Category: Alexander Technique

Discover the amazing benefits of working out on the floor.

Created for dancers by Zena Rommett over 50 years ago, floor barre is a proven system of exercises, done with your back on the floor with knees bent,  sitting up,  and on your side, The exercises lengthen the legs, arms and back.  Allowing the support of the floor, the back lengthens naturally while attention is paid to the pelvis maintaining its correct alignment with the legs and torso.

Read how Floor Barre® saved me from early retirement and rehabilitated me during injury:

I injured myself first in the 1980’s while touring Italy and dancing in outdoor festivals, and in January of this year.  I started the technique after my first injury and I regained my full range of motion and was pain free and dancing again. Although helpful, neither doctors, chiropractors, osteopaths and massage therapists could give the relief I found through floor barre classes !

With Zena’s work, I discovered I needed to provide myself with the means whereby I could heal on my own.  Floor barre offers a wonderful tool to strengthen and stretch your muscles in the most optimal skeletal alignment. You will also benefit from the Alexander Technique tools that I share every day with my students.

To book a  Floor Barre lesson, on Zoom, email me at bette@betterballroomwithbette.com, fill out the contact form below  or call 973 432 5815.

Make Floor Barre® a healthy, feel good new habit!

3 Tips to flexible, strong ankles and beautiful feet.

In every style of  dance, feet are both the extension of the leg line and an important articulator of rhythm and modulator of both speed and stillness.  In Latin and Rhythm, Smooth and Standard, the use of your feet is the key to driving your movement from point A to B.

Feet  are used to punctuate changes of rhythm. And women, in particular are graded on the use of their arches and the pliability of the ball of the foot and heel.  Aside from the aesthetic advantage of a beautiful arch, feet distribute weight either first through the heel lead in smooth and Standard dances or the ball of the foot in Latin and Rhythm.

When the feet are off the floor as in extension or pointed in tendu, they must be alive, with full engagement of the heel, arch and toes.  In walks, the feet are like cats paws that use the ground to push through each part of the foot, again, toe, ball, heel.  Distinguishing the 3 parts of each foot creates a sinuous quality that is both aesthetically pleasing and grounding for better balance and alignment.

Tip # 1

In your lessons and in all your social dancing, pay attention to your ankles.  Are you tightening around the joint?  If you notice this, ask yourself if you can let go and think of the ball of the foot as releasing into the floor.  You can practice tightening and letting go to see just how much tone you need e.g. to step to the side, forward and back.  The same goes for heel leads.  The ankle joint should be pliable and not stiff.

Tip #2

Think your whole spine pointing up while your neck and shoulders are easeful.  This will serve as an important tonal  guide all the way down to your feet and ankles.

Tip #3

Find 10-15 minutes a day to work your feet.  Here are some short exercises:

This foot exercise is designed to create mobility in the ankle joint and strengthen the arches.

1. Lie on a mat or carpeted surface with your knees bent, feet on the floor.
2. Flex your right foot, draw it up to knee level and with your knee bent, raise it up so that your flexed foot is facing the ceiling.
3.  Circle your foot around the ankle 8 times outward and then 8 times inward. Keep your lower leg quiet.  Switch to the left foot and do the same.
4.  Repeat #1 and #2 and this time Curl your toes, spread your toes,  point your foot (heel, ball of the foot and toes) and flex (toes, ball of the foot and heel).  Repeat 5 times each foot.

 

Do these exercises every day and after a week, notice how pliable your feet and ankle joint feel!

However you move through life,  feet that are stable and pliable help us to safely manage walking on uneven surfaces, improve balance, and prevent injury.

If you want to learn more about this process, book a lesson with me, either on Zoom or if you are in the NY/NJ area at my studio in Montclair, NJ.  Please use my contact form, tell me about yourself and leave your availability.  I will respond within 24 hours.

 

 

Many years ago, as a professional ballet dancer, I loved moving in a big, round, spacious manner.  For the most part, this worked for me.  But it was that other part that, at times, stymied my movements.  I often lost my organization and alignment to the  unchecked, wild enjoyment of my approach.  This was not helpful especially n the corps de ballet where we all were required to move as one.

It reminds me of the adage “learn the rules, then break the rules”. I seem to remember that this was often applied to abstract painters who may have been encouraged to learn to paint figures before splattering paint on a canvas.

But perhaps a better example is  the actor playing The Elephant Man twisting himself night after night into a painful shape without having a foundation of alignment to call upon.

You may think that all the rigorous training that ballet dancers go through IS learning the rules.  Not necessarily; monkey see, monkey do (admittedly my way of learning) was not taking personal responsibility for controlling my body.

I found a great deal of information about proper alignment from a wonderful teacher, Maggie Black, a stickler for getting up on your leg and purifying movement using a conscious approach to body placement.  I wrote about this process here. 

Studying with Maggie opened up a door to freedom. Untamed, unconscious movement gave way to conscious awareness of  placement and alignment, giving me more confidence. I had learned the clarity of rules  and now enjoyed a great foundation where the rules could be gently broken!

Now,  cross training has been offered up for dancers (and athletes) to acquire more and more bionic strength, stretch, endurance and extended lines. However helpful, the fact is the bar has been raised to a level where there are still injuries as more and more is expected of ALL dancers, from amateurs to professionals, from ballet to ballroom.

After Maggie moved her studio out of NYC, I injured my back on a grueling tour.  Zena Rommett’s Floor Barre® entered my life and I have adopted it as my alignment, healing, and feel good tool for maintaining stability while using joints as they are designed to operate.  

This was the only method that helped me regain my previous level of activity. It continues to be my go-to tool for rehabilitating the body.  My back injury resurfaced in January and I nursed it through these months with Zena’s work and have healed myself!

I’d like to invite you to try this anatomically sound technique recommended by medical doctors, dancers, actors, and back pain sufferers.  It has saved many dancers careers over 30 years.  I integrate my Alexander work into this technique to offer the most organic level of movement.

Please click here for more information.  Classes starting soon and space is limited!

Happy Dancing!   If you know other dancers who may benefit from reading my blog and learning about my upcoming classes, please forward.

 

What happens if you want to break a habit that you know is not working for you anymore.

For example, if you want to modify your posture, do you try to change it?

If you are trying, how are you trying?  Which of the  the mechanisms, processes, and physical conditions are being addressed in order to ‘try’ harder’?

Could trying be filled with habit?  And tension?   You’re back to where you started.

Another example could be trying to stop a reaction, like getting angry or defensive when someone says something about you that you don’t like.  When trying, we only have what we already know.

This is the classic usage of trying – attempting to change a habit by replacing it with another one that looks a lot like the original! 

Why is that?  Habits can be cozy and familiar.  But what do we need if we want an alternative?

What we don’t already know.

Now we’re getting somewhere.

Those who play sports, performers who wish to increase their skill level or anyone seeking relief from back pain caused by poor posture needs to know the thing that is interfering with their goals.  Things like recruiting neck muscles to do the job that requires other muscles to engage but can’t because neck tightening has taken over.

But don’t judge them, have compassion for your newly discovered habit. Give it life – beware of aversion.  By accepting it, you can start to work with it.
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•  Believe that we can’t make these habits go away completely, but we can change our relationship to them.
• We can change our relationship to them by changing our thoughts – directing  our body to move in the way we are designed – slowly developing awareness  of what we are actually doing in the moment.

Stay tuned!  Next week in Part 2, I’ll recount the stories of students that I have worked with and how they have changed their relationship to their habits in a positive way.

I love this guy!

​He is Eliud Kipchoge (El-ee-yood Kip-cho-gay). Eight straight marathons and Olympic gold are his.

He won the Berlin marathon on Saturday in a world record time of 2 hours, 1 minute, 39 seconds.  He is not far from an impossible sounding sub-2 hour marathon.

But it is his attitude around life that impresses, his disciplined, measured training and his intolerance for physical and emotional interferences that can easily highjack discipline.

For him, discipline is the premier reason he is successful. This is a familiar  training element with elite (and amateur) athletes, musicians, singers, and dancers, everywhere.  It is not about waiting to feel inspired to train, you just do it because it is the only way to get better.

But, here is the unique aspect of his discipline:

It is not about giving 100 per cent 100 per cent of the time.

“He estimates that he seldom pushes himself past 80% – 90 % tops – of his maximum effort when he circles the track for interval sessions, or when he embarks on a 25 mile run. Instead, he reserves the best of himself, all 100 per cent of Kipchoge, for race day – for the marathons he wins, for the records he chases”. (NY Times article 9/15/2018)

He goes into his marathons not overtrained, burned out or any version of doing too much.  He has measured out his considerable facility along the way with good health as a result.  He has never sustained a serious injury.

Of course I love this guy.  He already embodies the Alexander Technique principles of ‘knowing what you are doing while you are doing it’ and it’s not what you do but how you do it.   He’s not just working hard, he’s working smart. He is as energized by what he doesn’t do, as by what he does do.

Yet, he says “Only the disciplined ones in life are free.  If you are undisciplined you are a slave to your moods and passion”.  It’s just that his flavor of discipline includes a distilling down of all things unnecessary towards his goal.
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The work I do focuses on this element of tuning your body like a radio station dial to get the best reception, sound, volume and balance of bass and treble.  It’s a process of learning how your body works for you and noticing when it works against you and what to do about it.

If you want to find out more, book a lesson with me, either on Zoom or if you are in the NY/NJ area at my studio in Montclair, NJ.  Please use my contact form below tell me about yourself and leave your availability.  I will respond within 24 hours.
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 If you know others who may benefit from reading my blog, please forward.  

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“You are all trying to do something, and that something is your habit. All I want is to show you is a little bit of nothing”.
Marjory Barstow, trained by F. M. Alexander