As part of my continuing professional development, between March and July this year I participated in a comprehensive and fascinating course on the emerging field of the Science of Somatics. It was led by Tim Cacciatore and Sebastian Zahler, who are both somatic practitioners and neuroscientists. The course explored the science that lies behind somatic practices such as the Alexander Technique, Feldenkrais, Somatic Experiencing and Craniosacral Therapy. Not only can science help explain some of the mechanisms and benefits observed with these disciplines, but it is also clear that science may have a lot to learn from somatic practices.
It would take a whole book to try and summarise the course, so I’m just going to focus on one highlight for me. This was realising how all of our experiences arise as a result of our ‘brain’s best guess’. Whether it’s how we perceive an image, or whether and how we experience an emotion or pain, it is always the outcome of a highly complex synthesis of present incoming sensations with past experience and current context. Taking all these factors into account, our brain makes a prediction of what is likely to be the best response in the current situation (e.g. this could be a certain feeling such as anger or thirst). In making these predictions, the brain is using internal models such as our body schema – this is our subconscious representation of ourselves, telling us where everything is in relation to everything else. Without it, an action as simple as scratching one’s nose would be very hit and miss.
To give a simple example of a prediction, if I’m in the garden looking in the direction of the flower bed, the light travelling through my eyes triggers signals which my brain then interprets and produces an output which is the experience of ‘seeing a flower’ (perception). Similarly, because my life’s experience to date has been very positive with regard to being in nature, seeing the flower is likely to make me feel happy (emotion). Different people can have very different perceptions of the same flower because we are all making our own individual predictions. Optical illusions are an example of where our predictions can sometimes be way off the mark because we’re not seeing what we think we’re seeing.
Because the ‘output’ i.e. the experience depends on considering several different factors together, one particular sensation will not always lead to the same response, even in the same person. An example given on the course is that someone might register exactly the same sensation of an increased heart rate in two different situations, and their resulting experience could be very different depending on the context. So, if the person goes out for a run and their heart rate increases they may feel really good because that is their prediction as being what’s most appropriate. If, however, they’re sitting watching a horror movie and their heart rate increases in exactly the same way, they are likely to feel fear rather than joy – it’s the same sensory input but they (subconsciously) make completely different predictions and therefore have two very different experiences.
Another example is feeling pain. You can think of pain as being an inbuilt alarm system that alerts us when we need to change our behaviour to protect ourselves. With all pain (as with any experience), it’s our brain’s best guess at the time. So, if I step off the kerb awkwardly and twist my ankle, the sensations that travel from my ankle to brain will be interpreted as a danger signal that is likely to produce an experience of pain – feeling pain, I’ll want to do something to protect my ankle. However, context is everything. So, if the same thing happens but I realise I’m in the path of an oncoming lorry, although the same signals will be sent from my ankle to my brain, I’m much less likely to feel any pain because that would be distracting and it’s more important that I just run out of danger as quickly as possible.
You might be wondering why any of this is relevant to the Alexander Technique? Let’s take a couple of examples which may help explain how learning the Alexander Technique can improve issues as diverse as posture and pain states:
A common reason for people beginning Alexander lessons is a wish to improve their posture. They may, for example, have a tendency to stand and sit with the upper back leaning backwards, or they may hold their head tilted to one side. One of the several reasons that it’s so hard to change these types of things on your own is that it will feel right as it is. Because our internal models such as our body schema are constantly being updated, if we continue to always do the same thing, then our schema ‘gets a bit stuck’. This means that the individual will often be unaware that they are leaning back or holding their head to one side. What’s more, if they were to stand or sit with more alignment, it would feel that they were leaning forwards / holding their head to the other side (and, of course, in one sense they are right as they are noticing a relative difference to their usual). It’s thought that one way in which Alexander lessons can help improve posture is through the repeated (and pleasurable) experiences of standing, sitting, moving etc in ways that gently challenge the current body schema such that the internal model gradually updates itself and its predictions become more accurate.
Another example can be found with the many people we work with who are living with chronic pain. Earlier I described pain as a danger signal that is likely to make us change our behaviour in a way that is protective and useful. However, when pain persists for an extended period of time it does not necessarily remain a useful experience. It is well recognised now that sometimes the original tissue injury has completely healed but the person can continue to experience excruciating pain. In this situation, the many systems that are involved in pain (brain and nerve circuits, sense receptors, immune system etc) have adapted in ways that can produce a vicious circle of constant and often augmenting pain. In this scenario we need to embark on a journey of retraining the mind-body to make different predictions. In an earlier post I describe the role that the Alexander Technique can play in recovery from chronic pain.
As a method for improving the accuracy / helpfulness of our internal predictions, I believe that the Alexander Technique is uniquely placed. This is because of its nature as being equally a ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ approach. ‘Top-down’ reflects how we learn to use our thinking – our intention, attention and awareness – to positively influence our responses, movements and general state of being. At the same time, we are learning and changing ‘bottom-up’ through experience guided by the gentle hands-on contact from the Alexander teacher. So, for example if I have an experience of movement or ‘posture’ in an Alexander lesson that is different to my habitual one, then my internal models (body schema) is likely to be updated in a beneficial way.
While we don’t always make the best guesses, it’s amazing how we can usually make sense of a myriad of information, past and present, to make a good enough prediction. Where approaches such as the Alexander Technique come in, is that we can improve our internal predictions for easier movement and a calmer state of mind.