Winter Qi Chats | Week 4
Do you need a little push?
This week we discuss about the need to get pushed around to help train our bodies for balance as we age.
How well do you react?
We don’t live a bubble. As much as we’d hope, the world moves around us and from time to time we may be perturbed from a dog, grocery cart, other person or a door frame. I’ve been ‘bonked’ by any one of these objects and it’s rattled me as my body recovers. But I’ve noticed that the FULL body bonks are not as scary as are the knee, jaw or neck checks that I have received and this week we need to address how we can train all our joints with perturbation and it’s benefits to our balance and our stability.
Bonk - Bang - Boom
There’s MANY studies that note the importance of perturbation training for improving control of rapid balance reactions. But this form of training goes beyond just a tap on the shoulder or the hip. Perturbation training is great for the cerebellum. The cerebellum is the lower portion of the brain that serves as the error detection and error correction part of movement. Have you tried to bring a tea cup to your mouth and then accidentally bonk your teeth? That was your cerebellum acting up!
This just goes to show that part of your cerebellum’s job is to help coordinated and accurate movement in addition to balance. So let’s find ways to train the cerebellum to aid you in your quest for a body that moves with precision and control. That’s a BIG key to balance training.
Neuro-Qi Tip o’the day!
Let’s explore the unknown!
Demonstrating in today’s videos how to perform perturbation for various joints in the body
Set up bands around the house to play with your neuro-warm up joint drills
*Video posts every Friday by 11:30am MDT
Resources:
https://academic.oup.com/ptj/article/95/5/700/2686424
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1471-2318-7-12
