More Talk of Alexander: Aspects of the Alexander Technique [2nd Edition] 9780954352271, 0954352270

In More Talk of Alexander Dr Barlow has carefully selected 36 articles on many and varied facets of the Alexander Techni

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More Talk of Alexander: Aspects of the Alexander Technique [2nd Edition]
 9780954352271,  0954352270

Table of contents :
List of illustrations

Introduction by Dr Wilfred Barlow

Descriptions
The Teaching of F Matthias Alexander by Marjory Alexander Barlow
A Diary of Lessons with Alexander by Louise Morgan
Opening Address of Mr J H Hanson in the South Africa Libel Trial
The Meaning of Misuse by Dr Wilfred Barlow

Applications
Educational
A Psychophysical Education by Aldous Huxley
The Barrier of Habit by John Dewey
The F Matthias Alexander Technique and its Relation to Education by I G Griffith
Physical Education Research by Dr Wilfred Barlow:
1 An investigation into kinaesthesia; 2 An investigation into postural deformity

Psychological
Preoccupation with the Disconnected by John Dewey
Anxiety and Muscle Tension by Dr Wilfred Barlow
Alexander's View of Psychoanalysis by Marjory Alexander Barlow

Citation preview

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MORE TALK OF ALEXANDER

MORE TALK OF ALEXANDER

edited by DR WILFRED



BARLOW

MouRnz

First publi shed Septemb er 1978 Second edition with minor emend ation s and addition s publi shed March 2005 by Mourit z 6 R avenslea R oad Lond on SW 12 8SB Unit ed Kin gdom © 200 5 Th e Estate of Dr Wilfr ed Barlow

ISBN 0-95 43522- 7-0 Pap erba ck A C IP Ca talogu e record for this bo o k is available from th e Briti sh Library

Layo ut and typesettin g by J ean M. 0. Fischer Set in II /r 3 .2 Bemb o in Aldu s PageM aker 7 .o

,.

Print ed on roo gsm T utorial Op aque by th e Cromwe ll Press, Wilt shir e, England

CONTENTS

List of illustrations .......... ....... .. ..... .................... .... .... .. ...... .. vii Introduction by Dr Wilfred Barlow.... ....... ..... ........ ....... ...... .......ix DESCRIPTIONS I

2

3 4

The Teaching of F Matthias Alex and er by Marjory Alexander Barlow.. ......... ........ .... ............. ............. ......... 3 A Diary of Lessons with Alexander by Louise Morgan........ 19 Opening Address of Mr J. H. Hanson, KC, in the South Africa Libel Trial... ... ... ...... .................. ... ............... ... 29 The Meaning of Misuse by Dr Wilfred Barlow................ .46 APPLICATIONS

EDUCATIONAL

5 6 7 8

A Psychophysical Education byAldous H11xley................... 63 The Barrier of Habit byJohn Dewey ... ............ ..... .... ..... .... .67 The F Matthias Alexander Technique and its Relation to Education by I. G. Griffith........................ 72 Physical Education Research by Dr Wilfred Barlow............ 79 I. An investigation into kinaesthesia ....... .............. ........ .. 81 2. An investigation into postural deformity ............. ...... ....91

PSYCHOLOGICAL

Preoccupation with th e Disconnected byJohn Dewey.......... .......... .......................... .............. .. 107 ro Anxiety and Muscl e Tension by Dr WilfredBarlow......... ..... rr2 II Alexander's View of Psychoanalysis by MarjoryAlexander Barlow.......... .............. .................... 133 12 Jung and Alexander:The Common Gro und by Dr N in.aMeyer...................................... .............. ..... 137 13 The Process of Growth by Dr Robin Skynner..................... 141 14 Hide or Seek by DorotheaWallis......... ................. ...... .... ... 144 15 The Deeper Significance of Posture and Movement by Dr GrahameFagg................................ ...................... 149 9

More Talk ~fAlexander

THEOLOGICAL 16 End-Gaining and Means-Whereby by Aldo1,1s H1,1 x /ey...... 157 17 The Alex an der Principle and some Spiritual Disciplin es by Fr GeoffreyCurtis, CR....... .............. .... ........... .... .... .... 162 18 Ordering: A correspondence between Dr Wilfred Barlow and Fr Geoffrey Curtis ... .......... ................. .... . 175 ARTISTIC 19 Alexander's Ideas and Visual Art

21

by Dr WilfredBarlow....................................... ......... ..... 185 A Paint er'sTra ining by George].D. Bruce................. ......... . 190 Musicians and the Technique by Hugo Cole............. .... ..... . 192

22

Research at The Royal College of Music

23

The Indirect Approach to Singing

24

by Joyce Warrack.... ............. ...... ... .................. ..... ..... 2rr Tension and the Actor by Joyce Wodernan... ...................... 216

25

The Alexander Technique and the Actor

20

by Dr Wilfred Bnrlow.... ......... ........... .................. ....... ..204

by John Gray..............................................

..... .... ...... 220

SCIENTIFIC Mr Alexander 's Use of Scientific Method

26

by ProfessorA. E. H eath .......................... 27

28 29

......... ........ 231

Use and Misuse in Evolutionary Per spective by N. Tinbergen,FRS... ..... ........ ...... .... .... ........ .. ............. .234 Alexander's Meeting with Coghill by Edward H. Owen ....... .. ................. ..... .. ..... ... ........ .256 The Total Pattern of Behaviour

by Dr Wilfred Barlow........................... .... ............. ......260 MEDICAL 30 Ethology and Stress Diseases by N . Tinbergen, FRS..... 269 31 Instinct and Functioning in Health and Disease

by Dr Peter Macdonald.......... .... .... ...................... ...... .277 32

The Alexander Technique and Back Disorders

by Eric de Peyer.......... ..... .... ......... ......... ........ ....... ..286 33

Medical Aspects of the Alexander Technique

by Dr Wilfred Barlow.................... .............. ...... ...... ..291 VI

Co11twts OBJE CTIONS

34 35 36

Introduction ...... ........... ........................ .................. ...... .305 The FirstTwelv e Lessons by Dr Robin Skynner................ ....307 Th e South African Legal Action by Dr Wilfred Barlow........ 315 Wh at Sort of Alexander Teacher? by Dr Wilfred Barlow.... .......... ...... ......... .......... ............ 326

List ofWorks Consulted ......... ...... ..... ......... .......... ............. .... 331 Contributor s............................................. .... ........... .. ...... ..335 Inde x ofNames .............. ......... .. ... ............ ..................... .... .... 338

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIO NS

1. 2. 3. 4-

5. 6. 7. 8. 9. ro. rr. 12 13. 14. 15.

Pastry- cook from side and back, and stoopin g forward over work, p. 47 Arrow indi cating osteophyte, p. 47 H ead pu lled back, bod y thro w n forward, pel vis thrown back , p. 47 a. Rep eated extension mo vement in hyster ic. b. Extension mo veme nt empl oyed by ph ysioth erapi sts, p. 49 Left-handed j avelin -t hrower, showing development of lateral curv ature during mov ement, p. 51 R otation of ri ght shoulder and breast, p. 51 Id entical twin s with identi cal mi suse, p. 52 Uncon scious pain - producing contraction of left should e r, p. 52 Cervi co -dorsa l scolio sis, p. 53 Example s of po stur es, p. 54 Tap e m easure on back of h ead, p. 85 a. Head retraction in sitting down. b. Good use in sittin g down , p. 85 Movem .ent at wrist indicatin g head retracti o n, p. 90 H ead retra ction when standing up, p. 90 Typ ical feedback circ uit as appli ed to th e ce ntral nervo us system , p. 93 VII

16. 17. 18.

24. 25.

Percentage of postural defects in stud en ts, p. 99 Comparison of re-e ducational methods, p. 102 Ife Bronze Head , Nigeria,probably 12th-14th century AD,© copyr ight The Trustees of The Britis h Museum, p. 184 Apollo Belvedere , Roman mar ble copy of a Greek 4th cent ur y BC original. Vatican Museums and GaJJeries, Vatican. © Bridg eman Art Library / Alinari, p. 184 The Misericordia altarpi ece , c. 1445 (tempera on panel) by Piero della Fran cesca. Pinacoteca, Sansepolcro, Italy. © Bridgeman Art Library , p. 184 The Isenheim Altarpiece, c.1512-15 (oil on panel) by Mathias Gri.inewald. Musee d'Unterlinden, Colmar, France. © Giraudon / Bridgeman Art Library, p. 188 Posture before and after Alexander training ., p. 268 Position of pelvis, back, neck and h ead in slump ing position, p. 272 Typical slumped sitting posit ions, p. 273 Three sitting position s, p. 273

Table

I.

19.

20.

21.

22. 23.

Proforma used for scoring postural faults, p. 99

INTRODUCTION

THE last few years have seen a tremendous upsurge of interest in the work of Matthias Alexander. I would like to think that some of this has been due to my book The Alexander Principle,but it seems more likely that the time had become right, and that my book simply served as a catalyst. A great deal had already been written about Alexander and his own four books had always had a devoted following; but we have to remember that his own books were written in the first half of the twentieth century, well before the modern explosion of knowledge in the fields of education, medicine, biology and psychology. He was not only treading new ground-he had to use old words in new ways without the modern terminology which now makes explanation so much easier. Inevitably much of what was first written about Alexander now seems to have a period flavour. Indeed it is with slight embarrassment that I include some of my own earlier writings-the broad argument, the sweeping conclusions, the quotations from a limited number of sources. But the fact is that there is suddenly a huge new public for Alexander's ideas, and this new public wants to know much more about our origins and experimentations. Many of them want to know how it could have been that these exciting new ideas did not catch on before. Those of us who have tried to be midwives to Alexander's work can only reply that we did our best, but that in what can now be seen to have been an over-rigid and restricted society, those in authority did not want to hear about approaches which ran counter to their established ways. Not only this . Alexander was a maverick, an eccentric who did not disguise the distaste which he felt for inadequate educational and medical procedures. His manner was characterized by a directness and forthright intolerance which might delight the intelligent non-academic, but which infuriated those who found themselves at the receiving end. I first started collecting together some of the earliest writings on Alexander in 1945, and I published a small booklet of these under a title which T. S. Eliot suggested to me, Knowing How to IX

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Stop. It proved surprisingly popul ar as an introduction to Alexan der's work, and en courag ed by its suc cess I b ega n to collect toge th er further material. The b est of this m aterial was publi sh ed in th e Alexander Journal and thi s was circulated amo ng st Al exa nd er teac h ers and amon gst th eir pupil s and patients . It n ever reached a very larg e publi c, an d expe nse ha s m ade it difficult to produce on a regular ba sis. M any of the se earlier ar ticl es, although exce llent on th eir own, were sayin g much th e same thing in only a slightly different way, and I have th erefore left out of this pr esen t book tho se w ho se contents are covere d elsew her e. For m any reasons I h ave also had to leave o ut exce llent art icl es on th e application of Alexander's work to indu stry, c_riminol ogy, and mountaineering, but I h ave been ex tremel y fortunate in being allowed to publish th e Nobel Oration which Professo r Nikol aas Tin b erge n delivered w h en h e was given the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1973. It might b e said that Alexander's work really came of age at thi s point, when it was made the central feature of the Nobel Pr ize Oration . There are also m any other new papers which have not yet appeared in print , includin g Professor Tinbergen's Memori al Lec tur e at the Royal Society of M edi cin e; and I h ave includ ed some pap ers of my own wh ich h ave be en print ed in specia lised medical journals and w hi ch are not easily available. The material has not been easy to classify, but th ere is a clear distinction b etwee n those w h o are writing to give th eir personal reactions to w h at Alexander did and taught, and tho se who are attempt in g to comment upon th e relationship of hi s work to other fields of stu dy. Much of the writing co ntain s both of these aspects, but it seems to me h elpful to divide up th e material into (1) Descriptions, (2) Applications, and (3) Objections . · After a goo d deal of deliberation, I have included th e Lancet's su mma ry of the successfu l lega l action which Alexander brought again st the So uth African government. Hi stori ans will, I th ink , find the vo lumin ous evide n ce given in this trial a gol dmin e of in form ation, not o nly because of the nonsense wh ich was talked about Alexander, but also beca use of the almost hysteri cal reactions of som e emin ent members of the medical prof ession in thi s co untr y and in South Africa. I h ave also includ ed most of our le'ading co unsel' s-opening add ress, since it is an exce llent summ ary X

l11trod11 ctio11

of some of Alexander's work. Alexander had brou ght his action against th e South African government at a time - just po st-Smutswhen their methods were not so generally disliked as th ey are at pr esent . Observers of th e South African scene w ill be intrigu ed to see that th e notorious Oswa ld Pirow was the defen din g counsel for th at governm en t, and that Alexander's second counsel was Bram Fisch er, who was subs equ entl y to be impri soned by th e South Afri can government and died in j ail-I count myself fortunate in havin g got to know this delightful an d human e man, and indeed the others of a liberal viewpoint who help ed us. Since Alexander was old and not strong enou gh to appear, I had th e grue lling but, in retrospect, exc iting exper ience of spending two days in crossexamination by Pirow on some of Alexander's less defensible ideas. Alexander's work has deve loped recently into two distinct streams .There has always bee n an unorthodo x "fringe" surro und ing his work, and rath er surp ri singly this now shows itself in th e edu cational rather than in th e m edic al field . Various forms of esoteric mo vemen t- training and " bod y-conta ct" disciplin es have seemed to some peopl e to have clo se affinities with Alexand er's work, although it should be pointed out that it was on ly as a result of medical and scien tific work th at the technique has managed to beco me established in Co lleges of Furth er Educat ion-notably in music, drama, and spe ech- trainin g colleges. Because of its "fr ing e" education al propon ent s, it cannot be said to have m ade any appre ciable impact on the norm al school and univ ersity education al curri culum . Ind eed, in any case, the p ersonal one-to-one relationship w hi ch Alexa nder 's work involves will always be n10re suit ed to the one-to-one setting w hi ch m edical work involves, rath er than to th e gro up approach of most school and uni versity education. Inevitably those who have tri ed to use Alexan der's work in an edu cat ion al field have found it difficult to resist the demand for such group work; and once thi s demand is acce ded to, essenti al Alexand er detail has usually been lo st, although it can only be a question of tim.e before someone dedic ated to th e scien tific approach will make th e necessary educ ation al br eakthrou gh. The present time is an exc iting and important one for th e developm ent of Alexander's wor k. A goo d test of any man's importance is his end uranc e in th e pub lic mind after his death. Th e extent of his impa ct in hi s lifetim e n1.ay not be as signifi cant as th e XI

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later persistence and spread of what he stood for. Man y headliner s pass into oblivion after th eir death. Matthias Alexa nd er was not fashionable in his lifetime. A very few peopl e thought h e was sayin g something crucially important and those of us who hung on and supported him have sometime s been accused of exaggerated enthu siasm. We might repl y that when you have to whistle to keep your spirits up, th e whistle is bound to seem a littl e shrill at times. If ther e is som etim es a shrill note in some of the papers in this book, ther e is also a stream of good commonsense. I appreciate only too well that th e stat istical background which doctor s and scientists will eve ntually n ee d is not very much in evidence; but since research fund s have simply not b een forthcoming to h elp us, repor ts hav e h ad to b e, in the main, observation al and de scriptiv e : th e clini cal virt u es. It is my hope that th e wide rang e of topics which are touched on h ere will lead a ne xt ge n eration of teac her s and researcher s to ex tend their work into the various fields touch ed on h ere, as well as into many others. Chapters 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, II, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 23, 24, 26, 28, 31 and 35 are reprint ed from the Alexnnder]ournal, of which I am the editor. Part 1 of Chapter 8, "An inve stigation into kinaesthesia", was publish ed by p ermi ssion of the Army Council and formerly appeared in the MedicalPress and Cirrnlar;whilst Part 2 of th e same ch apter, "Po stur al defo rmity ", is reprint ed by p ermission of the Royal Society of M edicin e, to which it was deliver ed as part of a symposium on po stural deformit y. Chapters 10 and 22 are reprinted by p erm ission of the British Journal of Physical Medicine. The extract from The Study of Instinct by Professor N . Tinbergen reprint ed in Chapter 29 is with permi ssion of th e Oxford University Press; w hilst hi s Nobel Oration, C hapt er 30, is reprinted with th e permi ssion of the Nob el Foundation. I am grateful to Douglas Newton for h elp with my articl e on Visual Art, Chapter 19; and I shou ld , above all, like to express my thank s to my wife, Marjor y, for h er constant help in preparing this materi al, and to the teacher s of the Al exa nd er Inst itut e who have given such helpful advice and cr itici sm-in p ar ticular to those who helped so much in the difficult early years: Joyce Wad em an , Muriel Maconochie , Dick W alker and Inge Henderson. X ll

DESCRIPTIONS

1l

I TH E TEACHIN G OF

F. MATTHIAS

AL EXANDER

by Marjory Al ex and er B arlow

THESEannual lecture s were institut ed as a me m orial to F.M.Al exand er. A decade has passed sin ce his de ath on ro Octo ber 1955, so thi s is p erh aps an appropri ate m om en t to pass in review th e kn owledge w hi ch he left us, and to recall aspects of hi s teachin g w hich may be in danger of bein g forgott en , and ultim ately lost, as th e psychoph ysical benefit s of his work becom e bett er kn ow n. An in stitution , said Em erson , is th e length en ed shadow of one m anwe, in thi s Soci ety, are th e rapidl y lengthening shadow of Alexander. T hi s lectur e is a pl ea th at, as th e shadow grows, we may take care no t to lose th e sub stance. It mu st be rem emb ered th at in order to discuss or analyse anythin g th e natur e ofl anguage forces us to sp eak in a separative way. T he living hum an bein g is a w h ole--w ork s well or badly as a w hole--a nd living exp eri ences are int egrated and simul tan eous in a way w hi ch cann ot be expr essed in words. Ph ysical and m ental aspects o f any activi ty are in fac t one, bu t have to be separated for purp oses of discussion . T h e idea th at po stur e affects well-b ein g is a very ancien t one. We know th at th e Greeks we re co ncerned with it, that Victorian youn g ladies used back boards to enco ur age straight spi nes, and th at postur e trainin g in th e gymn asium is part of the accepte d curr iculu m in school s. Many eastern religions and disciplines co ntain ed instru ctions about th e carri age and co mp or tmen t of th e body. We mi ght almo st speak of th e noble lin eage of thi s id ea, sin ce so m any of th e expressions enshrin ed in our language indi cate a know ledge th at bodil y attitud e betrays inn er states of mind or domin ant characteristics.We speak of "a spineless creature" , "having no backb one" , "losin g our h eads" or " bein g level- h eade d"-we An Alexand er M em oria l Lecture given in Novembe r 1965.

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all know what it is to be "bes ide ourselves". The Bible abounds in refere nce s to a stiff-necked gene ration: "The stiff-necked and th e unb elievers shall be punish ed" and "They stiffened th eir n ecks th at they might not hear th e word of th e Lord" are two ni ce ones. During the last 30 years, at least, th e importan ce of body m echanics has been widely recogni zed. Alexander found th at th e probl em of posture was a much more fund am ental one than had been suspected. He did not use th e word "posture", becau se it was too limit ed a concept for th e nature of the discoveri es he had made, which showed th at bad po sture or, as he preferred to call it, "misuse of the self" was the end result of much deep er wrong proc esses, involving the whole person. In fact, of bad habits "wove n in the weakness of th e changing bo dy" , as Eliot put s it. One of the things he meant by th e " use of th e self" w as th e way in which the various parts of th e body are related to on e another in actually living , movin g and havin g our being. Posture impli es fixed po sition s, and right and wrong ways of sittin g, standing , etc., and po stur e training is based on th e inadequ ate assumption that bad po stur e can be altered satisfactor ily from th e outside, by doing some thin g different . To start with th e wrong end of th e stick-becau se the wrong end is observable-Alexander found that we live in almost complete ignorance of the way we use the body-that most p eople are distorting th e form, and i111p airing the working of th e whole organism, by bad co ordin ation , muscular overtension and mi suse of th e part s of th e bod y in their relationship to one another. The body is an instrument-it is the instrum ent throu gh w hi ch we live- it can b e capable of very fine and subtl e perceptions. Professor A. N .W hit ehead wrote in his book The Romantic R eaction: "The unity of the percept ual field, th erefor e, must be a unity of bodil y experience.Your perce ption takes plac e where you are AND is ENTIRE LYDEPENDENT ONHOWYOUR BODYIS FUNCTIONING."This instrument is being dama ge d an d distorted in ways lar ge ly unconsid ered until Alexand er began to teach. It is being rend ere d gross, heavy and in capable of sensitive behaviour , by overtension and th e result ant int ern al noi se to wh ich it is subj ect.This lack of peace in the bod y m akes almost impossible th e condition known as "peace of mind " . 4

The Teaching of F.Matthias A lexander

The form this misuse takes follows th e same gene ral pattern in everyone . Invariabl y, th e mu scles of the neck are overcontract ed, causing loss of the free pois e of th e h ead on top of th e spine. This leads to overcontraction of some mu scles of th e trunk, and lack of prop er ton e in the other supporting muscle s of the body. This result s in exaggera tion of the natural cur ves of the spin e, and harmful pressure on the indi vidual ver tebra e of the spinal column and on th e joint s, co upl ed w ith overwork and wrong relati onship of the limbs to th e trunk. In short we get a state of affairs where th e work of supporting the bod y is bein g wrongly distribut ed- the form of th e body distorted-and important functions such as breathing , blood circulation and digestion are working in efficiently and und er enormou s strain . Another way of putting it is that th e wrong genera l prin ciple on w hi ch th e bod y is being used is th at of contracting every part of it into the nearest joint , beginnin g with th e con tractio n of the he ad toward s the trunk . It is as if each of us is trying to take up the least po ssible amo unt of room in th e univers e. This unco nsciou s way of mismanagement of the self produce s states of disease-di s-abili ty, dis-comfort an d general ill-h ealth which baffle th e ordin ary do ctor, and for which th ere is no help other th an a radical change in th e manner in wh ich th e person is using him self. Fortunately, during the past fifteen years in England, medical research an d th e publi cation of scientific papers in m edical textbook s and journals h ave result ed in a great in crease in th e numb er of docto rs and psychiatri sts w ho turn to teachers of the Alexander Technique for h elp with patients who are suffer ing from the effects of bad use. To und erstan d the difference between usual methods of posture trainin g-o r postural correction-and Alexander's teachin g we must look again at his own stor y, re-exam in e our orig ins , and see ho w he arr ived at the knowl edge w hich h as made possible a co mpl ete ly new approach to th e problem of how to manage ourselves in the least harmfu l way.

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Alexander began with the concrete- he had little time for theo ries or for ideas which had no practical application. He was forced to hi s search by a disability which was int erfering with his work as an actor and recit er. The probl em seemed to be a specific difficulty-th at of recurring ho arsen ess of his voicebut it led him to discover that a small and apparently isolated weakness cou ld not be overcome without recours e to the total change of his whole self. And th at attempts to change at the out er, visible level-the usual way of trying to correct faults-were completely unavailing. Here, then, was Alexander, a succe ssful reciter with a pa ssion for Shakesp eare and a firm determination to become a great Shakesp earean actor. All his ambitions were falling to pieces becau se hi s voice was not standing up to the demand s b ein g made upon it . H e sought medical advice. Aft er disappointing trials of th e remedies, which worked improv ement s only as lon g as he refrain ed from Lising his voice, h e came to a realisation which was th e first strok e of genius in a long ser ies. He und ersto od th at he might be causing th e trouble him self-that he might be putting strain on th e vocal organs in some way which was unknown to him. Looking back from where we stan d now, this step in a new direction in thinking about his probl em stands out clearly as the key to all th at was to follow, and show s Alexander's capacity for origina l thought and also th e awkward way h e had of not accep ting anyt hing at its face valu e. Even as a small boy this quality was evid ent. It is said that he was a perfect nuisance at th e dame- school h e attended in Tasmania be cause h e invari ably questioned everyt hin g h e was taught , and asked his teach ers how they kn ew that th e inform ation th ey were giving him was so. There is no me ans of knowing how man y peop le with Al exander's voice troubl e have given up th eir careers as speak ers, actors or singers because th ey acce pt ed unthinkingl y that, if m edical treatment failed, th ere co uld be no other solution to their difficulti es. Alexander had now taken respons ibility upon him self for his trouble. In order to observe what h e did when h e used his voice, h e pr actised speaking in front of mirrors. By patiently watc hing what he was doin g h e found, at lengt h, that thr ee rath er peculiar things happ ened every tim e he spoke. There was a tendency to 6

The Teachi11g of F Matthias Alexander

pull th e head back, depress the larynx, and suck in air through the mouth.With th ese int erference s went a tendency to raise his chest and short en his who le body. After much experiment ation h e found that if he could prevent th e pulling back of the head the oth er n1isuses did not occur. This was th e seco nd m ajor discover y-na m ely, that the int erferen ce with th e free pois e of the head brought int erferenc e with the best working of th e rest of his body in its train . The dominance of the head in th e hier archy of th e body he later called "the primary control", partl y bec ause, in unr avelling th e muddl e of misuse, it is the first factor to be dealt with, and conditions the forms of mi suse in the rest of the body. Th e primary control, in its full definition, is th e relationship betw een th e h ead, the neck and th e back. It is th e prim ary control of the use of th e bod y, whether the use is go od or bad. Having discovered what might be causing the voice difficulti es, Alexander now set about trying to corr ect the se faults in the mo st obviou s way. He tri ed to DO th e oppo site. But the mor e he struggled to do th e right thing, the more en tangled h e became . H e found th at he cou ldn't stop the se wrong habits by trying to do so. At last h e realised that he hadn't go t to DO something different-but to stop doing what h e was doing already. This is the next import ant principle in hi s teaching, which turn s up sid e- down all th e acce pt ed notion s about correcting something that is wrong . Usuall y if something is wrong we think we must DO something to put it right . The new princip le is th at if something is wrong , we mu st find out what it is and stop doin g it. Th e only cur e for ban gin g on e's head against a wall is to stop . The under standing of this principle is cardinal in any attempt to chang e misu se, and highlights one of th e basic differen ces between thi s teaching and any other method. It also provide s a useful explanation of th e work on a certain level. It can b e formul ate d like thi s in answer to que stion s about what we do : "We teach people to become aware of th e unn ecessary strain and overten sion th ey m ake in everythin g they do , so th at th ey need not continue to mi suse th emselves in this way." In oth er words, w e are concerned with giving our pupils the 7

More Talk of A lexa11der

knowl edg e of how to lib erate themselv es from th e cage of overtension in which th ey are imprisoned. So that the free natural use of the bod y can emerge. Cyril Conno lly wrote in The Unquiet Grave: " Insid e every fat man is a thin one trying to get out."W e might alter it thu s, "Inside every tense man is a free one not know ing how to get out ." We are not teaching people what to do ri ght-but how to stop ( wrong DOING. It is impossible to DO an UNDOING. But to return to Alexand er in front of hi s mirrors. H e had now reach ed a deadlock . H e knew what was wrong, he kn ew he couldn 't DO anythin g to put it right. H e had exhausted all ways of tryin g to alter what was going on from the outside. ~ Th e next step was to begin th e journey inwards to the central Iplace in himself where the troubl e really lay. Alon g the rout e cam e the recognition th at he could not trust his sense offee lin g-that is, th e kin aesthetic sense of how much muscular tension he was usin g. He found that what he could see happ ening in th e mirror did not correspond at all with w hat he fe lt was happening. Up to thi s tim e no on e had que stion ed the reliability of this faulty gu ide which we all use in judging w hat is going on in the body-how much tension we are makin g-a nd also w here any part of th e bod y is in relation to other parts, and to th e whol e. Th e kina esth etic sense wo rks partly throu gh the muscle-spindles in th e muscles, as we ll as from receptor s in th e joints. Muscle-s indle s are tiny mec s whose function is to convey inform ation from mu scles to the higher .centres of th e brain about the state of mu scles and to rece ive inform ation back from the br a.in as to what th e muscles should do about it. Ho wever, if too much tension is bein g made in the muscle, th ere comes a certain point w h en thi s "fee dback " between brain and mu scle is put out of action , and we can no longer feel what we are doin g.This is th e scien tific explanation of w hat Alexander called "faulty sensory apprec iation ", and thi s is the real " nigger in the wood pile" of our ignor ance of w hat we are doing wit h ourselves when we are wrong. It makes clear why ordinary m ethod s of putting things right without taking wrong feeling into acco unt are likely to fail. Alexand er could not change anything by doing.H e could not trust his feeling. He th en saw th at h e had und erestim ated th e 8

The Teachi11g of F Matthias A lexa11 der

strength of habi t.Wh at h e observed in the mirror w as th e end result of disordere d inn er patterns lyin g deep in th e nervous system .And th at these inn er patt erns of impul ses, conveyed through th e nervous system to the muscle s actin g on th e bony stru ctur e and joint s of the body, were operative perpetuall y, whe th er h e was mo vin g, speaking, or sittin g still. In fact th ese inner pattern s were hi m-insofa r as hi s bod y was the out er manifesta tion of them . The nex t step in the journ ey was taken when Alexan der realised that the only place where he co uld begin to co ntrol the wrong habitual patte rn s was at the moment when th e id ea came to him to speak or move. The moment when, whatever state of mi suse he was in, it wo uld be made worse as h e wen t int o action . He had reached th e on ly place, and the only mom ent in time, where chang e co uld begin, or where he could have any control over the habitual patterns of misuse, w hi ch were dominating everyt hin g h e attempted to do. This place, or this mom ent in time , was th e instant th at a stimulus to activity reached hi s con sciousness. In the ordinary way, when a stimulu s comes, we react to it in the only manner possible. The respons e is m ade without thought-without any knowledge on our part of w hat we are putting into motion. T he reaction is the imm ediate response of the whole self, according to the habitu al pattern s of movement which we have developed from our earliest years. We have no ch oice in thi s, w e can behave in no other way. We are bound in slavery to these unr ecog ni sed patterns just as surely as if we were autom atons. When Alexa --er~g of this part of th e problem he h ad fo d th e key to all change. H e und erstood at last in wh at way h e mus --wo..ci~-----We have now follow ed him in hi s journey from the outermost manifestation of misu se, th at is, the in terfe rence with th e normal wo rkin g of his whol e body, resulting in th e vocal failur e, to the innermost point wher e he could stop this int erference. Let us now reverse the pro cess and follow him on his way out agam . He had to make pos sible a pause or space between the stimulu s 9

More Talk efAlexa11der

and the response. He decided to do this by saying "No" to, or inhibiting, the immediate response.This proved to be the cornerstone on wh ich all his late r discoveries were made, and through w hich later changes we re made possible .T he word "inhib ition " in this sense means the opposite of volition , withholding conse nt to automati c react ion. It does not mean suppr essing someth ing in the sense in which it is used in psychoanalysis. Having effectively prevented the old unc onscio us patterns from repeating themselves, and having made a break in the "perpetual motion" machine that he had become, Alexander then brought his brain into action by sendin g consc io us, verbal instructions to the parts of the body whic h he had been un able to control before . The first result of this way of work in g was to prevent the misuse of th e head , neck and trunk. He had to be content for a time to give himself a stimul us, refuse to respond to it, and give the conscio us messages or directions without actua lJy carry ing out a movement. This is the preparatory stage of w hat one might call . "road buildin g" or th e " layin g down of railway lin es along w hi ch the train wi ll eventu ally travel". In time he was able to cont inu e the new messages during movement . Eventua lly the old, wrong, inner patterns were replaced by th e new ones, resulting in the coordinated, trouble-free working of his body. In this way he put to a new use a facul ty we all have and use in ordinary life. This faculty is intelligence, or the power of the brain to determine and direct w hat we wis h to do. This power he now turned to the management and control of the use of his body, so that the who le of it became " inform ed w ith thought" . Let us now examine in detail the series of new orders or messages he was emp loying.The first and m ost important break in the old patterns came, as we have seen, w h en he said "No" to the habitual reaction. He then ordered the muscles of the neck to release. The neck muscles are the only part of the body which can exert direct traction on the head, and it will be pulled back or down or sideways accord ing to which group or groups of these muscles are being overtensed.

Tile Teachi11g of F.Matthias Alexa11der

No change in the poise of the head can happen while it is held m the grip of neck misuse. Moreover, the small, sub-occipital muscles between the base of the skull and the top vertebrae of the spine, the axis and the atlas, cannot perform th eir function of delicate ly balancing the head. The next order was for the head to be directed forward and up-n ot put but directed. The next order was to the back to lengthen and widen . Alexander exp lain ed to us that this was the nearest he cou ld get in words to the actua lity he wished to bring abo ut . These simp le verbal formulations are designed to bring about the reconciliation of two opposing tendencies in each case, and to ensure the balance of forces in the antagonistic muscle pulls in the body. A harmony results, where everyt hin g is doing its own work of maintaining stability, and there is a stillness without fixity, or, if you like, a lack of disturbance, in the working of the parts of the body in their relationship to each other. Too much forward of the head, and yo u lo se the upward tendency; too much up , and the head goes back-"leave it alone, in fact". Too much effort to lengthen the back, and it narrows-too much widening, and you lose length and slump down. The whole process is self-checking. I hope this makes clear why one cannot do the orders . Their first function is preventive. The wrong inner patterns are the doing which has to be stopped. I'm afraid I have rather laboured this story - so familiar to many of the audience. The full account of it is in Alexander's book, Th.e Use of the Self, but I warned you that I was going to re-examine our origins. It was neces sary to do this if what follows is to make any sense, especially to our guests w ho may not know Alexander's teaching. After he had worked out the technique by putting it into practice to restore his own normal coordination, he was very surprised to find that the misuses he had overcome in himself were present, in varying degrees, in everyone else. It is a curious fact that until the scales fall from our eyes in this matter of misuse, we do not notice the misuse of others. It is as if the words about the beam in our eyes and the mote in other people's went into reverse. I I

More Talk of Alexa11der

Alexander th en had to find a way of teaching others wha t h e knew . This was a considerab le task, involving not only explanation, but learning the special an d subtl e skill in the use of his hands needed for working on other people. Later still he took on a further burden in the shape of students wanting to learn how to teach the work . Th is is a different task again, group work instead of work wit h one indi vidua l. It is important to remember that we are all in the same situation as Alexander. He has found the way and the technique for following the way. We have the enormous advantage of the skilled help of a trained teacher. But the real importance and value of the technique is that we learn to work on ourselves. Alexander used to say, "Everyone must do the real work for themselves. The teacher can show the way, but canno t get in sid e the pupil's brain and contro l his reactions for him. Each person must apply it for himself." Learning this work is like learning anything else.We make use of the same faculti es an d need the same patience and perseverance as in any form of learnin g. So far we have exp lor ed Alexander's work in its applicat ion to our faulty muscu lar habit s and genera l misuse of the body, and seen how we may build up a stable good use which is under our contro l. Let us now examine some applicat ion s of his principles to other sph eres of our experience, and see if we can catch some part of the vision of its importance wh ich inspired him throughout his life. He und erstood, as perhaps no one else has done, that here was the possibility of a different quality of living, which could help resolve many of the difficulties oflife w hich we bring on ourselves through lack of awareness and contro l. He was very modest about his part in the discoveries, and often used to say, "If I had not discovered th e work, some other poor chap wo uld have had to go through all that, because the need for it is so great ." This attitude is probably common among creative people . Once the poem is written, the music composed, the painting finished or the scientific discovery made, the creation assum es its own life, and its orig in ator feels a certain detachment tow ards it. The Alexander Technique will work wherever it is applied. It is 12

The Teachi11gof F Matthias A lexm1der

not magic, but do es its job at the point of application. How deeply it is applied dep end s on th e aim s and wishes of the person concerned. If the aim is to get rid of a pain in the back, it w ill do so effectively by brin ging into consciousness the "wrong doing" which is producing the pain. If th e aim is greater awareness of habitu al reaction s in other departments of the self, it will work ther e too , and by the same process. We are all bound in th e prison of habit . We have habits of thought-un examin ed fixed opinions and prejudic es w hi ch deter min e our behaviour w ithout our realising it . We are also victims of habit s of emotion al reaction . These are very powerful dri ving forces. A young pupil of my hu sband's, when sh e first realised th e importance of the se thing s, burst out, "Oh, I see, Dr Barlow, thi s is a life-sent ence." Alexand er's favourite way of describing his work was "as a means of controlling hum an reaction". Under thi s basic umbr ella can be included every form of blind , uncon scio us reaction, an d here we co me to the who le question of self-kn owledge. The muscul ar bad habit s of misuse harm only oneself-unconsciou s habits of thought and emo tion harm oneself and other people, b ecause th ey det er min e our reactions to everyone else. It could be said that we use other peop le to practis e our uncon scious bad habits on. The grea test mi ser _ and misund erstanding we exper ience is often in thi s field of p ersona l relationshi s. Of cour se, the se inner emotional states are mirror ed in the way we use oursel~. States of rage, anxiety and fear-to take only th e most obvious examp lesare th ere for all th e world to see by th e unmi stakable bodily attitude s. This is also true of mor e subtle inn er conditions such as depression, worry and hop elessness. In some ways the constant and deep reaction-patterns are more obvious to ot her peo pl e th an to ourselves. I sometimes think that th ere is a wry sense of humour lurking somewh ere in th e backg round of th e univ erse, permitting thi s tragicomic state of affai~s, whe re certain character istics of a person are known and clearly seen by everyone, exce pt the person himself. There is a thing known as "t he state of th e world". In w hatever 13

More Talk of A lexa11d er

part of time a man's lifespan is set down th ere must always be large, terrifying problems, known as th e "state of the world". ~~~s wild animals and marauding tri b es were probably th e main worries-a part from the weather. Later, perhaps, th e pl ague, persec ution s, lawlessness and lack of respect for human life. In thi s things haven't changed much-and always there is war. An individual can do littl e abo ut these large issues. On a smaller scale, but nearer home , th ere is the probl em of other p_eop le. Most of the time they just don't behave as we think th ey sho uld. Again th ere is little th at we can do abo ut it, althou gh we waste an enormou s amount of energy trying to make them alter. Where th en can we affect anything? We have be en told many times in the co ur se of history , by wise men , that the chaos in the world is only a reflection of th e chaos within us-wr it large. Ale nd er tau ght that th ere is one main field of work for each of us-wo_r k_on o~se lves to ga_~ more light on our un consc iou s hAl:>_ its-work to use more constantly the one pla ce of fre~ vy_e have, th e morn.ent of the _i12?-Eacton us of a stimulu s, so that we incr ease the numb er of moments whe n we choose our reac~, instead of being driven by habit to react as we have always done in the past. For this we must be there--present an d aware, a.tt h e crucial moment, to inhibit before we react. We have no freedom in dictating th e state of the world, we have only limited control over the event s that happen to us, but c_an develop contro l over the way we react to these even ts. The freedom in our environment and in regard to other people's reactions is also limited , but we can have some control over th e nearest bit of our environment-ourselves . Alexander used to ch ide us for always trying to change and con trol the big things instead of changing the sm.all things that were in our control. The in scription at Delp hi ,.'.J{uo t-hy-s el.C, sum s it up. Down the ages we can see that all th e real teachers of mankind have tried to make people und erstan d this point, that chan ~ n only happen in the individual. We know that fundam enta l new 'icteas have ; !ways started w ith- one person and spread slowly and gradual ly as more and more individuals receive and und erstand the new knowledge. 14

The Teac/1i11g of F Matthias A lexander

The vision Alexander had of the possibility of individual evoluti on in th e development of consc iou sness and awareness was the mainspring of his life's work. It is thi s aspect of his teachin g th at places him in th e direct tradition of th e grea t teachers of hum anity. It is thi s sid e of his teaching which could so easily get lost. It is a not unr easonabl e supposition tha t many whose reported teachin gs have come down to us also gave to th e people of th eir time practical techniqu es for carrying out the teachin g. If so, mo st of this has been lost and forgotten, and we are left with reports and writing s w hich tod ay oft en have littl e m eanin g for us. It is int erestin g-a propo s of all thi s- that a pupil of min e, a doctor , once remarked that Al exand er had rediscovered the secret of Zen for our t;ip1e. Another aspect of tradi tional teachin g worth mentioning is th e necessi to_live i!J th e present . It is a recurrent th em e in the great mystical writings. The Now is all th at we have. We cannot inhibit next week, dir ect ourselves tomorrow, or even control our reactions five minutes hence. All thi s has to be don e Now . The fact that we find it so difficult to BE in th e present , and to deal with th e requir em ent s of the pr esent mom ent in th e most appropriate way, is, I might suggest som ew hat fanc ifully, also mirrored in the way we stan d. How can we BE all pr esent and correc t, if our head s are driving back into th e past, our bodi es ru shin g forward into the futur e and only our feet all too firmly anch ored in th e Her e and Now? But you m ay say, "Let's not be so gloomy about it ," and, of course, yo u wo uld be quit e right. Nothing is achiev ed by gloom and heaviness. As one of our stud ent s pointed out, "If there is a force of gravity there must also be a force of levity." Frequently, w h en h e was training us, Al exander wou ld come into th e stud ents' room, look aro un d at all th e earnest, seriou s faces pr eparing diligently for hi s class, and send us packing for a walk round th e squar e saying, "T h at's not th e way to wo rk , let's have, a bit of aie!Y_andJigl:i,t-aess-," One of the most endea rin g thin gs about him was his capacity for enj oyment and hi s refusal to be ser ious abo ut things which did not really matter. H e liked particularly jokes again st himself and

15

-f

More Talk of Alexander

would tell them with great gusto. He knew the meaning of the words "enjoy yourself". In 1946 my husband and I were on holiday in Brittany with Alexander and a South African QC with rath er expensive tastes.We were nearing the end of our stay and were awaiting, rather anxiously, the arrival of some travellers cheques belonging to the South African. They did not come , and meanwhile th e rest of th e party were supplying him with cash . On the last day the chequ es still hadn 't arrived and we had r ,600 francs between us to foot a large hotel bill. Aft er consultation we decided that the on ly thing to do was to send Alexander to the casino in the hope that he would retri eve our fort unes.We all went with him and stood behind his chair w hil e he, with the greatest composure in the world, proceeded very slowly and diligently to lose every sou that we had. As he remark ed in another context, "You cannot change th e course of Nature by primarily coordinatin ourself." All ended happily enough as Al exander had made friends with a young Frenc h couple who were staying in th e hotel, and they agreed to stand surety for us until we could collect the money from the ne arest large town. But to return to hi s teaching. It is, like all important things, invisible and fragile-the J 1e~ and core of jt, I mean . There is a nice littl e pi ece by Rilke which I can't resist quoting: "This is the creature that has never been, the y never knew it , yet, nonetheless, they loved the way it moved-its gentleness-its neck, its very gaze, calm and serene." I am reminded also of Bernard Shaw's remar k : "Alexander calls upon th e world to w itn ess a chang e so mall and so subtle that only h e can see it." Alexand er's teachin g comes into being - it is born anew-only when someone uses it. In this way it is like music, it is brought tb life when someone plays it and makes th e music manifest . Alexander used to tell us that he wrote his books to ensur e th at a record of his wo rk wou ld exist if the teaching of it died out . His hop e was that in this event , someone might come across the book s and reco nstruct the practic al side of it. Now, I know that these books come in for a lot of criti cism. It has always been so.They are not easy to read and cer tainly th ey were not easy to write . But 16

The Teachingof F MatthiasAlexander

there they are-the man's own words-how he worked the problem out and what he thought his discoveries meant. Francis Bacon said, "Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested." I suggest that Alexander's books are obligatory reading for anyone who takes his teaching seriously. He is accused of being incomprehensible. I would like to quote a passage from a recently translated book by Merleau-Ponty called The Phenomenologyof Perception. "The excitation is seized upon and re-organised to make it resemble the perception which it is about to cause," end of quote . I don't pretend to know what the author means, but I'm sure he is trying to express something important. It might even be worthwhile studying his book to find out. So with Alexander's books-they require study and hard application, given this they will yield up their go ld. Before the war I had a pupil who was home on leave from army service in India. He had a course oflessons and went back to his unit. Two or more years later he returned to London for a refresher course of lessons. I congratulated him on the change in himself which he had brought about. "Yes," he said, "I have been working hard . One thing has helped me more than anything else. I keep Alexander's books on my bedside table and read a chapter every night." The following day I told Alexander this story while we were having a training class. He was silent for a long moment and then said thoughtfully, "Yes, and I would be a better man if I did the same ." These then are the two aspects of Alexander's teaching. First, as a means of allowing the natural laws of the organism to work wi,th~ut i~terf~~nC!=:-; means of giving back the birthright of ~e, which, as children, we all possessed. Alexander said, "When an investigation comes to be made it will be found that eveLY-single thing we do in the work is exactly what is done in U~atu~ where the conditions are right, the difference being that we are learnin to do it,S O!}S~iously." I.s!Bll.y,th_e_teacher has be a craftsman in the ~1seof his hands, a scientist in his adherence to principles which are subject to r7

More Talk of A lexa11d er

"operationa l verification" and an artist in conveying !:is knowledge to others. The teacher's respo nsibility for the continued existence of the wo rk is he avy, especially if h e trains other teacher s, to ensure that none of th e essenti al elements of th e teaching are lo st. In the second aspect-the application of the work to de e er spl~eres of ~mr experience, the division into teacher and PJJP-ilvanis~r s.. There is no end to work on oneself-here we are all in th e same bo at. When Alexa nder was nearly 80 years old h e said to me, " I never stop working on myself-I dare not." He kn ew that the only limits to thi s kind of development are tho se which we impo se on ourselves. He continued to teach to within five days of th e end, at th e age of 86, and then , havin g refused all drug s which might depriv e him of it , he achieved th e rare distinction of being pr esen t at hi s own death. Toni ght we have remember ed him-but th e memori al th at wo uld ple ase him best is th at we should do his work .

18

2

A DIARY

OF LESSONS

WITH ALEXANDER

by Louise Morgan

AN OLD American friend of mine, Miss G. R., of New York, turned up in London in 1952 after several years' absence. She was so much altered in appearance that it gave me a shock. N ever have I seen such a deterioration in any hum an being. Her figure as I recalled it was slen der and upright, her comp lexion clear and bright, and sh e was always full of energy, with quick, darting movements. But now her he ad was sunk betw een her shoulders, her skin had the look of old parchm ent, she had grown stout and round-shouldered, one leg dragged, and she could stand only with the help of a stick. She had not walked for months. Only a spark of her old spirit was left. She made a gallant attempt to be gay, but the moment she ceased struggling her face became almost a death-mask. The story she told me was the tragic one of failure to recover properly from a seriou s disease, and gradual lapse into invalidism. She had seen specialist after specialist, faithfully following all that was prescribed for her, including treatments which were intensely painful, only to grow slowly but steadily worse. Fortunately for her, she had a fairly substantial income, so she was able to travel to London for what she called "fina l consultations". I thou ght of suggesting that she first consult Alexander, and eventua lly succeeded in persuading her to see Alexander. I felt sure he co uld help her, and must have conveyed my feeling of cer tainty to h er. She did see him, and was so impressed by his personality that she decided to make a final effort to save herself, and put herself entirely in his hands. A few days later I accompanied her to her first lesson, and from that day until she was obliged to return home to New York seven weeks later, I kept in close touch with her. We talked over her lessons, and discussed Alexander's philosophy. She began to read Edited from Loui se Morgan's lllside Yourself, Hutchinson

1954.

19

More Talk of Alexa11der

his books, and became so interested that she kept a diary of her lessons . She has given me permission to quote certain parts of it . It tells the story so well that I shall allow it to speak for itself. It is the first diary on the subject of the F.Matthias Alexander Technique to be published. I think it provides an excellent introduction to the Technique as well as a heartening and inspiring human record .

Third lesson I notice that Alexander keeps givin g my knees a gentle tap to remind me not to stiffen them unduly and not to hold them rigid. He also taps my ribs to remind me to keep them moving. Joints must be free, he says, and ribs must constantly expand and contract for good breathing. I feel he is trying to show me how to keep my head up out of my shoulders and keep it forward and up. He is also trying to lengthen my back and my spine upward, and to raise up all the parts of me th at have been pressed down. I feel he is remodelling my back. I don't seem to be able to do much myself, but I hope to co-operate with him soon . Something has begun to happen to me at last. It is a bit tiring, but something is happening, and that's the great thing. Fourth.lesson How hard A. works! His hands seem to fly about trying to help me keep my head up out of my shou ld ers and keep it forward and up . He tells me not to do anything about it, but just to think it, but I don 't get the point. There must be a point, and I must learn what it is. He seems to know exactly what to do, and never hesitates a moment. I am certain he knows what to do, unlike all the others who have tr ied out such awful things on me. I am certain he will never hurt me, so I have no fear of him. He makes me feel calm and happy and interested. He is trying to lengt hen my back and my spine, the poor crooked things .That great hand of his seems to cover my whole back, guiding the muscles to lift me. "And th e crooked shall be made straight." I want to co-operate, but still feel a bit helpless. I can hardly move. Seventh. lesson I am still struggling to grasp Alexander 's new ideas. He is right.You 20

A Diary of Lesso11s

have to keep a very open mind if you are his pupil. It seems that I am letting my head go back even when I feel l am keeping it forward. He says it's most important for me to keep my head from going back, bec ause it interferes with the " primar y control"whatever that is. I must read his book to find out . It appears to be something in th e region of the neck and head, where they join together, w hi ch controls the working of the who le muscular system. I have always been for central control-that is, putting one person at the head of a department and making them responsib le for it and not interfering with them. Maybe it 's something like that .Alexander does say the primary control make s for wonderful efficiency and harmony. We shall see. Or at least, I hope I shall see! How I do go on about all this. But I just can't help being interested. It's one of the most fascinating things I've ever struck.Where was I? Oh yes, putting my head back when I feel I am keeping it forward and up. Alexander says this is bec ause the habit of putting it back is so strong that it feels right to m e to put it back, and wrong to keep it forward. He also mentioned "faulty sensory percept ion ", but I don 't get th is yet . I am now remembering pretty well to keep my ribs moving and my knees free. He is still working away on my head, neck and shoulders, with an occas iona l h eave- up of my back that makes me feel as if I'd grown a yard. I feel so co nfid ent and full of power when he puts my head right and keeps it there, as if I could walk right round th e block. But then I let my head go back, and the power leaves me flat. I am not depressed, but I feel I am a long way out on a very weak limb .

N inth lesson Beg innin g to see light on feeling. It appears that what feels rightmay be very wrong.All the things which feel right for me to do are wrong.So I must not do the wrong thing-that is, the thing that to me feels right. Sounds fantast ic, but actually I'm beginning to see it's not in the least fantastic . I put my h ead back, naturally, because I have always don e it, and so it feels right. But putting my head back is wrong because I can do nothing right when it is back. It interferes with that "primary control"! This all boil s down to the fact that I must STO P doing the thing that FEELS right to me. 2J

J\!Ior e Talk of A lexand er

Today I realise how short I had grown without knowing it. M y back curved in at the middle, and shortened my spine. It happen ed so gradually th at I did not realise it. When I take good bre aths by moving my ribs a lot , I notice that thi s makes me feel taller. (I really must be careful about thi s word "feel" ! Mayb e I'm not so tall as I feel!) If I might pre sum e to sug gest it, some of the trouble is that we often say "think" when we mean " feel", and say "feel" when we m ean "think". My brain is very active thes e days, as if it was waking up from a nice refreshing nap. This is on e of the best signs of th e good Alexander is doing me.Alexander said today that when one breath es the right way, one lengt hens the spin e and widens and strengt hens th e back . He is pleased w ith th e way I keep my rib s mo vin g and my kn ees free. M y poor old knees! I don't feel a spark oflife in them som etimes.Thank goodness I can do something, even ifl can't understand these new id eas as well as I should like.

Eleventh lesson Alexand er still saying "Don't do anything you feel is right." Drat feelings! They are low-down, sneaky things that creep up on you and, as the English papers say,"cos h" you.All the same, he seemed pleased with m e tod ay. Several tim es I managed to stop before doing anythin g, say "No" to my feeling, and think the way to do ri ght. And I DID right. It 's really ind escrib able, when you can stop doing a wron g thin g and do a right thing instead,just by thinking. I stopped getting up wrong and got up right, and I KNEW I could do it. Alexander is showing me how to change a bad habit into a good one.You change it by stopping th e old feeling and learning a n ew one. I hop e I can hang on to thi s idea, and never forget it. I believe I'm writing all this down to remind me of th ese new things. I kept my head forward and up pretty nearly all th e time today . Towards th e end of the lesson Alexander put his fingertips, only two of them, at the base of my h ead, and I stood up like a breeze . Then he asked m e to stand up again, and again, and each time I got up bett er than I had ever done in my life. Better than I h ad done when I was well, befor e that awfu l illness. I always used to haul myself mor e or less un gracefu lly out of a chair, an d used to wonder how ballet dancers m anage d to rise so b eautifull y. It gave 22

A Diar y of L essons

me a thrill to realise that I was doing something better than wh en I was perfe ctly well. But th e be st of it was yet to come . Alexander said , "I don't know whether you know, but you did th e last two all by your self. I didn 't help yo u in any way. I kept my fing er-tip s an inch away from yo ur n eck ." M arvel of marvel s. I got up out of a chair all by myself for th e first tim e in years-" did it twi ce". This was a red -l ett er day.

Twelfth lesson Not so goo d . I guess I got too exc it ed yesterday over my success, and was careless. I seem to have slipp ed back into th e old habit of use of myself again. I ju st cou ldn 't do a thing right. I m ean, w rong! Which remind s m e, th at I've enjo yed myself more , and laugh ed mor e, since I came to Alexa nder , than in years. H e comforted m e by saying I can't expect to w ip e out years of mi suse in tw elve lessons. I must hold thi s thought over me. It 's wonderful, a miracle, what has happen ed to me in twelve lessons. It 's happe n ed in my br ain as well as my bod y. I have be en feeling new aches and pain s. I'v e been such a mass of discom fort and mi sery for so long that I don 't mu ch noti ce th em. But ther e is no doubt that the y are NEW ones . My mu scles are changing over. Of course th ey shout about it. Bound to. M y " dead" leg seem s stiffer than ever, and more lifeless. He says very littl e the se days, thou gh we usually have a crack or two. He just works and works on my head, neck and back. I even let my knees go stiff today an d for go t to move my ribs. I also put my arms out w h en I start ed to get up , an awful thin g to do, which I haven't don e for some tim e. But am I depr essed? No fear ! Sixteenth lesson The new aches and pains still go on. Now my bad leg is badder than ever. But Alexander has no pity on me. He says "Sp lend id!" w h en I tell him I ache all over. He even tells me he is glad to h ear th at I'm stiffer an d achi er an d sorer! Seriously, I see that it m eans goo d thin gs are happ en in g to me. Th e old muscle pattern is changing. No. I am ch ang in g my muscle pattern! Just like that. Gran d, isn't it! If it only m eans that I can throw away th at stick one day, I don 't mind wha t I go throu gh! It may be that I expec t to o much 23

More Talk of Alexa11der

bec ause I get so much. To compensate m e for a rather poor lesson tod ay, the hotel port er says he thinks I'm looking much better and brighter , and almo st like my old self. Dear old chap, he knew m e when I was well. M y mirror tells me my skin has improv ed a lot . I am sleeping lots better too. I am really much better in side myself. So here goes for a good lesson tomorrow. But bother th at stiffne ss and soreness!

Eighteenth lesson Another new idea. Would you believe it! I am giving orders to my brain. I am saying to it , "Te ll my muscles not to do thi s," and "Tell my muscles to do that. " Changing habit by changing m essagepath s in the brain . I say "Stop" to myself, or to my brain, and stop certain old proc esses.T h en I say to myself "Head forward and up , neck relaxed, spin e lengt h ening, back widening ." I don't DO anything, but ju st THINK it. Next thin g I know , I am on my feet without the least effort. This, says Alexande r, comes of thinkin g not of DO I NG but of th e MEANS WHEREBY one can achieve what one wants . This "means whereby" seem s to be very important. I don 't get it yet, but I guess I wi ll in time. Anyway, it wor ks! So, inst ead of conce ntratin g on getting up gracefully without a jerk or a jump, I think about th e means whereby I can do it. And then I do it . All Alexa nd er's ideas seem to work tog ether in some mysteriou s way. They make their own kind of sense. I shall see th e whole pattern one day. H e has thorou gh ly i-dott ed and t- crossed every thing. I gue ss this will do for on e lesson. N ineteenth lesson All through my lessons Alexander has never stopp ed tappin g m e lightl y with hi s fingertips to remind m e of things I should keep doing. It works o ut very well, because even in the hotel at night I feel th at light tap, and change to the new use of myself. He taps my ribs to remind me about the new use of myself in breathin g, my knees to remind me not to keep them stiff, and my neck near the head to remind me to keep my head forward and up. I am tryin g to free all my joints, which seem as if they were set in concre te. They are stiff as boards. But in genera l it seems to m e that the old kind of stiffness is going. Touch wood . (My knees will 24

A Diary of Lessol/5

do!) I now always remember to stop get ting up wrong, and to think of the means whereby I can get up right. But I don't always get up successfully because I don't always keep my head forward and up.Alexander is right in all he says. I have found that it is quite impossiblefor me to get up out of a chair without a jump if I have put my head back. I just know that if I have not come up in one smooth movement, I've got my head back . This is something I know, and will never forget. I've learned it inside myself, by the changes that are going on inside myself. I am beginning to see how th e "means whereby" ties up with keeping my head forward and up .

Twentieth lesson Whew! What a lesson! My cheeks were quite rosy when I got back, and I hardly knew myself. The porter said "T'wo nt be long now before you're walking without my help." Usually it takes both him and his second in command to get me from my taxi to my room. Alexander began by showing me how amazingly flexible his joints are. Each separate part of his fingers seems to be coming out of its joint, and his hand seems to be coming out of the wrist joint, and his forearm out of the elbow joint. Such suppleness, like elastic! How I envy him his supple joints.They make his hands soft as a bre eze yet strong as steel. I told him he would have made a wonderful acrobatic danc er, and it made him roar. I may say that, by now, I am pretty good at getting up from the chair without a jump . But never until today have I succeeded in sitting down without a powerful bump. His theme song used to be "Don't jump". Lately it's been "Don't bump ". I get about a third of the way down all right, and then I become anxious and put my h ead back .An d so I flop down with a bump. But today, prais e heaven, I sat down as if on air. I wasn't able to repeat it, but just that once was glorious. I felt like singing a hymn of thanksgiving. Never, never shall I forget that moment. I have done it once, so I shall be able to do it again. This getting up and sitting down like a feather has shown me what an awful state I'v e slipped into. That illness got me down pretty low, and I've been sinking lower and lower ever since without realising it . Doctors don't seem to realise what a long illness can do 25

More Talk cifAlexa11der

to you, and how much help you need to get back your health! No trouble is too much to be able to stand up and sit down in this wonderful way, as if I owned the earth, and th e world was my oyster, and so on . Ju st to think that I can do this in only twenty lessons of only half an hour each, when the doctors have worked on me for years. This lesson is th e best I've had . Alexander said when I got out of the chair (that dear old Queen Anne chair!) today, "That, my dear lady, was pe1fection personified." I beamed like the Chesh ire cat. What a lesson! I simply can't wait for the next.

Tiventy-sixth lesson Last night, whi le loo sening my knee joint s, I felt life in my "dead" leg for the first time. I co uld hardly believe it at first, but it was there all right. I gave th e great news to Alexander first thing, but all he said was "Good", quite calmly, as ifhe were taking it for granted. I suppose really that he knows what is going on inside me better than I do myself. But if his leg had been like a piece of cast iron , and sud denly began to move, I bet he would make a song and dance abo ut it. Today I was expecting wonders, but I got up right abo ut ten times and got up wrong ten times. Maybe this is what you call progress! Well, I can still laugh. I go over my lesson s every day in the hotel , trying to do w hat he expec ts of m e. By the way, it no lon ger exhausts me to write. My hand and my brain both feel pretty fresh when I finish rri.y diary, instead of being worn out. Today we talked again about the wrong habit of giving the right feeling and about saying "Stop" or "No" to it each time you want to do somet hing . Experience has proved to me that this is absolut ely true. It does work every tim e. Lord knows how he discovered it. All I have to do is put this truth into action. My leg felt alive during this lesson, but I was carefu l not to boast about it. I'm not out of the woods yet, so I must not crow too much. I'll keep my thrills about my "dead" leg to myself. Forgot to note that I've had some lessons wh ile lying on a table, to help my legs, I suppose. I am told to "think the knees going up to the ceiling " and I do so. It seems to loosen the joints without any effort on my part except the thinking . I can't raise the "dead" 26

A Diary of Lesso11 s

leg yet without help, but once it 's up I can hold it ther e.When I lie on the table I have a book und er my head like a Chinese lady of long ago. It helps me keep my head from going back. Alexander still goes on tapping my ribs, knee s and neck to remind m e. This helps me a lot.

Thirtieth lesson I have been sleep ing much better, and my waistlin e is beginning to appear again . Still rather full of stiffness, but, it is definitely less. Alexander says today, "I can see yo ur improv ement in the better colour of your skin." That is good to hear, and confirms what the porter said. I'm really very lucky to have found Alexander. Why doesn 't everybody know about him ? This is the kind of thing we all need, I'm certain, even the he althy ones among us. It seems crazy that he should not be as famous as so m any men are who don 't do half what he doe s for the good of humanity. It's the same story today that we've repeated so often. Alexander working on my head, neck, shoulders and back, and me attending to my means whereby, I still keep getting up and sittin g down . I thought of the people who have sat in that Queen Anne chair. The great G.B.S. sat in it for forty lessons and did just the same things I am trying to do . It is quite an inspirin g reflection. Nice to think that I can do some of th e thing s Shaw did , even though I couldn't write Man and Superman. Thirty-second lesson I nm taller. I have measured myself. I noti ced that when I looked out the hotel window before putt in g my head forward and up, I saw less of the scene from the bottom than when I looked out with my h ead forward and up. Then I tried lookin g out before giving myself orders, and while lookin g out I gave myself th e orders, and was delighted to find the scene rising before my very eyes. The picture seemed to come up in che s above the windowsill, and I saw yards more of the buildin gs across the street.T his was quite a dramatic discovery, but I did not tell Alexa nder. I worked it out for myself that the curve s in my back are straight ening out, th erefore giving me more hei ght. I also know that my old port er seems less tall to me than when I arrived here. So I actually am 27

More Talk of Al exa11d er

taller. At the end of today's lesson I walked from the chair to the sofa without my stick. I took it in small steps. But I did walk , all by myself. Now I know that I shall walk again. Nobody will know what this means to me except someone who has gone through the same exper ience . It is impossible to describe what walkin g on one's feet can mean to a person who has not walked for years. It is a miracle to me. I'm getting used to miracles. I just hold my breath , cross my fingers, praise God and wait for the next one to happen . At that point, the diary breaks off Miss G. R. had an urgent call back to New York owing to a family emergency-a real one, this time. She had two or three more lessons, but there was no time to write about them. In these, Alexander gave her instructions about how she was to carry on until she cou ld return. I had several talks with her as she did her packing and made arrangements for h er return in six months' time. It was good to see her walking round the room-a bit carefully, of course. But all the same, walkin g. She seemed again like her old self. Gone was the str ained, deathly look, the humped-over back, the dragging leg. No long er did she suggest an object of pity. In our last talk she suddenly said: "I suppose you realise that Alexander has saved my life. I was returning hom e less than three months ago to prepare myself for death. Oh, nothing dramatic, but ju st to put my affairs in order. What a teacher he is! He should be teaching the who le wor ld ."

3 OPENING

ADDRESS

IN THE SUPREME

COURT

OF SOUTH AFRICA

Witwatersrand Local Division Before the Honourable Mr Justice Clayden 16 February 1948

Appearances: Mr J.H. Hanson KC, with Mr A. Fischer, for the Plaintiff, Frederick Matthias Alexander. Mr 0. Pirow KC, with Mr M. van Hulsteyn, for the Defendants. MR HANSON:"May it please your lordship. This is an action in which the plaintiff, Mr Frederick Matthias Alexande r, of London, the founder of a technique which is known under his name, sues the defendants for £5,000 damages for defamation.The offending article appeared as an editorial in a journal called Manpower.This journal is described as a scientific journal and is a publication issued by the National Advisory Council for Physical Education. I believe that a copy of this journal is attached to the pleadings. The three defendants, that is, Dr Jokl, Dr Cluver and Dr Clarke, are the editorial board of this journal and as such are responsible for the article which appeared. "I feel at this stage it would be proper to tell your lordship a little of the plaintiff, such as we will be able to prove in evidence, and something of his technique, something of his teachings, something of his books, so that your lordship, in the course of hearing the evidence, will be able to get a proper perspective of what the witness will talk about." MR Pmow: "Permit me my lord . I take it my learned friend is outlining the evidence which either has been taken on commission in London or will be taken in this court, because beyond that there is nothing, I submit, which he can convey to your lordship." His LORDSHIP: "That is presumably what he is doing. " MR Pmow: "I just want to make sure of that ." 29

More Talk of A/exa11der

MR HANSON:"The books , of course, will be evidence b efor e the co urt and I propo se to addre ss yo ur lordship on some of th e thing s th at app eared in the books , so th at your lord ship can und erstand what th e witnesses will talk about . "The plaintiff , at th e clo se of th e last century, was an elocutionist carrying on his profes sion in Au stralia when he became afflicted with som e throat trouble which involved him in th e loss of his voice when any strain was thrown on it. He made a pain stakin g investigation into the cause of his troubl e, b ec ause m edical aid had failed. Thi s inve stigation led him to th e co nclusion th at the cau se of his troubl e lay in his own use of hi s organs connec ted with speaking and that th e strain-just puttin g it bri efly-o n his lar ynx was caused by th e mi suse of hi s ow n he ad and neck.As a result of th ese investigations he furth er concluded that thi s misuse discov ered in him self was pr evalen t among the peopl es of his ge neration , and, eventually, in th e course of his investigation s, h e evolved a theory and a technique which eventu ally established him as a teach er of his system, to re-edu cate persons in th e use of th emselves. "Ea rly in the century, in any event , som e years prior to 1910, in circum stances w hich I will, unfortun ately, be pr eclud ed from pro ving to thi s court, Mr Alexander h ad removed him self from Australia and had establish ed him self in London, where h e carried on his teaching , and since then he ha s don e so for 40 years, save for a short int erruption durin g the last war w h en his school for trainin g yo un g childr en had bee n bombed and h e remo ved hims elf and hi s pupil s to America until it was safe for him to return to England. "Now, my lord, Mr Ale xa nd er is not simply a teach er of a techniqu e. Hi s research es h ave led him to pond er on th e destin y of man in evolution , an d Mr Alexander has elaborated a philo soph y w hi ch h as influ enced, as I wi ll hope to pro ve to yo ur lord ship, some at least of th e thought of his day. In his career he published four book s an d I think I co uld at this stag e hand yo ur lord ship th ese bo oks in the order in w hich they app eared." MR Prnow: "My learned frien d should give yo ur lord ship all the editi on s; th ere are various editi o n s, and we allege th ere are discrepancies in th e variou s editions. If h e is handin g in books it may be that he can han d in copi es of th e variou s edition s as well ." 30

OpeningAddress i11the South Africa/ LegalAction

His LORDSHJP: "If you wish to do that." MR HANSON:"No, my lord. I do not wish to do that. I do not happen to have sufficient copies of all the editions and no doubt my learned friend, at any proper time in this case, if he wants to, can do so.These are the books that were used when evidence was taken on commission. They used the 1946 editions." Hrs LORDSHJP: "Are these th e 1946 editions?" MR HANSON:"Yes, my lord. These books will be referred to by their titles and not by exhibit numbers.Your lordship will see that the first book that was written was named Man's Supreme Inheritance.That book first appeared in 1910.There have been a considerable number of editions since then, in 1918, 1937, 1939, 1941, and your lordship has the 1946 edition. The reason why I am giving your lordship th e 1946 edition is that, when the evidence was taken in London, particularly in relation to the witnesses called by the defendants, their references were made to the 1946 edition . It will prove much easier for your lordship to follow, at least in the evidence called on behalf of the defendants . The second book , Constructive Conscious Control, first appeared in 1923; the book called The Use of the Self first appeared in 1932; and The UniversalConstant in Living first appeared in 1942. There were subsequent edition s to thes e books. I do not think your lordship ne ed worry about noting those dat es." His LORDSHIP:"No. But, I think, Mr Hanson, other copies of these books are going to be put in . It may be convenient at a later stage if they were marked A, B, C, and D, so that if there is reference to any other edition, they may be identified ." MR HANSON:"It can only be referred to as the 1918 edition, and so on. Now, my lord, I would say at once that Mr Alexander has no preten sions to literary skill. The books are not advanced by him or by us in this case as models of composition or literary structure. But these four books do contain all the thoughts and theories which were provoked by Mr Alexander's observations and which formed, I might say, his philosophy. His technique, the technique of his teaching, which is a method of education , is based on that philosophy. And it is based, if I can put it shortly, on th e evolution of man from an un consc ious, um·easoning creature to a corn.pletely conscious individual. 3I

More Talk of Alexander

" Now, his first book, Man's Supreme Inheritance, expounds hi s philo sophy, and it is based on the conception of man as a psychoph ysical unit, that is, of mind on the ph ysical side, as a unit . Briefly, hi s theme is as follows: That in the pro cess of evolut ion man , as distinct from other anim als, has developed a power of reasonin g and has a gu ality of consciou sne ss which distingui shes him from any of the lower animals . But m an's destiny in th e pro cess of evoluti on was that his consc iousness or his reason must pl ay an ever incr easing role in man 's behavio ur, both in hi s social relation ships and in the manner in which man uses him self. Hi s philo soph y is thi s, th at by virtu e of man 's reasonin g or hi s consciousness, man has been able radically to chang e the environm ent in w hich h e lives.To illustrate, my lord, th e savage lived in primordial forests, on plain s, and he suppli ed his needs directly from huntin g an d from contact with th at environm ent . But through th e ages, and w ith incr easing rapid ity in the last roo years, man has develop ed from that primiti ve stage, and he has, by vir tu e of his reasonin g, com pl etely changed his environm en t. Today man does not live from hunting .The in stinct s th at were sufficient for man when h e hunted are, in modern time s, guit e insuffi cient. Man earn s his living tod ay sitting behind a desk in an office or wor king a machin e or by thinkin g. His leisur e is different from what it was. Hi s locomotion is different from w hat it was . H e has not to depend on th e in stinct s w ith whi ch h e was origina lly endowed and which from time to time he improved by virtue of hi s environm ent . So that his them e is thi s, that the need s of man today are no lon ger capab le of being satisfied by any instinctive proc ess. Mr Alexan der believes, and he observes in hi s books , that thi s change of environm ent has occurred so rapidly th at it has com pletely o ut stripped man's ability to live naturally in his change d environment. Wh ereas once his instinct was a sufficient guide-a t a tim e, of co ur se, when man was more reliant on the physical side an d less on the m ental sidetod ay th at environm ent is not adeguate. "Now, Mr Alexander observes that in the pro cess of evoluti on man's reasoning, both in relation to his environment and in relation to him self, has developed. The one has not been so rapid. The pace of his reasoning in relation to th e use of hims elf has be en slower than th e rate in wh ich he has applied his reasonin g to hi s 32

Opening Address in the South Africa/ Legal Action

changing environment. And that originally, many thousands, tens of thousands of years ago, it was not difficult for a man to adapt his habits to the uses of himself to the very gradual changes in his environment.And for a great deal of the period of man's evolution he was an adequately adjusted creature, using himself efficiently. But AJexander's theme is this, man's present environment, in all walks oflife, both in his social relations, and in the use of him self, requires that man should be fully conscious of the way in which he uses himself, that is, conscious as to how he uses himself as a thinking, act ing ent ity. But man has not learnt the abilities to do so. Mr AJexander's observation is that though man has this capacity to apply his reasoning today, he has not, at the present stage of evolution, th e ability to do so; though he has the capacity, man today still relies upon what he calls his instinctiv e or habitual uses, which are quite inadequate. "In the present age the human being, from early childhood to fully-developed ado lescence, is not taught (we know it is so from our own lives) to be aware of him self and his manner of use. From childhood he acts in thi s sense unconsciously; he uses himself fortuitou sly or by unconscious imitation; he acquires certain habits and the manner in which th e individual uses himself becomes habitual and, as Mr AJexander observes, in our times alm ost universally incorrectly. For instance, the child in its tender years when performing some function that it does daily, acq uir es a stoop over its work, or acquires a habit of hunching his shoulders every tim.e he performs some act. That use becomes habitual to the child, and it grows into a man who will always walk about perhaps with one shoulder higher than the other, as I am endeavouring to imitate, or w ith a stoop in its posture. Mr AJexander has observed that that use, which has b ecome habitual, feels to the indi vidua l natural and correct. The man who walks around with an unsightly stoop does not feel in himself th at he is acting unnaturally or incorrectly; that has become to him the natural way he uses himself, a posture which, to him, feels correct and natural. Should you take that indi vidual and put him in a different posture physically, by straightening him by the force of your hands, the new position would feel, says Mr AJexander (and there is a lot of evidence on this), strained, unnatural and incorrect. 33

MoreTalk of A lexa11d er

"And he makes another very essential observation in hi s technique. You can take a child and stand it up straight , put its shoulder s in the correct position or what appears to be in the correct position, not necessarily in the correct position, and th e child will be able to maintain that position only momentarily while it is stationary, but th e moment the child proceeds to some activity, or the adult for that rn.atter, goes to pick up something or proceeds to sit down, the old bad manner of use wi ll assert itself. From standing straight the child , the morn .ent it goes to pick up a toy, will revert to the stoop or to the one sho uld er higher than the other as being the natural posture wh ich it adopts in activity. And it is thi s quality in man which makes a crooked head feel straight. The in dividual who habitually carries his h ead on the one sid e, whose head is put straigh t, wi ll feel that his h ead is on the other side and not straight. To the outs id e world, lo oking at the man, it w ill appear that his head is straight, to himself, his sensations will be that his head is leaning over to the side to w hi ch he is not accustomed. "And that, my lord, is what Mr Alexander calls in his work 'the false sensory appreciation' of the man and it is a factor that he has had to cope w ith in evolving his technique and one wh ich proved to Mr Alexander the great difficulty in teaching a man the correct use of himself and whic h led to the development of his techniqu e. There is a very forceful illustration of this, which I think falls properly in my opening, so as to give your lordship a picture. In the book, Conscious Control of the Individual, at pages 90 and 91, where he describes a distorted chi ld who was brou ght to him. He says this: A little girl who had been unabl e to walk properly for some years was brought to the writer for a diagnosis of the defects and the use of the psychophysical mechanisms, which were responsible for a more or less cripp led state . When this had been done a request was made that a demonstration should be given to those pres ent of the manipulative side of the work, the child, of course, was to be the subject to be manipulated, so that certain adjustments and coorclinations might be temporarily secured , thus, showing, in keeping w ith the diagnosis, the po ssibility of the education on a genera l basis 34

Ope11i11g Address i11the 5011thAfrica/ LegalActio11

in a case of this type. The demonstration was succe ssful from this point of view. For the time being the child's body was comparatively straig ht ened out, that is, wit hout the extreme twists and distortions which had been so noticeable when she cam e into the room. When this was done the little girl looked across h er shoulder and said in an in describab le ton e: 'Mummy, he has pulled me out efshape.' "It was for this reason that the chi ld felt she was no longer in shape. It was this particular feature, observed Mr Alexander, which proved to him the great difficulty in teaching a correctness to individuals which led to the development of his technique. "This case will abound with evid ence of this sort, that it is useless to order a person to do the correc t thing; it is no good saying to a man who has developed a marked misuse of his body, 'Stand up straight,' because the feeling of the old incorrect manner wi ll be a feeling that it was right and natural, and the man trying to do what is right, in the way Mr Alexander puts it, will not do what he feels to be wrong. A man who feels that he is standing wrongly, if h e has a certain posture of the shoulders, who is trying to do the right thing, will not, when he sits down or when he walks, or when he proceeds to some activity, do it in what is the right way if he feels that way to be the wrong way. "And that, my lord, is the first step in the teachin g of this technique; the 1rst ste is to make the indi vid L!al ~i.th the wsong ~1se .;,,. awa~e of what is wro_!2gand to make him aware of what is right, that is, by conscio us awareness. It can be done by demonstration, if his use i;-wrong ~to show him:, to appeal to his reason , as to what is the right way in which he should do it. Then Mr Alexander's observation is, that to teach the pupil to acquire an habitual use Qf -✓ what is right, the first quality that the pupil must be taught is an ili ility to 12revent t inhibit himself from doing what is wrong;.he ~ -----= must inhibi t his natural reaction and he must prevent himself from res and in g to a stimulus to act at all, ecause it is action which brings into operation his habitu;J nususes. ff I nught ~ xplain that. "A man learning the technique is ordered to sit. Ifh e obeys the order he will imm ediately use hims elf in his old wrong way, because he cannot help himself; he feels right; he feels natural. The 35

More Talk of A lexa11d er

thing he must do to th e order to sit is to inhibit, pr event him self, w hen obeying that order, from usin g him self th e wrong way; the pupil must th en be given th e experience of correct use by the means th at Mr Alexa nder w ill give him . But he must not respond to the ord er to sit if his fault has b een to bring his h ead back or hun ch his shoulders; h e wou ld imm ediately fall into th at posture if h e were not all th e time consc iou sly inhibitin g his respons e to th e stimulus. "That, my lo rd, is the second step of Mr Alexander's technique about th e necessity for th e pupil to inhibit. It is a prim e conception in hi s teachin g.At th e same tim e, while th e pupil is inhibitin g in th e teaching of the techniqu e, th e exp er ienc es of the correct use must be given by th e teacher. The pupil hims elf must do nothin g but inhibit, and th e teacher w ill, by thi s teacher 's hand , mo ve th e pupil in th e correct way, so that th e pupil will acqu ire, not at once but in time, th e new sense, the new feeling of th e co rr ect use. And bri efly, my lord, without going int o all th e obstacles that present th em selves in teaching, Mr Ale xand er says that, althou gh thi s use will at first feel w rong and unn atural, th e person feelin g wrong and out of shape, in some cases feelin g discomfort and m ay even feel pain, after sufficient repetition at th e hands of a teacher , th e correct use will come to him to feel right and natural and will beco me conscious ly the habitu al use of the pupil, replacing hi s old, unconsciou s, habitual, in correct use . " Now, my lord , I would like to say to yo ur lord ship that the se ideas and m eth ods of Mr Alexan der have not passed unnotic ed in th e scientific field. Evidence will be given to yo ur lord ship that, many years after Mr Alexa nd er wro te hi s first bo ok, Sir C harles Sherrington (acknowledged-there is no dispute about this-ackno w led ged on all hands to be the greatest livin g physiologi st of our tim e and today a man of over 90 years of age) makes reference to th ese co ncepts and teachings of Al exa nd er in hi s latest work, The EndeavourofJ ean Ferne!, a wo rk w hich app eared subs equ ent to th e libel in this case, but fortunately before th e h ear ing of the case, otherwise Mr Alexander might have found him self even in grea ter difficultie s in gett in g some scient ific support for the id eas that h e had been working on for 50 years. Sir C harles Sherrington has thi s passage, and I beli eve that it is not in appro priat e to read it at thi s 36

Ope11i11 g Address i11the South Africa/ LegalActio11

stage, because it will put mu ch of what is said in a proper setting. Perhaps I should dir ect your lord ship 's attention to th e fact that Sir Charles Sherrington uses language very simil ar to Mr Alexander's an d sho ws th at in fact he ha s taken a deal of it from Mr Alexan der's langu age. Speaking of hum an acts, Sir Charles Sherrington says this: Our att ention is direct ed to th e 'aim' of the act, not to th e 'how' of it ; th e 'how' often eno ugh takes care of itself. Conscious effor t wo uld seem unable to put us in tou ch actu ally with the proprio cepti ve reflex itself. So illusive is thi s last th at for long our mu scles were unr ecog ni sed as affordin g any sensual basis of our motor acts. When we bend a finger we can, wit hout lo oking at the finger an d without th e finger tou ching anything, tell within a littl e how mu ch or how little we bend it ; no hint , however, is vouchsafed to us th at muscles doin g th e act lie up th e forearm, or of the tensio ns or lengt h s they assume in doin g it. When we turn our gaze we are not aware of th e mu scles of our eyeballs, nor can any mental effort or int ensity of purpose make us so. Nonetheless, the un co nscio us reflexes at work in them are indi spensable to the due performan ce of our act. In evolution ary hi story, b ehavio ur such as th at part of o ur own which Descartes relegated to 'reason' and 'free will', seems of later development than is the robot behaviour, operated reflexly. ... Descended from a lon g sto ck ofless mentali sed creatures as we are, and living less reflexly th an they did , our more mentalised statu s has arr ived at putting the reflex mechanism as a going concern, within th e co ntrol , to a certain exte nt , of th e reaction s of th e brain. The ma stery of the brain over the reflex machinery do es not take the form of int ermedd lin g w ith reflex details; rath er it dictat es to a reflex mechanism 'you may act' or 'you may not act' .The detailed execut ion of the motor act is still in imm ediate charge of th e reflex. Our individual histor y exemp lifies this . " l hop e, my lord , th at wh en th e case is developed much further than it is now yo ur lordship will appr eciate that th at is Mr Alexan37

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der 's teaching, namel y, that consciously you can direct th e manner of your use; you can direct whether the reflex pattern should work or should not work; you can adjust yourself so th at th e reflex action will work properly, put in scientific term s. Then , of course, what happen s with reflex actions you cannot control.You cannot control whether yo u shall digest or not digest , or whether your liver will function or not function. But if you use yourself properly-if you do not int erfere with th e reflex patterns as Mr Alexander teaches-the aut omatic function s will function better. "Sir Charles Sherrin gton goes on to say: It is largely the reflex element in the willed movement or postur e which, by reason of its unconscious character, defeats our attempts to know the 'how' of the doing of even a wi lled act . Breathing, standing, walking, sitting, alth ough innate, along with our growth, are apt, as movem ents, to suffer from defects in our ways of doing them.A chair un suited to a child will quickly indu ce special and bad habits of sitting and of bre athing. In urb anised and industriali sed communities bad habits in our m o tor acts are especially common. But verbal instruction as to how to correct wrong habits of movements and posture is very difficult. The scantiness of our senso ry perception of how we do them makes it so. The faults tend to escape our direct observat ion and recognition. Of the proprioc eptiv e reflexes as such, whether of muscles or ear (vestibule), we are un conscious . . .. Correcting the movem ents carried o ut by our proprioc eptiv e reflexes is some thing like trying to reset a machine whose works are intangible, and the net outp ut all we know of the running. Instruction in such an act has to fall back on other factors more accessible to sense; thus, in skating, to 'feelin g' that edge of th e skate-blad e on which th e mo veme nt bears. To watch another perform er trying the movem ent can be help ful; or a looking-g lass in which to watch ourselves tryin g it. The mirror can tell us ofte n more th an can the most pain staking attempt to 'introspect' . Mr Alexander has done a service to th e subj ect by insisten tly treating each act as invol vin g the whole int egrate d indi vidu al , th e whole psychophysical

OpeningAddress i11the S0111/z Africa/ Legal Action

man.To take a step is an affair, not of thi s or th at limb solely, but of th e tot al neuromuscular activity of th e moment-not least of th e head and th e neck . " It is fortunate, my lord, as I have said, that the great Sir C harles Sherrington, before this case was started, has had occasion to mak e reference to th e plaintiff, particularly wh en it is rem embered that the plaintiff is bran ded in th e present case as a charlatan. I think I should, in connection with th e last passage I read from Sir Charles Sherrington's book , draw yo ur lords hip 's attention to th e fact that Sir C harles Sherrington had seen fit to quote , in a footnote, Mr Alexander's Universal Constant in Living. "T hi s brin gs m e to th e nex t step in outlinin g this technique. Mr Alexa nd er, in hi s experim ents on him self and in th e teaching of teachin g methods to others, had been led to observe th e fact that in all mi suses, all misuse s of th e bod y, ther e is a noti ceable and prim e misuse, more or less develop ed and pre sent in all individual s who mi suse themselves: nam ely, a tendency to tense the neck muscl es in any activity; th at if a m an pro ceeds to lift som ethin g, or ifhe pro ceeds to get up from a chair, his prim e misuse of him self is th e tens in g of th e neck, eviden ced in m any cases by a tendency to pull th e h ead and neck down, in relation to the to rso, that is, when th e m an gets up, som etim es imperceptibly, sometimes very notic eably. Look at th e man who is risin g out of a chair. It can be seen, in the effort to get up, that he tenses hi s neck and bring s th e head back and down , and, putting it rather shortl y, p erhaps oversimplifying it , that a correc t head-neck relation ship is a sine qua non, Mr Alexande r discovered, to goo d posture. That, unl ess you can ge t a good head-n eck relation ship, faulty po sture will result . That was prov ed by stud ent s of the Alexa nder Techniqu e. They have th e suspicion that yo u would have con sequ ent mi suses of th e body in activit y. " No w, until such tim e as your lordship is invit ed to read the whole of Man's Supreme Inheritance, which is Mr Alexand er's first work and therefore very import ant in this regard, I say that it abound s w ith illustrations of persons w ho cam e int o Mr Alexander's rooms-of stutt erers , stamm erers and of persons who we re brought there by do ctors describing somet hin g abo ut th em- and 39

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in each case your lordship will see the ob servation that there was a tensing of the head and neck, or words which convey that. Mr Alexander, it must not be lost in this case, is no physiologist; h e is no medica l man; he is no scientific man . He was an elocutionist who was pursuing his methods by dir ect observation. H e discovered, quite obj ectively, that if a man wer e taught to prevent this inte1ference with a correct head-neck relationship, to prevent this tension of the head in activity, it had a mark ed effect on the whole mechanism, and to him the head-neck relationship was therefore of prime importance in its association with the functioning of th e whole muscu lar mechani sm of the man , and he wrote that if a man will consciouslyprevent this tension of the head-neck in all his movementshe will not th en int erfere with the proper functioning of his whole mechanism. This can be achieved, as your lord ship will gather, by a mental direction of 'head forward and up'. It does not mean that a man, a man who is using hims elf correctly, must move his head in space in relation to his body, but ifhe carries into practice the mental idea when performing an act, the m ental co nception, it will pr event the head being pulled down into the body and so giving ri se to the ten sing which Mr Alexander maintain s affects the whole working of the body. And th is is described in his two earlier works, Man's Supreme Inheritance and in The Conscious Control of the Individual, as th e relationship of head-to-neck and head-to-n eck to torso, or it is described as a position of mech anical advantage, which was a word used in those days to de scribe the mo st advantageous working po sition of the bod y, which always headed this particu lar relationship of the head and neck in which th ere was no ten sion. "In 1932, when Mr Alexander produced a new work, that is The Use of the Se!£he used the phra se 'primary control' .Your lord ship , I hope, will be p ersuad ed- I say persuaded becau se the defend ant has introduced a lot of confusion about this-that he used the phra se 'primary control' to describe that selfsame relationship he had always been talking about, name ly the relationship of the head to the neck and the head and neck to the torso- 'prim ary ', because it is first in time and first in importance; a phras e that has be en used by great physiologi sts. I will endeavour to convey what that mean s.

OpeningAddress i11the Soi.it/,Africa/ Legal Actio11

"It means that the head moves and the body follows. The head is the prime directing force of the body in this relation .The head moves and the body follows . If the head moves correctly, the body will follow correctly; if the head moves incorrectly, the body will follow incorrectly. And this theory of 'conscious awareness', which is a philosophy of his earlier books on the destiny of man as applied to 'primary control', means this: that man must consciously not interfere with this relationship; he mu st consciously direct the head forward and up; he must consciously prevent it from tensing. Sir Charles Sherrington in the selfsame book has a short passage on this. It comes just a little before the passage I have read to your lordship a little while ago, but I omitted it because it would be meaningless until I had given this explanation. He writes: 'Today's knowledge teaches that every so-called " voluntary " muscle with its nervous supply is a little "reflex" system. Any act, of whatever provenanc e, which employs such a muscle cannot fail to enlist reflex act ion from it , and from muscles related to it- synergists , antagonists.These (proprioceptive) reflexes are unconscious as such, but on them depends in large part the rightn ess of the muscular act, and the possibility of physical perfection; it rests with each of us to attain it by per sonal understanding and effort.' "Now, my lord, the libel gives very scanty reference to anything in the teaching s of Mr Alexa nder that I have so far addressed your lordship on. To thi s I will revert again in a moment. But this point I prefer to make first, that some scathing refer ences have been made to the fact that a world-famous philosopher, Professor John Dewey, has supported Mr Alexander. The scathing references are that it was puzzling to see that number of people, including Professor John Dewey , the philosopher, publicly praising 'the Australian actor'. On page 13 Professor John Dewey has scorn heaped upon him and is really described as being quite senile at the time that he supported Mr Alexander. It is stated there: 'Another admirer of Mr Alexand er is Professor John Dewey, now aged 86, whose fame as a philosopher and educationalist is of cour se based on writings published when he was much younger. (His Psycliology appeared in 1887; his Study of Ethics in 1894 and his last great work, Human Nature and Conduct, in 1922.)' "The fact is that in Human Nature and Conduct Professor John

More Talk of A lexa11der

D ewey produc ed a wo rk w hi ch is describ ed as on e of his great wo rks, and in it h e devoted m any pages to Mr Alexand er. Som e of th em bear readin g at this stage.Th e book, w hi ch w ill be pro ved in du e co ur se, co nt ain s m any references betw een th e pages of 68 and 134. I am not go ing to read all th ese pages, but thi s app ears: R ece ntly a friend remarked to m e [the friend , my lord , is Mr Alexa nd er] th at th ere was on e sup erstiti o n curr ent am ongst even culti vated persons.The y suppo se, if on e is told w hat to do and if th e right end is point ed to th em, all th at is requir ed in ord er to brin g about th e right act is th e w ill or wi sh on th e part of th e on e w ho is to act. H e used as an illustration th e m att er of ph ysical postur e; th e assumption is th at if a man is told to stand up straight, all th at is furth er needed is th e wi sh and effort on hi s part and th e deed is done. H e point ed out th at thi s belief is on a par w ith primi tive m agic in its neglect of att en tion to th e m eans w hi ch are involved in reachin g an end. H e we nt on to say th at th e prevalen ce of thi s belief, startin g w ith false notions abo ut th e co ntrol of th e body and ex tendi ng to th e con trol of min d and character, is th e greatest bar to intelligent social prog ress. It bar s th e way beca use it m akes us neglect int elligent inquir y to discov er th e m eans w hi ch will produc e th e desired result, and int elligent invention to procur e th e m eans. In short it leaves out th e imp ortance of int elligent , con tro lled habit . We may cit e hi s illustration of th e real natur e of th e ph ysical act or order, its exec ution in contr ast w ith th e curr ent false notio n , and I refer to Mr Alexa nd er's Man's S upreme Inheritance. A m an w ho has had a bad habitu al po stur e tells him self or is told to stand up straight. If he is int erested and respond s, he braces him self, goes through cert ain mo vem ent s, and it is assum ed th at th e desired result is sub stanti ally attaine d , th at th e position is retain ed at least as long as th e man keeps th e idea and orde r in hi s min d . C on sider th e assum ptions th at are here made. It is impli ed th at th e m eans or defective co ndit ion of the realisation of th e purp ose exist independ ently of establish ed hab it an d even that th ey may

Ope11i11 g Ad dress i11the S0111/, Africa/ Legal Actio11

set in moti on in opposition to habits. It is assumed th at the m eans are there so that th e failur e to stand erec t is who lly a matt er of failure of purpo se and desire. It n eeds paralysis or a broken leg or some other eq ually gross phenomenon to make us appreciate the importance of objective conditions. Now, in fact , a man who can stand properl y does so, and only a ma n who can, do es. In the former case efforts of will are un necessary, and in th e latter useless. A m an w ho does not stand properly forms a habit of standing improp erly, a positive forceful habit. Th e co mmon implication th at his mistake is m erely negative an d that h e is simpl y failing to do th e ri ght thin g an d that th e failur e can be m ade good by a normal effort of will is absurd . One might as well suppo se th at th e m an who is th e slave of whisky drinkin g is merely one w h o fails to drink water. Conditions have been formed for producin g a bad result, and th e bad result will occur .. . . "T hen, my lord, in the follow in g pages , Professor John Dewey , who is a very famo us American philo sopher , actu ally in corpor ates Mr Alexander 's teachings in his philo sophy. It wou ld take me to o long at this stage, though it is only six pages, to read th em to your lord ship ; refer ence will be made to th em later. But th ere are two short passages to which I wo uld like to refer: 'Af ter we get to th e point of recognising th at bad habit s m ust int erve ne betwee n wish and exec ution in the case of bodi ly acts, we still cherish the illusion that th ey can be dispensed w ith in th e case of menta l and moral acts. Thus th e net result is to make a distinction between non-mora l and moral act iviti es, and lead us to confine th e latter stri ctly w ithin a privat e, imm aterial realm. But , in fact, forma tion of id eas as well as th eir execution depends on bodil y habit . . . .' "And h e then deals with his phil osoph y of mind and sh ows that moral and other purpo ses have also got some thin g to do with the same basis of false habits. He conclude s with this: Our id eas truly depend upon experience, but so do our sensations. And the exper ience upon which they both depend is the operation of habits-or igin ally of instincts. Th us our purposes and comman ds regarding action (whether physical 43

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or moral) com e to us through the medium of bad bodil y habits .The in ability to think aright is sufficientl y strikin g to have caught th e att ention of morali sts. But a false psychology has led th em to int erpret it as du e to unnecess ary conflict of flesh and spirit , not as an indic atio n that our id eas are as depend ent , to say th e least, upon our bodil y habits as are our acts upon our conscious thou ght s and purpos es. "There are mor e passages, but I will not wea ry your lordship with them now . If Mr Alexand er's id eas are sound, it wo uld naturally follow that amongst persons who h ave practised hi s teachin g th ere should have emerged illustrations of improv ement in h ealth. In fact, evidenc e will be put before yo ur lord ship to th e effect that the application of this technique , its application in connection with the use of the human body, does improv e posture, do es impro ve the use of the individual. It will be prov ed to your lord ship , throu gh m edical reference s, that bad po sture has a serious effect upon goo d health , and th at improv em ent s in posture will benefit the w hole organism . In order to teach thi s procedure, it requir es patience, und erstandin g and a power of appli cation. Your lord ship will also hear that m any pupil s fall by th e way, because th ey have not got the powers to adapt themselves or to see it through . "As in all progressive steps in human progress, the work is never confined to one man or to one place . Mr Alexander , acting quite ind epe ndentl y, has evolved these theories, som e of which may be opt imi stic , some of which may go a littl e far, but basically his lesson is th at he has a method for teaching good use of th e body and th at is to impro ve health . It is not with out significance that in oth er parts of the wo rld , quite ind epen den tly from Mr Alexa nd er, similar work on similar thought h as been taking place. In America in rece nt years, th ere has been a new develo pm ent in th e field of me dicin e, which has recen tly been called psyc ho som atic m ed icin e, which is a mor e dignified way of puttin g Mr Alexa nd er's 'psychophysical'. Evidence will be given to your lord ship that reputable orthopa edi c work in America is advancin g along the lin es that faulty bod y mechanics is at the root of much ill-h ealth. It is perhaps fortunat e that thi s action did not take place twenty years ago because the recent medical literat ure from America wo uld not 44

Ope11i11g Address i11the S011//,Africa/ Legal A ction

have been available for your lordship . It is fort un ate that th e informed and advancing medical opinion in these countries is now available to us in the form of recent works th at wilJ be proved in this case. "In Eng land , w hi ch appar ently lags a littl e b ehind America in this, some m edical support for Mr Alexander has been forthcoming over the years. Some 25 medical men over the years, from tim e to tim e, have been impr essed w ith his methods and have w ritt en abou t them. Some of the younger peop le in England, w ho have been conv in ced of the basic soundn ess of his id eas, are present in this co urt today. They have come from England and your lordship will hear some of them in evidence; others have given evide nce on commission in England.And I wo uld also point to the fact that at th e same time som e confirmatory work was done by the scientist Coghill, who is referre d to in thi s article . "He was an em in ent prof essor of anatomy, w ho se spec ial work was em br yology.The w hole of hi s conclus io ns in the field of em bryo logy, so he wrote, co nfirm Alexander's work, so much so that an appreciation was w ritt en by Cog hilJ in th e int rod uction to The UniversalConstant in Living. He writes: The pr actice of F.Matthias Alexander in treating th e hum an bod y is founded, as I understand it , on three welJ-es tablish ed biolo gical principl es: (r) that of th e int egra tion of th e whole organism in th e performance of parti cular fun ctions; (2) th at of prop rioce ptiv e sensitivi ty as a factor in determin in g po stur e; (3) th at of the prim ary imp ortance of posture in dete rmining muscular action. These principles I have established throu gh 40 years in anatomi cal and ph ysiolo gical stud y of Amb lystom a in embryonic and larval stages, and th ey app ear to hold for other ver tebrates as well."

***

At thi s point the opening address went on to deal with th e personal factors w hi ch had led to the wr itin g of the defamatory article. Evidence whic h totalled more than 450,000 words was taken both in London and in Johannesburg and Alexander was awarde d massive costs in addition to damages. Deta ils of the judgment of th e Supreme Co urt are given in C hapter 35. 45

4 THE MEANING

OF MISUSE

by Dr Wilfred Barlow

"M1susE" is an umbrella ter m for which no simple definition can be given. Alexander meant by "misuse" very much more than tho se distortions of the mu scular and bony framework which are the province of the orthopaedic surgeon, the physioth erapi st, the osteopath and the physical educationist . Firstly, misuse has to include the simple mechanic al actions which we carry out all day and every day in moving ourselv ~ s and movit :!g objects_in O__ldI_~ronment..l hav.e....de_tailed many of these in my book, The Alexander Principle-a good examp le is that of the pastry-cook (fig. 1), who for twenty years has bent over a conveyor belt stamping out pastry. In the process h e has developed a side ways curv ature which persists even when he stops doing it, becau se the muscle tension involved in the work is not released. He has also (fig. 2) developed an arthritic spur at the spot where he repeatedly presses down on his lumb ar spin e. Movement-misuse does not, ho wever, result from vigorous act ivities only: more usually it ar ises in relation to quite simp le movement:_s of everyday life such as sitt in g and standing (fig. 3) and it was around such movements that Alexander organised much of his re-educational work. Secondly, misuse occur s in the various positionin s and posture s which ~ up:s itting still, lying, standing, kneeling and all the var iations of these. Over l ~00 such pos t 10ns nave been listed (Scientifi.cAmerican 196, 1957). Very few of them require a misuse of the body. It is what goes on within these 1 ,ooo different positions which matters: " It's not what yo u do, it's the way that you do it," as the popular so~ it. Thirdly, and perhaps more difficult to describe and to observe, are those,...&E1-i:i s of misu se which may occur whe1J....Y::'.Uomn--2_:1nic~. In addition to the obvious ways of communicat in g by word Thi s article incorpor ates material from "So me var ieties of mi suse", Th e Alexa11derJoumal No. 2, 1963.

The Mea11i11 g of Misuse

Fig.

I.

Pastry-cook from side and back , and stoopin g forward over work

Fig. 2. Arrow indicating osteoph yte

Fig. 3. H ead pulled back, body th rown forwar d, pelvis thro wn back

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and ges~ we most of us exhibit tiny signs which-unconscious ly, automatically, and whether we like it or not-transmit certain mood '-q_gi~- ~O.Jl trary to our conscious intention. These signs m ay be hardly perce ptible by ordinary conscious observation, but when we undertake a detailed re-e ducation by Alexand er's m ethod s, we find that they are depend ent on h abitual patterns ofnmswhrtension, which by th eir p ersistence and event ual irr elevance mu st be terme d a "mi suse" . The se tiny mood- signs, which Dewey called "properties of sensitivity and delicate participative response ", are part and parc el of our p ersona l conscious life; th ey may, how ever, come to includ e uncon scious fragments of som e "role" w hich was of significance in the past but which is now irr elevant. Such small gestures, grimaces, m anner ism s, and shift s of mu scular tension will appea r strange and in appropri ate because th eir co nt ent and origin have been lost; th ey evoke from tho se aro und us reaction s which we do not want and, as habit s, may be far more difficult to eliminate th an tho se already m en tion ed. It is significant th at Alexander first described misuse in relation to com munication ,i.e. in his speaking habits; and it is only wh en we discover, as h e did, a resting-state of muscle ten sion in w hi ch no "role" is expresse d that we beco m e aware of th ese irrel evant tensions. Fourthly, w~ust also expect to see misu se in a large range of biological activities which are par tly under volun_tary and partly under involunt ary control: such things as br eathin g, eatin g, exc reting , and sex .Th e way in which we handl e th ese needs or fun ctions may bring the concept of misus e into the provinc e of mor als and social adjustm ent.

Misuse and emotions These various types of misuse do not of course occur ind epe ndently; at any tim e we may se~ m ent , posture, communi cation and biologic al functioning int ermin gling in a c-;~npos1te muscular reaction , both emoti~na l andbehav ioural. Th~ nerof mu scular use is especially bo~n ~d up with th e ~motion s, sin ce mu scle is not only the vehicle of speec h and expressive gestur e, but has at least a finger in a number of other emo tional pi es- for exam ple, breathing regulation. And not onl are emotio 12al attitudes, say, of fear and aggression, mirrored imm e 1ately in the musde, but also

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The J\l[eaningof Misuse

Fig . 4a Repeated extension movement in hysteric . Such muscular over-contraction interferes with the body-schema by cutting out muscle-spindle afferent impulses.

Fig. 4b Similar extension movement mistakenly employed by physiotherapists in postural re-education

such moods as depression, excitement and eva ·Qn have their charactetis9.f mus~ular patterns and p.Q§tures.The Bib le has it :"He that being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall be utterly condemned." This observation was not apparently confirmed by Freud, who spoke enthusiastically of science being a "mighty power to stiffen one's neck in adversity"! Tegner's remarks were interesting in this connection : "Rigid, unbending religious principles may develop similarly unbending spines and muscles ... tension-pains are relatively common (and often quite intractable) in strict Baptists, Salvationists, Plymouth Brethren and so on." This "attitude tl~ory of emotjo_n" stems from Darwin, who used the term "expressive action" to denote the moveme12ts, ges. -- tures and attitudes from which the existence of aR underlying emotic ,m~l state might be inferred-"such movements of expression reveal the thoughts of others more truly than do words, which ~

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may be falsified ". D r Ro bin Skynn er, w ho had access to a gro up of my patient s, found a close relationship betw een th eir habitu al postur al attitud es and th eir predom inant psychol ogica l co nflicts: "It also seeme d clear th at th e release of sp ecific tensions we nt parallel with th e release and accept ance of attitud es and em otion s of whi ch th ey were n ot fully aware." Behaviour ally, it is clear th at th ere can be no form of mo vem ent , po stur e or communi cation whi ch wi ll not rely up on muscl e for its m anife station. Th e hysteri c in fig. 4n has a rep eated extension m ovem ent w hich Ca meron (1947) describ ed as"act ing through or relivin g a special circ um scrib ed role w ith a cons tant th em e . .. with repetition it m ay beco m e th e preferr ed habitu al mod e of escape from conflict" . Such " depersona lization " occ ur s as a result of mu scular hyper tension , in w hi ch po stural awaren ess is diminish ed; th e ph ysioth erapist in fig. 4b , w ho is doing a po stur al exercise, seem s unlik ely to improve h er mu scular awaren ess by behavin g in thi s m ann er. In ti1rn; mu scle is not onl y_ itself modifi til into recurr ent pattern s of 1nis~ ut i t m~difi es the bon es ani joint s o;-;i1ic h it wo rks an Tu e circulatory system w hi ch traverses it. As an anth ropolog ist, H oo ton (19 36) put it : "T he bony fram ewo rk has been war ped and cramp ed and stretch ed in on e part or ano th er in accordan ce w ith vari ations in th e stresses and strains put up on it by different po stur es." It has som etim es b een suggested by orth opaedic surgeo ns that repetiti ve m ovem ent s do no t pro du ce lastin g deformi ty, bu t thi s is clearly not th e case. Fig. 5, for examp le, shows a young j avelin thro we r w hose repeated move m ent s have led to a sideways cur vat ure; fig. 6 shows a ph ysical-tr ain ing stu den t wh o specialized in right-h and ed throwin g activiti es. H er rotary twi st at rest is app arent from th e breast and arm position . Alexand er's co ncept of misuse is, howeve r, m ore espec ially con--.. cern ed w it 1 smaller, persistent postur es and estu re whi ch gradu ally leave their m ark on th e orga nism unt il th e _resting state becom es defor m eJ '' M an is no t ben t because h e is old ,b ut beca use hi s un co nscious defe n ces h ave bent him ," was a view of Boot h (1937) in a stud y of persona lity and chroni c arthriti s. M any people, indeed , w ill pers ist in a misuse even wh en it is prod ucing pain . I have foun d it int erestin g in my out patien t clinics to ask pat ien ts 50

Th e Mea11i11 g of Misu se

who com plain, say,ofbuttockpain to describe to me the quality of their pain whilst th ey lie relaxe d , face downward on the bed. As they describ e th e qu ality of th eir pain , th ey almo st always set up a state of mu scular contraction in th e painful buttock, and even when

Fig. 5. Left- hande d j avelinthrow er, showin g developm ent of lateral cur vatur e during move111ent

Fig. 6. Rotation of right sho uld er and breast

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More Talk of Alexa11der

they can be persuaded to release this muscular misuse, it will return when they think once more of their pain. Such "pain-making" by overtensing muscles is quite unconscious. Almost all misuse ~~rns are below the level . of conscioumess ., an.d_ b~o influence the posture. Pain-making may occur in what might be called the "one fine day" syndrome, in which the patient, like Madame Butterfly, maintains a certain postural att itud e, even though it is pain-producing, in order to be "right" for the departed loved one, against the day of possible return. We most of us tend to adopt the attitude of those we love- even in the cin ema we may mimic in miniature those we identify with. Indeed, a family posture is often the expression of the basic family mood, e.g. the identical twins in fig. 7. Rejection of the family mood may lead to rejection of the posture-"! can't stand like that, it feels ju st like the way my mother look s," as one girl with chronic back pain said after her posture had been temporarily corrected. Fig. 8 is an interesting example of "pa in-produ cing" by muscular fixation of the left shoulder. It can be seen that the muscle

Fig. 7. Id entical twins with identical misu se. Notice dropped righ t shou ld er and tension right side of neck.

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Fig. 8. Unconscious painproducing contraction of left shoulder

The Nlea11i11g of Mis11sc

wh ich runs from the left side of the neck down on to the top of the left shoulder is contracted so that the shoulder has been raised up. This particular person had in fact been discharged from the services because of pain in this area, altho ugh no one had noticed the "misuse" cause of the pain. This is another example of misuse which ~persists-after- certairr ~mvrour because there is no- knowledge of a_prnR.Y resting state of balance . It might also be appropriate her e to mention the effect of carrying out forms of muscu lar exercise which involv e over-contraction of muscle (see fig. 9)-this is particularly harmfu l where there is already a structural deformity, since not only will the deformity be increased but there is increasing inability to return to a balanced state of rest. The implications of this for physical education are tremendous. In The Alexander Principle,I gave the example of a civil servant who had severe arthritis of the neck with associated arm pain. It was possible to train him to release the tension which was deforming his neck, and in this position he was free from pain. Such ,

Fig. 9. Cervico-dorsa l scoliosis. Note raised left should er and "bodybuilding" exercise which increases pain and defonnity.

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how ever, was hi s ingrained attit ud e of cringin g in front of his sup erior s that he was un able to maintain the improved posture until he had eventually had a row w ith th e boss. Such defor ming attitud es of cringin g and evasiveness event ually, ind eed, will lead to structural change: for examp le, the evasive action of perpetually turnin g the gaze away by turnin g th e head to one side/w ill often set up a per sistent twist at th e base of the neck. Against thi s, Alexa nd er has suggested, as did an orthopaedic surgeon, Goldthwait, 1917, that "w he n th e bod y is used rightly, all of the structures are in su ch adjustment that th ere is no strain on any part. The ph ysical pro cesses are at th eir best, th e ment al func( tions are perform ed mo st easily, and th e personality or spirit of th e individual po ssesses its greatest strengt h." / This is, ho wever, easier said th an don e. Tee nagers, who usually sit aro und in such slump ed po stur es as figs. roe and rod might feel "stu ck up" if th ey were to sit up, using th eir bodi es well, as in figure roa, even if th ey misuse th eir kn ees, as in figur e rob. The valu e of conforming to the group pattern of slumpin g outweig hs for them any o th er cons ideration. These co nformi ty defo rmiti es are hard to avoid and it is difficult to be with a lot of other p eople who are " pullin g down" without doing the sam e-a ll th e more so when they are not aware that su ch habits are harmful.

Figs. roa, rob, me, rod. Exam ples of po stur es.

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The Mea11i11g