the sensory experience of Qi.

[Leigh Blyth]

Conscious proprioception - What I believe to be the sensory experience of Qi .....

Conscious proprioception:

"The ability to sense the position of your body in space and being aware of where you should be able to move."

Becoming aware of the sensory feedback from the 5 main muscles of movement is crucial for developing your conscious proprioceptive skills and feeling the balance of your body.

Firstly focusing on your Base-Line pelvic floor and rectus abdominis muscles as your central pillar of strength. Feeling the position of the linea alba, the primary reference for body alignment on the median plane.

Seeing the sparkles in my mind, feeling the condition of my body. Becoming aware of blank spaces where there's restrictions in my connective tissue, reducing my range of movement and 'blocking' the signals.


Thoughts from those with much more experience / learning than me on this subject ?? !

 

[Buka]

As a basic refresher for anyone interested....
Proprioception refers to the body's ability to perceive its own position in space. An easy example to understand - did you ever slip and lose your balance for a second? You know how your arms fly out at odd angles as your body rights itself? You never have to think about where your arms go, they just go there trying to correct your balance. That's proprioception in action.

Another way to understand it, and a great exercise to sharpen and increase your proprioception. (And that of any of your students with balance problems, or students rehabbing an injury or students with one leg slightly shorter than the other - in other words anybody)

Stand at your kitchen counter. Place your fingertips on the counter. Raise one leg then lift your fingertips. You will feel your base leg wobble to different points on the bottom of your foot as it tries to correct your balance. That's proprioception in action. While doing this if your balance slightly fails and you feel you have to put your foot down or your hands back on the counter - just tap your fingertips there for a second and correct your balance and raise the fingertips right back up. The exercise is easy for practicing Martial Artists. Harder for folks out of shape or rehabbing, harder still the older you get. If it's too easy for you, just slightly rise up on your tip toes.

I worked for some years in a physical therapy unit that catered to athletes and people with knee replacements. This was one of the exercises we used for both groups. A lot of the people from there still stay in touch with me from time to time. They tell me that in the morning when they're making coffee or tea, they tell just stay at the counter doing that exercise while the water heats. Apparently it's also helped their golf game quite a bit, or so they say. I don't know how, other than basic better balance, but whatever.

Anyway, if you have a student with balance issues, the counter- top, one foot exercises will help them proprioceptive wise.

As a side note....drinking drastically messes up your proprioception. Hence Field Sobriety tests.

 

[Leigh Blyth]

@Buka nice illustration of proprioception.

As I've become consciously aware of the relative positions of the main muscles of movement (pelvic floor, rectus abdominis, gluteus maximus, rectus femoris, trapezius) I can see/sense/visualise my body in my mind. The sparkles, the lights, the flashes - a representation of the condition of my body this feels like the mysterious Qi to me.

A flow, an energy, does that sound familiar to anyone more experienced with such matters? The "internal martial arts" based on feeling the main muscles and experiencing this?

Very hard to put into words which is why I hope others can help!

 

[Gerry Seymour]

@Buka nice illustration of proprioception.

As I've become consciously aware of the relative positions of the main muscles of movement (pelvic floor, rectus abdominis, gluteus maximus, rectus femoris, trapezius) I can see/sense/visualise my body in my mind. The sparkles, the lights, the flashes - a representation of the condition of my body this feels like the mysterious Qi to me.

A flow, an energy, does that sound familiar to anyone more experienced with such matters? The "internal martial arts" based on feeling the main muscles and experiencing this?

Very hard to put into words which is why I hope others can help!

I don't think there's any need for a mysterious force in explaining proprioception. We've (as a people) done a decent job of plumbing the depths of the neural system to understand much of how this process works. I still like using the shorthand of ki/qi to describe this, but not to explain it. In other words, I'll refer to "extending ki", to describe a fairly complex use of tension and relaxation that's a fairly simple experience. Once folks understand the shorthand, the term "ki" has a fairly mundane meaning for them, and still works in all the ways I've ever seen it reliably used (meaning this excludes no-touch responses and the like).

 

[Gerry Seymour]

As a basic refresher for anyone interested....
Proprioception refers to the body's ability to perceive its own position in space. An easy example to understand - did you ever slip and lose your balance for a second? You know how your arms fly out at odd angles as your body rights itself? You never have to think about where your arms go, they just go there trying to correct your balance. That's proprioception in action.

Another way to understand it, and a great exercise to sharpen and increase your proprioception. (And that of any of your students with balance problems, or students rehabbing an injury or students with one leg slightly shorter than the other - in other words anybody)

Stand at your kitchen counter. Place your fingertips on the counter. Raise one leg then lift your fingertips. You will feel your base leg wobble to different points on the bottom of your foot as it tries to correct your balance. That's proprioception in action. While doing this if your balance slightly fails and you feel you have to put your foot down or your hands back on the counter - just tap your fingertips there for a second and correct your balance and raise the fingertips right back up. The exercise is easy for practicing Martial Artists. Harder for folks out of shape or rehabbing, harder still the older you get. If it's too easy for you, just slightly rise up on your tip toes.

I worked for some years in a physical therapy unit that catered to athletes and people with knee replacements. This was one of the exercises we used for both groups. A lot of the people from there still stay in touch with me from time to time. They tell me that in the morning when they're making coffee or tea, they tell just stay at the counter doing that exercise while the water heats. Apparently it's also helped their golf game quite a bit, or so they say. I don't know how, other than basic better balance, but whatever.

Anyway, if you have a student with balance issues, the counter- top, one foot exercises will help them proprioceptive wise.

As a side note....drinking drastically messes up your proprioception. Hence Field Sobriety tests.

If I were going back to start over at 20-something, I'd probably go to school to train as a physical therapist. I've learned some really good exercises I use with students (like the one you describe here) when getting physical therapy for myself.

 

[Leigh Blyth]

Not to explain proprioception - to explain the conscious awareness of the the sensory feedback that is part of proprioception.

• Conscious proprioception.
  "The ability to sense the position of your body in space and being aware of where you should be able to move."
  Conscious proprioception
  An awareness of the sensory feedback your body provides about the position of your body.
  Feeling the relative position, motion and equilibrium of each of your main muscles of movement. (Pelvic floor, rectus abdominis, gluteus maximus, rectus femoris, trapezius.)
  Feeling the relative alignment of the anatomical structures on the median plane. (Linea alba, supraspinous and nuchal ligaments.)
  Feeling where your natural range of movement should be able to take you.
  Being able to see/sense/visualise your presence in space.   The sensory experience of Qi I believe.
  
  The basic idea:
  Throughout the body, various 'sensors' produce sensory feedback (information) that is sent to the brain (via our nerves).
  The brain processes the feedback about our position and movement for the sense known as proprioception.
  Proprioception: "The ability to sense stimuli arising within the body regarding position, motion, and equilibrium of your body."
  Your sense of proprioception will be running in the background, as your body subconsciously makes adjustments in order to maintain a 'functional posture'.
  Conscious proprioception is when we are aware of this proprioceptive information our body and brain has for us.  When we can consciously sense/feel:
  The position of the parts of our body.
  The motion of our body, and where we should be able to move (rom).
  Our equilibrium - whether the body is balanced or not.
  Your Base-Line muscles and conscious proprioception.
  conscious proprioception starts with your baseline pelvic floor and rectus abdominis muscles. our core pillar of strength that allows us to work through the tension and treat chronic pain and fibromyalgia naturally by regaining our full range of natural movement and feeling our Qi.
  To describe the position of something you need a reference.
  → The position of the rest of your body is relative to your Base-Line.
  To describe a motion (a change in position) a reference is also needed.
  → All movement should originate from your Base-Line.
  To be in equilibrium means to be balanced, but balanced around what?
  → Balance either side of the median plane.
  
  
• sorry about the dodgy copy and paste formatting.

 

[jobo]

Not to explain proprioception - to explain the conscious awareness of the the sensory feedback that is part of proprioception.

• Conscious proprioception.
  "The ability to sense the position of your body in space and being aware of where you should be able to move."
  Conscious proprioception
  An awareness of the sensory feedback your body provides about the position of your body.
  Feeling the relative position, motion and equilibrium of each of your main muscles of movement. (Pelvic floor, rectus abdominis, gluteus maximus, rectus femoris, trapezius.)
  Feeling the relative alignment of the anatomical structures on the median plane. (Linea alba, supraspinous and nuchal ligaments.)
  Feeling where your natural range of movement should be able to take you.
  Being able to see/sense/visualise your presence in space.   The sensory experience of Qi I believe.
  
  The basic idea:
  Throughout the body, various 'sensors' produce sensory feedback (information) that is sent to the brain (via our nerves).
  The brain processes the feedback about our position and movement for the sense known as proprioception.
  Proprioception: "The ability to sense stimuli arising within the body regarding position, motion, and equilibrium of your body."
  Your sense of proprioception will be running in the background, as your body subconsciously makes adjustments in order to maintain a 'functional posture'.
  Conscious proprioception is when we are aware of this proprioceptive information our body and brain has for us.  When we can consciously sense/feel:
  The position of the parts of our body.
  The motion of our body, and where we should be able to move (rom).
  Our equilibrium - whether the body is balanced or not.
  Your Base-Line muscles and conscious proprioception.
  conscious proprioception starts with your baseline pelvic floor and rectus abdominis muscles. our core pillar of strength that allows us to work through the tension and treat chronic pain and fibromyalgia naturally by regaining our full range of natural movement and feeling our Qi.
  To describe the position of something you need a reference.
  → The position of the rest of your body is relative to your Base-Line.
  To describe a motion (a change in position) a reference is also needed.
  → All movement should originate from your Base-Line.
  To be in equilibrium means to be balanced, but balanced around what?
  → Balance either side of the median plane.
  
  
• sorry about the dodgy copy and paste formatting.

I'm struggling to understand why you want to be CONSCIOUSLY,aware, of your position in space , that's what todderlers and drunks and learner driver have, advanced movement skill happen once your subconsciously aware of your position, and you no longer have to plan not to fall over or walk into walls or drive into lamp posts ! your subconscious portion of the brain working far faster than your conscious portion

I can see that's it's useful as a remediation exercise, but its not where you want to be long term

 

[isshinryuronin]

Not to explain proprioception - to explain the conscious awareness of the the sensory feedback that is part of proprioception.

• Conscious proprioception.
  "The ability to sense the position of your body in space and being aware of where you should be able to move."
  Conscious proprioception
  An awareness of the sensory feedback your body provides about the position of your body.
  Feeling the relative position, motion and equilibrium of each of your main muscles of movement. (Pelvic floor, rectus abdominis, gluteus maximus, rectus femoris, trapezius.)
  Feeling the relative alignment of the anatomical structures on the median plane. (Linea alba, supraspinous and nuchal ligaments.)
  Feeling where your natural range of movement should be able to take you.
  Being able to see/sense/visualise your presence in space.   The sensory experience of Qi I believe.
  
  The basic idea:
  Throughout the body, various 'sensors' produce sensory feedback (information) that is sent to the brain (via our nerves).
  The brain processes the feedback about our position and movement for the sense known as proprioception.
  Proprioception: "The ability to sense stimuli arising within the body regarding position, motion, and equilibrium of your body."
  Your sense of proprioception will be running in the background, as your body subconsciously makes adjustments in order to maintain a 'functional posture'.
  Conscious proprioception is when we are aware of this proprioceptive information our body and brain has for us.  When we can consciously sense/feel:
  The position of the parts of our body.
  The motion of our body, and where we should be able to move (rom).
  Our equilibrium - whether the body is balanced or not.
  Your Base-Line muscles and conscious proprioception.
  conscious proprioception starts with your baseline pelvic floor and rectus abdominis muscles. our core pillar of strength that allows us to work through the tension and treat chronic pain and fibromyalgia naturally by regaining our full range of natural movement and feeling our Qi.
  To describe the position of something you need a reference.
  → The position of the rest of your body is relative to your Base-Line.
  To describe a motion (a change in position) a reference is also needed.
  → All movement should originate from your Base-Line.
  To be in equilibrium means to be balanced, but balanced around what?
  → Balance either side of the median plane.
  
  
• sorry about the dodgy copy and paste formatting.

I do all of this on a daily basis. I learned how 50 years ago. The techniques for developing this evolved over hundreds of years before being passed on to me. I have a special name for it - kata

 

[jobo]

I do all of this on a daily basis. I learned how 50 years ago. The techniques for developing this evolved over hundreds of years before being passed on to me. I have a special name for it - kata

That would only be so if your fighting in the same room as your practising kata, make the place bigger or smalers out obstacles in the way and do three steps nire or less than your kata and you kata awareness is of little use to you

 

[isshinryuronin]

That would only be so if your fighting in the same room as your practising kata, make the place bigger or smalers out obstacles in the way and do three steps nire or less than your kata and you kata awareness is of little use to you[/QUOTE
You may not have a real understanding of kata. Many practitioners do not. It was not developed as a full length choreographed routine, but rather as a collection of individual/short series of techniques and positions combined together as a convenient method of training. Besides, I believe Leigh is speaking of internal biofeedback of one's own body position/dynamics, muscle memory, etc. in relation to itself. By having this body awareness and understanding the kata, one can easily adapt one's movement to allow its performance in any size space.

 

[jobo]

no to develop high degree of proprioception: "The ability to sense the position of your body in space and compensate your movement accordingly

,your going to have to explore/ predict the limits of the area with out looking, otherwise known as banging into walls or going out of bounds and also predict the speed, trajectory and intersection with other movable components, say people. and be able to compensate your movements on the fly,,

solo kata is not going to achieve that, unless they do in deed bang into walls and have random people doing random things in the same place at the same timen. you could try doing kata in a shopping mall when the Christmas rush is on, that might work

in general terms playing tennis would be a far better exercise, playing five a side soccer with walls as bounds even more so. in fact driving to the dojo is better

having a good understanding of where your body is in relation to its self, ie you know where your arms is, seem a rather basic skill, most people know where their arm is , ?

Conscious proprioception: seems a red hearing to me it's when your no longer conscious of it,tha, your good !

 

[Gerry Seymour]

no to develop high degree of proprioception: "The ability to sense the position of your body in space and compensate your movement accordingly

,your going to have to explore/ predict the limits of the area with out looking, otherwise known as banging into walls or going out of bounds and also predict the speed, trajectory and intersection with other movable components, say people. and be able to compensate your movements on the fly,,

solo kata is not going to achieve that, unless they do in deed bang into walls and have random people doing random things in the same place at the same timen. you could try doing kata in a shopping mall when the Christmas rush is on, that might work

in general terms playing tennis would be a far better exercise, playing five a side soccer with walls as bounds even more so. in fact driving to the dojo is better

having a good understanding of where your body is in relation to its self, ie you know where your arms is, seem a rather basic skill, most people know where their arm is , ?

Conscious proprioception: seems a red hearing to me it's when your no longer conscious of it,tha, your good !

Proprioception doesn't necessarily (or, actually, by definition) involve the location of other objects - just the location of body parts. I think the poster's point was that during kata they pay conscious attention to the relative location and position of many parts of their body.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Notice the IR people don't spend a lot of time navel gazing, we just do it. We use simpler words like hara, tanden, chinkuchi, and they amount to body mechanics and tai sabaki.

"Techniques will occur in the absence of conscious thought."

 

[jobo]

Conscious proprioception - What I believe to be the sensory experience of Qi .....

Conscious proprioception:

"The ability to sense the position of your body in space and being aware of where you should be able to move."

Becoming aware of the sensory feedback from the 5 main muscles of movement is crucial for developing your conscious proprioceptive skills and feeling the balance of your body.

Firstly focusing on your Base-Line pelvic floor and rectus abdominis muscles as your central pillar of strength. Feeling the position of the linea alba, the primary reference for body alignment on the median plane.

Seeing the sparkles in my mind, feeling the condition of my body. Becoming aware of blank spaces where there's restrictions in my connective tissue, reducing my range of movement and 'blocking' the signals.


Thoughts from those with much more experience / learning than me on this subject ?? !

Proprioception doesn't necessarily (or, actually, by definition) involve the location of other objects - just the location of body parts. I think the poster's point was that during kata they pay conscious attention to the relative location and position of many parts of their body.

well I may be conflating it slightly with other sensory imputs, but really it does, knowing your bodies position in space requires you to know where space starts and stops, ie the position of other things, at its most simplistic, balance requires you to know where the floor is,i, relation to your body,which requires input from your eyes/ ears,( balance with your eyes closed being significantly more difficult), but with out that you, fall over and proprioception is of little use to you in issolation,

 

[Gerry Seymour]

well I may be conflating it slightly with other sensory imputs, but really it does, knowing your bodies position in space requires you to know where space starts and stops, ie the position of other things, at its most simplistic, balance requires you to know where the floor is,i, relation to your body,which requires input from your eyes/ ears,( balance with your eyes closed being significantly more difficult), but with out that you, fall over and proprioception is of little use to you in issolation,

Yes, balance does require relationship to the ground (both "vertical" and the actual ground), but nothing about proprioception is different when there are or are not walls. That's a different issue, entirely. We can use proprioception to avoid the walls once we know they are there, but learning better proprioception doesn't vary depending whether there's walls or not.

 

[jobo]

Yes, balance does require relationship to the ground (both "vertical" and the actual ground), but nothing about proprioception is different when there are or are not walls. That's a different issue, entirely. We can use proprioception to avoid the walls once we know they are there, but learning better proprioception doesn't vary depending whether there's walls or not.

you said it didn't relly on knowing the position of objects the floor/ the ground and the planet are objects, that you need to know the poison off,,
and as I explained you cant know your position in space! if you don't the limitations to that space as space is just the SPACE between objects

 

[Gerry Seymour]

you said it didn't relly on knowing the position of objects the floor/ the ground and the planet are objects, that you need to know the poison off,,
and as I explained you cant know your position in space! if you don't the limitations to that space as space is just the SPACE between objects

You entirely missed the word "relative". I can, in fact, always know the relative position of my hand (to the rest of my body), irrespective of whether there is a ground or not.

 

[jobo]

You entirely missed the word "relative". I can, in fact, always know the relative position of my hand (to the rest of my body), irrespective of whether there is a ground or not.

but the ability to use your hands to balance urself, which is a fairly rudimentary example o its use, is completely dependent on knowing the position of the planet

knowing your hand is at the end of your arm is of fairly limit use unless you were wondering where your gloves are ?

 

[Gerry Seymour]

but the ability to use your hands to balance urself, which is a fairly rudimentary example o its use, is completely dependent on knowing the position of the planet

knowing your hand is at the end of your arm is of fairly limit use unless you were wondering where your gloves are ?

Proprioception doesn't depend upon the position of the planet. Keeping balance depends upon knowing the position of your body relative to the horizontal plane. It's a distinction of no real importance, but proprioception is concerned with the theoretical horizontal plane for that, and balance requires knowing the shape of the surface (does it match the horizontal plane?). The latter part isn't proprioception - that's the point. Proprioception is just the knowledge of the body's position relative to itself - it combines with other senses for things like balance.

 

[jobo]

Proprioception doesn't depend upon the position of the planet. Keeping balance depends upon knowing the position of your body relative to the horizontal plane. It's a distinction of no real importance, but proprioception is concerned with the theoretical horizontal plane for that, and balance requires knowing the shape of the surface (does it match the horizontal plane?). The latter part isn't proprioception - that's the point. Proprioception is just the knowledge of the body's position relative to itself - it combines with other senses for things like balance.

and to know the vertical you have to know where the exact centre of the planet is, there is no vertical with out out being in relation to an object out side of you, and you don't need to know the shape of the surface in order to balance or blind people couldn't walk

it's was buka that said balance was an example of proprioception in action, but I notice you're not bombarding him with your fallacious arguments !