Daily Tip #26 - Assess/Reassess
0:00 - Intro
Hello, Hello! I'm Shane from MATRIX, back with another week's worth of Daily Tips. In today's Daily Tip, however, we're going to start to see a shift. Instead of giving you brand new things to be doing. Instead, I'm going to start to teach you how to best use all the 25+ different tools that you already have.
0:22 – What Is Assess/Reassess?
For today's Tip, we're going to work on something very simple called Assess/Reassess. Essentially, we get all this great information from different sources and we start applying it to our lives. But a lot of times, we don't take the time to figure out what's actually benefiting us. And when we start looking at things from a Brain-Based perspective, what's really fascinating is that we can begin to identify the things that work for us, the things that are just kind of neutral, and the things that are actually making us worse very quickly and very easily. I'm not going to go into the details behind this. But basically, as we provide new stimulus to the brain, we're able to get a better output on the other end, very quickly afterward. And we can use that as feedback to let us know if what we did in the beginning was, again, something that's better, neutral, or worse. I'm going to show you three different types of ways to assess yourself today. Then you can choose which one works best -- and it might work best in different scenarios -- for you. You just have to be open to trying different things. The first one that I'm going to teach you is a range of motion assessment. The second one that I'm going to teach you is a coordination assessment. And the last one is balance.
1:41 – Range of Motion Assessment
When it comes to range of motion, you can test anything in your body. Shoulder range of motion, forward folds, if any of those are particularly tough for you, use them. But the one I'm going to show you today is my personal favorite, which is rotations. The important thing about assessing and reassessing is that it needs to be repeatable. You don't have a good idea of how things have shifted if you've changed the criteria around it. For doing a twist assessment, I always have my feet together. And I try to stay in exactly the same spot each and every time. I want to bring my hands out like this, so they're staying connected. And I'm going to start to rotate my body from side to side. Now, the first time that I go and assess something, I'm going to want to do this enough times, so that I've warmed up. That way, future reassessments aren't improving just because I'm getting looser from moving. We want to make sure I'm getting looser or tighter from the activity that I did. So, go ahead and give this a shot with me. Feet together. Arms out. Nice and tall. Just start to turn. You might do this for five seconds. You might do it for 30 seconds. Just until you get to the point where the way it feels in your body isn't changing and about how far you're going isn't changing. Once you've hit that limit, the next thing we do is we actually mark. So, with the arms out we'll turn to one side. Identify how far you turned. I'm lined up with the edge of the dresser here. If I turn this way, I'm lined up just a little bit off the stem of the plant. So, there's my baseline. That's the assessment. From there, I might step into one of the different drills that we've seen throughout the Daily Tips. Let's go back to the ACMs and I'm going to do a Spinal Extension Squeeze. Lengthening out. Squeezing into the back a little bit. Breathing while I'm doing it. Trying to climb all the way up the spine. And releasing back into the stretch. That was my drill, the thing I want to know is if it was better or worse. Then I'll step back in and reassess. And I personally went a lot further. I don't know if you could see that on camera, but it was a good four to five inches on either side. I know that back extensions are really good for me, so I had a feeling that that might be the case. And that you might get to see it on camera. That's one way to Assess/Reassess.
4:08 - Coordination Assessment
Another one is through coordination. To do this drill you take one hand -- that's your platform-your base -- holding it steady. The other hand with all fingers together, goes palm down, to palm up as fast as you can go. Now, you might be really good at this or it might turn into this kind of sloppy out of control thing very quickly. You might also start to feel some tension going up the arm. The way you would use this one for an assessment -- it's just like the last -- you do it once to create a baseline. You would do your activity, your drill. And then you would do the assessment again, to see if it changed. If you got sloppier that really wasn't a great drill for you. If you got quicker, better, crisper, you didn't get fatigued, then that's something you should be doing. And if it just felt the same, it's neutral. No big deal.
5:03 – Balance Assessment
The last assessment that I will offer you today is balance. With balance -- depending on how good your balance is -- you could have a really wide base. You could have a narrow base. You could have a split base where you're starting to line the feet up. For a lot of people, this is actually the most challenging. Or you could try standing on one leg. You can do that eyes open or eyes closed. Whatever gives you some amount of challenge. Set a baseline. See how wobbly you are. How long you can stay in one place. Go back -- whatever drill you're looking to assess -- and do the drill. Step back in and recheck your balance. If you felt more stable, that drill is awesome for you. If you fell over, maybe not the drill that you should be doing right now.
5:51 - Summary
So, that is Assess/Reassess. Basically, it comes down to having some type of baseline, where you can do a drill and then reassess against that baseline so you know if the drill works for you. In applying this to the Daily Tips, you don't have to go back through every single Daily Tip. But look at the ones that you've been doing. And the next time you go to do them, try this Assess/Reassess process to see if the ones that you're choosing absolutely worked well for you. Or maybe you should consider replacing them with something else if they made you a little bit worse. Later on, in the week, we'll talk in a little bit more detail about how to start to shift and apply what you learn from this. But today, your first challenge is to go out and Assess/Reassess the different things you do to know what makes you better, know what makes you worse, and know if it's just neutral to your nervous system.
6:44 - Farewell
I hope you found that interesting. Remember, there'll be a Q&A later today for those of you on the mailing list. If you have questions about why this works or how to do it, please jump on the Q&A. I would love to answer some questions about it. Otherwise, have a wonderful day! And if it's sunny and beautiful where you are as it is here, get outside for a little bit. Then check back in again tomorrow, 11 o'clock. I hope to see you there!