Deliberate Practice vs. Application

The Alexander Technique is meant to be applied. Dependent on your stage of learning (and life circumstances) you can speed up your development with Alexander Technique 'deliberate practice'.  You can think of this like the difference between practicing your instrument (deliberate practice) for the show, and actually performing the show (application).

Now you could just practice in your basement and never play a show, but then you'd never develop your ability to handle and enjoy interaction with other people and environments. On the other hand, you could play a whole bunch of shows and never practice but you simply might not give yourself enough clarity to improve on the mistakes you keep making. Thus, you ingrain bad habits and slow your progress.

What your balance should be between deliberate practice and application is something you have to determine for yourself on an ongoing basis. Typically, more deliberate practice is helpful when you get started or need to re-fresh, then application can take over. The key is to not completely either one for too long.

My balance this morning is at about 5% deliberate practice and 95% application.  These days when I'm really 'On and UP' it's probably more around 10-15% deliberate practice and 85-90% in application; I shift my balance this way so that when I teach i'm definitely 'On and UP' when I work with my students.

When I've gone through big learning jumps (especially in the beginning) I was likely closer to 40-50% deliberate practice and 40-50% application; and usually I took deliberate practice too far. This was part of my learning process. But this isn’t about me, it’s about you and your process.

So what's your balance between deliberate practice and application?

Beginner's Mind

Beginner's Mind isn't a new idea, and it's certainly not mine. In fact, I hesitated to put this post out because the idea of beginners mind is so overly discussed that it's practical application is easily lost. Nonetheless, I would argue the beginner's mind concept is essential if you're aiming to  self-generate new experiences of movement.

Here's a simple explanation of two major pitfalls and beginners mind in practice. From Andy Puddicomb (spoken when describing meditation practice):

".... it’s really tempting if we’ve had a few days perhaps where the exercise has felt really nice, left us feeling really kind of good, and we might turn up to the exercise wanting to re-experience that....and rather than allowing a natural process unfold, instead we try to project  onto the exercise what we’d like to experience."

"Alternatively, if we’ve had days when it’s been difficult, we’ve felt like there really hasn’t been much change, we might turn to thinking, ‘well it’s going to be the same again’..we go into the exercise rather than allowing something to happen organically... projecting our own ideas onto the exercise."

"So beginners mind...is really the idea that every time we turn up to the exercise we leave behind what has come before, and we simply follow the exercise through, allowing it to unfold in the way it unfolds on that day....in this moment...right now."

Thinking - Sensing - Feeling

It might be the case that the largest barrier to changing habitual movement and reaction is a limited awareness of ourselves.

It consistently surprises me how most of us (myself included) feel we clearly know what we're doing with ourselves/body/etc in action... However, it appears that when push comes to shove we're much less able to articulate the awareness of our actions than we think.

Most of the time we go about our actions on autopilot. Sitting, walking, picking things up with little direct attention to what we're doing.  It's not necessarily always bad, and it might be the most appropriate allocation of attention (if not certainly a personal or characteristic configuration of our attention in activity), but in any case it's just what is happening.

There also appears to be large differences of self-awareness between different people, and for the same people between different activities, times of day, and pressures.  Quality, accuracy, and depth of awareness is flexible, is generally underused, and can be trained like any other skill.  One way to get more detailed with your self awareness it is to articulate your observations as thinking, sensing, or feeling.

• Thinking = Observing thoughts (i.e. thoughts about future, past, present, etc..)
• Sensing = Any of your senses (i.e. what you see, hear, feel/touch, taste, and locating body segments and yourself in space *what's closer to the ceiling, my right shoulder or left shoulder? And does a mirror show me the same thing I'm sensing internally?)
• Feeling = Any emotional/affective colouring

Nursing Home In a Post-Texting World

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OK, I admit this picture is a bit dark, but don't give up texting quite yet, the relationship between movement and posture isn't quite that causal (2).  That said, the comic does reminds us that our postures (and behaviours) are not just a single event, but the end product of movement and choices expressed over a lifetime.

Each time you text, each step you take, how you move at work or at the gym;  over time, you are shaped in the ways in which you consistently perform these acts.  It’s an incredible and continuous act of learning that occurs between you and your environment, with and without your awareness and attention (3).

The opportunity lies here:  With each and every movement you're offered a fresh chance to observe, learn, and develop how you interact in the world.  This can include expressing new movement, positions, and behaviours that taken over time, can positively influence how you perform and experience the things you do; including how you use and shape your 'body'.

The opportunity is for the taking.

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Resources/ People/ Ideas related to the Alexander Technique in this post

1. Bizarro.com

2. Massion, J., Alexandrov, A., & Frolov, A. (2004). Why and how are posture and movement coordinated? Progress in brain research, 143, 13-27.

2. Krakauer, J. W., & Mazzoni, P. (2011). Human sensorimotor learning: adaptation, skill, and beyond. Current opinion in neurobiology. 21(4), 636-644.

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Posture Without Bracing?

Forcing yourself to sit or stand up straight simply doesn’t work well. We've all tried (myself included), yet despite this strategy failing to work we pretty much continue to do the same thing.

Sure, a select few people with will-power of steel have successfully 'fixed' themselves upright.  Unfortunately this consistently results in a stiff bracing with limited freedom of movement, restricted breathing, and elimination of the sense of ’naturalness’ in posture or poise.

Einstein supposedly said ...'insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result'.  So are we all insane? Maybe, but I think we've actually got quite a few tools to re-imagine this problem.  Here's one:

Re-imagine Posture as Readiness For Movement

The science behind how posture works is tricky business and there’s still much to discover.  Sometimes what’s found seems counter-intuitive to our normal approach.  For instance, some research suggests that overly bracing yourself may actually work against your own automatic (largely subconscious) postural control; sort of like interfering with your own postural auto-pilot.¹

Excessively contracting your trunk muscles to hold good posture may be causing more ’noise’ in your system, limiting the ability of your brain to do this skilled balance work for you.¹

One idea to re-frame what ‘good' posture means in your own life is to view it as a state of readiness for movement.² If you’re slumped, collapsed, or (it’s opposite) stiffly braced, then you’re less ready for movement in any and all directions.  If you’re balanced, engaged, and lighter on your feet or seat, you’re more ready for movement in any and all directions.

In standing, sitting, working at a desk, and everything in-between, a fuller expression of ‘good’ posture is often a simple by-product of being more ready to move.

 So the next time you catch yourself ‘fixing’ your posture, instead of ingraining a worn out old strategy, turn an old idea on it's head: Re-imagine posture without bracing and test out a new state, position, or set-up to access your readiness to move.

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Resources/ People/ Ideas related to the Alexander Technique in this post

1. Reeves, N. P., Everding, V. Q., Cholewicki, J., & Morrisette, D. C. (2006). The effects of trunk stiffness on postural control during unstable seated balance. Experimental Brain Research, 174(4), 694-700.

2. Jones, F. P. (1997). Freedom to change: The development and science of the Alexander Technique. London: Mouritz. *"posture as a phase of movement”.

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Posture, Expression, and Experience

You engrain and intertwine the ways you move and posture yourselves with the ways you express and experience your life.  This affects how others perceive you, and how you perceive yourself.

A common reason people learn the Alexander Technique is to improve posture.

What's interesting is that at some point in learning to improve you posture, you might end up gaining insight into the relationship between your postures and how others perceive you:  It can be a surprising moment when you become acutely aware of how your own postures and movements are so visible to others, yet much less so to yourself.

What's really interesting though is that your postures and movement go beyond how others see you; your movements and postures appear to influence how you see yourself.  In fact, they may influence your self-perceived levels of energy, the types of memories you recall, and the extent to which you feel assertive and powerful in stressful situations.

"Professor of Health Education Erik Peper found that simply choosing to alter body posture to a more upright position can improve mood and energy levels.” He argues that it’s not just the brain that influences the body, but the body that influences the brain; it's a 'two way street'.1 

For instance, in one study found that walking in a slumped manner “... actually increased feelings of depression and loneliness, and decreased subjective feeling of energy”,  but by changing postures subjects could experience greater levels of energy.2

This relationship goes even deeper in that postures may actually affect the kinds of memories you think of.  A study in 2009 found that “...posture significantly affects the recall of positive or negative memories... when sitting in a collapsed position and looking downward, it was much easier (for people) to recall hopeless, helpless, powerless, and negative memories...”

Clara Shih

The opposite was true when people sat more upright and looked upwards, from which position, ‘... it was difficult and for many almost impossible to recall hopeless, helpless, powerless, and negative memories and easier to recall empowering, positive...” ones.2,3 

In her 2012 Ted Talk, researcher Amy Cuddy described how the relationship between movement, posture, and self-expression is a fundamental factor that shapes who you are. She found that by taking on empowering movements and postures you can actually make yourself feel more powerful and empowered, which over time, can become part of how you go about your life.4

Like a 'who came first, the chicken or the egg?' scenario it seems postures are not only positions that happen after something happens, but also positions from which different kinds of feeling and memories arise.

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Resources/ People/ Ideas related to the Alexander Technique in this post

1. San Francisco State University: Research on posture yields insight into treating depression.

2. Peper, E., & Lin, I. M. (2012). Increase or Decrease Depression: How Body Postures Influence Your Energy Level. Biofeedback, 40(3), 125-130.

3. Wilson, V. E., & Peper, E. (2004). The effects of upright and slumped postures on the recall of positive and negative thoughts. Applied psychophysiology and biofeedback, 29(3), 189-195.

4. Amy Cuddy - Your Body Language Shapes Who You Are: Ted Talk

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Movement Awareness Training

There are many ways to explore movement, and the Alexander Technique offers one unique lens on this process.  Regardless of the approach(es) you choose, developing clearer awareness of how you move is a fundamental skill.  Here's a common example.

Hidden in Movement and Posture

You massage your over-tense back and it brings relief, but later in the week the problem returns... You have a nagging injury that always seems to ‘show up’ at the worst of times... You don’t feel your movement or posture is an issue; in fact, what does how you use yourself have to do with your performance or health?

When an underlying performance or health issue relates to how you normally use yourself in activity (e.g move or posture yourself) it can often lie below your level of awareness.

When this is the case, then downstream issues from the underlying issue can be excessively frustrating and difficult to deal with.  Your everyday level of awareness may still show you the symptoms, but these symptoms often hide the underlying problem even more.  One way to break this cycle is to learn your own patterns of movement and posture inside and out; so much so that you discover what is normally hidden to you.

Movement Awareness Training

Movement Awareness Training is about making a switch from unhealthy self-judgment and self-criticism, to a healthier state of non-judgment (or suspended-judgement) when observing your movement. It's about training yourself to be curious or even feel good when you observe your movement and 'mistakes' in movement, rather than beating yourself up with your observation to avoid having to do the hard work of training your movement awareness.

This is more than someone telling you that you’re out of alignment, that you should have better form, sit up straight, or be more 'present or grounded' when your perform.  This well intentioned advice simply points out what we're not aware of in ourselves.  It often fails to make lasting change because this external advice doesn't match up with how we internally perceive our movements and postures; leaving our issue still largely 'hidden' to us.

What's empowering is that if a performance or health issue is related to how you use yourself in your activities, then to an ever growing extent you can learn to sense how, when, and where these issues may be arising. You can build your awareness like a muscle.

In some instances you may even be able to develop your baseline level of self-awareness to the degree that it simply doesn’t feel right to move, posture yourself, or do your activities in many of the same old limiting ways.  And when it no longer feels right to do things the way you always have, then you'll change how you do them; you prevent the underlying problem from happening and catch off the symptoms in the process.

Remember, if an underlying problem is hidden in your movements, postures, and way of using yourself in your daily activities then problems often seem to come out of nowhere.  But by developing your self-awareness of personal habits of movement and posture you can increase your independent understanding of why these issues continue to come up.

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The Art of Everyday Movement

Pablo Picasso

It's impossible to learn the Alexander Technique without increasing awareness of how you, and others, move in everyday life.  You start to realize that there's so much expression in everyday movement that it may as well be it's own art form.

Making Art with Everyday Movement and Posture

Here's an experiment: Think about your everyday movement as if you're making art.  Regardless of the extent to which you're aware of your own movement, one could say your making art as you move and posture yourself throughout your day.  For instance, it's often the case that your friends know the art of your movements better than you do; they can pick you out of a crowd from 100 meters away just by the way you walk.

Here's another question along those same lines: If you were a character in a novel how would you describe your movement?  Smooth...stiff...light...heavy?  Dancers use entire systems to embody words to make art¹, thought it's rare for any of us (perhaps dancers included) to place this level of attention on our everyday actions, movements, and body-language.

Marsha Barsky³, a professional dancer and student of the Alexander Technique stated, " I move all the time, in all activities, and to cordon dance off from my other movements during the day was creating an artificial boundary between me as a dancer and me as a person outside of the studio...(Once I made that discovery) I ceased to think of myself as a 'dancer' or a 'mover' in the studio, and someone else outside of it"²

Picture from Monocle.com

Sure you might not aspire to be a dancer (or maybe you do?), but building deep awareness of your everyday movement can provide a foundation for making real and lasting change in your movement and postures. It's a simple, challenging, yet essential step towards accessing a fuller expression of your movement and self in everything you do.

In the art of posture and movement in everyday life what kind of art are you making?

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Resources/ People/ Ideas related to the Alexander Technique in this post

1. Laban Movement Analysis

2. Barsky, M. D. (2010). The Alexander Technique and Contemporary Dance: An Interview between Marsha and Robert Barsky. AmeriQuests, 7(2).

3. Marsha Barsky

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What This Blog Is About

This blog is a collection of thoughts and resources on the Alexander Technique. It's meant for curious people, but mainly for self-motivated students looking for more.

It's one more avenue for me to share a few of the ideas I've discovered along my own path as I learn and practice the Alexander Technique in my own life.

With it's challenges, personal insights, and benefits, learning the Alexander Technique has given me well over a decade of experiences and growth that I continue to develop and gain inspiration from each day.  

My hope is you'll find something useful or inspiring here to help you on your way.
- Mark