People come to us in pain, full of theories why.

Most of them wrong.

As purveyors of Alexander's discovery, we know the hidden habit that dictates the pain students are experiencing.

And the reason is shocking in its simplicity.

You are co-ordinating your actions by increasing your downward moving contractions of head/spine and arms – reverse that, all will be better.

People look at us like we are mad. What are you talking about?

The game of BodyChance success continues to startle and challenge me.

It’s been 17 years now since I started in 1999, and for the first 15 years we experienced an annual growth of around 17%.

Until we didn’t.

When you have 2 trainees, and you add another two trainees, you grow 100%. That’s easy growth. When you have 128 trainees, and you add 2 more, you’ve barely grown more than 1%! Not so easy.

We are at that place now, and I don’t know the rules.

Which way do we go now?

Lap dogs send you emails with questions like: is there anything I can do???

They look up to you, with unblinking loyal eyes, hungry for their Master’s voice.

Roaring Lions send you emails with judgements: what do you think you’re doing!!!

You want to surround yourself with roaring lions, not lap dogs.

Lap dogs are wonderful, reaffirming, great for your ego and totally useless at helping you to evolve towards your wish. Roaring lions are difficult, challenging to your ego and totally useful in helping you evolve towards your wish.

On a Skype this week with an AT Teacher*, he told me a wonderful story.

It was about a student – call her Marie – who was also a long-time friend. Of course Marie knew about his AT work, but she had never been much interested.

Then one day, out of the blue, Marie called…

“Look, I don’t want to learn Alexander Technique…”

(rather puzzling he thought)

“… but can you help me cross the street?”

It confirms a growing belief I have about our future – most people don’t care.

I recently had a friend compare me to Donald Trump - that was new!

For me it was a “he said-she said” dialogue, and for her I was distorting the “facts”. I was rewriting history to make my world happy again: “Sorry, but the latter sounds like Donald Trump’s thinking.” she wrote to me.

A really interesting thing what happened last year in London.

As background – it was during the time we staged ATSuccess’ first foray into live workshops. The ATSuccess London Symposium essentially embodied our core message:

Package Alexander's discovery to a specific group of people.

Your “niche” as the marketing lore goes.

There were 7 different events on offer, and over 50 teachers got involved. Huge success. Now I start to introduce the interesting thing:

Basil is a remarkable BodyChance teacher, famous throughout Japan in the classical music world (“It’s very small.” Basil assures me) yet virtually unknown to the wider Alexander community. Totally fluent in English, Basil is an American citizen born in Hong Kong, who grew up in Japan from the age of one.

Basil is a delightful experience here: American on the outside, Japanese on the inside.

Years ago, an American neighbour of mine expressed mild interest in Alexander's discovery –because of her migraines. One day, she asked if it could help her, and got close to agreeing to have a trial lesson…

Then suddenly she blurted out a startling question:

“It’s not going to change my personality, is it?”

And I immediately thought ‘yes’

and re-wrote a little Shakespeare in my head:

Cry ‘Havoc,’ and let slip the hands of change;

That this great deed shall flow around the earth

If you want a bizarre sexual experience, one place to find it is on a Tokyo peak hour train.

I know, because I have had occasional unsolicited experiences. This phenomenon led to the creation of “woman only” carriages during peak periods of travel. It involves people steadfastly avoiding eye contact, while trying to read books or smart phones in impossibly tight circumstances.

What happens?

Money never motivates you.

Sure, we love to have it. We think about it a lot. But it’s not money we seek – it’s freedom.

It might be freedom from a past. It might be freedom from a situation. It might be freedom from an identity.

Many successful entrepreneurs – enough to establish a pattern – have an origin story of epic proportions. Often one of their parents died or disappeared on them at an early age. Another is abject poverty: the “rags to riches” story. Another is a clever, misunderstood kid out to prove something.

Whatever.