PHYSICAL THERAPY

ON THE BALANCE ‘BEAM’ –

FASCIA’S ROLE IN PERFORMANCE

By Thomas Myers

Balance is a very wide concept, and a deep one as well. Cats, squirrels, horses and swinging monkeys all have an exquisite balance but all of those balances are different - even the koala bear demonstrates a slow balance in the eucalyptus branches. In the human body the definition of balance expands even further - balance between body and soul, mind and emotions, work and play, dominating and being dominated.

If, for a moment, we

restrict our thoughts about balance to simple body balance, it turns out not to be so simple at all.

Consider the elements of neuro-muscular balance, what we usually call ‘co-ordination’. An action plan must be formulated inside the brain and as Sir John Eccles informs us, the right side of the pre- motor cortex on the right side of the parietal lobe is the starting point for such an action. However the motor cortex does not run the muscles directly, the original ‘idea’ must first be tested in the hypothalamus (to see if it fits with our greater intents), the basal ganglia (to get the basic movements of body parts together), and then the cerebellum (to get the pre-programming for the familiar parts of the movement) (see Figure 1).

Once the action is assembled in the brain, it still must pass through the central pattern generators of the spinal cord before arriving at the peripheral nerves for the precise timing and deliv- ery to the neuromuscular junctions, where the presumption is that the tiny amounts of acetylcholine released will result in a smooth, co-ordinated acceleration of muscle contraction - and the body

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SPINAL CORD

central feedback (efference copy)

central pattern generators

will move to execute the original idea. If the idea is bringing a pint from the table to your lips, or any other familiar action, then little more is required.

BRAIN STEM

higher control

MUSCLES GLANDS

proprioceptive feedback

effector organs

sensory input or feedback from environment

environment Figure 1: Inter-relationship between the neuromuscular system 11