M02.16 – Activity and Co-ordination Plans? Help!

Victoria wrote a delightful comment yesterday:

“The past blogs have interested me immensely, and yet it seems I can’t make heads or tails of what you’re talking about. Could you possibly give us an example Jeremy of what you mean?”

Have you seen Masayuki Suo's wonderful Japanese film "Shall We Dance?" Please watch it, and you will have more of an idea of an the audience receptive to my concept of an online Alexander Technique learning service… *** (pretend for a bit that you are a Social Dancer) *** A Guide for Social Dancers I've worked with a lot of Social Dancers in Japan. There is one problem you have which is common to most – shoulder and neck pain. Many of you feel it is a result of holding your arms in the air for so long while you dance, but this is not the cause. A person in good posture is able to work with their arms in the air for hours freely and without pain. The reason it happens is a result of confusion between your shoulder, arms, head, neck and spine. Over the next few days, I will offer you more clarity about how these elements function together to create beautiful, integrated dance. Let's start by discussing arms… Shoulders There are no shoulders. Yes, you read that right. Arms Your shoulder is actually no different from your arm. It is not a separate moving entity. Do you know where arms are connected? Exercise One Point to the place on your body where your arm joins your skeleton. I bet you pointed here (Glenohumeral joint) as most dancers do.   I think it is a result of seeing too many Barbie dolls where the arms pull out from sockets. In fact, your arms connect to your spine at the base of the neck (Sternoclavicular joint) …   This is important to know – when you lift your arms to wrap around the body of your partner, visually create the movement happening from the sternoclavicular joint – try it next time you dance… This is an arm!     Think that your whole arm - leading from fingertips, moving along it's length and into the base of your neck and running down the whole length of your whole spine - is wrapping around your partner. Understand how the entire spine is supporting your arm in every move it makes. Try that and come back for out next lesson tomorrow… *** This is activity plan, pure and simple. Did you notice, however, that I snuck in tiny bit of a co-ordination plan at the very end? The part about the "whole spine" is axial movement, a la Alexander's primary control. It could be part of an ongoing series – that I never wrote – to captivate an audience within social dance - had I done sufficient niche positioning of my Self in that market! I had done some, wrote a series of 6 articles over a year, and almost had a book deal, but then the magazine shut down and I reviewed my position. The industry is in decline – younger people are not doing it in the same numbers as the past – so I decided it was better to focus my energy on another niche. I am not a social dancer, but we still have them turning up to the studio so my effort was not wasted. An online Alexander business would work specifically with the individual movement problems that are suffered, and slowly offer bodymapping, thinking, visuals, experiments that would led people to start thinking and moving in a new way. For Social Dancers, one of the big issues is arm and neck pain while dancing. Of course the results from being enrolled online would be tantalizing – sometimes a good result, other times not. As long as some people got something all of the time, or all of the people got something some of the time, the business model could work. It would operate to entice people to take the next step and have lessons, while still generating income in the process. A win on both counts and a better biz model than the one we have now. Activity and Co-ordination plans will be a subject of the month on Service Product, starting in August. Right now I can not go deeper, but… Perhaps you can come to my London workshop on Sunday August 4th to learn more about it? Sorry if you are unable, but I will be pursuing this subject further when we get to Step Four. NOTE: Full and Pro members can go to the Texts directory and download this part of the presentation that I gave to the Dance Federation's annual conference in 2010.