The awareness of the natural functioning of the body's reflexes is gained by the release of tension and is encouraged by the teacher while the student is gently oriented through daily routines such as speaking, walking, sitting down and geting up from a chair. In this way, balance can be found between muscular tonus and release giving the body the proper support for movement. Breathing and circulation become freer thus awarding the student conditions to answer to problems of everyday life with less stress and greater freedom of choice. There are no side effects or limitation of age.

"Most people fall into a mechanical habit of thought as easily as they they fall into a physical and mechanical habit which is the immediate consequence." F. M. Alexander

Frederick Matthias Alexander (1869-1955) was a man ahead of his time. In the end of the 19th century, he designed a revolutionary method that concerned the human being's development that, along those years, attracted several personalities in the fields of science, education and arts. It can be said that Alexander was a pioneer in western culture and developed a method in which the man is seen as a psycho-physic unit. Alexander believed that his work would benefit future generations as an instrument for the human being's improvement, through an integral education in which the physical, emotional and mental aspects are all involved.

This work began in his youth, when Alexander became a renowned Shakespearean actor in Australia and New Zealand and his recitals became popular. His health, that was already fragile since childhood, worsened due to his frequent theatrical presentations: breathing problems and hoarseness became constant problems. Without any success with doctors and without knowing how to solve these problems, Alexander began a research using himself as the object of observation and study. He noticed that the way he used his body and mind directly affected the general functioning of his organism - his voice and breathing problems were merely consequences of a dysfunctional body. Since then, he developed a method based in Man's psycho-physical unit, named The Alexander Technique.

Advised by several Australian doctors, Alexander moved to England in 1904 where he would have more chances of expanding the potential of his findings. Along those years, he obtained support from several personalities of his time like: writer Aldous Huxley, playwright George Bernard Shaw, Nobel Prize winner of physiology Sir Charles Sherrington, anthropologist Raymond Dart and the philosopher and educator John Dewey, amongst others
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In 1930 he began the first teachers training course, in what later became known as The Alexander Technique and continued teaching his technique up to 1955, year of his passing.

Along his life he wrote four books:
- Man's Supreme Inheritance, 1910
- Constructive Concious Control of the Individual, 1923
- The Use of the Self ,1932
- The Universal Constant in Living,1943

Nowadays, even though unknown to the general public in Brazil, his work is being applied in different teaching institutions around of the world. The principles developed by Alexander influenced several therapies, self-knowledge processes and body work existing today. When one enters in contact with this technique it is very common to e surprised by how original, simple and modern it actually is.

“This story of perceptiveness, of intelligence and of persistence, shown by a man without medical training, is one of the true epics of medical research and practice." "... this basic scientific method is still too often looked down on by those blinded by the glamour of apparatus. A little more attention to the body as a whole and to the unit of body and mind could substantially enrich the field of medical research ."

Extracts of the speech given by Prof. Nikolaas Tinbergen, on the work of F.M.Alexander, when receiving The Nobel Prize of Medicine in 1973.