I have to take a pause in my Alexander Technique training, after having gone through only one semester of the nine necessary to become certified as a teacher by AmSAT. I continue with taking private lessons though.
So, I am having a table-turn-only lesson because my knee is totally messed up. No chair turns for me right now. I am tense. I can’t even bend my knee, so I extend it and my teacher puts a pillow under it. I am able to keep my other leg bent. My knee hurts with sharp pain, and all the muscles of my leg are aching. My other leg hurts too, obviously because I am walking in a funny way. My entire body reverberates with the pain. I am exhausted from the pain. What is wrong: an MRI showed a meniscus torn in two places, but more importantly, irregularities in the bone. So I am undergoing every medical test in the book to find out if I have any nasty cancer type thing happening before I am cleared to have surgery. I am learning to live with ambiguity while I wait for the results.
I tell my teacher that I am revisiting that time when I first started Alexander lessons, perhaps because I am in lots of pain again, that I feel I am losing ground because I cannot train, and because my life as I know it is on hold yet again: twilight zone time. And he told me that this scenario is impossible, as since I have been taking lessons with him (now for over a year) I have become so adept at inhibiting and directing and of course, I had done one and a half years of lessons before he and I started working together, and that I had my semester of training. So I will not lose a thing, not to worry. Hmmm…
After only about five minutes into the lesson, all of a sudden, all the tension just up and leaves my body and it is a moment of sheer bliss. I feel like a rag doll in control. As I often tell myself after a lesson, “wow that was the best lesson I ever had.” Profound stuff. So I am thinking that this forced pause will be highly beneficial. It will enable me to sort out my thoughts.
magdalenaportmann
Well done to take the plunge, Rena! you say that your life is on hold. But maybe it is not! It is simply presenting you with a new challenge. Another opportunity to find out about the way you operate, and an opportunity to see how the Alexander work can create better conditions for coping with what life has put your way. See what you can do with it – take an active interest – and thus you will be able to turn the postponement into a very valuable time of discovery. All best wishes with it!
Rena Anya Devéza
Thank you so much Magdalena! I do believe that only good things will emerge from this moment in time!
Kristin
COURAGE!!! Check out Jeanne Barrette’s (AT teacher’s) blog. She went through some extraordinary stuff that might provide some insight. It is beautiful and inspiring……
http://activestillness.com/2009/03/
Rena Anya Devéza
Mille fois merci Kristin! I look forward to reading Jeanne Barrette’s blog!
Mark Josefsberg
Hang in there Rena. And, do whatever gets you through the night. Looking forward to your healing!
Rena Anya Devéza
Thank you Mark! I suspect that keeping up this blog will be on my healing agenda!
Annie Turner
Lovely blog, Rena. You have a lovely way with words! Yes, sounds like a very powerful part of your training rather than a pause. Never easy to see this from the inside at the time, but ‘to every season there is a purpose’, which will become clear later. I wish you well with the investigations, and so glad you can continue your private lessons and gain that valuable support. Hang in there, my lovely! This too will pass.
Rena Anya Devéza
Thanks so much Annie! I love what you say about this being a powerful part of my training! I will glom onto that thought!