On the Alexander Technique

Frederick Matthias Alexander (1869-1955), an actor, the founder of the system named in his honor, investigated human unconscious habits and how they interfere with learning, performance, and physical functioning. The total system has been established in 1880's and has been very popular ever since. One of its early proponents was George Bernard Shaw.

In our days Alexander Technique is considered a well-established holistic modality, recognized by both conventional and alternative medicines. Courses on the technique are taught, for example, at the Juilliard School of the Arts in New York, at the Royal College of Music and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, in Boston University and many other academic centers. Two Nobel Prize-winners for Medicine and Physiology, Sir Charles Sherrington and Sir Nikolaas Tinbergen, mentionedthe technique in their Nobel Prize acceptance speeches.

This is what they said: "Mr. Alexander has done a service to the subject by insistently treating each act as involving the whole integrated individual, the whole psychophysical man." (Dr. Sherrington). "Inoticed with growing amazement, very striking improvements in such diversethings as high blood pressure, breathing, depth of sleep, overall cheerfulness, mental alertness, resilience against outside pressures and also in such refined skills as the playing of a stringed musical instrument." (Dr. Tinbergen)

The Alexander Technique concerns mostly with very simple movements like sitting, walking or standing. The practitioners used what in our days is called "guided imagery", for example picturing the head as a balloon on top of the body, which helps to release the tension in the neck.

The technique is proved to be powerful in clinical settings in treating quite diverse diseases, including depression and Parkinsonian disease(Clinical Rehabilitation , 11 (1): 8-12, 1997), back pain of different etiology (Clinical Experimental Rheumatology , 14 (3): 281-288, 1996) and as a prominent relaxation technique (Professional Nurse , 2 (7):222-224, 1987; Nursing Times , 89 (49): 50-52, 1993 )