How tall is tall?

taking up space

Lauren Colace
April 04, 2025


I was walking down the street one day and passed a tall man wearing a chef’s jacket. There are many tall people about but this guy was TALL! He stood unashamedly upright, his head poised and easy, eyes surveying the world from their elevated vantage point. It’s so unusual to see a tall person enjoying their full stature, I was thrilled to see how it can be. It is not easy to be tall in life - very often a tall person must stoop to go through low doorways, stoop to see eye to eye with their interlocutor, stoop to fit around furniture that was not designed with them in mind. And there’s more - I see tall people who seem to be shrinking inward, as if someone sometime had told them that they take up too much space in the world. When a student of Alexander Technique learns to release some of the habitual holding patterns that limit them, it often feels like their body has become taller and wider. Often it does actually result in an increase in stature. “I feel tall,” said one of my students a couple of weeks ago. Tall is allowing yourself to take up all the space between your head and your toes. You can try it. Easy. As you sit or stand right where you are as you read this, take a moment to notice the top of your head. Then take a moment to notice either the soles of your feet if you are standing, or your tailbone if you are sitting. Then connect these two points in your mind and notice the space inbetween. Enjoy filling the space that you occupy with your body. Tall means to be your full height regardless of centimetres. The same student came a week later with proof. In her house is a low beam which she used to have to mind. Osteoporosis had contributed to a loss of stature over a period of time. After 6 weeks of AT she bumped her head again. Tall as tall

I was walking down the street one day and passed a tall man wearing a chef’s jacket. There are many tall people about but this guy was TALL! He stood unashamedly upright, his head poised and easy, eyes surveying the world from their elevated vantage point. It’s so unusual to see a tall person enjoying their full stature, I was thrilled to see how it can be. It is not easy to be tall in life - very often a tall person must stoop to go through low doorways, stoop to see eye to eye with their interlocutor, stoop to fit around furniture that was not designed with them in mind. And there’s more - I see tall people who seem to be shrinking inward, as if someone sometime had told them that they take up too much space in the world.

When a student of Alexander Technique learns to release some of the habitual holding patterns that limit them, it often feels like their body has become taller and wider. Often it does actually result in an increase in stature. “I feel tall,” said one of my students a couple of weeks ago. Tall is allowing yourself to take up all the space between your head and your toes.

You can try it. Easy. As you sit or stand right where you are as you read this, take a moment to notice the top of your head. Then take a moment to notice either the soles of your feet if you are standing, or your tailbone if you are sitting. Then connect these two points in your mind and notice the space inbetween. Enjoy filling the space that you occupy with your body. Tall means to be your full height regardless of centimetres.

The same student came a week later with proof. In her house is a low beam which she used to have to mind. Osteoporosis had contributed to a loss of stature over a period of time. After 6 weeks of AT she bumped her head again. Tall as tall