Alexander Technique Case Study: Vadim
March 19, 2019
First Session
What did you learn?
I learned how to feel and try to release tension in different parts of my body, particularly in my arms and knees. More specifically, I learned how to consciously take the time to think about my body before an action, in particular to sit down keeping my feet grounded, hip-width wide, without my knees going inward, and using my back to keep my body straight. Last, I learned how to stand up in a more effortless manner.
Where in your body did you become aware of that you weren’t aware of previously?
Primarily my back muscles (latissimus), and how effortless it was to engage them. Second was my elbows and all the tension in them. Last were my knees.
Where in your body were you already concerned about and what did you experience?
I was concerned about my back hunching a little more year after year, and family/friends were pointing it out more frequently.
How were you feeling when you left?
I was feeling very light, relaxed and calm. My body definitely felt like it released a lot of tension, and I was more aware of the different parts of my body that contribute to my posture. I was feeling so good that I did not think about my glasses and forgot them.
Do you feel more integrated?
Yes, tremendously more, and it is quite fascinating.
March 29, 2019
Dear Deena,
Today, I learned to feel the places in my body that are tense and to release them. Importantly, I now focus more on my breathing as I feel that it is the start of “tension release” by priming the body with oxygen – the “food” of the muscles. Moreover, I try to feel the slight forward head tilt before sitting down, and to feel that it accompanies and contributes to a smooth and effortless sitting down motion. Also, I try to focus on my knee/hips and the sequence of the different movements in order to release the tension in my knee as well as my hips (which I felt more today compared to last week). Next, I focus on releasing my jaw (breathing helps a lot) as I feel that it is affecting my neck and my overall posture. I did not realize before that the jaw muscle greatly affects the neck and upper back muscles. Last, I try to focus on not engaging my muscles in an excessive manner and to use my body in a more efficient fashion (in terms of efforts).
Overall, I try to feel where my body is tensed and I try to release it, in particular I try to feel the transition of a tensed muscle to its relaxed state and how the release affects the different part of the body connected to that tensed muscles. For example, I felt that releasing my knee clearly affected my hips, and releasing my wrist affected my elbow and shoulder.
Sincerely,
Vadim
April 23, 2019
Dear Deena,
Here are my thoughts and insights from the last session:
Regarding my walking, I try to concentrate the rotational motion of my hips, which carries along my back and eventually to my shoulders. I try to feel my arms swinging on the opposite side of the leg moving forward. Last, I try to release my shoulders, keeping my shoulder blades back, and to engage my back. Also I try to remember to keep my eyes wide open which helps release my neck while walking.
Next, regarding my sitting down, I try to feel the upward rotational motion of my neck and the link to my hip moving backward. Once on the chair, I try to release my shoulders and being able to move my forearms without engaging my shoulders, which I feel helps me not to collapse.
I feel that my posture has improved, and I am more conscious and aware about the different parts of my body that need to be solicited for a given movement. Last, I try to not overuse a muscle, if they are not needed for a particular motion.
June 20, 2019
Dear Deena,
Once again, I am sorry for this delayed response, but when I get caught up with science research a hard time to consciously switch off from thinking about antibodies and organ transplant rejection. Enough digression, here are my insight of my experience so far:
My lifestyle, culture, passions and convictions always drew me towards a rational, Cartesian, and logic way of approaching unfamiliar subjects. Nonetheless, my curiosity enabled me to listen to perspective that I would not have paid much attention on my own. The most prevalent judgment I received from my family and my friends was that I paid too much attention to my brain and not to my physical body, although my brain is dependent of my physical well being. In a more pragmatic sense, and since I am rather lucky in terms of ability to play many different sports, I did not appear fit to what I like to do, and above all, my posture was like “Notre-Dame hunchback’s”. To that end, I decided to act upon it and decided I should change!
Today, I am glad to have been able to want to change something for my own self and well being. Although many of my peers thought that the posture was not that significant, I realized that it is the foundation for so many things, including both physical and physiological facets. My “Notre-Dame hunchback’s” never felt bad nor did it seems to affect my self-esteem, yet as I learned to understand how it really make a difference, I feel even better than I used to. The conscious shift that made me take action on things that I felt were not so important is really the most gratifying feeling one can have. Not only because it feels good physically, but it pushes my mind to be more objective on pre-conceived opinions that one can have on their own self.
With regards to the actual physical body and the changes that occurred with my posture and my overall more genuine stance, I learned in the past coupe months how to feel the different parts of my body, while still understanding that effortless body movement is governed by a fine tuned orchestration of conscious decisions that will become innate overtime. Although I still have a long way to go, I feel that I have already change drastically not only in my posture but also in the way I approach new things that my prejudices usually predispose my mind.
Another important aspect of my learning to understand where is the problem coming from and how can that problem be fixed rather than trying to understand why. For example, I realized that my posture is not only a problem with my back, but more a problem with how all my body part were interacting with each other. In addition, the conscious understanding and feel of what muscles must be working in sync actually anchors the feeling that standing straight is more effortless than being “Notre-Dame hunchback’s”, thus understanding that the human body is supposed to work a certain way, yet I have forgotten how to do it, and that it is much easier to go back to it than one can expect.
Overall, my posture is completely different where in my car I had to adjust my rear-view mirror to adjust to my real height, and where many people have noticed something “different”, and that feels good!
Above all, I now understand how a good posture is important for many different reasons, and although it was something that I overlooked for many years, it is always better to take action later rather than never.
As usual, I am looking forward to the next session, which is tomorrow!
Sincerely,
Vadim
July 15, 2019
In an integration session, Vadim brought his toddler daughter Romy so that he could monitor his habits while being a parent.
Dear Deena,
Here are my insights from last session with my daughter Romy around:
As I mentioned before, this session was very different and I did not expect my posture to be unconsciously affected by the presence of my daughter, Romy. Although I was consciously focusing on my posture and my breathing, my body was in “alert mode” (or “dad mode”) where I could not let go from anticipating Romy’s behavior. I feel that it was maybe one of the reasons for my shoulders and arms to be locked, as they are the primary parts of my body that have to react quickly and precisely. Therefore, it was consciously harder to keep my neck straight since my shoulders were tense.
This interaction was very interesting because it reflected a more real situation, where the brain is constantly exposed to different stimuli. It seems that for me, my posture does not yet come in the top priorities of my unconscious when Romy is around. This session was a very good exercise to consciously prioritize the assimilation of different stimuli, particularly endogenous ones. Indeed, it seems that I have to work on listening to the stimuli that come from within rather than muting them in place of external stimuli.
Last, I felt that keeping a good posture while interacting with my daughter is not as easy as it sounds. It pushes me to be aware of multiple things at the time, which is not hard in itself, but slightly difficult when it has to do with old habits, i.e. bad posture. Again, I try to focus on using the least amount of muscles when I interact with Romy.
I try to focus mainly on keeping my back engaged, my neck straight, and my feet well-grounded. The latter was actually most impacted when I had to carry Romy as her weight was throwing my balance off and if I am not well-grounded then I will use much more muscle and energy than required.
Interestingly, adopting a good postural behavior in front of Romy should be beneficial since toddlers learn a lot by mimicking who they have around. This is what I try to consciously remind myself because I feel that my posture will start to unconsciously spring back to a good one.
Thank you again for letting me bring Romy to the session, I really enjoyed it and I think she did too because she did not want to leave and wanted to come back. I’m looking forward to the next session.
Sincerely,
Vadim