Thinking about writing on this topic, I Googled “Alexander Technique and beauty” the other day and found no consequential results.
Nobody that I can find has written on this topic.
Call me shallow, but I not only prefer to look at beautiful people rather than ugly people, I much prefer to be around beautiful people rather than ugly people.
Beauty just makes me happy while ugliness brings me down.
Unnecessary tension patterns are ugly, even if the underlying framework of a person is handsome. People with stiff faces, postured expressions, furrowed brows are usually not fun to be around.
By contrast, many of my Alexander teachers were in their 60s and I found them most pleasant. Some days I just wanted to hug them. The Technique did not remove their wrinkles and the other signs of age, but they were so alive to the moment, so spontaneous and free in their movements, they were beautiful.
When we stop interfering with ourselves, when we stop pulling down and in, when we stop unnecessarily holding ourselves, when we let go of needless stiffness and tension, then our real selves can blossom. We can create the life we want.
One of the major areas of the body where people hold excess tension is in the face. A tense face is not attractive. By contrast, when people stop furrowing their brows and tensing around the eyes and lips and jaw, then they can come alive. It’s intoxicating to talk to a person who’s alive to the present moment and you can see their thoughts and feelings write themselves across their face.
Jennifer, an Alexander teacher, comments: “I rarely say anything about this to my students (for many reasons), but just a few weeks ago, I was teaching an 84-year old woman, and at the end of the lesson I held up a full-length mirror so she could see herself in the mirror. I was so taken by her image that I spontaneously and joyfully gushed, “Now that’s a BEAUTIFUL woman!” It was nice to see that she barely reacted to the comment, but was pleased by seeing her own image.”
Alexander teacher Franis Engel writes: Height is statuesque – and it’s standing up to your full height that Alexander Technique offers a way to do without it appearing forced or arrogant. Learning grace under pressure by showing how to redirect reactive habits that tend to pop out during stressful situations. Using A.T. as a tool in your bag of tricks shows off confidence and feeling at ease in an open and flexible countenance – that’s attractive and inviting.
Symmetry is beautiful. As you age, things happen that tend to make a person’s face and body posture asymmetric. Even a temporary injury can leave a person with the “battle scars” of being incompletely healed. By knowing Alexander Technique, you have a way to train yourself out of being lopsided – a way that doesn’t sacrifice the pursuit of beauty for increased suffering.
By the time you’re fifty, it’s said that you have the face you deserve. Often I thank my first Alexander Technique teacher. Seeing the hint of knitted and raised eyebrows that popped out to show others my concern, he would reach up and draw his finger across my forehead. I never knew I was doing this to my face until the moment he would point it out; he never blamed me for not being aware of it. Now that I’m in my mid-fifties with an unlined forehead, I give a little thanks to how he showed me Alexander Technique could train the worried look out of my face.
