I'm currently reading a book entitled, "The Mind & the Brain: Neuroplasticity and the Power of Mental Force" by Jeffery M. Schwartz, M.D., and Sharon Begley. I'm finding this book extremely interesting as it speaks about the human brain, how it develops and what it's capable of. As I was reading this book, I started putting some of the issues the authors discuss into the realm of tactical physiology and strength and conditioning...more issues that keep me up at night.
Before we get too far into this article, I need to shed some light on neuroplasticity and the human brain. In short, the human brain is full of neurons. Neurons are little nerve cells that are responsible for a whole plethora of functions. They help us taste, hear, see, jump, run, drive, shoot stuff, etc. Each neuron looks a lot like a creature from the blue lagoon. On one end of the neuron, there is a bunch of little arms sprouting out that are called dendrites. These arms look a lot like the roots of a tree and are responsible for picking up incoming messages. On the other end of the neuron is an arm called an axon which is responsible for sending messages on to other neurons. In essence, there is a communication process going on between the axon and the dendrite called a synapse. These synapses are the communication point between one neuron and the next neuron down the line.
I'll use the metaphor of a train and all its cars. Visualize a train with all its cars lined up on the track. Now visualize that each car of the train is very close to one another but not quite touching. The car is the neuron, that little gap between the non-touching cars is representative of the synapse between successive neurons. The command to do something (i.e. jump, taste, sit, feel) starts at one car and sends the signal down the line to the rest of the cars on the track. This communication makes it possible for all the feelings, senses and movement that we as human beings enjoy.
Neuroplasticity is the scientific verbiage for a phenomenon called brain mapping. Brain mapping is what happens when we learn a new skill, smell a new smell, learn a different language, etc. In order to explain this further, let's use the example of learning a new skill. As some of you know, I've been writing a lot lately about explosive strength. This is something that can and needs to be developed in the tactical athlete. By doing a systematic program, the neurons (among other physiological changes) will actually begin to change the map of the brain. What that means to the neuroplasticity scientist is that your brain will develop and look different after you train for explosive strength. The pathway that is responsible for such a movement will be created. In other words, it will start developing highways in the brain that are responsible for making the warrior more explosive. Pretty amazing stuff!
In the past, scientist believed that the human brain didn't change at all after a certain age of human development. Research is now showing that that may not be true. We may still be able to change the make-up of our brains by applying proper training and learning.
There are many studies that have been performed over the years to show that brain re-mapping is actually possible. Scientists have incorporated the use of monkey's, dyslexic children, stroke patients, amputees and musicians to basically prove that neural re-mapping is possible. Although we don't have time to cover them all, I think it's important to our cause to at least mention a few of the many studies that are mentioned.
For example, scientists placed food wells outside of monkey's cages that contained banana flavored food pellets. The scientists designed each food well to be a different size. There were 4 different size food wells that the monkeys had available to recieve the pellets. In order to retrieve the food pellets, the monkeys had to extend their arms, stick a finger or two into the food well, find the pellet, scrape it out and put it in their mouth. As you can imagine, the monkeys had an easier time getting the food pellets out of the larger wells compared to the smaller ones. At first, the monkeys struggled to pick the food up but were later flawless at eating this way once they practiced it a couple hundred times.
Sounds believable enough. Practice makes perfect, right? The important part was that the scientists went back to study the brain of the monkeys and found that they had changed. The nerve cells that were responsible for grabbing the food actually increased (1). This means the brain adapted to the training in order to become more proficient at eating a certain way. They learned the movements slowly and became faster and more efficient at it later.
The next example is actually even more interesting. Scientists had a group of people practice a five-finger piano exercise. The subjects of the study were randomly assigned to a group that physically practiced the exercise, a group that only mentally practiced the exercise, and, as all good studies do, had a control group that didn't practice at all. Each group was tested daily for brain re-mapping. Over the course of 5 days, mental practice alone led to significant improvement in the performance of the exercise but was significantly less than that produced by the physical practice alone. In other words, thinking about moving a certain way actually improved the movement patterns, just not as much as the actual physical practice. The interesting thing was that the mental practice still led to the same plastic changes in the motor system as those occurring with the physical practice. This suggests that mental practice helps lay the ground work for further development of skills through physical practice (2).
So, what does this have to do with the old military mantra of, "Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast?" It seems to me, looking at the above mentioned studies, the human brain is capable of making specific changes in order to master certain types of movements. This is a learned response and very specific to the movement. If you are an Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technician, it would be pretty beneficial not to fumble around inside an explosive. That is what training is for. Learn the movements under a controlled environment to develop the correct neural network that you need so that it becomes second nature. Learn it slow, mentally rehearse it, and become more efficient at it later.
If you're learning to clear a room with hostiles and friendlies in the room, it would make sense to learn the skill slowly and mentally rehearse the tactics to develop the nervous pathways. Once the pathways are developed, let speed take over in order to be effective and flat out dangerous. Slow is good for learning smooth movements. Smooth movements are the way to speed. Attacking with speed and efficiency makes it almost impossible for the enemy to answer back to your attacks. That's good for you-bad for them.
And that's my take on "Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast."
God bless,
Mike Sanders
- Nudo, R.J., G.W. Milliken, W.M. Jenkins, M.M. Mezenich. Use-dependent alterations of movement representations in primary motor cortex of adult squirrel monkeys. J Neurosci. 16(2): 785-807. 1996.
- Pascual-Leone, A., N. Dang, L.G. Cohen, J.P. Brasil-Neto, A. Cammarota, M. Hallet. Modulation of Muscle Responses Evoked by Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation During the Acquisition of New Fine Motor Skills. J Neurosci. 74(3): 1037-1045. 1995.
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