image from urmc.rochester.edu

Radical Kindness to my Biopsychosocial Self
 
Fancy words for Integrative Alexander Technique in Pandemic Days
 
This morning as I fumbled through my litany of annoyances, frustrations, concerns and worries about HCoVid 19 and its effects in my life, the first line of my fancy definition of the Alexander Technique appeared –
 
Constructive conscious kindness to yourself
 
And became
 
Constructive conscious radical kindness to my biopsychosocial self
 
Radical because we are being asked to expand our practice of kindness challenging us to see that the actions being asked of each of us serve world-wide community kindness.
 
Daniel Siegel provides a definition of kindness that resonates with how I think the Alexander Technique integrates with our life:
 “The visible, natural outcome of integration. Positive regard for others, compassionate intention, and acts of extending oneself in service of others are all different manifestations of the differentiation and linkage of selves within a larger ‘We’ at the heart of being kind. Involves honoring and supporting the vulnerability of others and the self.” (2012: p. AI-44)
WE.
Biopsychosocial, a term introduced by physician George Engel, Professor of Medicine and Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center emphasizes the interconnectedness of self and community:
“I have proposed guidelines for a more inclusive model, a biopsychosocial model based on general systems theory. As the name suggests, its intent is to provide a framework within which can be conceptualized and related as natural systems all the levels of organization pertinent to health and disease, from subatomic particles through molecules, cells, tissues, organs, organ systems, the person, the family, the community, the culture and ultimately, the biosphere.
[…]
Overall health reflects a high level of intra- and intersystemic harmony. Such harmony may be disrupted at any level, at the cellular, at the organ system, at the whole person or at the community levels. Whether the resulting disturbance is contained at the level at which it is initiated or whether other levels become implicated is a function of the capacity of that system to adjust to change.” (Engel 1968, p. 175)
 
In this pandemic moment, all of Engel’s levels of wholeness demand our attention.
The pleas of our government officials and health care professionals is to think beyond ourselves.  If we understand ourselves as integrated biopsychosocial beings, we might be able to see more clearly that we are not sacrificing for others, we are sacrificing for ourselves.
 
At the moment pandemic conundrum arises, while acknowledging the challenge, my practice today is to use the Alexander Technique to call myself to serve my whole biopsychosocial realm, comforting the discomforts I experience at some levels as I integrate all the elements of me – from atom to biosphere -  in the service of kindness to every level – in communion with you and you and you and you  and you and you…..


Engel, G. L. (1978) ‘The biopsychosocial model and the education of health professionals’. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 310, pp. 169-187. 
Siegel, Daniel J. (2012) Pocket Guide to Interpersonal Neurobiology: An Integrative Handbook of the Mind. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. 


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Say yes to health by using your hands to Dance.                     
 
(an Integrative Alexander Technique Public Service Announcement related to Corona Virus Needs)
 
Many of us have seen the videos of public officials telling us not to touch our faces, followed by them immediately touching their faces. 
 
Of course they are immediately touching their faces! Those of you who have studied with me will probably remember me saying “Don’t think of a pink elephant.”  And realizing that once I say “don’t think of a pink elephant”, you were thinking of a pink elephant. 
 
We need to be talking to ourselves about what we want rather than what we don’t want.
 
We need a yes message.
 
The first day when I found myself about to touch my face and said “No”, I found my whole system tightening.  It was quite unpleasant.  And, as soon as I recognized it, I knew why.  Daniel Siegel’s work in interpersonal neurobiology highlights that the use of the word “no” evokes a reactive state of being,  whereas the use of the word “yes” evokes a responsive, receptive state of being. (Siegel, DJ .2017. Mind: A Journey to the Heart of Being Human among many.)
 
 A yes message will be more pleasant, so easier to carry out; and more effective because we aren’t evoking the pink elephant.
 
Say yes to health by using your hands to Dance. (or whatever other motion you’d like to do. Say yes.
 
(also saying yes to washing them a lot!)