That Swing

There is information {guidance} that precedes normal sensation and ends up being much more useful. It is an energy sense, a feeling of ebb and flow that you can experience a split second before you feel a kinesthetic change. Musicians who play music in which rhythm is the most essential aspect call this feeling of flow the "groove" or "being in the pocket" Athletes call it "being in the zone" or "playing out of your head". Duke Ellington was referring to it when he wrote: "It Don't Mean a Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing." "That Swing" is the flow of life energy and ease that characterizes any high-quality performance. It is that especially valuable content that transcends all style and form.

Notice Now

"Every time you're willing to acknowledge your thoughts and come back to the freshness of the present moment, you're sowing seeds of wakefulness for your own future. You're cultivating innate fundamental wakefulness by aspiring to let go of the habitual way and do something different."

Pema Chodron
Comfortable with Uncertainty

All The World's A Stage

"Tensions and limitations always come from a lack of trust in yourself: either you are over-anxious to communicate or to present an image, or you want to convince an audience of something about yourself. Even the experienced actor often limitis himself by relying too much on what he knows works and is effective, and this in itself is a lack of freedom."

Cicely Berry
Voice and the Actor

Polemics

Noticing allows you to know how you are doing without judging. There is no good or bad, familiar or unfamiliar, improving or not improving, there is only Noticing or not Noticing. If you are Noticing , then you're fine. If you're not, and if asking the question hasn't already gotten you to Notice, you can then choose to do so if you want. Noticing works like a compass that points true North. Whenever you want to know if you are going in the right direction just Notice and you can save yourself the trouble of having to go all the way up to the Arctic Circle just to see if that's where the North Pole is.

Less Is All

"When things are going poorly, do less. When things are going well, do less."

Marjory Barlow

Notice Now

"Every time you're willing to acknowledge your thoughts and come back to the freshness of the present moment, you're sowing seeds of wakefulness for your own future. You're cultivating innate fundamental wakefulness by aspiring to let go of the habitual way and do something different."

Pema Chodron
Comfortable with Uncertainty

Sense and Nonsense

"It is because the thoughts you think you think appear as images that you do not recognize them as nothing. You think you think them so you think you see them. This is how your "seeing" is made. This is the function you have given your body's eyes. It is
not seeing. It is image making. It takes the place of seeing, replacing vision with illusions."

A Course in Miracles

A.T. and Tai Chi

"The head is lifted as if supporting something. The neck is upright and lightly pressing up.The body in between pulls open and you are open and extended. This should not be done in a way that is stiff. When this is done correctly then your spirit can come up. Your eyes are bright and shiny."

Yang Zhenduo
Tai Chi Master

Let it!

"Your head loves to float up out of your body. Let it!"

Marjory Barlow

Letting Go of the Good Stuff Too

If you drop a dollar,
why do you worry
all over the floor
in the dark just to find it?
You have a diamond mind!

Right and Wrong

"I am not going to teach you what is right. I will help you find out what is causing you to be wrong."

F.M. Alexander

East is West

The two most fundamental elements of Alexander's work are Inhibition and Non-Endgaining. They are the basis of conscious control which Alexander believed could lead to the possible and necessary evolution of humankind. Constructive conscious control of the individual was so central to Alexander's thinking that he chose it as the title of one of his books. Although his approach was revolutionary, the idea has been around for a while.


"Among the ancients, he who wished to have the shining virtue illuminated throughout the world, first governed his nation well. Wishing to govern his nation well, he first managed his family in good order. Wishing to manage his family in good order, he first cultivated his person. Wishing to cultivate his person, he first rectified his heart. Wishing to rectify his heart, he first rendered his thoughts sincere. Wishing to render his thoughts sincere, he first let his innate intellect reveal itself. The way to reveal innate intellect is to eradicate the desire for things."

Confucius
The Great Learning

Either,Or

Every thought, feeling, and intention is either expressed or repressed by the movement of your body.

Letting Your Talent Just Take Over

Joe Girardi, former catcher for the New York Yankees, when asked what it was that made his teammate, future Hall of Fame shortstop, Derek Jeter special he said: "He was so special because he was relaxed. He was relaxed as any player I have ever played with. When you are able to relax you allow your body to do the things that it can do. There are a lot of players that get tense in situations. They jump at the ball. They get too anxious. They don't see the ball good. Derek's not afraid because he lets his talent and his atheletic ability just take over. He was always fun to play with and you always wished as a player that you could relax as much as he could."

Dewey and Alexander

‘Never before, I think, has there been such an acute consciousness of the failure of all external remedies as exist today, of the failure of all remedies and forces external to the individual man. It is, however, one thing to teach the need of a return to the individual man as the ultimate urgency in whatever mankind and society collectively can accomplish, to point out the necessity of straightening out this ultimate condition of whatever humanity in mass can obtain. It is another to discover the concrete procedure by which this greatest of all tasks can be executed. And this indispensable thing is exactly what Mr Alexander has accomplished...When once a reasonably adequate part of a new generation has become properly co-ordinated, we shall have assurance for the first time that men and women in the future will be able to stand on their own feet, equipped with satisfactory psycho-physical equilibrium, to meet with readiness, confidence, and happiness instead of with fear, confusion, and discontent, the bufferings and contingencies of their surroundings.’

John Dewey

Unconditioned Listening

Here is one of the best definitions of Noticing that I have ever come across. It comes from "The Ease of Being" by Jean Klein. It really speaks to how important it is to Notice without any expectations; without an agenda.

“Whenever listening is intentional, tension arises because a result is anticipated, and this result is a product a projection of memory. Unconditioned listening has no end in mind and in this openness all the senses are receptive. Hearing is no longer confined to the ears, instead the whole body listens with an ever-expanding sensitivity until you feel yourself in listening itself...you no longer listen because you are the listening”

Self-Help

be present
be patient
be persistent
but kind

Freedom to Change

"If there are things in your experience that you no longer wish to experience your belief must change. If there are things that are not in your experience that you want to bring into your experience your belief must change. There is no condition so severe that you cannot reverse it by choosing different thoughts. However, choosing different thoughts requires focus and practice. If you continue to focus as you have been, to think as you have been and to believe as you have been then nothing in your experience will change."

"Life is always in motion so you cannot be stuck."


Abraham/Hicks
The Law of Attraction

Non-Judgement

One of the most valuable things about Noticing is that it can free you from judgment. Instead of evaluating how you are doing by whether it feels right or wrong, you can look at the way you do things soley in terms of whether or not what you're doing causes you to interfere with your ability to Notice. There is no right or wrong, there is only Noticing or not.

Facing Facts

"Facing facts is always empowering. Be aware that what you think to a large extent creates the emotions that you feel. See the link between your thinking and your emotions. Rather than being your thoughts and emotions be the awareness behind them. Don't seek happiness. If you seek it you won't find it because seeking is the antithesis of happiness. Happiness is ever elusive, but freedom from unhappiness is attainable now by facing what is, rather than making up stories about it. Unhappiness covers up your natural state of well-being and inner peace; the source of true happiness."


Eckhart Tolle
A New Earth

Cause or Effect?

I think it's helpful to remember that the excess tension that we experience while moving is not the disease but rather just the symptom. Our principal ailment is that we are hypnotized by the way things feel and are constantly comparing the sensation of moving to our expectation of how we think it should feel. Using our consciousness {and our subconscious} in this way, we interfere with our innate ability to adapt to the changing demands that moving makes upon us. Noticing can be a way out of this trap because when we Notice we aren't making comparisons. By asking yourself "Am I Noticing right now?" the present moment moves center stage. The question answers itself most helpfully because if you are asking it, then you are Noticing and when you are Noticing your body and mind work together to release excess tension.

Three Things

Here are three attitudes that can contribute to the speed at which you progress in the Alexander Technique:

1} Being interested in finding out what affect the choices you are making are having on you as a whole.

2} Wanting to understand the relationship between what you are doing right now and your ability to do things in the future.

3} Being more interested in 1} and 2} than you are in just trying to get somewhere or just trying to get something done.