My Alexander teachers often used the expression ‘work’ with regards to exploring through the medium of the Alexander Technique. To be more precise, perhaps we could say that there is the lesser work and the greater Work. The lesser work is one of preparation. When Mr Macdonald sometimes said to a pupil, “Do you wish to work?”, he was in my view referring on the main to the preparation.
After an initial period of studying the Alexander Technique, a pupil may experience a form of lightness within the body, which is often described as experiencing the feeling of “floating”. This stage in the work can be very pleasurable, for one experiences oneself in a very different way, and it is often the reason that people continue their studies. However, it is very common that pupils want to maintain this elementary stage, so that they may continue to experience the feelings associated with it, and this prevents them from going deeper.
In the Scale of Perfection, Walter Hilton wrote the following regarding the luminous darkness: “You know well that the night is a space of time between two days, for when one day has ended another does not come straight away, but first comes the night and separates the days, sometimes long and sometimes short, and then after that comes another day. There is also a spiritual night. You must understand that there are two days, or two lights; the first light is a false light, the second is a true light.”
If the seeker is prepared to go on beyond the initial ‘day’, with its accompanying feeling of light and postural aura, it begins to fade, and the pupil may then begin to feel periods of deepening unhappiness, the sense of unbalance, violence, and/or despair. One may begin to experience also (and this is an important recognition for oneself) a terrible hate and hostility towards the Work. The force that is hostility should be discerned from the force that is hostile. There is a subtle but profound distinction between these two forces. Incisive therapy can help with the latter but the former needs thespirit of the Work.
Mr Macdonald used to often encourage his pupils to “Think Up”, at other times to “Aim Up” or “Direct Up”. However, not understanding his words properly, I fell head long into the trap of trying to “do” the Up. There are variations to the doing, sometimes very subtle, all of which in the long run lead to an unhelpful sort of lightness. This form of lightness denies the necessary movement and force of the Down. To go up one needs to go down, down into the earth of the body.
The “tree”, as it were, that grows up out this earthly placement is the spine. Mr Macdonald would sometimes say to a pupil during a lesson “Up to go down, down to go up”. These words lived in his hands, allowing you to experience what he simply called Force A and Force B, one ascending the other descending, one expanding the other contracting. This movement is also central within Tai Chi, as with the seasons and the movement of the tides rising and falling.
When these forces are flowing properly in the spine, a third force arises that could be said to have lightness, but this lightness is different from that mentioned earlier, as it is concurrent with a quality of weight; it is embodied. It this regard it can in truth be said that Mr Macdonald taught universal fundamental principles.
To ascend safely one needs to have gone down deep into the psyche. Should an initiate rise too soon or inappropriately, as with Icarus, sooner or later there will be collapse, and the greater the inflation ultimately the greater collapse.
In her lecture Ego and Shadow Barbara Hannah said, “Whatever ground one can reclaim from the shadow is firm and fertile ground, a ground which enables one to commence building the house founded on the rock, whereas everything which is built on the light side of the ego complex, or on the persona, invariably turns out sooner or later to have been built on sand.” (Lecture No. 85, pps 13–14 Guild of Pastoral Psychology, London 1955).
As one goes deeper, the resistance increases, but in the journey one is not alone, and help will come if sincerely requested. When I gaze now inwardly upon the influences of my fundamental Alexander Technique teachers, by moments I remember the extraordinary clarity and importance of direction imparted by Mr Macdonald, the stillness calling through the guidance of Miss Goldie, and the releasing transmitted by Mr Carrington. Putting the three teachings together, and this is not meant to be a formula, I think it would be accurate to say: release upward into the direction of stillness. This stillness potentially can deepen into quietness, a necessary prerequisite for silence.
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