THE ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE is a unique approach to the study of movement. It is a means of eliminating unnecessary tension while learning to move in an easier, more effective way. The technique teaches us how to be at ease in simple everyday activities and how this new flexibility can be the basis of more specialised skills.
The technique was developed in Melbourne at the end of last century by F. Matthias Alexander, an actor who lost his voice, and is now taught throughout the world. The Alexander work focuses on the unconscious habitual ways in which we use ourselves - our patterns of posture, movement and responses to stressful situations - and teaches us to have constructive consciousness of these aspects of ourselves.
Alexander teachers have had extensive training in observation and in using their hands to help their students move out of their patterns of misuse. The technique provides the means of profoundly altering our lives on many levels as these patterns of posture and movement are after all part of a psychophysical totality. Working in a holistic way, a real change in one area means a change in all areas.
What is the technique helpful for?
People come for Alexander technique lessons for many reasons; in all cases the teacher will proceed not by trying to address the obvious problem, but rather by looking at people's overall use of themselves.
- To improve posture
- To deal with neck or back pain, sciatica, RSI and the full range of muscular and skeletal problems
- To help heal physical injuries or recover from illness
- To learn how to carry out daily activities with ease
- To learn more effective ways to deal with stress
- To deal with voice problems
- To help their asthma or other breathing problems
- To cope with neurological disorders such as stroke, Parkinson's disease and MS
- To improve ability in a chosen sport - running, horse-riding, golf etc
- For musicians - to play their instruments with ease and without pain
- For performing artists to improve their performances