How do people feel appoggio (support)?

Because everyone’s body and their kinesthetic sense is so personal, I think the answer of what “people feel” is going to be very wide-ranging. To me the “lotte vocale” is an encounter between butterflies or otters, not elephants or military tanks. It’s a delicate, physically friendly thing. If I feel any kind of “lean against” anywhere I’m doomed. The concepts that have worked for me are:
1. Inalare la voce.
2. Sing into yourself.
3. Draw the sound in.
4. Sing down-back-up into the center of the sound.
All of these with instantaneous attack that is neither glottal nor aspirated.

These are concepts which result in actions. If I work from the other direction, taking mechanical actions to make a sound, I’m screwed. I know some will argue this to the death. In my loudest fortissimo, my torso is definitely working more, and the buzz in my folds and tract from top to bottom definitely represents more “action”, but for me as singer or teacher, I cannot encourage any kind of push or flow – enough will happen when the body is in balance. We have to find ways to make the combustion happen right at the folds, at exactly the intended instant. No felt pressures below nor above the larynx, and then learn how to magnify that equally from above and below without any felt push or squeeze.

In real life, there is often more work to do with subtracting bad things than adding anything. Then the magnification, the resonance, the size and color, can gradually strengthen. I didn’t make any of this up. It is a line of vocal development that many believe in, but is explained in many ways. It’s personal, subjective, and irrespective of physical measurement or anatomical reality. I am reporting how it happens for me and how I teach it. I worked too hard for it to worry about whether it conforms to what a particular Zeitgeist says.