Primary Control: so primary control is essentially all about the spine, and how you align it and place your head on it. As a small child, Alexander expresses that you naturally align your body and your neck and your head properly because there's no conditioning to not do so, but of course we all end up slouching in the end for whatever reason. I slouch because my computer is way more comfortable on my lap than sitting on a table, for instance, and that conditions me to curve my back, and lower my head almost continuously. He also talks about the fact that proper posture is kind of a vague, military style concept for most people; so it's hard for a person to reflect on how to get your body to do a healthy posture without forcing it. This is where 'invitation' comes in, a term we use when we discuss meditating but that is also useful to provoke our bodies. Just as we invite our mind to focus back on the present, on the moment, we can invite our body to adjust, or head to adjust and it will do it for us in a way that's more comfortable that rigidly expecting it to move exactly how we want it to.
Unreliable Sensory Appreciation: This aspect of Alexander's technique has to do with being over confident or blind to where the flaws are in your posture and movement. Using a mirror is really important, because what we think our body is doing and what it's actually doing can be very different. It can be comparable to when a dancer is trained properly they always point their toes. When I dance, I may THINK I'm pointing my toes, but unless I can have an outside perspective or a mirror, or I consciously am trained to do it the way a dancer is, I have a misconception about what my body is doing. Alexander expresses that this is true about posture and movement and that he discovered in himself these misconceptions about his posture with a mirror.
Inhibition: Inhibition is a step after figuring out what primary control feels like, and working to keep it, to make it habitual instead of your other habits. By conditioning yourself to respond with a primary control posture (engaging both your body and mind in the effort) you better your well being; it just takes the self control not to maintain the habits that originally conditioned you have bad postures. Like.. I Should probably put my laptop on a desk honestly.
Direction: Direction correlates to me with invitation as far as Alexander explains it, that there's a gentle push for your body to do a specific thing, and you allow the impulse to occur rather than forcing it. There's an intent, and the body responds to the intention with an action, rather than demanding an action that's specific and may not be done correctly. It kind of calls for your body to be trusted, rather than forced; that instinctively you know what you're asking of yourself and you have to allow your body the freedom to do it with a gentle intent in mind.
Ends and Means: This is a great aspect that can be applied beyond Alexander's technique to life; that the process of performing something is more valuable than the end result, and while thinking about the process, you allow changes that may be more beneficial. Alexander's technique calls for this because by just focusing on a particular posture and the end result, there is a forcefulness that doesn't allow your body to react genuinely, but to simply approach a goal and complete a task. By thinking about the way your body gets to that goal, the way YOU get to your goals, you allow for your path to change for the better rather than simply completing a task and maybe forming some bad habits because of that hurry.
Reflection:
I think the Alexander Technique should have its own class, honestly. These are all great things to read about and understand, but we've said many times in class that this is something experienced rather spoken about. We have some great discussions about it, but I think a semester or even two of just working in this technique would be highly beneficial for all of the students in our department. Something I have noticed as a criticism towards American performers in film is that we're not trained, we make our break and we're not taking the classes and getting the education we need to be talented and versatile actors. I think that criticism has some merit when you look at how many British actors with college and conservatory educations are taking roles in American films. It makes me wonder, how many of our American film actors have even heard of this? This really useful technique that could really help them? Does Amy Adams or Brad Pitt or Will Smith know the Alexander Technique? Obviously we're in college for theatre, so we're a step ahead of the game in a way, we're learning about it, but I think these techniques are what's really going to make our skills refined and marketable in such a competitive industry. I think, from the conversations we've had about Alexander Technique this is a technique every actor should invest in, that this is fundamental training, the 101, and valuable both to performance and to life.
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