Your Guide to the Alexander Technique [Paperback]

I've read a dozen or so books about the Technique over the past dozen years. I became interested in the ideas behind the Technique after having had lessons with 2 very different Alexander Techers. Both teachers helped me a great deal with a chronic back pain problem I'd had since my twenties (I'm 67 now.) My first teacher was very non-verbal, but his hands-on-guidance was very clear and was able to change my posture quite a bit. My second teacher was far more verbal, and also had very good direction in her hands. She encouraged me to do some reading, starting with "Fitness Without Stress"(my favorite) and then "Body Learning" and most recently the Authorized summaries of Alexander's own four books(most of these you can get from Amazon - but the authorized summaries you have to get by mail from an Alexander Technique Professional Society - you can find out more at the Alexander Technique Bookstore at alexandertechnique.com/books)My sense is that Gray's book is not as clear as the other books's on the Technique I've read, although it does cover the basics.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I am a violinist with the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields and the Technique itself is an **invaluable** element of my life and work---and I would say this book is the best Alexander book not written by FM Alexander himself (it's also much easier to read than FM's brilliant but *very* Victorian prose). This would be my Desert Island Alexander book!

Far and away the most tedious and tiresome book I have read in a long time. The author writes in a style popular at the turn of the century. Unfortunately, the century was 1800s. Dry, overly complicated, and filled with word selections such as "whilest" and "Effortful"; using those terms and language as the Alexander himself did, in the early 1900's. It is one thing to honor the originator, it is another to make the text convoluted and unreadable in an attempt to be "faithful" to the technique.

As a "how to" book, this one fails miserably. The best that can be said for it is that it is a mediocre "how not to" book; the author spends much more time telling you the wrong way things are done rather than the correct way to do them. The photos in the text that show the wrong way, far outnumber the photos showing the correct way to do things. Photos showing proper technique are poor at best.

As an example, the author elected to use a photo of a toddler walking as an example of good posture. Since no toddlers are reading this book and they are substantially physiologically different from adults, I doubt that was the best example to give. Showing an adult in a good example of the technique would have been much better and more illiminating. In the few photos where adults are used to demonstrate the correct posture, the effect is somewhat unattractive.

While I have no doubt the concept behind "The Alexander Technique" is a good one, and it has many health benefits, the actual technique and the teaching of it can only be described as overly complicated. Designed to confuse the reader into thinking there is more to it than there really is. Some of the things promoted in the text such as: "Experts" in the technique,

"Qualified Teachers", "slow step by step process that you could never hope to achieve on your own...". are just there to try and shroud the technique in a false mystery. Marketing plain and simple.

If the author elected to use language designed to clearly educate, illuminate and instruct, this book might have been a worthwhile addition. He didn't and therefore, it isn't.

Let me save you the cost, and the time required to wade through this gobbledie gook.

1. Keep you head balenced on top of your spine

2. Relax your neck to help direct and condition the balence of the head.

3. Stand up straight without forcing yourself into the position.

4. When you can stand and sit straight, comfortably, with your entire body in a relaxed state, you've got it nailed.

That's it. Now go look for a book to buy with more to offer.