Yesterday's lesson started out quite well; it wasn't too hard to find the connection between my sitting bone and the top of my spine. Halfway through though, something just got stuck inside, and things got a bit more sticky and confusing. I told D. and he made his guidance a bit more 'physical' by putting one hand on my neck and one on my chin. This gave me a better sense of what to stay free of, and resulted in quite a bit of release. Also, tiny changes on my side, like thinking of the connection between the bottom and the top of my spine, rather than starting somewhere in the middle, resulted in noticable differences.

We paid a lot of attention to first going up in order to get anywhere else. Although I get the idea intellectually, I still notice that I find it hard to let go of the concept of needing to get anywhere in the first place. At some point during the lesson, I remember asking why I cared so much about where to go. I decide not to, and then not to, and then, just a moment before things happen, I still do. Experimented with this a bit, going from standing to sitting with a bit of an unexpected detour. This clarified a lot about what to pay attention to (not contracting my head & neck in relation to the rest of the spine) and what not (where the bleep is he taking me?).

We also discussed what happened with my shoulder, and how come I didn't see this coming. My shoulder- no, correction, I am much calmer now. Last night in bed, something in my lower back suddenly started disappearing, kind of dissolving, and a huge breath of air did itself. Felt great, I can't remember the last time I breathed like that. Might even have been the first time ever.

My Hamburg adventure also left me with something nasty: after a walk along the Elbe, nothing special, just a pleasant one-hour-stroll, my shoulder started giving me big, big trouble. Starting somewhere at the middle of my back, all the way up to my neck, everything just began to whine at first, and to really hurt later on in the evening. By night, I had some nasty stings behind my right eye, and a head full of panicky thoughts.
"What is this?"
"Could it be RSI?"
"What on earth did I do wrong this time?"
"Should I have been able to prevent this?"
"Did some kind of nerve got stuck in my neck?"
"Is this the coming true of the ominous words of my physiotherapist when I was six? 'Sit straight, or you'll have to wear a brace when you're 30"?
"Did something go wrong during my last AT lesson?"
"Where is this coming from?"
"Could it be...?"

Fortunately, Cypher talked some sense into me by pointing out that these questions were only aggravating the situation. So I decided to do the only sensible things I could think of: take a hot shower and some paracetamol, shove a book under my head and lie down. This I repeated every day, and it helped a bit, in that it took away the sharpest pain. I was able to spend the rest of my weeklong holiday without too much problems, although the pain didn't go away, and I couldn't walk for very long.

Today, I visited the company physiotherapist, and he concluded that my shoulder and upper right arm muscles were extremely overtensed, but other than that, nothing serious was the matter. He then manipulated them and I walked away relatively painfree. I was so relieved to hear it was 'just' my old shoulder problem in an extreme form, although I still was unpleasantly surprised by this sudden and unexpected manifestation of pain, and want to discuss this in my next AT lesson.

Although, deep down inside, I do sense where it's coming from. I'm in the middle of the most fundamental change I've experienced so far. I know I'm on the right track, and I've got many friends and other persons to help me out. But in the end, it's me that needs to change, and this kind of change doesn't let itself be forced. In this kind of circumstances, it's not strange that the stress that accompanies the change manifests itself physically, especially not in the first days of a holiday. Which doesn't mean that this kind of pain is normal and should be accepted as the status quo. But it's understandable in a way.

Meredith Monk is an American singer/composer/performer whose voice music I discovered over ten years ago. I still remember the moment I first heard her music: it was so strange and dreamlike, with hardly any words, lots of swoops and exotic sounds, foreign sounding syllables and things I didn't even know you could do with just a voice. That first piece was Atlas, and it travelled with me over the years, as a source of both inspiration, fun and consolation.

What I find very interesting in her music from an AT point of view is that she learned to extend the use of her voice by exploration. I don't know if it's her that invented what we today know as 'extended vocal technique', but she surely is one of the first singers that realised that the voice has many qualities apart from our singing voice. In her own words, she realised that "the voice could be like the body and that it could have a kind of articulation and flexibility and fluidity like the body has." Over the years, she carefully observed her voice and her body, and experimented with such things as whispers, creaky voice, swoops, hushes, yelling, barking and what have you. All this is what makes up her music, which, for me, is the best explanation why 'music' takes 'playing' as its action verb: so full of freedom, playfullness, wonder and weirdness.

Last week, I finally got the opportunity to see her perform live. I had to travel to Germany to do so, but it was so worth it. What an experience! When she entered the stage, she just went and stood at the front, two feet slightly apart, hands resting in front of her, watching us like we were watching her. And when she closed her eyes and started singing, I just kept wondering where on earth that voice came from, because nothing in her gave away that she was singing. It was almost like the singing did her, in a way. Like the music came from somewhere out of the ground and just passed through her, swaying her a little at times, without effort or artificiality. There were moments where I could have sworn that I saw a little fountain coming out of her head. Just watching her was already such a joy! This was nothing like the singing I've heard, seen or known so far, this was true expression of someone's self, and it was beautiful.

After the concert, I did something that I'd normally never do: I waited outside with my Atlas CD cover to have it autographed. I managed to meet her and exchange a few words with her, and she struck me as a very authentic and kind person.

When I was back in the hotel, I had to keep pinching my arm :-)

Lots of talking and lots of brain activity today. Lots of it. Plus wobbly legs.

Sitting: I should maintain and renew my upwards direction also after having met the chair; at the moment, something inside me 'sits down' on reaching it.

There's not really much use in noticing 'wrong' things after they happen. It makes you a great noticer, but the real achievement is to prevent them from happening in the first place.

Demonstration of forward and down vs. forward and up (first makes you fall over, second takes you, surprise, forward and up).
Give up all responsibility except the responsibility for upward direction.

Our representation of what we feel will never be completely right. It may get less wrong eventually, but it will never be 100% accurate. Learn to live with that, accept it, because that's the only way you'll ever going to learn something.

Impossible is only impossible in my head. I can really get out of the chair without repositioning my feet, helping with my arms etc.

Fun!!!!!!!!!!!

Had a nice lesson yesterday, with lots of attention for what it is to allow the neck to be free or to let the shoulder come out, rather than physically helping or pushing. We did some walking around, and something really funny happened: it's impossible to direct upwards and drag your feet at the same time. That's some nice positive reinforcement; usually I only notice that bad use prevents free and healthy action to happen, but this time, it was exactly the other way round. Came home pretty much knackered, and this morning, my shoulders felt like I just had had a major workout session. But I slept really well- finally!

The Alextech list is not just nice for discussions and questions, but also for finding teachers! Turns out that one of the members. P., lives quite close to my home town, and since I really like visiting other teachers, and I could really do with some ontfrutseling, I went to visit her today.

I haven't done tablework for ages, so doing some work lying down was a real treat. We paid some attention to talking, what happens when I do so, and whether it's the only possible way. Chairwork was cool too; talked about trust, the actual size of the lower half of the spine (it's huge; even bigger than my forearm), and how you can trust it to do what it should be doing. Something new for me was getting out of the chair and stopping halfway, at a kind of 'point of no return'. P. made me wait and wait, with muscle tension building up, until the standing up more or less did itself. It's not something I'm used to, and it felt quite awkward.

It was nice to have worked again. And it's also nice to know who you're talking to on the list.

A while ago, a beginning AT student posted some questions to the AT list. He had had lessons for about six months and was wondering about how you notice progress, how you know you're doing things the way they are supposed to be done, and whether it was normal that he experienced headaches after lessons. Nick Mellor posted a reply that clearly and concisely captures some prominent issues that a beginning AT student can encounter, especially during that initial phase where AT principles just don't make sense yet. Nick, thanks for letting me post it here!

"Ask your teacher what skills she is teaching you. Since she’s an Alexander Technique teacher, the basic skills are inhibiting and directing your primary control (head-neck-back relationship.) Ask her to demonstrate, explain and focus on each term, and ask her to tell you when you’re inhibiting and directing well. We can only explain here, but it’s not enough, since in lessons they are defined mainly through experience, experimentation and feedback. Ask her to give you specific things to do during the week that help to foster these skills.

Ask your teacher to explain why “feelings of relaxation” can’t be trusted. It’s called “faulty sensory appreciation” or “debauched kinaesthesia” (ask your teacher to explain and demonstrate.) Your stiff back is not necessarily a “bad” response to a lesson-—it could be showing you how stiff your back was *before* the lesson AND (here’s the rub) it was so stiff that you couldn’t feel how stiff it was until it had let go a little. The reason we are in a mess is often that what we feel is not giving us accurate feedback. This is an absolutely central concept in the Alexander Technique, and one of the reasons why having a teacher is a big advantage over trying to learn the basics on your own. Your inaccurate sensations can send you down many blind alleys.

About trying to relax in between lessons. Relaxing your neck or your shoulders is subject to faulty sensory appreciation, and you are very likely to end-gain in the attempt. In the worst case, you could relax your neck at the expense of further discoordinating yourself, causing more problems than you solve. Instead of “relaxing”, learn about, and use, inhibition and direction, and don’t try to change individual symptoms without reference to your primary control (head-neck-back.)

Ask your teacher if there is work you can do outside of the classroom. You cannot learn the Alexander Technique by spending half an hour a week with a teacher, and then doing no more than lying down regularly, although the lying down is a start. You need to work on yourself between lessons, and to do that, you have to have a clear idea what “working on yourself” really means. That’s what your teacher’s there for—- not just for the relaxed feeling you get after a lesson.

Don’t confuse “feeling helpless” and “being accepting”. Some of the responses you’ve had sound like ‘whatever the frustrations of your learning experience, you should just hang in there.’ Well, Yes and No. It is your right to expect simple, straightforward guidance on how to apply the Alexander Technique in daily life. If you’re not getting that, it may be that your teacher needs to be told what’s missing from your experience of lessons. It is (of course!) important to learn to be more accepting of yourself and the way external things are, but this is very, very different from feeling helpless.

Learning self-direction is about as different from helplessness as it’s possible to be. It’s an active, humorous, bright-eyed, patient, alert, self-admiring, self-accepting, kind, strong-willed determination that can take time to discover in yourself. In many ways good self-direction is highly focussed on getting things done, and seeing things change-- just as FM Alexander was highly focussed on getting his voice back so he could go on acting. Acting was the love of his life, and it really mattered to him that he succeeded. His genius was not to end-gain in seeking this end."