A Personal Experience 
by Julio Maidanik

I first knew about Noam Renen, through Nicholas Brockbank article “Description of an unusual lesson I had with Noam Rennen.”

Brockbank’s comments intrigued me, so I followed the link to Noam’s website, which at that time only included his article “A personal view of the personal view of Moishe Magidov of the ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE Published in: THE ALEXANDER JOURNAL, No. 12 - Autumn 1992”

I found Noam Renen's article very interesting, so I read it several times, and contacted him to  ask questions about his article. Although he kindly answered my questions, he emphasized that the Alexander Technique is practical and not theoretical, so that individual lessons with a teacher were the only way to learn it.

He sent me other articles he had written, among them his collection of aphorisms "Use your Brain", which made a great impression on me.

Many times his advice has helped me  overcome the difficulties in my learning the Alexander Technique.

Noam Renen workshop on Alexander Technique
January 2003

I finally found my way to get to Zurich  and have lessons with Noam Renen, on January 2003
What follows is a description of my experiences during this "workshop".

I believe I have learnt a lot from those lessons, through which I got a clearer understanding of the way I shall follow in my future work with the Alexander Technique.

An Alexander Technique lesson by Noam Renen

 “On the Knees” 
(pupil: Julio Maidanik)

This procedure, called by Noam “On the knees”, consists in going back and forth from “standing” to “sitting” (on the legs), with Noam “directing” the movement.

Noam Renen prefers this procedure, similar to the more classical “Getting in/out of a chair”, because:

1. The feet are not involved, so getting the back to work is much easier

2. According to his experience, most people “hold” at their hip joints.

It should be remarked, that this is not merely a “physical exercise”, Noam “directs” the pupil, and conveys the kinaesthetic experience of the “directions” through his hands, while the student  must “inhibit” his habitual reaction to “do” the movement, or to “hold”.

Often, Noam will make the pupil remain at an intermediate position, and correct his back posture.

When near “sitting” this may be very tiring to the leg muscles, but when the back works (“opens” is another way Noam calls it), the body feels “light” and the legs don’t get tired.

He also uses the standard procedure “Getting in/out of a Chair”, and several times he let me choose which one to work with.

“Getting in/out of a Chair” proved to be much more difficult for me to “inhibit” my habitual reaction to use muscular force to “jump” out of the chair, or “collapse” to the chair when sitting down .

Noam would not let me "gain my end"  when he sensed I was using muscular force in the habitual manner, and stiffening my neck. That is  a completely diferent aproach from my previous experience with other teachers, who did allow me to "end-gain" and only afterwards remarked my wrong doing. 

I believe that Noam's aproach to teaching follows F.M.Alexander's, of providing the pupil right experiences:
"Under the ordinary teaching methods, the pupil gets nineteen wrong and one right experience. It ought to be the other way round"
F.M.Alexander, Notes of Instruction (in E.Maisel, The Alexander Technique)

I have found other advantages in Noam's procedure "on the knees" over the standard one, besides the ones that Noam mentioned. In any case, experimenting with both of them, I discovered many new aspects involved in that fairly "ordinary" activity that F.M.Alexander used for teaching.

“On the Knees – Hands on Back of Chair”

“Hands on back of Chair”, in Noam’s view is much more difficult, and he uses it for teaching advanced pupils only.

He remarked that his teacher P.Macdonald, stressed the freeing of the wrists, while in his own view, the wrists get free  (and the shoulders don't get tired) by themselves, when the back "opens".

According to him, that is easier to achieve "on the knees" than in normal sitting.

Noam uses a procedure that literally “makes” the pupil to stand up.

Note the smile on the pupil’s face, this is due to the unfamiliar experience of being “lifted” without effort either by himself or by Noam.

After walking with Noam’s “direction” around the room a couple of times, the second part of the lesson takes place on the table.

To get the pupil lying on the table, again Noam uses a procedure, that takes the pupil effortlessly from standing to lying.

Note the smile on the pupil’s face.

While on the table, Noam releases tensions that may have built at the pupil’s back, with several procedures that resemble those of Chiropractics.

“Straighten the knees”

In this procedure, the pupil is instructed to “straighten the knees”, which together with Noam coordinated flexing of the pupil’s legs, produces a light shaking of the body, mainly of the legs and lower back.

“Stretching arms”

Noam takes the pupil’s arms and stretches them over his head.

According to Noam, he uses “directions” and not muscular force, and he showed the difference: when he uses force, the pupil contracts his shoulders, and opose Noam action.

On the other hand, when he uses “directions”, the shoulders remain free, and the back is gently stretched.

After that, the pupil is left alone,  lying on the table with the legs resting on the chair, while Noam begins teaching to another student.

Compared with the standard semisupine position of "mechanical advantage", the position with the legs resting on the chair, is  more "relaxing". 

Noam Renen’s “one legged seat”.

“One-legged seat”

Noam Renen has devised several devices, to help his students.

One of those is the "one legged seat”, which makes collapsing while sitting, nearly impossible.

He recommended me to exercise regularly on it, to help strighten my back.

Among several other devices, he has devised a special  violin support. I am not familiar with that instrument, but from what I have seen,  it seems not to require the player to hold the instrument with his chin.

Being at Zurich

Banhoff Strasse - Zurich

I stayed in Zurich from January 19^th 2003 till January 28^th .

During my stay, I had daily lessons with Noam, sometimes up to three, and was invited to watch his lessons and his training course.

I had some time off, and the lessons gave me much to think about, so I used to walk around the beautiful city of Zurich, and take some “fresh air”.