Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #683593 in Books
• Published on: 1995-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 168 pages

Customer Reviews

Informative, but little guidance how to learn the technique
The title of the book had prompted me to buy it. I had some basic knowledge of the principles of the Alexander Technique and wanted to know more about it both in terms of depth of understanding as well as guidance on what to do. While the book provided a lot of good information on basic concepts it failed to address the one thing that I had bought it for: How to Learn the Alexander Technique. Instead, it kept referring to finding a teacher and learn from this person. I was disappointed about that because I would have liked to have more pointers for myself first and had wanted to try it out without help.

The nearest thing to a "do-it-yourself" book.
There seems to be a lot of controversy about whether someone can learn the Alexander Technique without a teacher. My own experience started with taking lessons from a teacher, but I've met several people who learned quite a bit on their own - not just learned it intellectually (which doensn't do much good anyway) but also were able to apply what they had learned to improve their posture, coordation and balance in very concrete ways.

"How to Learn the Alexander Technique" is a great starting-out place for anyone who's interested in the process but either doesn't have a teacher or would prefer to do as much on their own as possible. But it would be unfair to dismiss the usefulness of the Alexander Technique if you don't succeed. After all, most people have lessons in learning how to drive a car and so it's not surprising if you end up needing at least some lessons in learning how to "drive" yourself in a better way.

Ultimately, I think the best place to get a deeper understanding of the Technique is from Alexander's own books. But a very good first step is the Conables' book, "Body Learning" by Gelb and "Fitness Without Stress" by Rickover. Also a book called "Freedom to Change" by Jones.