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What is the Alexander Technique?
The Alexander Technique is an internationally -renowned educational method that promotes ease and efficiency of movement, enhanced balance and coordination, freedom of breath and voice, and improved sensory awareness. It is the study of how we use ourselves in all our activities. The manner in which we use ourselves directly affects how we function, perform, and maintain health.
How does the Alexander Technique work?
The Alexander Technique works by teaching you to respond differently to the stimulus of any movement or activity in daily life. Instead of responding in accordance to your habits, you learn instead to respond with a broader range of choices, more in harmony with your natural human design. The Technique is primarily concerned with the working of the “postural reflexes”, i.e., the mechanisms that enable you to support and balance yourself against the ever-present pull of gravity while you go about your daily activities. As you learn to prevent the habits that interfere with these reflexes, you will be able to find freedom, ease and confidence in all your movement, whether it be walking, breathing, dancing, or playing a musical instrument.
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How can the Alexander Technique help you?
Built into us as human beings is a natural poise and coordination, an ability to move with ease and efficiency. Unfortunately, we often interfere with this ability through habits of movement and thought. Young children, who generally move with ease, balance and confidence, far too often grow up to be adults who move with effort, fatigue, and stiffness. The Alexander Technique teaches you how to reverse and prevent this degenerative process, by helping you to become aware of, and to stop, the habits which interfere with your natural poise and coordination. |
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What are the principles of the Alexander Technique?
The Alexander Technique can be understood and applied through various principles. The following are some of the most essential principles of the Technique:
Use and Functioning - The quality of use directly affects the quality of functioning in an individual. (see more)
Primary Control - The Primary Control is an innate postural reflex and organizing force in the human body. (see more)
Awareness - Alexander described “awareness” as an increased knowledge of how we use the body, mind and senses in activity. (see more)
Inhibition - Inhibition is the space between stimulus and response. (see more)
Direction - Direction can be defined as the muscular energy we send through our bodies to perform an activity. (see more)
Faulty Sensory Awareness - Because our habits of movement feel right to us, it is often difficult to know when they are actually putting us in the wrong. (see more)
Ends and Means - If we set out to achieve a desired result in any activity, without stopping to consider how to best achieve this result, we will invariably respond in a habitual way. (see more) |
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