Many thanks to Magdalena for her comments on last week's blog. There is no disagreement I think between us, in taking the aim of Alexander Technique to be 'consciousness, and making conscious decisions as to what and how we want to be and how we want to operate, rather than be driven by habits'. There was and is no suggestion from me that this was new to people deeply interested in the Alexander Technique in its broadest sense. Where there might be disagreement is in how far the Alexander community should be open about this and about how far for marketing purposes we stray into ideas which are deeply problematical, when viewed from the perspective of Alexander's writing. That though, is for another day and blog.
Today I want to return to what I suggested was new in last week's blog. For this Magdalena's comments provides a welcome point of departure in iterating, what I understand to be Alexander's position, namely the importance of using the stimulus-response model to understand ourselves. While I reject the stimulus-response model, the reasons for which I will come to shortly, this rejection is not the radical break, that I was blogging about last week. That comes with looking at ourselves as persons in relationship and with elaborating how Conscious Control might look if we took ourselves to be persons in relationship rather than simply as individuals.
To elaborate, what Conscious Control of the person might look like, one must first get past and give up the stimulus-response model that Alexander uses. Magdalena's comment here is most helpful, in that she is open in writing that this is something she 'believes.' I think that this ultimately correct, in that it is a belief, or a model, or even a position and as such we can choose whether or not we wish to adopt it or not. For me the rejection of the stimulus-response model, even when used at its most conversational came from the pragmatic realisation, that it concealed more than it revealed, hides more than it illuminates.
By this I mean that, what Magdalena labels as a stimulus, I have always found to be constructions, interpretations of myself, a situation, another, that are better deconstructed and dialogued with, rather placed within the ‘category of “stimulus”’. In other words Magdalena’s comments exist as comments to me, comments to you that if placed by me or you, within the ‘category of “stimulus”’ hide what they essentially are, namely comments by another person to me and to you. To re-label them or subsume them as ‘stimuli’ is to hide that Magdalena and I, have at least temporarily entered into, which is some sort of relationship with each other. As, such we hopefully exist to each other as persons trying to understand each other, from our very limited communication through this blog, and are not merely stimuli in each other’s worlds.
My sincere thanks to Magdalena for her comment, which has allowed me to, hopefully illustrate, something of what I am attempting to begin to communicate. There will be no blog next week as Easter will be upon us.
Dear Richard, I feel honoured to have given rise to a whole new blog - but I also feel ashamed of myself. My reply to your last blog was really a reaction. i jumped to conclusions, made assumptions, before reading your blog properly and carefully. Jumping in is not a very good trait in an Alexander Technique teacher! Of course you are right: lumping everything that life presents us with into the stimulus-response model is a crudely reductive process and does not do justice to the interaction between two - or more - living sentient conscious beings. Even a very broad definition of stimulus and response cannot do justice to what might be going on in interpersonal interactions. But then I wonder what can do justice to this - what kind of model could possibly be more useful. The relationship between the self and the other is one which has interested me for years. I have thought endlessly about 'understanding' someone, and what this could possibly mean, and whether it is actually useful at all. I have studied the views of Sartre, Merleau-Ponty and Levinasse on this relationship - and realise that it is, for me, an impossibly difficult challenge, a bit like the concept of infinity. Maybe this is why I find it easier to deal with things within the stimulus-response model. That does not mean that I think that interpersonal relations are no more than stimulus and response. But it is the impossibility - for me - to fathom the so much more which brings me back to using the tool of stimulus-response. I use it as a tool, a crude tool, never forgetting that sometimes one has to put this tool aside and allow space for something else, even without knowing what the something else is.
ReplyDeleteFundamentally, I agree with you. My reply here is simply an illustration of my own difficulties and musings.
I have looked at some of your other blogs, and I very much respect your views. I will become a follower of your blog, and I hope that we might occasionally interact again - and maybe without me having to become red-faced!
My very best wishes,
Magdalena
Dear Magdalena,
ReplyDeleteOnce again my thanks for your comments and generosity of spirit in engaging with the blog. I do hope you will continue to contribute to the dialogue, it is very valued.
Very best wishes,
Richard