Patience is not my leading
virtue. Anything that can be done
can probably be done faster, right?
What are we hanging around for?
And look! There’s something
shiny over there!
Some things, however, have to
take their time. Growing babies,
for example. Or growing babies
into adults, for another. Long
division, poems, and Ikea projects also all benefit from careful consideration,
concentration, and perhaps occasional swearing. It turns out that mobility and motor control are two more of
those things.
I have known for some time that a
lot of strength builds during the eccentric, or lowering, phase of weight
training. Increasing the time a
muscle is under tension adds fatigue and eventually strength.
However, I didn’t fully realize
that slowing down movement gives the body time to smooth out the motion, to
figure out how best to use its pathways, and to create feedback and
feed-forward to develop better strategies. Giving the muscles and the brain more time to work produces
better results.
It is time to embrace the tortoise
side of things.
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