Connecting Links is a transcript of an informal talk given by Irene Tasker in 1967. By this point Irene had over fifty years of experience teaching the Alexander Technique. She had a unique position as a teacher of Montessori who applied the Alexander Technique to her teaching of mostly ‘disabled’ children with tremendous success. A proponent of the technique in the field of education, she had close ties to John Dewey and was herself a connecting link as she was instrumental in the writing and editing of the majority of Alexander’s books.

In the talk she describes the largest takeaway from her work with Montessori as observation and attention to the ‘means whereby’ recalling, “I learned from Montessori that my function as a teacher was primarily to observe and, according to what I observed, to provide each child with material best suited to him at his particular stage, and then acting as his guide, to give him the least help necessary to enable him to educate himself.” She stresses repeatedly through the talk the importance of giving the means, not the ends. I can’t help but compare this to my philosophy of teaching the viola where my main goal is to teach my students how to practice, how to figure out problems on their own.

Ms. Tasker’s descriptions of the writing and editing of F.M.’s books was a very interesting section in the talk. I had no idea that she and Ms. Ethel Webb had worked so extensively on them and they deserve added credit. She seemed to be a bit defensive about some criticism of Alexander’s books that were circulating at the time stating, “On the question of repetition, F.M. was insistent that you had to say things over and over again if you wanted them to sink in.” She also very fairly asserts that, “I think it is true to say that there are some people who prefer to know first about the Technique and from what they read decide whether or not to know it. Equally, there are others who are not interested to read about the Technique and the philosophy with it, until they know the effects of the working of the Technique upon themselves.”

A point that comes up in the talk has been bouncing around my mind, as I enjoy writing about the AT; to express concepts previously unexpressed in language is bound to be problematic and that writing which concerns itself with truth requires work to understand. I often find that only after I experience a truth, that I can recognize and appreciate it.

There is a wonderfully charming and heartwarming account of Ms. Tasker’s application of the Alexander Technique at the “little school” as well as other teaching positions she held over the years. She stresses the importance of applying the work to speaking advising, “I don’t think too much importance can be placed on the application of the work to speaking” adding “I think it should be part of the training of Alexander teachers. It is true that we teach with our hands to convey sensory experiences, but it is speech which conveys the ideas of which the sensory experiences are the counterpart.” Reflecting back on my training, I wish more emphasis was put on this, it took quite a while before I felt I could keep my inhibition and direction going while speaking and was often tempted to work in silence. We certainly did not spend the kind of time Alexander did working with speaking from what I can gather from the accounts of the early trainings.

I can’t help but relate to Ms. Tasker’s experience with the work. She describes taking the concept of inhibition to an extreme and F.M.’s response, “The other extreme of too hasty reaction, [F.M. went on] is drift.” I find this point to be one of the most difficult in practicing the AT. It seems Ms. Tasker did also as she mentions, “To keep the delicate balance between refusing consent to wrong doing and giving consent to the new doing seems to me the never-ending task for us all, both in our own use and carrying over that use into teaching.”

I love her response to the ever present question of progress in the AT: “We tend to speak of the ‘work’ and ‘the progress of the work’ forgetting that ‘we’ are the work.” I take that to mean that the collective body of Alexander teachers and students working (inhibiting and directing) will determine any progress in the work as a whole, not the perfect image or breakthrough scientific theory of the Technique.

Although the talk is nearly fifty years old, it seems as relevant as ever. Perhaps Ms. Tasker and I are kindred spirits as her emphasis on “not knowing”, that we [teachers] are the learners, and using Technique to connect the different parts of our understanding so we are more than the sum of the parts reflect my own values.