Koko Told A Lie (Part I)

Koko was a 280lb (127 kg) Gorilla who sign languaged.

She had a little kitten as a pet. One day Koko got mad, and when the Masters came to her cell, they found her sink ripped away from the wall. 

Koko's explanation?

"The kitten did it."

***

As I wrote last week – our brain will blame anything but itself.

To assign cause to your Self is a highly-evolved cognitive act – overriding much of your evolutionary inheritance. We are deep-wired to blame the "Outside" for anything that goes wrong. Anyone watching the current occupant of the White House can see this in action: a pure and unadulterated blame-throwing bonanza.

The alternative can feel like Self-blame and leads much too easily to depression and suicide, something familiar in our world, but rare in Nature. Humans are the only known beings to use weapons when putting an end to their own life; that's how isolated we are.

How do we cope with this anomaly?

We become like Koko. We lie. To others, and especially to ourselves.

According to "LieSpotting" author Pamela Myer, we are lied to between 10 and 200 times a day. You can even train to become a Liespotting Expert, but there's another path available to you…

***

One day my teacher Marjorie Barstow - at the ripe age of 90 - was in London teaching a woman how to hold a violin for better performance. Marj asked her what she thought she was doing?

"I'm probably pulling my arms down too much," she replied.

Marj's reply struck me so profoundly that her words still echo back three decades later:

"There are no "probably's" in this work. You are either doing it, or you are not. You have to be very honest to be in this [Alexander's] work."

And there it is.

"You have to be very honest to be in this work."

I had never associated honesty with Alexander's discovery. Marj was my teacher in this. She noticed how – in English at least – people exchanged the pronoun "my" with the impersonal "the" – a tactic of objectifying and moving away from the subject that Myer claims is a common lying technique. 

A student would say to Marj:

"The neck hurts," then Marj would ask:

"Whose neck?"

There'd be an embarrassed giggle, then a mollified, "Well, MY neck hurts Marj."

Postural investigation puts you on a journey towards self-responsibility, kick-started by honesty. It happens in every lesson in ATSuccess.

You have a chance to get my coaching – one month to start, subject any you like:

https://bodychance.mykajabi.com/offers/jDn6SEkY/checkout

AND TOMORROW: more on Postural Honesty!