I’ve already posted several articles, and am writing more each day. I talk about things like finding ease, efficiency and balance as it pertains to playing music, safety concerns for musicians, as well as specific ideas and applications of musical practice aimed at helping musicians find and cultivate their personal expression.

I’ve posted some videos of remarkable musical performers, and from time to time will be using video to demonstrate some of the Alexander principles as they relate to practicing music.

I’ll also be writing reviews of books, ergonomic accessories and other products I think can help musicians.

So please come by and visit. I’d love any feedback, too. I’m always happy to research and write about anything that my readers find interesting. Just click here to visit Bill Plake Music Thanks!

One of the most common habits of tension I see as I watch many computer users (besides collapsing and sitting behind their sit bones) is how they “crane” their heads forward to get a closer look at the screen. This usually involves rounding the spine and tucking the pelvis backwards as the face is drawn closer to the screen. If you do this, you create a huge amount of excess tension in your neck and shoulders (not to mention your lower back as you tuck your pelvis).

So when you come forward to get a closer look at the computer screen, remember your hip joints, and move from them. To find your hip joints, simply trace the bone of each of your upper legs toward your pelvis. (You might find that your hip joints are more toward the middle of your pelvis than you thought.)

Once you’ve found your hip joints, practice hinging forward, moving your entire head, neck and torso as one integrated structure. Let your neck release so that your head stays in balance on your spine in an upward release. Then go back to your computer and apply this strategy as you come forward. If you get into the habit of doing this, you’ll find that your neck, shoulders (and your lower back) will feel better during and after your work session.

For you to perform well as a musician, you must be aware of many things simultaneously. Here are but a few:
• Your intonation
• The intonation of those with whom you’re playing
• Time and rhythm
• Notation (where applicable), including dynamics, articulation, form, etc.
• The quality of your sound, and/or attack
• The blend of your sound in the ensemble
• The conductor (where applicable)
• Your personal emotional expression

I could go on. The point is, you have to be aware of quite a few things. You also probably know that all these things are integrated together in your consciousness as the whole “experience of playing music”.

But conspicuously missing from the above list is one of the most important things to pay attention to: How you are using yourself. More specifically, what you are doing with yourself as you create music.

If you shift immediately to placing all your attention on yourself as you play, you’ll very likely play worse, feel awkward, self-conscious, and in general, disconnected to the music making process.

The idea is not to divide your attention by paying attention to yourself as you play, but rather, to gradually learn to integrate your self-awareness by expanding your consciousness.

Think about it. You’ve already developed your ability to keep many things in mind as you play (again, as an integrated whole). It’s therefore possible that you can learn to place an increased self-awareness into this whole. In my experience, I’ve found that self-awareness becomes the central organizing principle that helps me to be easily aware of everything else as I play.

In other words, self-awareness is the thing that integrates everything else (intonation, time, form, notation, etc.) into a clearer, whole musical experience.

So how do you develop this ability to be more self-aware as you play music? Simple, you practice.

Here are some simple guidelines and suggestions for practicing:
• Devote 15 minutes per practice period to deal exclusively with improving your self-awareness. After that, go on to practicing whatever and however you like. By devoting your time to this on a daily basis, you shift your emphasis on “sounding good”, or “practicing something useful” to allowing yourself to pay attention to your use as you play.
• Pay attention first to how you pick up your instrument. Do you tense up (stop breathing, pick up your shoulders, stiffen your neck/jaw, etc)? You might be surprised to learn that you’re already indulging in your habitual playing tension before you even get the instrument into position. Any unnecessary tension you notice as you do this, you can make a conscious decision to prevent.
• Notice how you’re sitting or standing as you play. Do you find your sitting (or standing) balance first? Or do you find yourself coming down and forward toward your instrument as you “clamp down” to play? It’s important to find an easy balance first, before you bring the instrument to you.
• Notice what you do as you create sound on your instrument. Are you stiffening your neck? Are you lifting your shoulder(s) unnecessarily? Are you pulling yourself downward, maybe twisting through your spine to do so? Are you locking your knees? Are you holding your breath? Are you making a huge, noisy, tense inhalation to prepare to play?
• Notice what you do as you begin to play notes. Do you lose your ease and balance? Do you begin to stiffen your neck and shoulders? Hold your breath? Stiffen your fingers and hands?

Anytime you notice yourself going into your habitual patterns of unnecessary tension in your 15-minute “awareness” period, you simply stop what you’re doing (even if it means to stop playing completely!) Every time you stop yourself from creating this tension as you play, you accomplish two important things:

First, you weaken the response from your brain that creates the pattern. If you do this over time, you gradually reduce the pattern to the point of elimination (it stops becoming your habit).

Second, you strengthen your skills in self-awareness. Your capacity to pay attention becomes more and more refined. The best thing about this is that after a while, you don’t have to “look” at yourself to become self-aware. Rather, the awareness of what you do with yourself as you make music comes to your attention on its own.

In a sense, this is what has already happened to you with your sense of pitch. If you’re playing out of tune (or if the person next to you is), you probably don’t have any problem hearing it. This happens because your capacity to discern pitch has been highly refined. Through practice.

And so it is with your self-awareness. So give yourself the chance to develop this very important skill. You’ll find nothing but growth and improvement if you do. In one sense, this is the chief aim of the Alexander Technique. Lessons in the Technique can help you discover an effortless way to integrate all the components of music making into a smooth running whole. Your practicing and your performing will never be the same.

Alexander wrote of “erroneous preconceptions” as being one of the stumbling blocks to improving how we use ourselves. If you don’t have a clear understanding of how your body functions with respect to gravity, it is quite possible that you will move and maintain balance in strenuous and inefficient way. This can, over time, lead to pain and dysfunction.

In recent years neuroscientists have been studying more about what they refer to as internal representations, body schemes, and body models. In the Alexander Technique world we often refer to them as body maps (based on the work of Alexander Technique teachers Bill and Barbara Conable). In the simplest sense, your body map is your brains representation of your body, and your body in relation to your external environment. What researchers have found (and Alexander Technique teachers reaffirm on a daily basis) is that the body map will always trump reality. That means that you will move in accordance to how your brain maps your body, whether that mapped representation is accurate or not.

If, for example, you think of your head as connecting to your spine at the very back and bottom of your head (instead of higher up between the openings of your ears), you will move and attempt to maintain balance accordingly. This means that you’ll stiffen the back of your neck in an effort to hold your head up (as opposed to letting your head balance on top of your spine). These leads to a huge amount of excess tension in your neck and shoulders, manifesting itself all the way down your back and affecting your arms and legs (as well as your breathing). Not good. But again, once this misconception is rectified, you’re on your way to moving more freely and safely.

There are many different ways we can map ourselves inaccurately. Here are a few of the most common and most essential body mapping errors that I encounter while teaching. I hope that this will help some of you gain a more accurate sense of yourselves:

• How and where your head connects to your spine-The vast majority of people, when asked where their heads meet their spines, point to the back of their necks about an inch or so below the level of their earlobes. In reality, the joint is located farther up and farther forward. Two get a better sense of where this joint is actually located, place the tips of your index fingers lightly in the openings of each ear. Now imagine where the tips of those fingers would meet if they could continue towards each other. That’s approximately where your head meets your spine. If you think it’s farther back and downward than it actually is, you will probably carry unnecessary tension in your neck as you pull your head backwards to hold your head up (as opposed to letting it balance on top of your spine).
• Your hip joints and sit bones-Your sit bones are the bony protrusions at the very bottom of your torso (part of your pelvis) that you can feel in the middle of your buttocks. Many people mistakenly think of them as being part of the legs, thereby tightening their necks, backs and hips as they try to “sit up straight” on what they think are their sit bones. In reality what they’re really doing is sitting on the backs of their leg bones.
As for your hip joints, they are not on the outside of your hips. The bones you feel on the outside of your hips (depending on where you are touching) are either part of your big pelvic bones, or are actually a part of your legs. Your hip joints, on the other hand, are located closer toward the inside of you pelvis. If you trace your upper leg bone from your knee toward your hips, you’ll find how it connects more to the inside of your pelvis closer to your hip joints.
• The connection of the arm to your torso-Many people map the arm as ending at the shoulder joint. This is a slight misunderstanding of the bigger picture about how your arms are structured, and how they function. Your arms are supported by a structure called the shoulder girdle, which consists of your shoulder blades, collarbones and the top of your breastbone. The actual place where your arm connects to your skeleton is where your collarbone connects to the top of your breastbone. (Your upper arm bone actually connects to your shoulder blade, which is suspended from muscles, but does not connect directly to your skeleton). You can find this joint by first finding the notch at the top of your breastbone with your left hand, and then moving your fingers to the right side of the notch to find the joint (it’s a small, bony protrusion). Once you feel that joint, move your right arm and you’ll feel the articulation of your arm at your skeleton. If you realize that your arm connects to your skeleton here, you’ll be less inclined to make all the movements of your upper arms from the shoulder joint itself. This will give you greater support, stability, strength and range of motion (not to mention help you avoid shoulder injuries).
• Rotating your lower arm-You have two bones that make up your lower arm: one is on the same side as your thumb, the other is on the same side as your pinky finger. When you rotate your lower arm, you cross one bone (the thumb side bone) over the other (the small finger side). In other words, the pinky-finger side bone stays still while the thumb side sweeps over it. Many people map this in the opposite way: thinking the thumb side as being stationary as the pinky-finger side sweeps over. If you do this, you will create a huge amount of tension in both your lower and upper arm (not to mention your neck and back). Rotating this way habitually can lead to several types of repetitive strain injuries (RSI).
• How your diaphragm moves when you breathe-Space doesn’t permit me to list the various ways that people misunderstand the diaphragm and it’s role in breathing. But here are a few clarifications. Your diaphragm is a thin, dome-shaped muscle that attaches to your spine and rib cage. When you inhale, your diaphragm contracts to pull your lungs downward as your intercostals (muscles between your ribs) move your ribs upward and outward. This has the effect of increasing the internal volume of your thorax (body cavity), which creates a vacuum in your lungs, thus sending the air in. Many people see their stomachs moving in and out (relative to their backs), and therefore mistakenly think that they are seeing the movements of the diaphragm. But your diaphragm doesn’t move that way. It moves upwards and downwards (toward and away from your head, respectively). What you see when your stomach moves forward and back is the displaced content of your abdomen. If you mistakenly think that it’s the movements of your diaphragm, you’ll have a tendency to collapse or tighten in your rib cage, which greatly interferes with your capacity to gain a full, free breath.

So let yourself clarify and improve your body map and you’ll move and function better. Lessons in the Alexander Technique are a great way to gain a clearer, more accurate body map. Not only will you learn about where these important structures are in your body and how they work, but also, (more importantly) you’ll gain the kinesthetic experiences of moving with this new, improved map. This is learning on the deepest level, and leads to significant, lasting improvements in your movement and postural habits.

How did you become interested in studying the Alexander Technique?

What prompted me to study the Alexander Technique is that I noticed it on the La Canada YMCA schedule, and I’m cheap. It’s great when the universe comes through, as it’s been on my personal “To Do” list ever since I heard about it in a college acting class. Decades later with horrible posture and all sorts of problems like osteoarthritis in my hip and spine and asthmatic tendencies, I thought taking the class would be more fun than an inhaler or a hip replacement. Although I must admit, I am looking forward to my pat downs by TSA at airports.

My posture is what really bothered me so I decided to give the class a go. What happened was I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, and I looked like the Leaning Tower of Pizza with gray hair. The fear of growing a hump on my back came up too, which would be really scary because I swim a lot and might be mistaken for a shark and then shot.

How have you been helped by the Alexander Technique?

I sit for long hours in front of the computer, as I write and do all sorts of research for all sorts of documentaries. I love my work but sitting all day makes the stress on my lower back incredible. I also sing and perform professionally, and what I’ve learned in Alexander classes I take with me to auditions.

The Alexander Technique has helped me become aware of where I am holding stress, so much so that I’m now able to relax without going to firing ranges. This has actually saved money for private lessons in the future. Now when I resort to old posture habits, I can quickly reduce the tension or as we say in Alexander speak: “Inhibit the response”. My vocal range is now 2 ½ octaves, and I have very few breathing problems. Although the pain in my lower back and hip can be intense, instead of pushing through it, I’ve learned to listen to it. Lying on the floor with my knees bent as I’ve learned in class is like a spinal epidural for me.

How would you define and describe the Alexander Technique?

I have this childhood memory of riding a horse on an early summer morning in the country when the sun was bright but not hot and the dew glistened on the grass. Everything was moving comfortably and in harmony that day, and it was the first time I felt confident. I use this memory a lot these days when the pain gets really bad, and I am sharing it with you now as to me it best describes what the Alexander Technique is. Perfect. Painless.

What advice do you have for anybody just starting lessons in the Alexander Technique?

The best advice I can give to anyone starting the Alexander Technique is to stick with it. Change starts on the inside, and it’s a process, and of course, have a sense of humor, because it’s a fun ride!

Click here to see Elizabeth’s short video on the Alexander Technique

This seems almost impossible to believe, because so much of your conscious attention is going into what’s going on with your fingers, mouth, tongue, etc., as you play saxophone.

But research has shown that a great deal of brain activity is involved in maintaining the act of upright balance (most of it below consciousness) as we human beings go about our business. Research has also shown that when we are struggling to maintain balance that our other cognitive functions tend to be compromised. This often leads to the downward spiral of tension (stiff muscles) creating more tension (frustration and distraction).

In fact, most of the patterns of muscular tension that I see musicians engage in involve some form of “fighting” their natural balance. A stiff neck, raised shoulders, rigid (or collapsed) spine, locked knees (and a host of other bad habits) all have one thing in common: They put you out of balance.

If you are habitually putting yourself out of balance as you play, you are not only creating unnecessary tension in your body, but also, you’re keeping your brain from giving its optimum attention towards your music making. Better balance means a better chance to find expression, creativity, adventure, presence, and pleasure as you play your instrument.

What are the qualities of good balance? Good balance:
• Is dynamic and fluid (the relationship of your living body and gravity continuing to change in real time)
• Is easy to maintain
• Supports good breathing
• Involves muscular release (primarily) to expand your stature
Conversely, good balance:
• Is not rigid and fixed (it’s not just a “position”)
• Is not exhausting
• Does not interfere with breathing (no breath holding!)
• Does not involve muscular tension that (primarily) compresses your stature

So when playing your instrument, begin with how you balance yourself. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Notice your habit. What do you do with yourself as you play? Do you find yourself stiffening and compressing yourself downward toward your instrument? Do you find yourself stiffening your neck, craning your head forward? Do you stiffen your legs? Noticing your habit is the best first step to lasting change.
• Start with exploring balance without your instrument. If you sit when you play, make sure your head is gently poised (as opposed to stiffly held) on top of your spine directly above your pelvis. This means you’ll need to sit on your sit bones (the bony protrusions you can feel in the middle of each buttock). Let your feet rest evenly on the floor with minimal tension in your legs. If you stand when you play, let yourself release into an easy upward balance: your head gently poised on top of your spine; your shoulders released and supported on your ribcage; your pelvis in neutral (no arched back or tucked pelvis); soft, unlocked knees; your body weight dropping straight down through your ankles and coming very slightly toward your heels. If you’re in reasonable balance there will be a plum line (more or less) from your ears, through your shoulder joints, through your hip joints, through your knees, through your ankles.
• Practice maintaining balance as you bring your instrument to you. Notice that as you bring your instrument in front of you that your balance will change. It has to. When you hold something in front of you, you need to let your weight come slightly backwards to achieve a counterbalance. If you don’t allow for this you’ll probably tense and brace your back and legs way more than necessary. If your standing, let your weight come back slightly from your ankles. If you’re sitting, let your weight come slightly back from your hip joints and sit bones. In either case, don’t bring your weight back from your waist by arching your back. Check yourself in the mirror, or get feedback from another person to help you with this.
• Notice if you pull yourself out of balance as you begin to play. Can you maintain balance as you play, or do you find yourself going into your habitual pattern of tension and imbalance? This is a great opportunity to stop and redirect yourself into easy, upward releasing balance.
• Never try to “hold” yourself in balance. Remember that balance is dynamic, not static. It’s less about position than allowing the freedom to your neuromuscular system to make continual adjustments. (I know I mentioned this above, but it bears repeating.) Balance primarily involves release.

Like most skills in music, this is something you’ll need to practice if you wish to improve. It’s well worth the effort. If you can maintain an easy, dynamic balance while playing, not only will you avoid unnecessary fatigue and strain, but also you’ll open up your mobility and freedom to express yourself in a more satisfactory way. Lessons from a skilled Alexander Technique teacher can help you significantly to understand, discover, and utilize effortless balance as you play music.

One common misconception that people considering a course of Alexander lessons have is that the Technique is a finite method of training aimed at learning how to have better posture or relieve pain. Because it is called a “technique”, this seem like a fair assumption. In other words, you learn this exact bit of bit of information, in this exact sequence, and all your problems are solved. But the Technique is actually more of a process of exploration and application that you bring into your daily living to get continuous improvement in how you function. I continue to study the Alexander Technique (and am always improving the quality of my life because of it). In essence, there is no limit to how much you can grow and improve by applying the Technique.

Another common misconception is that the Alexander Technique is a form of manipulative “treatment”. This invites the false assumption that every lesson is directly involved in changing the structure of your body, perhaps in the way that Rolfing (or other deep tissue work) or chiropractic treatments work.

While it is true that your body will very likely change structurally after an extensive series of Alexander lessons, it is not the primary intention of the work. The Alexander Technique is a form of postural and movement education. Because of this what we’re aiming for is helping you to improve your thinking (your awareness, your sensory perception, your attention), so that your body will come into good balance and tone (because of your improved thinking). This is something that requires consistent application and reinforcement of the Alexander principles.

Another mistake that people sometimes make when starting lessons is taking them sporadically. Although something is always gained from an Alexander lesson, it is nearly impossible to get lasting changes without having the timely and consistent feedback that the lesson experience gives you. If you take one lesson every once in a while, you might find yourself feeling as if you’re starting from scratch over and over again. This obviously brings frustration, an ultimately, you’ll probably give up on the Alexander Technique without giving it (and yourself!) a fair chance.

Some Alexander teachers think of it this way when asked the “how many lessons” question: If you went to a piano teacher and asked the same question, the teacher might reply, “That depends on what your goals are. Do you want to learn to play a simple melody? Do you want to learn to play easy, popular classical pieces? Do you want to play professionally?” And so forth. As you can see the answer to this question becomes more open-ended. It could be anywhere from 2 to 3 lessons to a lifetime of study.

In a certain sense it’s the same with the Alexander Technique.

Here are a few things to keep in mind when considering how many lessons you might need:

• What are you hoping to achieve from taking lessons? Do you wish to manage chronic back pain? Do you wish to improve your coordination as you participate in a particular skilled activity, such as a sport or playing a musical instrument? What you are hoping to achieve will be a determining factor in the number of lessons you might need. I’ve had students who’ve taken four or five lessons, and have been absolutely satisfied that their issue had been resolved. I have other students who continue to take lessons even though their initial reason for taking lessons has become resolved. They continue, as I do, because they find new surprises in how much more easily, comfortably and confidently they can move.

• What particular challenges are you facing? Do you have serious chronic back pain? Have you had it for many years with little to no success improving this condition? Do you have structural and/or medical issues that increase the severity of your condition? These are obvious challenges that will influence the amount of study and application you can expect.

• What is your learning style? Do you learn easily from kinesthetic experience? Or do you have a difficult time discerning anything about what’s going on in your body? Do you need a good deal of verbal explanation? Are you reluctant to try something new, or do you dive right into things? It takes even a highly skilled teacher some time to discover how you learn best.

• How willing are you to apply what you learn? Do you want to only come to the lessons and not give it a thought afterwards? Or are you the type that takes a bit of information and immediately puts it to work? The Alexander Technique is not a form of treatment. It’s education plain and simple. Ultimately you’ll improve because you’re beginning to apply what you learn outside of the lesson.

• How frequently can you take lessons? If you can only come once in a while for lessons (two weeks, or so), you’re most likely going to require more lessons to achieve the same results than you would if you came every week (or even better, twice a week). Because your habitual patterns are so ingrained, the more frequently you can “go against them”, the faster you’ll learn (the more you’ll improve).

So if you’re considering taking lessons, here’s two things that I’ll recommend for your satisfaction with your endeavor:

First, take the right amount of lessons from the start to give the Technique a fair chance. This means maybe starting with a single lesson to see if the work is something that interests you (and more important, seems like it’s something that can help you). If your still on the fence after one lesson, take two more. After about three lessons you’ll probably know for sure whether or not you can help yourself with this work. If you decide to continue at that point, commit to taking a series of ten more lessons. After these lessons you’l have noticeable improvement and may have even had your needs completely met. Either way you’ve given the Alexander Technique a fair chance. It is important that you take your lessons at least once per week in the beginning. Twice per week is preferable, and highly encouraged. Even if you only have enough money for ten lessons, take them twice per week. You’l have a significant learning advantage.

Second, think about adding lessons in increments once you’ve committed yourself to studying the Technique. After you’ve tried ten lessons, commit to 20 more (even if you have to do so in increments of 10). After about thirty lessons you’ll be pretty far along with the work. It is often at that point that I get my “lifetime students”. That is, students whose initial concerns have been met, but continue to study the work because of all the other surprises in improvement that lie ahead. I am such a student. It’s also at this point that students begin to take lessons more sporadically, as more of a “tune up” or “reminder” in the work. I’ve yet to see any student disappointed in the Alexander Technique after giving it such a chance.

Ultimately how many lessons you might need is a personal thing. I’d have to see you, asses your habits of use, learn who you are, what you need, how you learn. But I hope this gives you a little something to consider.

Alexander described the Primary Directions as “an ideal state of conditions” in the human organism. You can think of the directions as a description of expansion in the body as opposed to contraction. The directions are never something you try to “do”, but rather, are something to hold in your thinking (as a way to prevent you from unnecessarily tensing or collapsing) while in activity. They are as follows:

I allow my neck to be free,
so that my head can release forward and up,
so that my entire torso can lengthen and widen,
so that my knees can release forward and away
(forward and away means specifically that your knees release forward from your hip joints and away one from the other)
so that my heels can release down (into the floor or ground)

Keeping in mind that the Directions are preventative by nature, you can also think of them as:

I allow my neck to be free (I won’t stiffen my neck)
so that my head can release forward and up (I won’t pull my head back and down my spine)
so that my entire torso can lengthen and widen (I won’t shorten my spine or narrow my back)
so that my knees can release forward and away (I won’t retract my legs back toward my hips and I won’t pull my knees in toward each other)
so that my heels can release down (I won’t stiffen my legs and feet. Instead I’ll let my weight pass through my spine, pelvis, legs and feet so that I can release up and away from the ground)

Whenever you see anybody moving with great ease, confidence, balance and coordination, they are usually moving in the manner described here in the Primary Directions (whether conscious of it, or not).

It would serve you well to know, memorize and understand these directions. A great place to start would be to practice repeating them to yourself as you lie down in constructive rest. Notice how much more release and expansion you get. Notice how your breathing gets easier. Notice how you calm down. Notice how you become more present, more connected to yourself and your surroundings. If you practice this daily, your ability to direct yourself gets clearer, stronger and more applicable.

Make a commitment to yourself to use your Primary Directions more and more in your activities. Use them as you exercise, cook, walk, work at the computer, sing…anything can be made better by directing yourself in a constructive way. As a musician, I use the directions over and over as I practice and perform. Think of “refreshing the thought” (renewing your directions) while you’re in the middle of doing something: letting yourself stop, become aware, and move with greater ease, balance and enjoyment. Even doing this a few times each day can make significant improvements to your health and well-being. Give it a go!

The best saxophone lesson i’ve ever had was not given to me by a saxophone teacher. It was given to me by somebody who knew nothing about playing the saxophone: Frances Marsden, my first Alexander Technique teacher. It was precisely because she knew nothing about playing this instrument that she was able to help me see many of my harmful habits for the first time. She did something very simple, but immensely helpful: She observed what I was doing as I played, then asked questions about it.

She would ask, for example, “Is it necessary for you to raise your left shoulder as you play?” I would stop for a moment and think, then reply, “No, it’s not at all necessary. It doesn’t help my sound or my fingering technique.” She would continue, “Let’s see what would happen if you don’t do that.” And of course, I found that if I didn’t do that, I would play better. We would go on and on like this. She, rather innocently asking questions, and I stopping to observe and reconsider my technique. You see, Frances didn’t know what was necessary to produce sound or create technique with the saxophone. She was just looking at the tension I was creating as I played, and asking me if it was necessary. Sometimes it was, but more often than not it wasn’t.

Most saxophone teachers would never ask many of the questions Frances asked because they are so used to seeing such habits of tension in their students, peers, and themselves. In fact, many times they don’t even see this as tension at all. It’s what’s necessary to play the instrument (so they think). This can be the price that is paid for being an “expert” in something. You stop seeing the possibilities for change and growth. You accept that some things are the way they are simply because you can’t imagine beyond your own knowledge and experience.

When I work with performing artists or athletes, I strive to be like Frances, to maintain the mind of the beginner. I simply observe and ask questions. This usually helps these people to see what they do in a completely different light, and thus opens the door to growth and improvement.

And even as I teach the Alexander Technique to people who aren’t performers, I like to proceed in the same way. I think that there is no limit to the amount of ease and efficiency we can find in any activity. When I’m not teaching at my best, it is often because I’ve lost sight of this. I’ve stopped thinking like a beginner and instead find myself handing the “answers” to my students. When I shift back to “not knowing, so that I can observe and ask questions” I find my way back to useful teaching technique.

And as I continue to improve as a musician, teacher and human being, I find that I need to think like a beginner more than ever. It is always a thrill for me to discover some seemingly little bit of tension that I create in myself, then asking if I need to do that. (The answer is usually a resounding NO.) Then I can use my inhibition and direction to let some new surprise emerge.

So as you proceed with your activities, allow yourself to imagine that you could discover at any moment a new and even more efficient way to carry out your activities. Let yourself find wonder in what you do. Observe yourself and ask questions. Have fun not knowing. To paraphrase F.M. Alexander, “The next time you find yourself pleased by the way you did something, smile to yourself and see if you can do it again with half the effort.” You’ll never stop improving as long as you think like a beginner.

The subtitle of this book is: “Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science”. I can say without hesitation that this is one of the most inspiring books I’ve read in many years. In essence, it’s a story about the brain’s ability to physically change itself through experience (referred to as “neuroplacticity”). But what makes the book particularly relevant is that it is about how these principles of plasticity have been transformed into practical applications that have manifested seemingly miraculous results for people with serious neurological problems (psychological, physical and psycho-phyiscial).

Through intriguing accounts (that border on sounding like science fiction!), the author introduces us to the work of such cutting-edge neuroscientists as Paul Bach-y-Rita, Edward Taub and Michael Merzenich. These scientists, by using ingenious procedures and rather brilliant (yet startlingly simple) technology, produce miraculous results in their patients:

A women who’s vestibular system (absolutely crucial to upright balance) is destroyed learns to stand and walk, and becomes fully mobile again by training her brain to use her tongue as her “vestibular system”.

People who significantly improve their physical strength by only thinking an exercise routine, rather than physically carrying it out.

There are also stories about stroke victims making (previously thought to be) “impossible” recoveries, as well as people who learn to free themselves of addictions, depression, and a host of other psychological ills. Doidge even talks about some of the improvements in autistic children through new types of therapy and application of ideas. All of this is done by changing thought and activity to change how the brain functions. (This sounds a bit like what happens in a series of Alexander Technique lessons!)

In the Alexander Technique the student is constantly brought to the various stimuli that produce his or her habit, and then taught to respond in a different way. In doing so, the student weakens and eventually changes the habit. This is referred to in this book as “unlearning”, and Doidge makes very clear the difference in the nervous system between “learning and unlearning”, stating that unlearning (as you might expect) is more difficult than learning. Most of the changes that took place with the various patients cited in this book involve unlearning.

From my Alexander Technique teacher point of view this is very exciting and affirming: Inhibition is the key to making changes in ourselves, and we have no idea of the scope of its power. This I wish to always keep in mind as I teach the Technique, and as I work on myself.

Other Alexander principles and ideas come to light in this book: focused attention, redirection of thought, self-perception and sensory appreciation, to name a few. Also, much of the therapeutic work described in the book involves movement: forcing the brain to work in a different way as an activity is carried out. To be clear, the author never mentions the Alexander Technique. (He’s probably never even heard of it, though maybe he should.) It’s just that the principles he cites of changing the brain involve the same principles that Alexander discovered many years back.

The bottom line is this: when we change our thinking, we change our brains. This is why I think that after having a certain amount of Alexander lessons, people rarely (if ever) fall back to their old habitual movement patterns.

The Brain That Changes Itself also clearly describes how neuroplasticity conditions not only our beliefs, but our likes and dislikes in everything from food, to music, to people, to moral values. All of these things are malleable through experience.

Rest assured that Doidge writes in an easy to understand manner that will appeal to the layperson. No huge technical explanations or difficult abstract concepts to grasp. Easy prose written from a compassionate point of view (Doidge is a psychiatrist.) The book was, in fact, on the NY times Bestseller List. So go to your local bookseller (or go online) and buy it. Or go to your local library and check it out. I think you will be edified, if not amazed.