A good night's sleep. Priceless, and just one of the many benefits of increasing your self-awareness.

Whilst I hear this all the time (or at least a lot of the time), it’s always really refreshing to hear my Alexander pupils talk about the benefits they’ve gained. So I asked the question “What’s been the biggest change for you?”

She told me this:

“Awareness! It’s like an attitude change. I’m now aware of my body again, and what I’m doing with it. And even if things go wrong, now I know what to do about it.”

Great! Well done you, I’m really pleased! There was a survey some time ago, by the Society of Teachers of the Alexander Technique, of Alexander pupils, asking them what the biggest change was. And the most common answer was the same. Awareness.

It’s by becoming more aware of ourselves that we can avoid all those bad habits, the bad sitting, the bad typing, the bad grumpy same-old responses to the same-old problems.

I always put it down to my Rule Number One.

Rule Number One: You’re the boss. Not the computer, not the car, not the chair, nor the tv. Not the relatives, not the tension, nor the pain. You. You are the boss of you.

Which means you get to choose how you react to things. You get to choose how you sit at the computer, or how you hold your phone or tablet. Not the computer. Not the phone. Not the tablet.

By becoming much more aware of your body, you’re much, much more likely to handle it in a better way.

So the question I have to ask of you today, as you’re there staring into this screen, is this…

“Who’s the boss of you?”

• Will back and neck pain stop you from enjoying the rest of your life?
• Are you struggling to find an answer, or frustrated and unable to overcome this frankly horrid problem?
• What would it feel like to wake up with no more pain, able to do everything you want without pain?

By the time you finish reading, l’ll have shown you how a recovery technique can help you ditch your pain, so you can begin to live your life to the full.

“The Most Effective of All Treatments.”

It’s well known that remaining active, rather than bed rest, is the best approach to back pain; however, there’s been conflicting evidence about the effectiveness of posture or exercise education. Finally, a recent trial funded by the Medical Research Council and the NHS has revealed that the Alexander Technique has an answer.

The most effective of all the treatments reviewed – BackCare, the Charity for Healthier Backs.

The study (detailed in the British Medical Journal) was carried out on 579 patients with chronic back pain. It found that after a year of lessons, people suffered just 3 days of back pain a month – unlike the 21 days of pain for those receiving normal care.

6 lessons gave 70% of the benefits in just a quarter of the time, and these results apply to most patients with chronic or recurrent back pain. And the people who had Alexander Technique sessions reported improved quality of life, according to the findings published by the British Medical Journal On-line.

Fortunately, 97% of back pain sufferers could benefit from this one simple technique – Jack Stern, Spinal Neurosurgeon.

In a British Holistic Medical Association study of people with chronic pain, Alexander Technique was the favourite approach to long-term pain relief.  Learning the Alexander Technique teaches you how to ‘drive’ your own body. I like to think of it as getting back your remote control for your movements rather than everything being knee-jerk and painful.

Safe and Gentle

The Alexander Technique is very safe and gentle – BackCare Charity.

It really is safe and gentle. In the 2400 sessions of Alexander Technique in the BMJ study, not one contra-indication was found. Each session is an experiment in movement, often fun and entertaining, where you remain completely in control. You won’t find me wrenching you around, or hurting you like some manipulative therapies!

Alexander Technique helped a long-standing back problem and to get a good night’s sleep after many years of tossing & turning. Paul Newman, actor.

Tried it all before?

Many of you will have received effective relief from back pain, only to find the problem keeps coming back. You haven’t been given a long-lasting solution you can use for yourself. Others find no relief, and are forced to live day-in, day-out with the relentless discomfort of pain. 4 out of every 5 adults will experience back pain at some stage in their life, but no-one has yet offered you a method for helping yourself to be free from pain that is effective, proven, and that lasts a lifetime. Until now.

Thanks James. I have much less pain now. My daughter was really pleased to see the improvements and tells me to keep coming! – Mrs B, Civil Servant, Heaton Moor.

What’s the Alexander Technique?

Alexander Technique Teachers are highly specialised and trained to gently and skilfully bring your head into its best relationship with the top of your spine. This allows tensions in the back, and then the whole body, to be released. You learn to keep this great feeling of freedom going throughout your day. This means a more expansive, more fluid way of moving, resulting in less stress on your body – your muscles, your joints, and of course your mind. Learning the Alexander Technique gives the body time to heal. It takes from 5 to 30 private lessons to gain a really firm understanding of the Alexander Technique, and we focus on giving you what you need in as short a time as possible, which means just one session can give you valuable tools for change. It also combines well with other elements in a back rehabilitation program. It can help you recover from surgery, derive the maximum benefit from your fitness program, help you improve how you do your recovery exercises, and extend the benefits of osteopathy, chiropractic, massage and acupuncture.

I recommend people to the Alexander Technique who have not improved with traditional rehabilitative therapies. Part of their pain may be due to posture and the improper use of their bodies. Many people who have neck or back pain and have gone through heat, ultrasound and massage with no relief can be helped by learning the Alexander Technique. It definitely works. I highly recommend it. Barry M. Schienfeld, MD, Specialist in Rehabilitation Medicine and Pain Management, Community General Hospital, Harris, NY.

Back pain, neck pain, and headaches, whatever your reason for starting lessons, Alexander Technique helps you learn how to suffer less. But Alexander Technique also gives you so much more than pain relief. You’ll experience improved mobility, alertness, confidence, general health and inner calmness, according to a recent survey carried out by STAT (the Society of Teachers of the Alexander Technique). I prefer to address the causes rather than the symptoms of your back and neck pain by teaching you how to move with greater ease and poise, so you become the catalyst for your own recovery, relieving pain and preventing further injury. As you begin to use your own body with more skill, the causes of your pain are reduced – or removed.

This is undoubtedly the best way to take care of the back and alleviate back pain – Jack Stern, MD, PhD, Neurosurgical Group of Westchester.

How Do I Learn It?

On a basic level, Alexander Technique teaches us not to compress, hunker-down, or stress ourselves in the face of life’s challenges. That’s why it’s used by actors for the stage, by presenters for meetings, by golfers and sporty types for poise, by teachers and lecturers for stress-relief, by people with posture pain for relief, and by anyone who wants to take back control of their life. But don’t just take lessons to reduce pain – by having a wide, open and upright posture we look better, and feel more in control. And by noticing when stress starts to get us down, we can avoid over-reacting and losing our cool. And the results are always the same – more poise, energy and confidence, and less pain.

The end result: you look leaner, taller, more poised and confident – The BBC.

If you live near Manchester, Wilmslow, Stockport, Macclesfield or around Cheshire and have back pain or neck pain, come and find out how much I can help.

How to book your Alexander Technique session:

I handle my own bookings for this clinic. Call me now on 0161 4316977 to set up your first session, email me, or use my contact form.

Invest a little time into how you look after your body now and it will help you reap the benefits in the future. This is where the Alexander Technique comes in. Because there’s no effort involved, you don’t need to hit the gym or pound the pavement to enjoy the benefits – just a simple weekly session to boost your posture, well-being and joie de vivre.

It’s never too late to start learning the Alexander Technique. In fact, one of my most regular clients started in his late eighties – and he just loves how it make his golfing easier.

I was over the moon to see Good Housekeeping’s top Fabulous & Over 50 List.

Did you know all these women made it to the Fabulous and Over 50 list and they practise the Alexander Technique?

Just check out how many fabulous Alexander-Technique-toting superstars made the list.

Fabulous & Over 50…

#2 Joanna Lumley

#3 Dame Judi Dench

#6 Lulu

#12 Oprah Winfrey

#14 Madonna

#17 Jennifer Saunders

#27 Emma Thompson

#33 Sheila Hancock

#36 Jerry hall

#37 Meryl Streep

#47 Dame Joan Bakewell

#54 Vanessa Redgrave

#62 Anthea Turner

#64 Trudie Styler

#82 Julie Christie

And There’s More…

Those are just the names I recognise. No doubt some of the others do too! Here are just a few female celebrities (past and present) who didn’t make the list but have benefited from Alexander Technique… Lisa Snowdon, Vanessa Redgrave, Juliet Stephenson, Juliette Binoche, Prunella Scales, Hilary Swank, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Lynne Redgrave, Julia Sawalha,Victoria Beckham, Ruby Wax, The Duchess of York, Julie Andrews, Kelly McGillis, Maggie Smith, Mary Steenbergen, Bonnie Langford, Penelope Keith, Sinead O’Connor, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Marilyn Monroe (obviously Marilyn didn’t make the list, as the amazing Marilyn is now deceased.)

Did you Know?

Woman Magazine voted Alexander Technique the number 1 tip for having a slimmer waist.

Top 5 benefits…

Here are my Top Five Benefits of the Alexander Technique for Ageing Well…

• Proven to reduce back pain by a massive 86% in a new NHS study of over 500 people.
• Makes it easier to sit up and breathe easily – so you can digest well.
• Help you get rid of the “hump” in your back – your posture improves and you’ll look better too!
• Takes less effort to get in and out of chairs, and to get out and about.
• Improves your balance and reduce the chances of falling.

My Clients…

Most of my clients come for sessions from all over Cheshire. Some pay a little extra to have home visits and benefit from private, one-to-one sessions in the privacy of their own home. Everyone ends up feeling taller, slimmer, less stressed and full of energy, ready to take life on with a smile. I’d love to add your name to theirs, so if you’d like to be Fabulous and Over 50…

Book your Alexander Technique session:

Call me now on 0161 4316977 to set up your first session, email me, or use the contact form.

Struggling to find a solution?

If you’ve got RSI in Manchester or the Cheshire area, this self-help technique can help.

Perhaps you’ve tried many of the recommended forms of exercise or had osteopathy or chiropractic sessions, or tried meditation or yoga, and not found an answer. Or maybe they’ve work for you in the short-term, but the pain soon returns.
Repetitive Strain Injury (Occupational Overuse Syndrome, Cumulative Trauma Disorder, or Work-Related Upper Limb Disorder) includes a raft of different conditions and symptoms in the shoulders, arms, wrists and hands.
Many people recover using the Alexander Technique for their RSI, leaving them able to do all those things that they were unable to because of the pain.

You can learn:

• How to stop doing the things that make your RSI worse. Your pain levels will drop as you recover.
• How to sit at a computer, type, drive a car, or perform repetitive acts like playing a musical instrument in a way that feels lighter and easier, and causes you much less pain.
• How to be happier and less stressed. It’s much more rewarding to be free from pain.

The best way to get better from RSI is to help yourself.

I provide a personalised programme to help you recover from RSI. You’ll learn how to get better on your own, rather than relying on other people, by dramatically improving how you sit, stand and move. Your posture and actions flow much more freely, releasing all that daily tension and pain.

The effectiveness of the Alexander Technique is well documented and has been the subject of several scientific studies. It is increasingly recommended by doctors. The RSI Association

Be sure to visit your GP and get help as soon as possible!

Use Alexander Technique as a complement to working less (or stopping), stretching well (tai-chi and yoga may help but be careful not to overdo anything!), and relaxing as much as you can. Explain to your loved-ones how much it hurts, how little you can do without making it worse, and ask for some sympathy. Healing takes time and the less tense and stressed you are the quicker you’ll get better… Be sure to check out repetive strain injury.org.uk and the RSI Association.

How to get rid of RSI with the Alexander Technique.

Alexander Technique teachers are highly specialised and trained to gently and skillfully bring your head into its best relationship with the top of your spine. This allows tensions in the back, the arms wrists and hands, and the whole body, to be released. You learn how to use your arms without tightening – how to use a computer, car or instrument with more ease and less pain.

The result is a more expansive, more fluid way of moving, meaning less stress for your body. The Alexander Technique Teacher helps you to maintain this over time, until you’re able to practise the technique for yourself. So you have a skill for life, rather than relying on other people to poke, prod, massage and generally ‘do things’ to you.

Learning The Alexander Technique gives your body the time it needs to heal.

It was RSI that brought me to the Alexander Technique in the first place, so I know where you’re coming from, and how painful and upsetting it can be. Because I’ve been through it, I have sympathy for your pains, and can show you how to get free from them. Now I live, free from RSI, in Manchester.

To get an idea for how I work to help your RSI, you might read this article by an Alexander Technique teacher from New York, describing how she helped RSI sufferer Mike.

The Problem

•    You have a work-related disorder (RSI, tendonitis, wrist pain, carpal tunnel syndrome, thumb strain, back or neck pain).

•    You need to earn a living, or are already unemployed.

•    No-one seems to be able to truly help, or the help is not enough.

•    Other people don’t seem to realise what a nightmare your RSI can be, and think you’re being over-dramatic or sensitive.

•    You get mixed messages about what works and what doesn’t.

The answer: I’ll help you by…

•    Assessing your symptoms

•    Giving one-on-one help and support

•    Giving written recommendations to your workplace if you want them

•    Providing a workplace visit with observation and advice (if you want)

•    Helping you to learn to apply Alexander Technique for yourself

•    Giving you stretches and exercises tailored individually to you

You may be surprised to hear that often, the efforts you are making to relieve the pain of RSI actually make things worse.

You may also be surprised to hear that often your idea of stretching actually tightens your muscles and makes the problem worse.

Using the Alexander Technique, I’ll teach you how to promote your own recovery and can show you how to stretch appropriately so that you don’t cause more damage. If you have ergonomic equipment, it won’t work as it’s supposed to unless you are using your body properly as well. If you perform stretches and exercises but don’t have good alignment and use your body well, you’re often making matters worse.

The Alexander Technique is named after FM Alexander and is a set of techniques that are aimed towards postural retraining. Essentially the technique will train your body into adopting a good posture, which will hopefully reduce or eradicate the risk of developing a repetitive strain injury. The method has been widely lauded among physicians as an effective treatment for RSI’s and medical insurance companies have been known to pay for RSI sufferer’s lessons in the Alexander Technique. RepetitiveStrainInjury.org.uk

I used to be in loads of pain from RSI, before I learned the Alexander Technique and liberated myself from it. Then I trained for full-time for 3 years to teach the Alexander Technique, which means I can help you too.

Call me on 0161 4316977 to find out more, email me, or use my contact form.

It works by teaching you how to go about everything you do with less tension and less effort. My clients are often delighted to find out just how easy it can be. By moving with less effort, you’re putting a lot less strain on your joints and muscles, so everything feels lighter and easier. That’s the trademark of a good Alexander Technique session – you feel a lot lighter and everything takes less effort.

After six sessions I can feel a positive change and look forward to further sessions. Conditions improved: increased awareness, reduced pain, reduced stress, improved happiness and improved energy – Alan (and wife) from Stockport.

A Skill for Life

You can learn a new way of going about your daily life -so this is something that you learn, rather than something that’s ‘done to you’. It really is a skill for life.

If you’ve tried physiotherapy, osteopathy, chiropracty, drugs, massage, surgery or acupuncture, and still end up in the same old fix, and you haven’t experience the Alexander Technique then you’re missing out! In a series of zero-effort sessions, you’ll learn to sense the muscular tightening that naturally accompanies pain. I’ll show you how to release that tension, so you’re not making the issue worse by tightening up and stiffening around the pain.

There’s no quick fix here, although often I’ve helped people to ditch back, neck, hip or knee pain, sciatica, and headaches after just a few sessions. Sometimes it happens quickly, and for other people it takes a lot longer. The only way to find out if you’ll learn it quickly is to try a lesson. It’s important to realise that if there’s a significant injury or physical problem, I may not be able to help at all. But if your pain is just a result of bad habits, as in the case of most back and neck pain, then there’s a good chance I can help. Make sure you’ve seen a GP to ensure you don’t have a serious underlying condition.

97% of people with back pain could benefit by learning the Alexander Technique – it is only a very small minority of back pain sufferers that require medical intervention such as surgery -  Jack Stern MD, Spinal Neurosurgeon.

Your body adapts to habits – sitting, standing, driving, using a phone, using the computer and so on, or even just sitting and watching TV. The Alexander Technique looks for the ways you act and move, and teaches you to avoid the bad habits, or to do them with a lot less tension. So a lot of the causes of the pain and malfunction are removed, which means a lot less pain.

An alternative therapy used to improve posture is more effective at treating back problems than conventional treatments, research has found. Those who received 24 lessons of Alexander technique experienced 18 fewer days (per month) of misery. In addition the Alexander technique group reported improved quality of life. Telegraph, 19th August 2008.

Personally speaking, I learned the Alexander Technique to help me get over RSI (repetitive strain injury). It took me a while, but I got there. So now I get to do all those things the pain had stopped me from doing. And I really enjoy life to the full. With the Alexander Technique, minimum effort = maximum results!

You can’t learn it from a book or CD, you really do need to come and try it out for yourself. You can find me in Manchester, Wilmslow, Stockport and around Cheshire giving home visits and group courses and workshops.

If you’d like to benefit like June or my other clients, book your first session to try it out by calling me on 0161 4316977, email me, or use my handy contact form.

And if you don’t feel the benefit from your first session, you don’t pay, so there’s nothing to lose!

As a cognitive scientist (BSc. Hons) I’ve always wanted to bridge that gap. Vision, audition and consciousness are all under the microscope at the moment in Universities around the world, and as our world becomes more and more virtual, it’s massively important to understand how we relate to the technology around us. You’ll probably notice you’re being ‘dragged in’ slightly to this page to read it, probably pulling the head down and towards these words. In a world where external stimuli are becoming faster, more urgent and more demanding, its paramount to manage how you react to these things!

For example, this article in the Daily Mail about text-neck (which is very much an advert for chiropractors) talks about the bad posture and pain caused by too much smart-phone use. While a chiropractor will crick and crack you to release some of the tension such habits cause, most people are powerless to change the behaviour themselves (one reason why chiropractors see so much repeat trade). However, learning the Alexander Technique would give you the skills to not end up with the problem in the first place. Or if you do have this issue, you can unlearn the bad habits causing your pain (like I did to get rid of RSI), so you get an intelligent fix for life rather than a short-term fix that fades. The choice is yours of course. You can add comments here.

We’re all suffering from it to one degree or another. For many of us, life’s too full of problems with not enough time to sort it all out. Wake up… Work or look after the kids… Or both… TV… Sleep… Repeat…

You might have tried to get help with hypnotherapy, or massage, or a holiday, or changing jobs, or downsizing, or buying a new mattress, or taking a chill pill. Whatever the help you’ve received, it probably hasn’t worked. They might work a bit for you in the short-term, but unless you make some fundamental changes to the way you do and react to everything, not much is going to change.

Most of my clients come to me to get help with pain, stress or anxiety-related problems. A few come because they want to be better at the things that they already do well (golf, riding, singing, acting and so on).

The best answer to coping with the stresses of life. The Sunday Times, April 2008.

Stress: A Dirty Word.

Lets face it, stress is pretty much a dirty word. In our modern western society, it’s seen as a sign of weakness to admit stress, and workplaces groan in fear of stress-related litigation. Many of us enjoy the pressure, and feel it validates us, but deep down trouble is brewing.

Our response is often to ‘knuckle down’, ‘work harder’, or just to let it all boil up until we find ourselves screeching at strangers, or, worse, our loved ones, or sobbing quietly into our pillow.

I’m guessing you’re reading this because stress or anxiety are making your life miserable, or your work untenable. Maybe you get breathless or have panic attacks. Maybe you’re tense or have a tight neck and shoulders. Maybe it stops you from sleeping at night.

Fight or Flight.

Modern life just seems to be getting faster and faster, doesn’t it? Texting, tweeting, rushing to the shops, getting stressed in traffic jams, or simply not having enough time to get it all done, all these things can take their toll. They cause us to react too quickly, and often this includes a little bit of ‘fight or flight’. Our fight or flight response triggers when something happens too rapidly for us to react, or when we’re startled by something. Like when the phone rings, the doorbell chimes, a dog barks, or the boss appears. It takes time to recover from each startle, but we don’t get the time any more, and the tension builds until steam starts pouring from our ears. And because it’s building all the time, we don’t notice until we feel dreadfully stressed and anxious. It’s a modern disease, and a nasty one at that.

Help Is At hand.

The good news is that help is at hand. When you come to me for help with stress and anxiety, you learn to pace yourself and be much more aware of your response to everyday situations, like driving, using the computer, public speaking and so on. I teach you how to keep your cool as you go about your daily business, without getting tense, anxious, or out of breath. I teach you to relax and get it all done. That’s right. My clients get it all done, and they relax as they do it.

How Does It Work?

The trick is being much more self-aware, much more mindful of yourself, your thinking, and your posture. So there are no sporty exercises needed, no blood, sweat or tears. Just a change in your responses. Which is easy! Learning the Alexander Technique gives you a fascinating tool for noticing when the tension is creeping up on you, so you can notice your reactions building and let go of the tension. It means you’re calmer and more confident in everything you do. That’s why actors use it for stage-fright, golfers use it to improve performance, and you can use it to reduce stress and anxiety. Because it improves your posture, you can breathe more easily, making a massive difference to your day. And that improved posture makes you more confident and happy in your own skin.

With the aid of the teacher’s hands, the student learns to release and lengthen muscles that have been shortened over time because of stress and misuse. But how can stopping unnecessary muscular tension heal emotional wounds? Unconscious experiences, such as unhealed traumas, unexpressed feelings and painful memories can be pushed into the body where they are not free to be dealt with in the mind. These tensions might turn into physical symptoms and ailments, but can also lead to mental illness, such as depression and anxiety. The Times.

You’ll Learn How To:

• Spot and overcome your own reactions to the causes of stress and anxiety.
• Release tension and stress with easy, no-effort exercises.
• Stay calm and focused under pressure.
• Perform better at work or at play.
• Get a good night’s sleep.

How to book your Alexander Technique session:

Call me now on 0161 4316977 to set up your first session or simply have a chat to see if I can help, email me, or use the contact form.

Does your bad posture cause you pain?
Has someone has been nagging you?
Maybe you stoop because of your height?
Or you have a dowager’s hump that only seems to be getting worse?
Is it making you look less attractive?

You can improve your posture with the Alexander Technique. Changing the way you think and move means you put much less tension and effort into everything you do.
You gain a new, more comfortable, less strained way of standing and sitting. Work and play become much, much easier. It’s a way of re-integrating your mind-body awareness and making you much more present. So you stop all that slouching and hunching over, you drive with less stress, and you sit at work without those awful aches and pains. I can show you how your bad posture and tension is dragging you down, compressing your spine, narrowing your back and restricting the movement of your ribs and breathing, pulling your neck forward – and your head back and down, causing neck ache and more tension. Ugh! The good news is you can learn to stop hurting yourself like this, so your head sits comfortably poised on top of your spine, which lengthens and provides the support for the rest of your body, your ribs free up, your breathing improves and you tire a lot less easily. This is the Alexander Technique. As your posture improves, you feel fresher, in less pain, more poised and in control. My clients are also reporting sleeping more easily, getting fewer migraines and headaches, and feeling much more confident.

The Alexander Technique remains the best of the self-care strategies to prevent the sequel of poor posture and poor breathing. Harold Wise, MD, PC, New York, NY

Correct Posture

We’ve all heard the standard posture advice before. “Stand up straight! Pull your shoulders back!” Honestly, advice like that is pretty useless. It just doesn’t work. It’s an old wives’ tale.
Humour me now by doing your best to sit up straight. Please, sit up straight in your best possible posture. Now hold that posture and read through the rest of this page. I think you’ll find the results surprising!
It’s such a shame. Whenever we think of good posture we think of images like army Sergeant-Majors. We stiffen our backs and necks, and stick our chests forward. Of course, we might look like our posture has improved. At least for a while…
All that pushing and pulling and stiffening isn’t doing you any favours. Are you still sitting up straight?
The effort to do this is substantial. Muscles that remain held for a long time get tired, and then you want to let them go. To slump. To compress your poor vertebrae.
And off you go into a see-saw of stiffening then slumping, stiffening then slumping (you know the one!)

Posture Help

Help is at hand. We all have a series of reflexes, throughout our bodies, that support us against the force of gravity and naturally co-ordinate our movement. You can see this reflex working naturally in toddlers and young children. There’s a way to release the in-built reflexes you’ve been suppressing. It allows you to sit and stand with natural balance, supported by gravity rather than constantly fighting against it.
Are you still continuing to make yourself sit up straight? Is it getting tiring?

Bad Posture Advice

Lets face it, if posture advice worked, we’d all have great posture, because our parents nagged us about our posture, and their parents nagged them about their posture, and the list goes back through time. A long stream of people nagging about our posture. All the way back to some caveman turning round to his wife and grunting “Urg! Thundina! Sit up straight!”
And if the advice had worked, we’d all be sitting pretty! But we’re not, are we? We’re crumpled, stiff, tired, bent over, and generally very sore!

More Bad Posture Advice…

The other problem with most posture advice is that we forget it. We forget our posture the moment the phone rings, or the doorbell rings, or a new e-mail arrives. We forget good posture when we decide to make a cup of tea. Or when we get up for the loo. We forget good posture every time something happens to distract us – and those distractions can come from outside us (the phone ringing) or from inside us (when we decide to do something, like make a cup of tea).

A Recipe for Pain

We’re driven moment-by-moment by movement habits well below our level of awareness. If you know how to drive a car, you learned to drive it and now you drive on autopilot. You’re not constantly working out how far to turn the wheel, or which pedal is the brake. Our brains love to work on autopilot, so we can spend the rest of the time thinking (often worrying about the past or future). And the autopilot does a great job until, with age, the slump and bad posture starts to be included. Then we do things, on autopilot, badly.
So the only effective way to change this is by becoming alert and aware of your posture, by being mindful of how you are acting.
One of the downsides of learning the Alexander Technique for posture is that it takes some time. That’s why I recommend starting with my Six-Step Plan. The upside is that once you’ve learned it, you’ve learned it for life. So rather than relying on other people to sort your posture out for you (which is often painful and ineffective), you can learn to sort out your own posture. It’s painless and fascinating.
So… Are you still sitting up straight? Isn’t it a bit uncomfortable? Or did you forget and are already pulling towards the screen to read this? I’m sorry for asking you to sit up straight for so long. It didn’t work did it? You might even feel more tired than before! So you can see how most posture advice is just nonsense. Tiring too!

How to Improve and Have Good Posture

Posture is easy with Alexander Technique. Fix your posture: learn the Alexander Technique. Now.

After Alexander Technique lessons, you’ll find you can sit, stand and move with less effort and strain, so you experience less pain. You’ll feel and look taller  and more relaxed too!
It’s also proven to reduce back pain by 86%, and my Six-Step Plan means you can start enjoying the benefits of great posture and pain-free movement as soon as you like.
Today book one my introductory sessions and find out for yourself! Let me help you make the changes you need to spend the rest of your life looking and feeling much, much better.

How to Book Your Alexander Technique Session:

Call me today on 0161 4316977 to set up your first session, email me, or use the contact form:

• Learn how your posture has a massive effect on your vocal quality.
• Reduce nerves and remain poised, cool and confident – ditch the stage fright!
• Stand tall and look your best with wide open shoulders, a beautiful long neck, and a full, resonant voice.
• Great for singers, actors, public speakers, presenters, interviewees, and singing in the shower!

The Alexander technique can help release tension in the body, allowing the voice to become fuller and freer. The Guardian, May 10th 2009

Grace and Poise

Our voice is affected by our state and poise, and the Alexander Technique helps you to improve this in many ways… It helps you to stop tightening your neck, over-tightening your back, or slumping, and stops that habit of pulling your head back that ruins the quality of your voice. Freer ribs make for a full, resonant voice. And it helps you find those bad habits that are spoiling your performance, then helps you to get rid of them. You can only dump a bad habit once you’re aware of it! Learning the Alexander Technique for singing or to improve your voice can be fun!

Secret of the Stars

The Alexander Technique is taught at all the major music and drama colleges, universities and conservatories across the globe in places like The Royal College of Music, The Royal Academy of Music, The RNCM, Julliard, RADA, Chetham’s, UCLA, Yale School of Drama, NIDA, the Victorian College of Arts, Royal National Theatre , New York University Tisch School Of The Arts, Actors Studio MFA Acting Program, the conservatoires of The Hague, Utrecht and Amsterdam , e University of Washington School of Drama , The Actors Studio, Old Globe Theatre-London, Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute, London Academy of Music & Dramatic Arts, the Royal Shakespeare Company – in fact pretty much anywhere a good voice is needed! I myself teach at Chetham’s during the summer.

Just some of the stars who endorse the Alexander Technique are Yehudi Menuhin, Paul McCartney, Sting, Julian Bream, James Galway and the conductor Sir Adrian Boult.

You can find some great information for singers at alexandertechnique.com

Here’s an interesting interview (audio, 24 minutes) with a professional Bossa Nova singer and Alexander Technique teacher.

And here’s an interview with (audio, 25 minutes) with Marieke Schuurs, a singer, singing teacher, Body Mapping Educator and Alexander Technique teacher trainee

In my twenty-three years at the Royal College of Music, nearly every one of my students has been advised at our first meeting to put their name down for Alexander lessons! It is the perfect starting-point for learning about the physical facts of the art of singing and how to put them into practice – Professor Lyndon Van Der Pump, Professor of Singing, Royal College of Music.

If you work with, or simply enjoy your voice, and your vocal quality, singing and confidence matter, then the Alexander Technique is a fun, and effective way to change for the better.

It’s almost impossible to learn how to apply this technique for your voice from a book – if only life were that easy! The best way is to come for a session and try it out for yourself.

Call me on 0161 4316977 to find out how I can help your voice, e-mail me, or use the handy contact form to book a session.

You can use Alexander Technique to help your back pain, improve your posture, for singing and voice, acting, and sports performance. It’s also great if you get neck and back pain, if you suffer from RSI, or if you just get uncomfortable sitting at your computer. I work with everyone from teachers and nurses, actors and singers, to company directors. Everyone from teenagers to people in their eighties. An NHS study proved Alexander Technique can reduce days with low back pain by 86%. If you want to take back control of your body, your posture and your reactions to stress, it’s for you. And because you can try my Alexander Technique sessions in Manchester, Stockport, Wilmslow, Macclesfield and around Cheshire, you’ll find me easy to get to. The Alexander Technique is a way to feel better, more relaxed and comfortable by working with your mind-body connection. It’s the latest fitness sensation that the celebrities and the rest of us are flocking to. And it works! 86% less back pain: proven.

Just check right now to see how you may be hunched over your keyboard, or holding your mouse with the “Grip Of Doom!”

Celebrities aren’t the only ones to benefit.

There’s a way we handle ourselves – an overall poise, not just the working of this muscle, or that muscle. It’s what happens when we decide to move – we can either be expansive and conscious, or (the more common modern way)… tightening up with stress and worry and using ourselves on autopilot. When my new clients come to me and say “My back’s hurting me”, I usually reply “No, you’re hurting your back.” It’s how we act and move that makes the difference.

This isn’t about learning how to control each little muscle separately. That would be almost impossible! It’s about learning how our interface between thought and movement works – your mind/body connection, so that we can move consciously and gracefully in everything we do… like Marilyn Monroe (she studied the Alexander Technique!)

Pick it up and you can stop giving yourself backache or RSI, shoulder and neck pain, so you can stop stooping as you get older, hunching as you concentrate, or slumping as you sit. And all of this leads to a more pleasant, enjoyable way of living. Which means whatever your age and fitness level, you can age gracefully, with more poise and less pain. You can sing better, act better, play sport better, and get much more out of life. No other programme has been proven, by randomised control trial, to help you more.

All you need is a trained (MSTAT) Alexander Teacher like me. Whether you’re looking to learn Alexander Technique for great posture, or as a back pain treatment, for help with MS, fibromyalgia or ME, or if just want to live life to the full, call me on 0161 431 6977 or use my contact form.