable choices, because you know that while we have been able to run on oil and gas for a long time, accomplishing a great many things, these resources are rapidly depleting. We must now instead find sustainable renewable energy from more abundant natural resources like the sun and wind. However, as Señor Ghandi so wisely said if we must "be the change [we] wish to see in the world," supporting Mother Earth begins at the most local ecosystem we know.

 

New Fall Smoothie for Alternative Happy Hour

Redefining Posture - Alexader Technique - Happy Hour - Bushwick

Trying to break  the ol' after work drinks at the bar routine? Introducing the new Apple Pie Smoothie as part of Alternative Happy Hour on Wednesday evenings at my Bushwick studio from 5-8pm.  Share an hour long Alexander Technique lesson with a friend, and enjoy this delicious "seasonally appropriate" smoothie while you're at it. A relaxing and nourishing way to change up your 5 o'clock habits. $30 per person. Book your happy hour today by emailing me at redefiningposture@gmail.com. *Smoothie designed by health coach Patrizia Hernandez of La Vita Wellness.


Alexander Technique? Ain't Nobody Got Time for That!

Alexander Technique? Ain't Nobody Got Time for That!

Several students have asked me variations of the same question in the past several weeks, so I wanted to take a moment to address it here.

The question:  I feel great when I slow down and become more aware in my Alexander Technique lessons, but I don't know how to maintain that awareness when I have to move quickly in the rest of my life. Is the point of Alexander Technique to be aware 100% of the time?

Answer in short:  Hell no! Ain't nobody got time for that!

There’s no way for us mere mortals to be mindful and aware of our mind-body-selves 100% of the time. We’re just not built for that.  But how about for 10 minutes a day, or 5 minutes? How about for even just a split second check-in to stop and ask yourself, "Can I do less?" or "Can I release my neck into length and my back into expansion?"

Fight/Flight/Freeze and the Alexander Technique

Fight/Flight/Freeze and the Alexander Technique

In Memory of All the Unarmed Black Men Who Have Died at the Hands of Police Officers

Once I watched a grown man in a business suit leap out of his subway seat with fear and surprise at the sight of a lone purple grape rolling down the floor of the train car headed toward his feet. I can only assume that out of the corner of his eye he saw something more threatening than a grape. Perhaps he thought it was a mouse, or perhaps he knew it was a grape, but a traumatizing experience with fruit from his past triggered a fearful reaction causing him to jump up and run away.

We all have our purple grapes: stimuli in our lives that trigger our Fight/Flight/Freeze responses, because they are associated with some past experience where, real or not, we perceived our lives as threatened. Fight/Flight/Freeze (FFF) is seen all throughout animals in nature, and even though we modern day humans rarely need to fight, run, or play dead to save our lives as we once did when we lived out in the open with other animals who saw us as prey, we still often feel as though that were the case.

Feminism and the Alexander Technique

Feminism and the Alexander Technique

During a private lesson, one of my students recently said as a result of the work we were doing she felt like she did not have to do anything other than what she was doing, or be any other way that how she was in that moment.

We are often programmed to think we need to do or be something more than we are. Even with the freedom I am privileged to experience as a woman in the United States, I still encounter pressure from society at large, and in personal relationships, to act and look and be a certain way in order to conform to a socially acceptable standard of femininity.

Mindfulness and the Alexander Technique

Mindfulness and the Alexander Technique

An article entitled "No Time to Think" by Kate Murphy published in the New York Times Sunday Review on July 27th, 2014 states:

"In 11 experiments involving more than 700 people, the majority of participants reported that they found it unpleasant to be alone in a room with their thoughts for just 6 to 15 minutes."

It speculates that the constant busyness many of us seem to experience, and sometimes even glorify this day and age, may just be a tactic for avoiding self-reflection. Busyness distracts us from acknowledging the reality of our thoughts, emotions, and sensations -- particular those we consider "negative". 

As an Alexander Technique teacher and resident of the City that Never Sleeps, this does not come as a surprise to me. Many of my students and fellow city dwellers spend their every day powering forward with no time for pause, working nonstop to get ahead in their careers, going to the gym, bouncing from one social engagement to the next, running errands, and keeping up with social media 24/7. But this pace is not sustainable. Whatever feelings and sensations we shut out get pushed down in our psyches, only to bubble up in unexpected ways at unexpected times. Without time for self-reflection, we're just hurtling through our lives on auto-pilot, limiting our capacity for growth and change.

Failure and the Alexander Technique

Failure and the Alexander Technique

My Love Affair With the F Word

I wanted to write about why failure is an essential element in any Alexander Technique practice, but everything I wrote seemed overly complicated and wordy. I was having a difficult time trying to squeeze out a decent draft from what I had, until I remembered to practice the very thing I was preaching.

The way I was writing wasn’t working, so instead of charging forward without changing anything, I stopped. I let go of the familiar tension that had built up over the process of banging out the first draft, released my neck and back, and allowed myself to grow into more of my full expansiveness. I let my breathing open up, and I acknowledged the support of the ground. I wiped the slate clean and started over.