I’m in constant awe and we approach the major challenge in Movement between Efficient and Inefficient movement. A better way of thinking about it, is Super Smooth and Clean or Jerky, Almost Exorcist-like Movement.
Watch this to Understand what I mean by Efficient (Super Smooth Movement)
You’ll notice it many times if you notice a baby first learning to walk. Although It’s a beautiful thing, watching your beloved baby walk their very first steps, it’s often very quirky, and often times haphazardly. You’re baby walking across the floor, while you the parent, go and back forth and making sure your baby doesn’t fall.
To Fall or Not To Fall
The goal of everything we do, just like a baby, is to eventually be able to move better. The problem with most people is that everyone’s movement skill is often times just plain and ordinary; as most people don’t care to become better, smoother, more efficient.
Dr. Eric Cobb is known for his many sayings, but this one rings very true to me, “Powerful Effort versus Effortless Power.” Often times, many people try to make things harder than they actually are, often at the expense of their health. I’m not saying that there aren’t times when we need tension, tension, and even more tension ex: Bending a Horseshoe, A Short Nail, A Max Deadlift, Etc; but what I’m saying is that the key is to be able to balance all that Tension with some time also focused on learning how to relax.
Your body is constantly trying to balance itself out. If you want the scientific mumbo jumbo, it’s called Homeostasis, basically the body undergoing correction procedures for all the little things you do that cause it to unbalance. Although the body does try to balance itself out, if you yourself don’t make a conscious effort to balance it out, then in the long-term you’ll likely get injured in one way or another because the body needs your help. Without relaxation work, you can never fully appreciate how to Tense as well, nor can you understand how to tense at all. The key thing is simply to practice and follow some basic rules.
1. Perfect Form – Hit the Target
2. Dynamic Postural Alignment – Maintain your Posture, specifically Tall Spine
3. Synchronized Breathing – Breathing should follow movement. When you flex your body, exhale. When you Extend your body, inhale.
4. Balance Tension-Relaxation – Everything should eventually move to the state where you can perform the movement as relaxed as possible. Notice the best at anything… Pro Basketball Players, Pro Football Players, or even Elite Powerlifters, they make it look easy because they have taught their bodies how to not only coordinate well, but to relax any unneeded muscles.
The Jump From Across Court
By all means, if you want to look and move as stiff as a board, feel free to violate these four rules of movement. But if you want to move well and be healthy, than realize that your movement is a product of the effort you put into it.
Stay Tuned, will talk more about how to use these rules in your movement practice, whether it’s Kettlebells, Barbells, Dumbbells, or just your play Bodyweight.
Thanks,
Darryl Lardizabal, Z-Health Exercise Therapy Specialist (R,I,T)
