This ebook, An Alexander Technique Approach to Psychotherapy, is published on this website in a PDF format. It explores the connection between physical habits and beliefs that we live by.
This ebook is also for sale on all AMAZON websites in a KINDLE format.
Located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (MOVEMENT THERAPY)
Because the Alexander Technique is mostly known for how we work with people in psychotherapy to solve their physical problems, it isn’t common knowledge that we also use release work on the massage table to help the person in psychotherapy get out of physical trouble.
What is the purpose of tablework in an Alexander Technique session?
IT IS TO SHOW THE PERSON IN PSYCHOTHERAPY HOW TO FULLY REGAIN CONTROL OF HIS OR HER BODY, FROM HEAD TO TOE, SO THAT THE CLIENT RECLAIMS THE ABILITY TO STOP CAUSING HIS OR HERSELF PHYSICAL PAIN AS THE PERSON IN PSYCHOTHERAPY GOES THROUGH PSYCHOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATION.
What do I mean?
There is an AMAZING principle that is central to the Alexander Technique, and it is not part of any other movement work that I know of. Here is the principle: IF YOU CAN RELEASE TENSION ANYWHERE YOUR BODY, THEN YOU HAVE CONTROL OF YOUR BODY. It is truly a display of true CONSCIOUS CONTROL of your body, when you can release holding and tension anywhere in your body.
ANY PERSON IN PSYCHOTHERAPY CAN GO THROUGH PSYCHOTHERAPY WITH EXCESS PHYSICAL TENSION, AND MOST DO. BUT HARDLY ANY PERSON IN PSYCHOTHERAPY CAN RELEASE EXCESS PHYSICAL TENSION SIMULTANEOUSLY AS HE OR SHE TRANSFORMS EMOTIONALLY, UNLESS THEY’VE DONE ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE WORK.
Tablework plays a huge role in assisting the Alexander Technique teacher show the which parts of the body that the person in psychotherapy has no control over, and then how to regain conscious control over these disconnected areas.
I have the person in psychotherapy lie on the table on his or her back clothes on. I ask the client to let me lift an arm, and to not lift the arm for me or hold it up once I’ve lifted the arm.
You would be surprised how many people in psychotherapy are incapable of releasing their arm, of making their arm available for me to move without the client helping. The moment the person in psychotherapy realizes I’m going to lift the arm, they lift the arm for me, AND CAN’T LET ME DO THE LIFTING WITHOUT HIS OR HER HELP.
This is a powerful expression of how the person in psychotherapy has lost the ability to be “at rest” in the arm. In other words, the client is tensed 24/7 to do something with the arm and is never at ease or rest in the arm.
What I just wrote simply translates into the person in psychotherapy always having unnecessary excess tension in the arms, which is carried into psychological defense, and eventually causes physical pain and strain, no matter how well the person in psychotherapy seems to move.
As I work with the person in psychotherapy on the table, I also ask the client to consciously surrender the movement of each leg to me, or to let me support and move the client’s head with a released neck.
So, in tablework I teach the person in psychotherapy how to consciously regain control over the client’s whole body by ASKING THE CLIENT NOT TO HELP ME.
Let me talk about this psychologically for a moment. WHEN WE ARE NEWBORNS WE DO NOT HELP OUR MOTHERS TAKE CARE OF US. We let our mothers do everything for us initially, and as we mature we learn to do more and more for ourselves, and this is normal and healthy. If you look at the logical progression of doing more and more for ourselves over time, many of us get the message that we must do everything for ourselves all of the time.
This means that if you feel you must do everything for yourself and do it well as you go through psychotherapy, you will go overboard. Going overboard means you will try to process your past with too much physical tension. Too much work is too much tension, and this leads to wear and tear and pain to the body.
How this shows up is as an inability of the person in psychotherapy to stop doing too much unnecessary physical work in a psychotherapy session. IF YOU’VE SPENT A LIFETIME BELIEVING THAT THINGS ONLY GET DONE IF YOU DO THEM, THEN YOU WILL PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY DO TOO MUCH TO GUARANTEE THEY GET DONE RIGHT!
The Alexander Technique teacher’s job is to help the person in psychotherapy regain or acquire for the first time conscious control of his or her body, by finding that balance between doing what is necessary in daily activities, and by learning to let go of the physical tension and habits that are unnecessary in doing things and interacting with others.
IN SO MANY WAYS AN ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE TEACHER CAN TEACH THE PERSON IN PSYCHOTHERAPY THAT IT IS OK TO ACCEPT HELP AND REDISCOVER THE JOY OF NOT HELPING AND NOT DOING UNNECESSARY WORK WITH TABLEWORK.
