Diversity Initiatives

DEIBA: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging, and Access

Integrating DEIBA into our organizational systems and culture at AmSAT is a liberatory practice, similar to how we notice unconscious habits that restrict and impede our natural movement. Pausing and preventing unskillful habits opens up new possibilities allowing individuals to discover more freedom in thought and action. By integrating DEIBA into how we work as an organization and how we relate to each other, we may reduce and remove barriers that have limited access to the Alexander Technique and expand AT in the world.

Organizational initiatives include:

Making DEIBA a key area of support for strategic planning 

Taking actionable steps to integrate DEIBA into our future planning, our current activities, and our interactions with one another

Providing skills-building and DEIBA education for our members.

Hiring Necessary Trouble Collective to provide professional consultancy that specializes in Nonviolent Communication and DEI work.

AmSAT Statement on Diversity and Anti-Racism

The Membership of the American Society for the Alexander Technique denounces and repudiates all racist statements written by F.M. Alexander and the racist evolutionary theories he used in his writings;

The AmSAT Membership stands for the practice and promotion of the Alexander Technique that fosters environments where equity, diversity, inclusion, and anti-racism can flourish; recognizing that those debunked theories and pseudoscience referred to by Alexander do not represent the Technique we teach.

AmSAT’s DISABILITY ACCESS STATEMENT

AmSAT will make every effort to accommodate special needs and requests in order to facilitate participation in our programs and events by people with diverse needs and abilities.

What DEIBA means in AmSAT:

DIVERSITY contributes to the growth of the Alexander Technique by welcoming the perspectives and experiences of more people with their varied histories, traditions, and gifts. We have done some good work in this area, and more is to come. Greater diversity means we expand our knowledge base and are able to integrate the wisdom of voices that have, so far, been absent.

EQUITY begins with the acknowledgment that not all people have had the same access to opportunities for health and well-being. It is an intentional examination of the ways of working on various aspects of AmSAT, including policies, processes, and programs, so that we can shift to ways that give the greatest chance possible of creating access and equal outcomes. And this in turn builds trust in the community.

INCLUSION is the how of achieving diversity and is strongly linked to belonging and access. Embedding inclusion as a principle would lead to this community being one that has the ability to meet a diverse set of needs that allow people to thrive. Inclusion shifts our focus from individual strategies to the common purpose. Inclusion invites in every person’s whole self without them having to suppress, hide, or minimize any part of who they are.

BELONGING is our most important human need. It moves us out of isolation and towards trust and connection. It is fertile ground for innovation as it can support a real and felt experience of being seen and valued for who you are and what you bring. Belonging begins with the individual - supporting them to have a sense of belonging within their own bodies and expanding to the collective - finding ways to bring that sense of ease, trust and wholeness to everyone involved.

ACCESS widens the window of welcome so that all people that want to find their way to this community and its practices can do so, regardless of ability or identity. It includes the neurodivergent, people with mobility issues, and those with bodies of all types. Access is about removing barriers - physical, emotional, psychological, or intellectual - so that anyone who is in need of the relief and support that AT can offer is able to obtain it.