Conscious Control as an ‘agent of change’
Let me start by introducing you to the idea managing your Awareness and Attention.
Awareness: Awareness is what you are noticing in any given moment. Awareness can be expanded or contracted.
Attention: Attention is what you choose to prioritise in that given moment. The amount of Attention paid to whatever has taken priority can be increased or decreased (fixed or released).
So, currently, you’re reading this text: You’re aware of the screen, what I’ve written and I bet the screen has ALL your attention. Screens are very good at grabbing our attention!
Your awareness has shrunk and your attention on the screen has increased and is FIXED.
But conversely, when you’re on a mountain top, your awareness expands and your attention is no longer FIXED. It isn’t being grabbed by one thing but is moving freely from one thing — a bird, cloud, gust of wind etc.
But what’s the point of Expanding your Awareness?
We all live busy lives; we’re swamped with emails, reminders, alerts, deadlines, lists of chores — things that are grabbing our attention — things that are shrinking our awareness.
We’re over-stimulated, over-stressed. We don’t have time or space to think for ourselves.
For me an Expanded Awareness gives me the chance to get out of my ‘busy head’, become aware of everything around me and take a breath. It’s like having a ‘Pause’ button for life — No mountain tops required.
So, how does this relate to swimming?
In any moment of Expanded Awareness, there’s a moment. The present moment.
A chance to change a habit…or a limiting belief….a swimming habit or a swimming limiting belief.
You then notice what is grabbing ALL your attention — a deadline, a chore, a swimming target, an annoying swim lane ‘hogger’ or a nagging ache.
You can then adjust how much attention you want to give and see what else might need your attention.
Managing my attention whilst maintaining an expanded awareness is a skill that I learnt to develop as part of my unconventional Alexander Technique training.
It’s something that I incorporated into my Intuitive Swimming method.
I use the Alexander Technique principles of Conscious Control to bring about this Expanded Awareness — this new approach to Awareness and Attention.
Conscious Control is the core principle of Alexander Technique. Conscious Control is all about noticing.
Within the concept of Conscious Control there is Inhibition. Inhibition is choosing to stop your habitual reaction to something you notice. This allows a new response to be chosen.
I’ll write about the other principles of Alexander Technique that allow us to change the way we approach swimming struggles from ‘fixing’ to ‘understanding’.
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(If you want to dive deep into your swimming understanding, I have an affordable, fully self-paced course, with my unique approach to Alexander Technique. Come and build a community of like-minded swimmers who want to solve their swimming struggles, swim mindfully and fall in love with swimming.
Main – Photo by Milad Fakurian on Unsplash
