Coordination training for everyday life
In times like these when we’re largely unstimulated (at home, not able to get outside much, interact with other people, encounter novel environments like nature, public space, varying terrain, etc), our brains get antsy. This can lead to anxiety, fear, discomfort, etc, as our brains search for some sort of stimulation.
Our brains and bodies crave stimulation. They thrive on novelty and complexity. Exercise can provide this stimulation, but all too often exercise modern exercise is sterile - rote repetition of highly specialized forms without any creativity or problem-solving. Exercise has become much more about tissue effect than neurological stimulation.
New exercises provide that response the first few times we do them, but eventually they stop producing that “new” feeling and our brains can turn off. So we seek new exercises to get that novelty again. This isn’t bad, but it puts brain and musculoskeletal training at odds:
To elicit the response our body needs to get stronger (more muscle mass, mind-muscle connection, and hormone response), we need progressive overload: the regular loading of muscle tissues in order to induce adaptation (commonly discussed in exercise physiology as the SAID principle: Specific Adaptation to Implied Demands).
Basically, we need to do that one thing regularly with a little more challenge every time in order to get stronger. Example: barbell back squat - if you want to be able to lift more weight in the back squat you’re going to have to increase your muscle tissue size/density; adapt your nervous system to handle heavier loads; and understand the necessary details (aka form) of barbell back squatting.
The best way to do this is to barbell back squat a lot with varying reps and sets (over a long term), and do accompanying exercises that strengthen the muscles involved in back squatting without overloading the nervous system by back squatting with heavy loads all the time. There’s tons of different ways to do this that I’m not going to get in to right now. This is the basic premise of most strength training. It’s mostly about training muscle tissue and the nervous system.
Brain training is different: there is a nervous system element, and it can stimulate muscle tissues, but it’s more akin to learning to play a musical instrument: adaptation comes from high volume repetition of fine motor patterns until the brain hardwires those patterns. Sounds similar to practicing a movement pattern, right?
The main difference is the level of intensity: instead of high intensity, low volume training we do for strength training (doing less than 100 repetitions of something in a week’s training), the overall stress on the body is much lower, but the volume of repetition is significantly higher - perhaps even hours a day, depending on the practitioner in question.
A good cross-platform example here would be sports: athletes practice certain skill movements hundreds, if not thousands of times per week. A basketball player could drill a three-point shot 200 times in one practice. That level of repetition rarely happens in strength training/exercise, with the exception of extreme high volume-style exercise programs, wherein high reps are done not for skill practice, but for fatigue generation.
The goal of skill training, whether art or sport, is repetition to the point of reflex. Once a skill is committed muscle memory, the performer in question is able to build on it, adding skills of increasing complexity. This is what eventually leads to what most identify as mastery, or a highly developed capacity in a particular arena.
One thing to notice about any “master” of a discipline is the ongoing nature of their practice - no-one reaches the top of their field and stops practicing, learning, or developing. They regularly revisit basic concepts, refine their practice on all levels, and continue to push their boundaries in new and different ways.
This could be attributed to the love of the practice, but it’s also about stimulation: the brain needs the constant stimulation, or it becomes stagnant. Hence the saying “never stop learning.” The constant influx of new information drives the brain’s primary engines, keeping them sharp and ready to process and problem solve anything that gets thrown at it, whether physical or mental.
It is recommended that as we age we regularly play puzzle games like sudoku to fight off conditions like dementia. Co-ordination drills are like crossword puzzles for the body: they stimulate the systems of our body to stave off the boredom that leads to the eventual decay of our reflexes.
Adding in a few co-ordination drills to your daily life can potentially increase not only your sports performance and grace, but also reduce risk of fall injury, dementia, and other old age-related conditions. You can train to be less clumsy! Coordination drills train the systems of the body that control balance, spacial awareness, proprioception (awareness of the body in relation to itself), and reflex.
Training coordination doesn’t have to be incredibly intense or hard. Training sessions don’t need to be protracted or complicated. Just a few drills - even one - practiced for 5-30 minutes a day can make a huge difference.
Join me for my live Zoom workshop Everyday Coordination this evening (Wednesday, 4/29) at 5pm PST to learn more. We’ll go over some basic drills, ways to progress, and dig a little deeper in to the why’s of coordination training.
Click here to learn more and sign up: