On Being Stiff

The AT student and the Zen student have something in common.  The nattering nabobs will call us names.  Zen students are referred to as Zendroids and AT students as Alexandroids.

I'm not quite sure what this means, but I think we can look odd, make people feel uncomfortable, so they call us names.  I have been a student of both, and I do wonder if I appear stiff to some people.  A woman who knows me well has said I can look like I have "a stick up my butt".   A few years ago a small child poked me while I was at a bus station: apparently he thought I might be a mannequin   

For the life of me I do not get it.  Since starting my AT teacher training program I am increasingly delighted to move.  Simple movements feel devine: relaxed, effortless.  I feel happy and graceful when I move.  The simplest tasks: walking, standing up, picking something up are fun and easy to do.  So why do some look at me as stiff?

I do know something about being stiff.  I have hurt myself in the past and with muscles in spasm I would barely move.   I have been in a state where I was sure movement would cause considerable pain.  In both situations my range of movement was dramatically curtailed and I'm sure I would appear stiff to anyone.    But nowadays I do not experience myself as stiff.  Quite the opposite.

Then I watched a video of a first generation AT teacher: Marjory Barlow.  When I first saw this I was struck by how upright she appears.  And at first she appeared stiff.  But as I watched the video it became clear that she is not stiff at all.  Her movements are both subtle and dramatic but she does not fidget or squirm or writhe or pull her self down.  Her movements accentuate the points that she is making in the interview.  There is ease in all her movements.

She is extraordinary.  What makes her amazing is that she is peaceful and healthy.  And that is extremely rare.  Most of us will see a person like this only once or twice in our lifetime.

A close relative suffers from intermittent back pain.  When I visited him last he was in pain.  I recommended the AT creative rest: put a paperback under your head, lie flat on a carpet and bend his knees to let his feet lie flat on the floor.  While there, try to do as little as possible, and do that for 10 minutes.  The next day he said he could only do this for 5 minutes.  He said he did not like it.  He found it "boring" and would not do it again.

"Boring"?  What is that?  It's the inability to be with his life just as it is.  How pitiful!   How terrible!  It must be hell to always have to make effort to get away from yourself, to never be able to find peace and contentment.

But he is not alone.  Go to any movie theater and watch people as they stand in line or classroom and watch people sit.  Everyone holds a static posture for a few seconds at best.  They are all pulled down, hunched over, constantly squirming.   Why do they do this?  Because their muscles complain about being misused and their minds can not tolerate a lack of diversion.  They're not in pain, quite, but as soon as the pain comes on they move their body and divert their mind.  The amount of happiness that can be found always dodging the devils pitchforks must be quite limited indeed.

But there are a few people in the crowd who are not moving.  They are the ones who have just undergone surgery, or are suffering from a whiplash injury, or have had their spinal column fused.  They are quite sure that if they move they will have even worse pain than they have currently.  And there are those who have had terribly hardened idea and opinions (sexual repression for starters) and they are afraid to move should their armor buckle.  Or perhaps their hardened ideas prevent them from moving at all.    All these people are stiff and are clearly identified as such.    

So, it is quite natural to assume everyone who is not moving is stiff.  We simply can not conceive of meeting someone who is content just to stand of sit still.  We can't imaging that someone would love to move but also loves to be still - who moves when there is some reason or desire to move but is otherwise still.

I wonder if I appear like this.  But I would not say that I am still.  Really there is always some movement, breathing, muscles twitching in my shoulders that accompany my thoughts, slight changes to the tonic state of the muscles in my trunk to stay upright.  There is always plenty going on.  I suppose I might appear still to ignorant people.  

But there is less and less about me that is stiff.   

Peace can not be found while moving to avoid pain.  Nor is stillness compatable with life.   I feel the breeze and sway with it and I smile.  To do this, and to appropriately respond to the stimuli, I need to continually "inhibit" and "direct".