Alexander’s Mysterious 2nd Discovery – Part II “The Performer.”

FM’s 2nd Discovery I avoid talking about because of its subtlety.

If you perform at all – dancer, musician, actor, singer, speech-giver, narrator, clown – it means one thing: stop trying to feel what you are performing.

If you are in a physical art of any kind – yoga, pilates, gym trainer, runner, sportsperson, martial artist, athlete – it means another thing: stop trying to feel what you are doing.

In both instances, there is a profound misunderstanding of how to use sensory information to guide your activity.

Neuro-scientists pay attention – many of you have no idea about this either.

THE ARTISTIC PARADOX

To get an audience to feel your performance, you must not try to feel your performance. Why?

Because feelings are a result, not a cause. 

By “Feelings” I mean a range from sensory feedback through to emotional states. Here are a few hard facts about feelings:

- feelings are capricious and selective; you cannot command what you will feel.
- feelings are comparative: they only report on change, not on sameness.
- feelings are a record of the past: they are a report on what has already happened.

Artists who try to feel their music or feel the emotions of their characters or feel the expression in their body have got it the wrong way around.

Feelings come at the end of a process, not the start.

Take an actor portraying anger: anger results because of a situation, because of circumstances. Only a child might “decide” to be angry, and most adults can see through that in a second. Actors are the same. Genuine anger will result when the character thinks about what has happened to them. The actor who tries just to show us “anger” is boring, even difficult to watch.

Musicians suffer from the same fate.

When a musician tries to “feel” the music, it inevitably involves them tightening their musculature so their body can manufacture a spurious “feeling”. This attempt to manufacture feeling plays havoc with the freedom, flexibility and responsiveness that leads to masterful artistic expression.

What do you think about instead?

You think about the circumstances – this starts with a technical appreciation of what is involved physically in doing what you do.

Watching lessons of this is action is what happens at BodyChance – along with giving you a concrete series of thoughts that accompany your performance. The offer I have at the moment will involve watching many classes where this concept is applied.

The lessons part of a Super-Sized package that also includes:

- Jeremy Chance’s 1-Day BodyThinking workshop: talks, activities and games that explore the BodyThinking Online course information playfully.

- Greg Holdaway’s 3-day seminar in Osaka, with lessons demonstration the application of this information in a practical way.

- “How to Teach Online (by example)” with Lucia Walker, Malcolm Balk, Cathy Madden. Greg Holdaway and others… Priceless examples of how to communicate using Zoom.

- And of course the centre-piece: BodyChance’s BodyThinking Online course. A comprehensive fact-bursting series of 66 videos that help expose delusional ideas by replacing them with constructive ways to think about when you are performing.

- 5 recorded BT coaching sessions with Jeremy on everything from BodyThinking to building your practice.

Read more about BodyThinking and how to purchase this package here:

BodyThinking Online + “How to Teach Online (by example)” + Lots more:

https://bodychance.mykajabi.com/store/oTZvjLye