“Studying the Alexander Technique with Steve is one of my favorite things each week. He’s a body whisperer who coaxes diminishing habits away and introduces the body to a better way. As an athlete I am less sore, as a singer I have more resonance, and as a lawyer I am more in command.”
What is the Alexander Technique?
The Alexander Technique is a rich study of posture, breathing, and movement.
The Alexander Technique helps people feel and function better. It uses touch and verbal instruction to reorganize patterns of tension and movement. Because we all have patterns — of movement, of tension, and of being that are tangled up with each other. The premise being that if we can get ourselves tangled, then we can also get ourselves untangled. While it’s not always a straight line, we build awareness, then awaken/activate new patterns, and finally figure out how to integrate into daily life. What this really means is training the communication between brain and body. With practice, you can clarify which patterns to encourage, and which ones to prevent.
Experientially, people report a sense of lightness and freedom, but also feeling energized, present, and grounded. Practically, the Alexander Technique encourages a reorganization of posture and movement which leads to a redistribution of muscle tone. Tone is the resting level of tension in your muscles. Usually this means that overused surface/power muscles get a needed break, and deeper layers of intrinsic musculature are coaxed into more activity.
Private Lessons
The best way to learn the Alexander Technique is through private lessons. Typically, students take weekly and sometimes twice-weekly 45-minute lessons. To begin, I suggest doing three lessons to gauge whether you connect with the work and my style of teaching. From there you can decide whether to carry on. Traditionally, a full introductory course is considered thirty lessons. I suggest doing a minimum of ten to give the work time to show up in your life.
I teach from my home in Bayside, just north of Brown Deer Road and east of Port Washington Road.
For rates, suggestions, and policies click the button below.
Who does the Alexander Technique?
People come to the Alexander Technique for a variety of reasons, but low back as well as neck and should pain are at the top of the list. It’s also popular with musicians, dancers, and actors. I’ve also worked with surfers, cyclists, and sommeliers. The range of folks who find benefit is an indicator that the Alexander Technique is not just one thing, and that using your body better has many benefits.
How does the AT contribute to Good Health?
Good health means participation.
Taking responsibility for how your energies are directed.
Being alert, open-minded, energized.
Free from pain and being able to cope constructively when pain is present
And to some degree, control over your reaction to stress.
Is AT about posture?
Good posture is a series of curves that are in balance. Poor posture often occurs when the balance is interfered with.
We all have strategies for balancing our curves. Often those strategies are a bit miscalibrated.
So things are a certain way and it may be good to get to know which relationships to encourage and which ones you’d like to prevent.
In that sense, yes, the Alexander Technique is about posture.
Will it help my _______? (back pain, migraines, tension, etc.)
Maybe…there’s a good chance… I would direct you to what others have experienced.
“…I get monthly migraines. I usually take a cocktail of pain meds to manage them, but my day is always ruined. Last week was intense for me, and I should have gotten a migraine. Instead, I kept noticing again and again the moments when I was holding tension in my head and neck and shoulders and I just gently let them release. And that migraine never happened. I’m wary of declaring victory over my migraines, or saying the Alexander Technique can cure something that’s plagued me my whole life, but these ways of being aware and gentle with my body are life changing.”