Mysteries of Muscle Memory

When you learned to write, you trained the muscles in your arm and hand to create letters. It took time and concentration to do this, but with repetition it became automatic. Your hand developed muscle memory; when you write your name, your muscles remember how to move without focusing on the process.

Dancing, yoga, gymnastics and weight training are examples of other activities that require enhanced muscle memory. We can make the learning process easier and help establish muscle memory by using a few simple techniques:

* Visual images
* Repetition
* Slow motion
* Micromovement

Imagery

Using a visual image is an effective way to train your body to perform a new dance step or exercise. The best visual images are those which are familiar and detailed.

In dance, visualizing a movement helps you perform the step. For example, if a dancer wants to make an S-curving motion with her body, she can visualize a fish swimming, a camel walking, or a snake crawling. Since the best visual images are familiar and detailed, visualizing the color, texture, shape and markings of the image make it more vivid and effective. Likewise, visualizing yourself correctly repeating a new dance step or exercise makes the learning process easier.

Many people find geometric shapes helpful. For example, you can imagine drawing a big circle to make learning a belly dance hip circle or circle step easier. A square is a useful image for learning a box step or hip square.

Repetition & slow motion

Repetition helps fix a new exercise or dance movement in your mind, so that the next time you perform it, you remember it more easily and perform it with less effort. Slow repetitions of a new exercise or dance step enable you to feel every nuance of the movement.

Rushing through a movement before youve completely mastered it skips over the important process of sensing every nuance of the movement; beginning dance students and exercisers often need to be reminded to slow down. Going slowly helps your muscles recognize precisely what the movement should feel like when performed correctly.

Micromovement

Micromovement means performing a movement in a very tiny way, using the least range of motion possible. For example, if you were writing the letter O ten inches high and then writing o in a script so tiny it could barely be seen, your O would require a much larger hand movement than tiny letter o, the micromovement. Using a tiny range of motion helps you sense subtle muscle movements which are occurring, but micromovements must be performed with awareness to get the full benefit. Going slowly helps.

Have fun with learning!

Select the movement or exercise you are working on, then answer the following:

Imagery: what animal, shape or object does it remind you of?
Repetition: what kind of music would help you when practicing this movement?
Slow motion: how many counts does it take you to complete one repetition?
Micromovement:what is the smallest range of motion you can use for the movement?

Ramona is the author of Dynamic Belly Dance, the Joyful Journey of Dancemaking and Performing. See free belly dance videos, read book excerpts and order an autographed copy at http://www.DynamicBellyDance.com

Copyright 2007 - All rights reserved worldwide. Reprint Rights: You may reprint this article as long as you leave all of the links active, do not edit the article, give author name credit and follow the EzineArticles terms of service for publishers. Thank you!

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You Can Overcome Anxiety

Anxiety is a natural emotion that strikes one and all at sometime or the other in life. I am no exception. But I am writing this article to assure you that you could also overcome anxiety just like I did. There was a time when I used to suddenly feel the following symptoms:

Sudden palpitations
Perspiration or profuse sweating
Dry mouth
Trembling of hands and feet
Tightness in the chest
Dizziness
Blurred vision

Do you recognize these symptoms? Of course! They are symptoms of sudden anxiety that creeps in uninvited at wrong times and wrong places. It takes hold of you and makes you feel incapacitated to anything. But that is all in the past, in my case.

I wanted to take control of my anxiety. So I started reading a lot about anxiety. I read about why we get anxious, common symptoms and treatments, etc. Symptoms are all too common but treatments vary for anxiety.

Do you know all your anxiety and other sicknesses start in the mind?

First of all you need to be aware that you have a problem of getting anxious easily for no good reason.

You feel nervous and sick when you stop thinking calmly and start imagining wildly! It is a fact. When you think you have a problem, irrespective of the reality, you start nurturing negative thoughts. Your mind is only too happy to feed on such thoughts and helps you picture unwanted scenarios. When your mind does this, your nerves do their part to react to such ideas or imaginations. Due to this mental drama, you start getting anxious about the whole situation. In 99 percent of cases this is how anxiety occurs.

I started to watch my mind - After repeated anxiety attacks and learning that I have to face it, I started paying more attention to myself. If I felt a bit uneasy about something I would just drink a glass of water and sit for a while. I would feel butterflies dancing in my stomach. But I would not move. Instead I would just watch my mind to see what it is thinking. Many might just laugh at this admission. But, try it and you would find an amazing discovery about your fears and causes for your anxiety.

I learned a few positive affirmations to make my mind strong - Whenever you get negative thoughts, tell yourself that you would not entertain such thoughts. Instead learn to think positively. Repeat positive affirmations and they do you a world of good.

While medications might give you temporary relief, your efforts at being calm would help you find the exact reasons and you could clearly see how you create your own anxiety and tension. Along with your medication, whatever you are taking now, it is also good to practice yoga or meditation. They helps you to stay calm and keep your nerves calm too. There are many books and online information available.

Act smart and help yourself beat back your anxiety. You control your thoughts by controlling your mind. You could definitely live a life free of anxiety attacks.

I love to read books and write about useful information to others. I have been a ghost writer for the past two years. I strongly feel that writing is a satisfying job and a healthy hobby.

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