Alexander Technique and Subtle Yoga as complementary systems: Sense your feet

Alexander Technique and Subtle Yoga as complementary systems: Sense your feet: Sense your feet My old yoga teacher used to stop her lessons and in great compassion say: ‘Poor feet, they've been imprisoned for so l...

Sense your feet

Sense your feet
My old yoga teacher used to stop her lessons and in great compassion say: ‘Poor feet, they've been imprisoned for so long. Let them free.’

•The feet are of the most enervated organs in our body
•They are designed to be very aware of the surface they touch so one can move carefully and at ease.
•We imprison our feet in shoes gradually losing access to the sensitivity we once possessed.

Go barefoot whenever you can.
Don't wear shoes at home

Alexander Technique and Subtle Yoga as complementary systems: Chronic conditions

Alexander Technique and Subtle Yoga as complementary systems: Chronic conditions: Chronic conditions G.  had a terrible lower backache.  His work forced him to sit daily for many hours.  He was wearing a lower back brac...

Chronic conditions

Chronic conditions

G.  had a terrible lower backache.  His work forced him to sit daily for many hours.  He was wearing a lower back brace, to ‘hold’ him up and ‘support’ him.  Years of physiotherapy didn’t do much to help his condition.  G was attached to his back brace and felt uncomfortable to take it off.  Living with back pain taught him to be ‘very careful’.  It seemed that faulty habitual use caused the system to manifest pain. X rays and scans revealed no real damage or injury.

People with chronic conditions deal with multiple issues: 

The cause of the pain 

Habits of thinking and management

Patterns of use

Fear of change

In working with a chronic condition, one has to take time to acknowledge the complexity of the circumstances, to be respectful of fears and worries, to avoid the ambition ‘to fix’ the ‘problem’, to bring compassion and patience to the lessons. 

Fear of falling

Fear of falling 

We are born with a fear of falling, which protects us but also significantly impedes our ease of movement.
Standing and walking, our centre of gravity is high and is located in the navel area, which contributes to ease of walking on the one hand, but on the other hand, one is continuously vigilant not to fall. Fear of falling is innate but also gets reinforcement by the environment.
I remember running down a slope and my mother shouting behind me, 'If you run down the slope, you'll fall!' How much fear in such a statement!
With age and loss of flexibility, the fear of falling increases. And with it grows a process of avoiding movements that change the centre of the gravity, such as avoiding bending, sitting on low surfaces, preferring an elevator over stairs, and more. Failure to shift the centre of gravity at ease creates stiffness, clumsiness, and imbalance.

i
photo by:https://danceinforma.com.au/articles/inventories-of-bodies-in-movement-in-wa/

We are designed to live in motion. Our movements are complex, and most are controlled by unconscious mechanisms and patterns.  Our bodies can develop ineffective and harmful movements and posture habits, and there would be no automatic faculty to take notice and correct them.

Most of us go through our days in an unconscious bodily manner, with our heads full of random thoughts. The body and mind are not at the same time and place, and their existence is separate.

A state of unconscious presence in the body may cause suffering. A lack of physical awareness may develop problems of posture and movement, followed by aches and pains.

Unconscious posture and movement, guided only by habits, is a basis of suffering.

Alexander Technique and Subtle Yoga as complementary systems: Psycho-Physical We are Psycho-Physical beings. Bot...

Alexander Technique and Subtle Yoga as complementary systems: Psycho-Physical We are Psycho-Physical beings. Bot...: Psycho-Physical  We are Psycho-Physical beings. Both aspects of ourselves, the mind and the body are intertwined, forming one person. A...