The work grew out of discoveries made by F. Matthias Alexander around 1890 while solving a voice loss problem. Briefly, Alexander discovered that human functioning is damaged when we interfere, in the course of our daily activities, with the delicate poise which should prevail in the interactions between the head, neck, back and breathing.

 It is the function of a course of lessons in the Alexander Technique to identify the nature of that interference for an individual and to provide the pupil with the means whereby that misuse can be replaced with a constantly improving manner of using him-or-herself.

The Technique is used today primarily by three groups of people: by performing artists who wish to avoid injury and to enhance freedom and poise in performance, by people who wish to recover more rapidly from injuries or chronic pain which may be caused or exacerbated by their way of doing things, and by people who would like to foster a general improvement in the quality of their lives.