Rockford Alexander Technique: What is the Point of Lessons?

If I were a violinist, which I am, or if I were a golfer, which I'm not, I would want to have a coach at least sometimes who I would trust to tell me how I'm doing. So I would play my violin and listen to the coach go, "Eh, you sound like a mosquito..." (which is what Jascha Brodsky used to say, notice I left out the end of the sentence), but then the coach would say something truly useful about my position and stance and help me do better.
So there is to be an actual goal in the Alexander lesson - to do better.
But what?
Raymond Dart, the anthropologist, lectured on Alexander's work in 1970. He had been a student of the work for decades in South Africa, having been attracted to it initially by, in his words, "my consciousness of the imperfections in my posture." Simply being aware that there is a problem is a great starting point, but part of the problem is thinking that it's all about posture.
Dart later points out in one of his conclusions, "We all have the same quota of head and body segments whether we totter about like children, run around the sports field, or perform programs on public platforms or in olympic contests. The way we use them depends on the degree of neural organisation or bodily and intellectual skill attained individually."
So here we have an answer to the question, "What are we trying to do better?"
We are trying to use ourselves better, all the parts of the self, brought together into one whole functioning vertebrate organism.
And here we have to make clear that there really is an end point in the lesson, and it is only that the individual becomes more fully himself as a coordinated person, not interfering with the natural abilities given to the vertebrate.
Now that's a big open question..."what is this natural ability?"
Just watch your cat pouncing and the baby learning to crawl and walk (assuming there is no structural interference with normal nerve system development). It's all right there in front of your face. Take a look at a portrait of the elder Ralph Vaughan Williams hanging in one of the museums in London. You'll see a fine example of a really badly coordinated individual. He didn't look well.
Lessons restore normal nerve system patterns that determine development and control of the parts. Who can be helped? We'll talk about that later.