Tone
- tension present in resting muscles and other tissues in the body.
This month we want to share with you some insider info on how you can improve your tone without dealing with the frustrations of insanity.
Tone is often thought of as being lean or being able to see muscle definition. While this is part of it, tone also directly tells us information about how well your brainstem is functioning. It can indicate why your static posture is the way it is and may point to why you have pain on one side of your body more often than the other. All of these things live next to each other in the brain, and we know based on current research that areas in the brain that live next to each other act on one another. In this blog we will take you through some basic concepts to help you improve your health by looking at:
Muscle Tone | Posture | Pain
Muscle Tone
Let’s say one has an aesthetic goal, your left side is not as toned as your right and you want to even them out. In the bodybuilding world, if you have less tone on your left they would say you should do more resistance training on your left. If someone has tried this and it hasn’t worked, they may need to consider a different route. Like we mentioned earlier, in the neurological world, things look a bit different on the inside. Here’s a bit of science. The left motor cortex feeds the left brainstem which controls the tone on the left side of the body. The left motor cortex is fed by complex movement from the right side of the body. Due to varying reasons spanning anywhere from stress, trauma, or overuse, there may be a need to facilitate brain activation in certain areas to help you get past your unevenness problem. Try exploring more complex movements instead of always moving in a straight line. This may activate areas of the brain that could otherwise be dormant!
Posture
Do you ever wonder why some people seem to always have good posture? Most people think the secret is to strengthen your back, strengthen your core, stretch tight muscles, and continuously think about sitting up straight. This rarely creates notable results and leaves people feeling like there is something wrong with them. There’s a better way! Like we mentioned, the brainstem actually controls static posture - so next time you go to work out, try pressing your tongue onto the roof of your mouth, moving your eyes up and down, or clenching your teeth and see if you notice a change in your ease to stand a little taller.
Pain
We wanted to mention a little about pain while we are on the topic of tone because the brainstem controls pain inhibition. It’s worth noting that if you have pain more often on one side of your body, and you also notice that the tone is less on that same side, your brainstem may need some love. Don’t worry, the beautiful thing about neuroplasticity is that everything can and is changing. What’s even better is that there are ways to target areas directly to help you get out of pain and move towards the best version of yourself!
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Each person will probably have to go about what we discussed a bit differently. Need help? Our expert trainers can give you the guidance you need to break past those barriers and get you feeling and looking the way you want!
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