COULD YOU WORKOUT IN THE DARK?
Could you workout in the dark? Do the rules of nature require that we know what is going on with our body, even in the absence of eye-sight? Would the ability to know where your body parts are at any given time help you survive in nature?
Let's begin by answering the questions in the order of appearance: 1) Yes; 2) Yes; 3) Yes.
It seems that such an ability is of tremendous worth, leading us to the question: how do we achieve all this with our body? - The answer is an ability known as proprioception or kinesthesia. Proprioception is a physical ability nested in our skeletal muscles, and is a neural ability to sense the location, relative movement, and actions of our muscle and by that, our body's position even absent eye-sight.
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Proprioception reduces the need to direct your eye sight at all of your body parts all the time, in order to know what to do next. For example, the ability to walk without needing to look down at your legs to know where they are. The importance is that it allows us to look forward parallel to the floor at all time, and scan the horizon (in nature we scan for approaching danger).
Proprioceptions allows us to focus our eye-sight on what the brain perceives as the most important to our survival, and by that, reduced the number of stimuli that require extra sensory resources.This lowers the energetic cost of staying alive, and focuses our attention on what the brain thinks is most important. At this point, let's understand how the ability of proprioception is actually possible.
Sensors dedicated to the enabling of proprioception are called proprioceptors (ceptors = sensors). These are mechanoreceptors that are capable of sensing changes to mechanical forces such as mechanical pressure and mechanical tension. They are commonly positioned in the skeletal muscles, their tendons, skin, and the skeletal joints themselves.
Proprioceptors can further be divided into multiple subtypes, able to detect different kinematic parameters, such as joint position, movement, and mechanical loading. Proprioceptive information is sent to the central nervous system (CNS), there they are integrated with information received visually via eye-sight, and from the vestibular system (dedicated to balance; located in the inner ears).
There four basic types of proprioception types. They include the sense of effort (forces produced by the body itself), the senses of position (3D conformation) and movement of our limbs and trunk, the sense of forces applied onto the body, and the sense of weight (how heavy something is). Proper proprioception allows daily functions to be achieved faster, smoother, and successfully.
Proprioception is a physical ability that can be trained and improved. While it should be part of everyone's workout plans, it is especially important for the elderly. The main way we wish to engages our proprioception abilities are by exercising carefully with our eyes closed. This increases our reliance on proprioception to know "what's going on". I always suggest working out with smaller weight medicine balls, transitioning from maximal flexion to maximal extension; maximal adduction to maximal abduction, etc. The principle of the matter is to slowly move the medicine ball from being closer to the body to being as further away from the body (and back), without losing balance nor moving your feet.
Examples of such exercise can include holding the medicine ball with one hand and elevating it as high above your shoulder as possible "offering" it to the sky; Extending the arm from front to behind your back and back to the front; Elevating the arms to shoulder level with the medicine ball moving outwards and sideways; Moving the medicine ball from one side of the body (in the front) towards the other side (other shoulder); Flexion and extension of elbow ( a "bicep curl"); Mild supination and pronation of the wrist; Horizontal rotation of the waist with the medicine ball parallel to the floor from side to side. More option exist for the lower body such as squats are a great option (very effective once you have the minimal technique required to exercise them safely); holding the medicine ball between your feet and moving it around (back fixated on the floor); working against a pully machine or any other machine in the gym that is safe and secure.
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Since holding and/or balancing a ball of any kind with the legs is challenging for must people, proprioceptive exercises for the lower body are advised to be done with weight that can strap onto the limbs. The same can be used for the hands, though it reduces the proprioception aspects of motion. Another option is to use body weight and incorporate proprioception to your stretching exercises, simply by stretching with your eyes closed (safely). It is also possible to workout in pairs, leaning on the other person and exercising on one leg with your eyes closed.
We transition from smaller radius movements, to larger radius movements; from lighter weight to greater weight; from slower movement to faster movement. Last, we teach and learn the movements with our eyes open first, and only then transition to working with our eyes closed. The full diversity of optional exercises is not truly covered in this one post...
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