It was constant worry.

I don't see anything!

How can I teach in activities, when I don't notice anything to work with? These thoughts were often running through my mind as I began shifting my teaching from "Alexander-is-a-feeling" into "Alexander-is-how-you-think".

Then I realised - how ridiculous.

I had a half-written blog prepared on the plane last night, but once I landed in Australia and checked our secret Facebook group (where 43 teachers share as part of the paid area of my blog) I was overwhelmed by the volume of comments to behold!

So instead of posting a blog, I decided to post answers and comments in Facebook. Then I worried that the members may not have caught my torrent of replies in the midst of a messy, scrolling Facebook page, so I decided to post them here. How original ideas are born.

The Prince of Print, Gary Halbert, was famous for a simple question he posed to marketers in his seminars. Anyone in the direct marketing business knows this story - and I've told it before - so if you don't know it, get your education going by reading my old blogs from here.

I am standing there, looking out on an ocean of people - all wearing orange!

It was a Sydney Easter in 1981, and the crowd was gathered for another "celebration" with Bhagwan Rajneesh's band of merry followers. The Orange People, as they were called then, wanted Alexander Technique in their line up of workshops, but it was all gratis: pitch your workshop to the crowd, see who comes.

As I stood there I thought: I have a unique marketing opportunity: I better not screw up.

He did it, so why can't we? No reason.

On my Skype last night with a mentoring client (members know who), we explored her recent group teaching experiences. She had three regulars, then a newbie turned up, so she focused on basics.

"How was that?" she asked the regulars at the end.

Their response: "We didn't get enough hands on."

Oh dear.

A feeling is a report from your past.

It is about what just happened, even if you are imagining the future. You see an image, you react to it. We dream, we imagine, we create - then we have feelings about these constructions. Our hormones are triggered; we feel multiple emotions coursing through our system.

As an Alexander Technique teacher, I used to think it was my job to supply a new feeling to my student. I was very good at it - people marvelled after my lessons how different they felt, how amazing the Alexander Technique was…

Some people have already jumped on board for next month's workshop on teaching that is marketable. Joining today (Oct 27th) gets you an extra month's membership for free.

Those of you who follow my blog are familiar by now with my mantra - niche, niche, niche. This is easy to say, vast to implement. It's not just a marketing thing - it is a service thing, it's how you teach, how you implement in your lessons. Many companies spend vast amounts of time and money simply developing new products, and Alexander Technique teachers are not exempt from this law of the market place.

I was on a Skype with one of my mentoring clients yesterday, and the topic came up about how to use your time effectively. Over the years, I have learnt many ways to analyse this task, but the most useful of all was to ask a simple question…

Is this activity putting me into contact with new students?

Of course, I are talking about your time in the business, not your time with family, friends or in conscious rest. When you are "on" what are you "on" to? There are so many tasks required to build a business, and one way to categorize them is like this:

To respect the person you want to attract, you need to stand with them.

Of course to "stand with them" may mean voicing an opinion that causes controversy amongst others. My declarations about chair and table work fall into this category.

Alexander died on October 10th, 1955, but did he really?

He still lives in the minds and hearts of many of his followers. It's a blessing and a curse. Twirling around the air at my school in Japan, you can often catch the phrase…

"Is that really the Alexander Technique?"