Undue haste and hurry in our lives often take us out of balance in our body, and our mind. Years of sitting or standing badly, working on computers, hunched over laptops, iPads or screens, driving, or slouching on sofas, give us unhelpful tension and body habits which take their toll.

We pay little attention to how we go about moving – or being still – but our habits in how we use ourselves in daily life may contribute to aches or pains around our body, stress, inefficient breathing or poor posture.

The very act of living in our world of haste and constant stimuli often literally means we pull down or tense unnecessarily in our bodies without being aware of it – and we take that extra effort and tension from our reactions and responses into all we do. Alexander Technique enables us a physical and mental space for change bringing us back into equilibrium.

Alexander Technique is a learnable skill, one you can carry forward into your daily life and that doesn’t require specialist equipment.

It is gentle, respectful and non-invasive.

It is a way of maintaining poise throughout all stages and challenges of life.

Who can benefit from Alexander Technique?

Those in discomfort or pain

Alexander Technique helps us reset our ‘default’ approach of bringing excess tension and effort into how we support ourselves and how we move. Learning to stay in easy balance in our body instead of adding unhelpful postural tension habits can help relieve and prevent aches or pain in our back and neck, or our shoulders and arms. Undoing unnecessary tension can help with stiff joints and retaining flexibility and mobility.

Bringing a conscious attention to things creates opportunity for change; to redirect energies from habitual unnecessary tensing we have become accustomed to. Understanding upright ease brings back freedom of movement and lessens potential for misuse or unnecessary wear and tear. Aches or pains such as neck or back pain can be alleviated as you learn to better manage your posture and movement.

Those who wish to enhance skills or performance

Alexander Technique is often taught in Performing Arts and Drama schools where learning to reduce patterns of undue stress and muscular tension enhances presence and poise for actors, musicians and singers. But you don’t have to be a performer to benefit from Alexander Technique. The same principles can be applied to performance or skill in any activity – from public speaking and voice to creative performance, from Yoga to cycling or running. Even how you sit at the computer or use your smartphone.

It’s about developing an awareness in activity of how you are in yourself as you go about whatever you do. And learning how not to interfere in your use of yourself with excessive tensing or effort in your body.

Those who wish to be calmer, more confident, more in control of their body and themselves

Many people come to Alexander Technique because they are aware of being out of touch with their body. Alexander Technique can help you acquire new habits of posture reacquainting mind and body so you can move with ease and poise – comfortably, safely and efficiently. Movement matters.

Alexander Technique won’t eliminate life’s pressures or take away your stress, but it will help you respond to things in a calmer and more productive way.

You can use Alexander Technique as part of your everyday life

It’s a matter of learning the art of pausing more, and of tensing less. When you grip that steering wheel, bash on your computer keys, sit at a desk or workstation, wait around in a queue, go about household tasks, walk along the street, sit for a coffee, play the piano, do Yoga, play sports, go running, lift or bend to tend your plants – whatever it is that you do, Alexander Technique skills will improve how you use your body and relieve pain and stress caused by everyday habits of misuse. It will help you to look after your body and yourself, and to cope better with the demands of life.

“You can’t do something you don’t know if you keep on doing what you do know.”

  FM Alexander