Working out is one of the best things a person can do for their body. Moving your body on a consistent basis keeps you strong and helps you live longer, but what if there was a better way to workout? Mind body connection is a very pivotal part of working out that very often gets neglected.
What is mind body connection? Have you ever been to a workout class and heard the instructor tell you to "engage your core" or "squeeze your glutes" at the top of a squat? Essentially they are telling you to use mind body connection. We are all guilty of mindlessly going through a workout just to finish, or going through the motions without really thinking what every motion is doing. While working out in general is great, the mind body connection is what takes a workout over the edge.
This connection really comes from education on exercises. Knowing what muscles are used in different movements is how you can start to connect your body and your mind. For example, when doing a deadlift, you should be using your hamstrings, glutes, and your lats for the motion. You pull your shoulders back by engaging your lats to protect your back and keep it flat, and then you drive up through your heels using your glutes and hamstrings. Without the engagement of the upper-back in a deadlift the weight would be carried in the lower back and cause injury. It is also important to engage glutes at the top (kind of like squeezing your butt) to really activate the muscle, but also to protect your back by correcting your form. Just quickly doing a deadlift without engaging muscles is actually like not doing a deadlift at all.
The deadlift is just one example, this is applicable to every workout and movement--even cardio. Running on the treadmill can get very lazy after long periods of time, and that is why lots of people do not see results doing extended period cardio. Cardio does help with cardiovascular health, but may not be the solution everyone thinks it is.
Core work is another example of lack of mind body connection. Imagine you are about to get punched in the stomach. That brace that you make is you engaging your core--it is not you just sucking in. Engaging your core helps protect your back and works those muscles when you are supposed to instead of your back muscles. This will help with that defined and toned stomach everyone is always looking for.
I could go on and explain how every exercise is important to connect mind and body, but I will leave the research to all of you. In the end it is all just knowing what each movement works and practice of what feels right and what doesn't. Don't go too heavy on weight to start, you will get injured, just make sure you have the right form and the mind body connection.
I love working out with a mind body connection because I also find it to be meditative. When I focus specifically on connecting my breath, movement, and muscle engagement, the outside world melts away. This makes me not only stronger in the physical sense, but also mentally. It allows me to leave my workouts with a new found clarity. Also, I never thought about how a mind body connection might prevent injury, but you've got a point. If you're paying attention to what your body feels like, then its less likely you will continually do an exercise that is painful. Great post!
Very interesting! I also think that I feel the exercise more in the targeted areas when I practice this connection and really think about the exercise that I'm performing. When doing bicep curls, if I focus on that muscle and think about correct form, I tend to "feel the burn" more than when I just curl mindlessly. I think focusing on the exercise really helps me, so it is interesting to read some of your points in this post!
I definitely think the mind-body connection is important to maximize workouts, especially compound lifts, but the nature of a lot of exercise (or at least weightlifting) is that you naturally get better at it and thus form better connections the more you do it, however you do it. I know that when I hit arms, this definitely worked as I'm naturally weak in that area but the more I did it, the more I could isolate target muscles during presses, curls, etc. I will say that for some exercises it's much more important, like deadlifts- if you do them wrong, you're wasting your time or even risking harm.
The "mind-body" connection is one of the most important parts of working out in my experience. It helps your form and prevents injury, but as someone who works out for my mental health, it can become a form of meditation to focus on how your body feels throughout a lift. This is a great article explaining the science behind it that I did not know.
Very interesting post! I've recently come across multiple articles explaining the importance of exercise for both mental and physical wellbeing, but I think you highlight an important component here. Today, many people are following online workout plans and videos which could potentially elicit more injuries. The consumer may not know the proper mind-muscle connection to be making for a given exercise because their instructor is not in the room with them.