“I mistrust all systematizers and I avoid them. The will to a system is a lack of integrity.”
–Nietzsche
Because I agree with Nietzsche, I do not offer training that emphasizes some sort of system. I do not propose to be the unriddler of the universe, the
man who figured out the secret formula for saving the world or even saving a business. Instead I show people how to solve their problems themselves.
To accomplish this, I base all training squarely on the foundation of the Alexander Principle. The philosopher John Dewey noted that the Alexander
Principle “bears the same relation to education that education bears to all other human activities.” The implication is clear: any training that fails to
incorporate these principles cannot possibly achieve its fullest potential.
The Alexander Principle and the means by which it is taught (the Alexander Technique) are notoriously difficult to describe. Dewey gives us some insight
there as well:
“The principle and procedures set forth by Mr. Alexander are crucially needed at present. Strangely, this is the very reason why they are hard to
understand and accept . . . it is difficult for anyone to grasp its full force without having actual demonstration of the principle in operation. And even
then, as I know from personal experience, its full meaning dawns upon one slowly and with new meanings continually opening up.”
Because of its experiential nature, I can only provide metaphors and conceptual hints as to how it works. In essence, the Alexander Technique is a way
to help people move from the known to the unknown. We cannot do something totally new if we are attached to anything old, anything familiar and
known. We can only find wisdom in this movement into the unknown. So far, humans have proven clever, but not wise. The proper object of any
serious education is to help the student find that wisdom which is immovable but not fixed. It exists completely outside of our knowledge. What we
know only stands in the way of it. The basic premise of my training is that we get in our own way. The one constant in every decision we make is the
decider. We take ourselves into every action. We cannot act more intelligently, more gracefully, or more ethically unless we let go of what we know and
grow into something new. Other training fails to take this into account. One gets nothing but concepts and ideas, and one then interprets these by means
of one’s conditioning: history, politics, society, economy. In every situation of life, one continues to re-act instead of responding with the whole of one’s
intelligence and creativity. Authentic freedom, genuine spontaneity, and true creative intelligence cannot ever emerge unless we free ourselves from the
known.
The Role of the Alexander Principle in Corporate Training
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Look at grace in any activity, from the chess board, to the ice rink, to the dojo, to the negotiating table: the most successful people, the greatest geniuses
and masters, make it look easy. Nietzsche explains why: Not the intensity but the duration of great feelings makes great men and women. A sustained
engagement takes little effort. But it never sleeps; one never goes mindless, and so the suki continually shows itself. “Suki” is the term the Japanese use
to designate a moment of opportunity, that space between the joints that Chuang-tzu’s cook uses to carve the ox without effort. Life is a stream of
these suki, these spaces between its joints, these paths of least resistance. We just have to stay awake. Then things happen all by themselves, and we
neither need nor receive any credit. Prepare yourself for that last consequence. No one gives you credit for accepting a suki. The story goes that at a
golf tournament some heckler in the crowd told Jack Nicklaus that he had gotten lucky on a particular shot. Nicklaus retorted with something like,
“Maybe . . . but the more I practice the luckier I get.”
What you want is for all your actions to look like luck, not effort or even skill really. Just luck, grace, spontaneity, laughter. Krishna does battle with
the great demon and it looks like play, like a joke, like random joy. The Alexander Technique provides the necessary tools for turning the world of
business into pleasant, successful play.
I teach people to live and work like Chuang-tzu’s cook. Although Chuang-tzu’s metaphor resonates clearly, he gives us no more practical method for
attainment than does Lao-tzu. The Alexander Technique provides clear and simple tools to bring Integrity into our every action. What this means is that
I do not go to a group and say, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we could do this wu-wei thing?” Instead, I directly confront them with things they do to get in
their own way while providing concrete alternatives. There is some similarity here between my work and that of Michael Gelb. Gelb, also an Alexander
teacher, doesn’t want to just tell you how great Leonardo is; he wants to show you how you can actually manifest some of that genius in your own
life. Likewise, my training shows people how to reduce their stress levels, increase their energy and freedom, and unleash their total
intelligence.
In order to accomplish this, my training takes the emphasis away from hitting a goal, focusing instead on process and on Integrity. Integrate and you
will hit the goal as a consequence, an afterthought, a simple matter of fact, like rain falling. If we learn to establish the right kind of engagement, we
can interact with the environment in such a way that we do less while getting more done.
The majority of business people have it firmly in their head that they go out and make deals happen. But deals fall like fruit. Work hard enough and you
increase the odds of your standing near a tree with your hand open when an apple decides to let go. The same thing with athletes. Many think hard
work is everything. But we can set aside all that fire and brimstone when trying to close a deal or win a race and instead look at the wind, and the
branch, and the stem of the apple--the crucial structures. Then we could engage the situation and watch the apple fall all by itself.
The greatest masters in any discipline prove the veracity of such claims. During one of his championship matches, Bobby Fischer played a move that
astonished everyone watching. When he played it, everyone agreed it would lead to his undoing. By the end of the game it became clear to all that this
incredible play had in fact sealed Fischer’s victory. The experts were desperate to understand: How did you know to make that move? Fischer replied,
“It just felt right.” Like fruit falling from a tree.
One the clearest metaphors for this work comes from Chuang-tzu, another famous Taoist:
The king's cook was cutting up an ox.
Out went a hand, down went a shoulder,
he planted a foot, he pressed with a knee,
the ox fell apart with a whisper,
the bright cleaver murmured
like a gentle breeze.
Rhythm! Timing!
Like a sacred dance,
like ancient music.
"Good work!" the king exclaimed. "Your method is faultless!"
"Method?" said the cook, laying aside his shining cleaver,
"What I follow is beyond all method.
"When I first began to cut up oxen
I would see before me the whole ox, all in one mass.
"After three years I no longer saw this mass.
I saw the distinctions.
"But now, I see nothing with the eye.
My whole being apprehends.
My senses are idle. The spirit is free
to work, without a plan, following its own intelligence
guided by the secret opening, the hidden space,
my cleaver finds its own way. I cut through no joint, chop no bone.
"A good cook needs a new chopper once a year---he CUTS.
A poor cook needs a new chopper once a month---he HACKS.
"There are spaces in the joints; the blade is thin and keen:
when this thinness finds that space, there is all the room you need!
It goes like the wind!
"True, there are sometimes tough joints. I feel them coming, I slow down,
I watch closely, hold back, barely move the blade. And whump!
The part falls away, landing like a clump of earth. Then I withdraw the blade,
I stand still and let the joy of the work sink in.
I clean the blade and put it away."
The king shouted, "This is it! My cook has shown me how to live my life!"
One of the best things about the Alexander Principle its thoroughly practical nature. The most important factor in our lives, the only one we can directly
influence, is our Self. The Technique gives people concrete means for keeping that Self Integrated. By Integrity I mean to suggest a harmony between
perception and action, an immovable wisdom that is not fixed. The connotation is very similar to the Chinese concept of Te. According to translator
Victor Mair, Te has been variously translated as “power,” “action,” “life,” and “virtue,” and even translated as “charisma” and “manna.” It signifies the
essential “nature” of a thing. Mair himself translates it as “integrity,” and that works quite nicely if you think of it as an ego-less integrity, suggesting
Integration, a total engagement with reality, and action that flows from a dynamic center. Mair points out something extremely interesting: “The basic
components of the Chinese graph [of ‘Te’] at the time of the writing of the Tao Te Ching were an eye looking straight ahead, and the heart, and a sign
for movement or behavior.” I would use that same pictograph to represent the Alexander Technique: by means of it one learns to see clearly, with the
eye and the heart, and then act decisively. Perception and action become one.
In order to move from a life of low Integrity to one of high Integrity we have to get out of the way. According to Lao Tzu’s most famous formulation,
we must learn wei wu-wei: which means to “do non-doing.” Another way he put that: wu-wei erh wu-pu-wei, which means, “doing nothing, nothing is
left undone; or, by means of non-doing, everything gets done.” While Lao-tzu deserves credit for brilliantly introducing the concept of wu-wei, Alexander
deserves credit for giving us the practical means for incorporating it into our actions.