Shhhhhhh!

O.K., now that you've have been experimenting for a while, do you ever find that sometimes Noticing doesn't seem to work no matter how hard you try? If that's so, you're probably trying too hard. It's easy to get pushy with Noticing. When doing you experience Noticing as a simple shift of attention away from trying to feel, but we are so accustomed to evaluating things by how they feel, it's easy to fall back into using feeling as THE reference.

This is especially true when Noticing has led to changes that you like and want to repeat. Since those changes are defined by the new way you moved and felt, there's a tendency to go directly for those changes and forget about the Noticing. If we are truly determined to recapture the new experience, we will return to Noticing but try twice as hard, constantly checking to see if the nice feeling returns. Oops! The whole purpose of Noticing was to stop using our debauched kinesthetic sense as a guide in order to allow our postural reflexes to work their magic. Alas, no magic here, just stinky old habits.

Enter: Half-Power Thinking. Take the amount of effort you are using to Notice and cut it in half and then move a bit. Divide that effort in half again and move again. Divide again and move. Divide and move. Now you're Noticing with one-sixteenth of the effort you started out with. You are back in the realm delicacy. You're Noticing innocently, without an agenda and simply observing what happens.

The mind and the body are an interesting pair. Zen master Shunru Suzuki described them as being: "Not two, not one" He said, "If you think your body and mind are two, that is wrong; if you think that they are one that is also wrong. Our mind and body are both two and one...this is the most important teaching: not two, and not one." As separate entities, mind and body need to communicate but as a unity there is complete understanding, like telepathic twins. In certain ways we mediate that communication, but it has to be done gently. Noticing opens the door with a whisper. We move with ease and grace. There's no need to shout.

Frank

Dr. Frank Pierce Jones was my first Alexander teacher. Frank pioneered the scientific verification of the Alexander Technique. Using electromyography, X rays, multiple-image photography and a device that he invented called the force/stress platform, Frank documented the effects of the Alexander Technique from an objective, scientific point of view. I was lucky enough to participate in some of his experiments and honored that he included a short piece of my writing in his book, "Body Awareness in Action." Besides being a brilliant teacher and researcher, Frank was one of the kindest people I have ever met. He epitomized what it means to be "a gentleman and a scholar."

“The Alexander Technique teaches you how to bring more practical intelligence into what you are already doing; how to eliminate stereotyped responses; how to deal with habit and change. It leaves you free to choose your own goal but gives you a better use of yourself while you work at it. Alexander discovered a method for expanding consciousness to take in inhibition as well as excitation and thus obtain a better integration of the reflex and voluntary elements in a response pattern. The procedure makes any movement or activity smoother and easier, and is strongly reinforcing.”

Dr. Frank Pierce Jones

One-Liners

It is virtually impossible to break a habit, luckily, all you have to do is make a different choice.

I came across this oxymoron perusing the chapter headings in a well-known self-help book:How to Create Lasting Change.

The only thing you can rightfully expect is the unexpected.

Don’t feel your feelings just have them.

Great atheletes are great not because they do what others can't do, but because they don't do what others can't not do. {Try thinking that 3 times fast}

Thought first.
Movement second.
Feeling last.

Habits are opinions but ease is wisdom.

Good use is always there; tucked in just beneath our habits.

Intention.Attention.Surrender.

You can't use feeling to guide you because it’s always behind you.

You’re a scientist conducting an experiment not a policeman on border patrol.

The sixth sense is the sense of yourself.

It’s silly to try to understand what you already know.

See without looking.
Hear without listening.
Touch without feeling.

The Alexander Technique is only elusive if you are trying to catch it.

Experiment #2: Notice and Move

Notice and Move is the next activity to add to your daily AT experiments. It's very simple. You Notice and then you move.You Notice and then move again. Here are some guidelines:

1.
Make the movements short. Snap your fingers or sing a note. Take a step or tap a table. Stand up. Any movement that takes about a second will work. Short moves are the best because you're going to do a bunch of them in a row.

2.
Move immediately after you Notice. Don't wait to feel the effects of Noticing and in particular, don't wait until you're "sure" you've Noticed "correctly." Just flash the thought of Noticing and LOCOMOTE.

3.
Pause for a split second right after you've moved. This wipes the slate clean for the next Notice. As you get good, the pause will happen without your even thinking about it, but in the beginning pausing consciously keeps the movements from blurring into each other.

4.
Notice and Move 8 times in a row then pause for 10 seconds; that's one round. Do 4 rounds; which takes about a minute and a half once you get the hang of it.


Notice and Move is designed to help you experience how quick and simple Noticing really is. Repeatedly choosing Noticing over "old habiting" improves your coordination and it lays the groundwork for the next skill: being able to extend Noticing. Give it a try and see what you think.

"Simplify, Simplify." Henry David Thoreau

Noticing seems to burden you with yet one more thing to think about when you are trying to get things done. The truth is, Noticing lightens your thinking load; here's how. First, by inhibiting your habitual response, you trigger the postural reflexes. This allows your body to freely adapt to the unique demands of what you're doing at that moment. Under the umbrella of Noticing, your body unlearns some of the habit patterns that get in the way. As a result, you move more easily and release excess tension, which is actually excess TENSING, a verb, not a noun. It's frozen excess motion; much like a fist actively being clenched or opposing muscle groups playing tug-of-war with each other.

But this excess motion is also excess "thinking"; because before you can overdo a movement, you first have to over-think it. Noticing induces simplified thinking. It opens a gap in your habits so that your intrinsic intelligence can come foward. This vast intelligence has evolved through countless species over millions of years and is a lot smarter about movement than we are. By Noticing, we bow to this superior intelligence and so take advantage of its power. As a result, effort is distributed more equitably, we have more freedom and flexibility and we experience more ease. So, although Noticing seems to complicate things at the start it greatly simplifies things in the end because instead of doing more thinking when you stop to Notice, you are actually doing less, quite a bit less in fact. Thoreau would approve.

Fog and Progress

“After you have practiced for a while, you will realize that it is not possible to make rapid, extraordinary progress. Even though you try very hard, the progress you make is always little by little. It is not like going out in a shower in which you know when you get wet. In a fog, you do not know you are getting wet, but as you keep walking you get wet little by little. If your mind has ideas of progress, you may say, “Oh, this pace is terrible!” But actually it is not. When you get wet in a fog it is very difficult to dry yourself. So there is no need to worry about progress.”

Shunru Suzuki

What you don't know...

The Alexander Technique is a process of de-education. When you let go of knowing, learning rushes in.

The Virtue of Patience

When it comes to exploring movement, patience can be a good three-fold strategy. Patience before you move, patience while moving and patience after.

Being patient before you move opens the door for something fresh to happen. If you pause for a split second between deciding to move and actually moving, a tiny gap is created and in that gap you can Notice. That frees your body to respond in a more balanced way and you sidestep your habits of movement.

Patience during movement means that you don’t try to evaluate what’s happening by how it feels. Instead, you let go of judging things kinesthetically and gently ask yourself: “Am I Noticing?” This little question extends the gap and your body continues to discover an easier way to move.

Having patience after moving is perhaps most important of all. The desire to improve is what motivates us to make a change in the first place. However, we get in our own way if we constantly check to see if it feels like were getting better. Instead, if you can be patient and allow the process of re-education to evolve in its own way and at its own pace, you have the chance to change in a deep and fundamental way and in the end you benefit much more than you ever could have anticipated.

Experiment #1: Head/Hand

Noticing is easy. Try this:

Place one of your hands on the crown of your head. Now,
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Take your hand down

What were those two experiences like; Noticing your head and Noticing your hand?

Place the same hand on the crown of your head and again,
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand

Raise your hand 4 inches directly above the crown and;
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Take your hand down

What were those two experiences like; Noticing your head and Noticing your hand above your head?

Place your hand on the crown of your head one more time and;
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand

Lift your hand 4 inches above the crown of your head and
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand

Finally,
Notice your head/Notice your hand/Notice the space between your head and your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand/Notice the space between your head and your hand
Notice your head/Notice your hand/Notice the space between your head and your hand
As you bring your hand down Notice that space opening upward,

That's Noticing.