Postural support and breathing
Head, neck, back relationship: when your spine supports your head and your rib cage (thorax) you no longer need to grip your head and your ribs to support your spine.
Continue reading →Category Archives: John Nicholls
Training procedures
Regarding training procedures for hands on work, I was of course around the Carringtons as one of their everyday assistants for many years and so observed the development of their training procedures. When I began directing a training course myself … Continue reading →
When did FM begin to use his hands?
A friend and colleague, Paolo Frigoli from Coccaglio, Italy asked me to set down anything I know about this subject as there seem to be so many different assertions about it floating around in the online world. So here are … Continue reading →
Three Types of Inhibition
This is something I’ve been talking about for many years in workshops and in training courses, but I recently realised I hadn’t actually put it in writing anywhere except in my chapter for the book Ageing with Poise* ed. by … Continue reading →
Difficult, non-feeling students
This was written in response to a teacher asking for advice dealing with a student who says they never feel anything change either during or after a lesson. The first thing I’d say about this is that when I began … Continue reading →
AT and Meditation
Margaret Goldie told me that FM sometimes said to people “Choose to be quiet throughout your whole body, with particular attention to your neck and head.” Sitting quietly in balance with that kind of inhibitory attention while maintaining overall length … Continue reading →
Up before Forward?
(Answering a question from a teacher as to whether the “order of the order” forward and up is essential, i.e. forward before up.) I remember Walter Carrington one day in a talk to his training course (probably in the late … Continue reading →
The intention of upward direction
This post was stimulated by questions about “the intent of directing upwards” from Cindi Kim in New York and Lira Fernández-Davila in Madrid. My thanks to both. One relevant conversation I recall having with Walter around this kind of subject … Continue reading →
Back and Front Lines and outer and inner circles
The idea of the back line can also be extended in ways that are very relevant to Alexander teaching. Many of us AT teachers have sensed both from personal experience and from working on students that there are common lines … Continue reading →
The Back Line
The Top Line is the phrase used in the world of horse training to denote the chain of musculature along the top of its neck (from the base of the skull), right along its back, and on round its hind … Continue reading →