This week in my Alexander groups we will be thinking about our arms, or as one of my teachers, Bruce Fertman points out, our arm structure. My students today found that just easing the tendency to grip the arms against their sides produced ease throughout the body. And we did that with the aid of a highly technical piece of equipment – a tennis ball – carried around the room under our arm pits!
And we looked at posters showing the muscles of the arms and how they connect deep into the spine. And we played ‘dem bones’, with six people holding six separate bones and working out how they connect to make an arm structure 🙂 A playful session of contemplative anatomy.
What else might we do this week to explore, think about and focus on our wonderfully mobile and beautiful arms? We might do a very traditional Alexander procedure, ‘hands on the back of the chair’ to explore how dynamically we can use both arms together to hold a single object. We may do some ancient Chinese Qi Gong exercises and enjoy the slow, fluid movement of lifting our arms to the heavens, we will probably pick up objects and explore the experience of lifting different weights. And we will read from Bruce Fertman’s book, Teaching by Hand, Learning by Heart the section on breathing – because our arms effect our breathing profoundly – as does everything else! 
Jennifer Fox Eades: Alexander Technique Teacher 