Brain power = change
Change your outcome through thought and dialogue.
Whether your movement is fluid, efficient and enjoyable or inefficient, uncomfortable and forced, it is telling the story of how our brains are meeting the challenges that they encounter. Understanding how to influence this process is a powerful tool to create new movement possibilities.
As we all know, over time our bodies change with age, as it turns out, our bodies including our nervous system are constantly remodelling in response to the input and experiences to which they are exposed. The term Neuroplasticity may be familiar, and it is used to represent constant reorganisation of it’s structures, function, and connections in response to the stimuli it encounters. Whatever you are thinking, feeling, or experiencing, change is taking place in your brain via the process of Neuroplasticity.
Our glorious brains are somewhat predictive. They are natural experts at developing processes that are quick & efficient, and most of the time you won’t realise you’re doing whatever it is you’re doing. Our brains will make a prediction based on an existing database of previous experiences, using incoming sensory information to confirm or contradict those predictions. When the sensation confirms the prediction, the behaviour continues, but a contradiction will stimulate the nervous system with a new possibility.
The predictive ability is important when in real-time, the cerebellum (small brain) makes continuous calculations & modifications a fraction of a second in front of the movement’s point of progress to ensure smooth motions. Without this process there would be a ‘lag’ in movement and your movement would result in a juddering or stop/start quality.
This response is essentially automatic, it’s happening with little to no thought, it’s happened in the brain before the body has even moved! So how do we change this process and create new, stronger, more conscious, less predictable movements?
To change the predicted motor loop, we need to trick the sensory feedback which will cause the motor loop to adapt, which is how change is possible. The key to change is to surprise the system and the key to surprise is sensation.
If you’ve ever gone to pick something up from the floor only to realise as you’re picking it up, it’s much lighter or heavier than predicted? This is known as a movement error. The experience creates new stimuli and your brain adjusts your movement for the next attempt.
Change can happen relatively quickly when offered skilled guidance and space to learn to sense for yourself, it is the novel sensory input that makes the nervous system sit up and take notice.
Another area that will assist the progression of change is dialogue. Dialogue is essential when interacting in all areas of life. With movement, offering cues that are inviting you to become curious about the exploration of movement are essential in creating this change in the motor loop.
An example of this is when cueing someone to ‘control’ a movement. If we ask for control, there is a chance that an increase in tension will occur because we don’t want to fail, this diminishes the flow of movement. If we use speed of movement as an option to explore, this will create a new perceived objective. You could notice whether the speed changes through various phases of a movement, or if there is an awareness of the smoothness and rhythm of their movement. The use of more supportive cues focuses the brain to address different qualities of the movement, making adaptive calculations as the movement goes on.
Getting clear on the intentions of the movement is important and liberating. You may have many movements in your head that you are trying ‘not’ to perform, which is only going to see you resist movement in an attempt to have all the ‘control’.
Our brains are capable of incredible things if we allow it by learning to work with it. Our brains respond well to intentions, but often our intentions are not clearly defined.
Change is possible if:
1. You really want to move with intention…Just move!
2. Clearly see the line of motion (visualisation)
3. Invoke movement quality when crafting your intention (inspiration)
4. Make it look easy!!!
The brain is responsive, malleable, and versatile, learning how it functions helps both the teacher and the client/student of their body communicate with the nervous system more effectively!
Enjoy the movement.