In the 20s, Coca-Cola had an ad campaign that named Coke as “the pause that refreshes.” Also, apparently, at one point Coke had what we now call cocaine in it - so times have really changed. Growing up Coke used “Coke is it!” as an ad campaign which is as direct while being as vague as can be.
The second major principle of the Alexander Technique (AT) laid out by Patrick MacDonald, one of Alexander’s early trainees, is “Inhibition or Non-Doing.”
Inhibition is a word that might land with a negative connotation in 2022, something that we are supposed to overcome, something that we let stand in the way of getting what we really really want. (A zigazig ah, perhaps) BUT -
In terms of the Alexander Technique, Inhibition is a pause. In a way, it could be said to be “inhibiting” the force of habit that we spoke about last week. It is a pause, there is no set time limit for this pause. Perhaps it is a breath, perhaps many, or maybe a full minute or simply pausing. This pause, this inhibiting of habitual actual action, can also be named non-doing.
Non-doing is a big concept in the mindfulness world and a lovely overlap between AT and mindfulness.
Let’s talk about your hands for a moment. Or my hands - like right now - my hands are typing, remembering through that muscle memory perhaps those hours spent with Mavis Beacon teaches touch typing when I was trying to get my wpm up to snuff for a temp job… what are you hand doing right now? Scrolling, fidgeting, tensing, relaxing… in this very moment I ask you to invite your hands to let go of doing and come into being.
This invitation might be responded to whatever arises, there is no right way or wrong way to respond to the invitation, but it could be used as an exercise to experience Non-Doing - to experience being.
This space between letting go and beginning again is the pause - in this space is the work, from an AT lens, of inhibition - noticing habit and inviting that habit to lay back to let whatever is present, perhaps a new way of being, come forward.
And that new way might feel refreshing.