I saw this post and wondered if anyone would mention AT. As a programmer who has had back problems and taken AT lessons, I would also recommend it with the following caveats.
First, as other posters have already said, see a doctor. If you suffered some trauma, there may be structural damage beyond what AT can help. AT is almost always useful in prevention and recovery. But if bad habit is not the root cause of your pain, it might not be the best treatment.
Second, Andy says the only problem is expense. That may be true in the big city but out here in the boonies there is another problem: availability. It is just a little ironic to me that I learned of AT after college at UIUC. It turns out that there are many good teachers in Urbana-Champaign. It was the home of the former NASTAT (N.A. Society for Teaching of AT). This is one of the places in the US where they actually train AT teachers. Alas, now U-C is a 3+ hour drive.
If you are unsure, I recommend a book called The Alexander Technique by Leibowitz and Connington. It starts off with a number of anecdotes designed to sell the reader (bias alert! they are selling!) on the technique. However, my experience confirms to me that the results in the anecdotes are quite certainly possible.
While the book doesn't recommend trying to learn on one's own, it spends almost half of the book discussing the "Liebowitz Procedures", a way of learning on your own. Judith Liebowitz developed the "Procedures" while she was the AT instructor at Julliard. (The forward to the book is by Kevin Kline (the actor)).
One last note. I also practice Tai Chi. I use it as a way to focus on improved Use of Self, the goal of AT. I can't speak about Yoga since I have only read about it and talked to people who practiced. But in my opinion (uninformed opinion alert!), AT attempts to teach more or less the same thing as its Eastern cousins. Except, there is no spiritual component to AT. Both Tai Chi and Yoga were developed as part of religious practice. For some reason it seems easier for Westerners to accept them. Perhaps it is because Tai Chi and Yoga are discovered by Westerners as part of a much larger discovery process.
M.
Check out Bob Metcalfe's column this week on Ucentric. If they can deliver, it's sure what I want.
http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xml/00/08/14/ 000814opmetcalfe.xml
M.
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I saw this post and wondered if anyone would mention AT. As a programmer who has had back problems and taken AT lessons, I would also recommend it with the following caveats. First, as other posters have already said, see a doctor. If you suffered some trauma, there may be structural damage beyond what AT can help. AT is almost always useful in prevention and recovery. But if bad habit is not the root cause of your pain, it might not be the best treatment. Second, Andy says the only problem is expense. That may be true in the big city but out here in the boonies there is another problem: availability. It is just a little ironic to me that I learned of AT after college at UIUC. It turns out that there are many good teachers in Urbana-Champaign. It was the home of the former NASTAT (N.A. Society for Teaching of AT). This is one of the places in the US where they actually train AT teachers. Alas, now U-C is a 3+ hour drive. If you are unsure, I recommend a book called The Alexander Technique by Leibowitz and Connington. It starts off with a number of anecdotes designed to sell the reader (bias alert! they are selling!) on the technique. However, my experience confirms to me that the results in the anecdotes are quite certainly possible. While the book doesn't recommend trying to learn on one's own, it spends almost half of the book discussing the "Liebowitz Procedures", a way of learning on your own. Judith Liebowitz developed the "Procedures" while she was the AT instructor at Julliard. (The forward to the book is by Kevin Kline (the actor)). One last note. I also practice Tai Chi. I use it as a way to focus on improved Use of Self, the goal of AT. I can't speak about Yoga since I have only read about it and talked to people who practiced. But in my opinion (uninformed opinion alert!), AT attempts to teach more or less the same thing as its Eastern cousins. Except, there is no spiritual component to AT. Both Tai Chi and Yoga were developed as part of religious practice. For some reason it seems easier for Westerners to accept them. Perhaps it is because Tai Chi and Yoga are discovered by Westerners as part of a much larger discovery process. M.
Check out Bob Metcalfe's column this week on Ucentric. If they can deliver, it's sure what I want. http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xml/00/08/14/ 000814opmetcalfe.xml
M.