balance troubles & HUNTING FOR A SOLUTION
For a few years, I have had intermittent episodes of vertigo and difficulty balancing.
I have paid close attention to what happens - my symptoms - in case the seeds of a solution are contained within them.
Visual special effects - and not in a good way
My visual world starts to move around in an unpredictable way. It spins when I am still. And when I start to walk, it whooshes away from me at speed or looms up big and close, like a horror movie shot with hand-held shaky camerawork.
I find I can’t gauge how far away an object is. So, I crash into the walls when walking down a corridor. I drop mugs and bowls or slam them into the surface when trying to place them down gently on the worktop.
Anxiety and emotional wobbliness follow
Along with nausea, bodily signs of anxiety come to the fore (holding my breath, clenching my jaw, gripping my neck muscles tight to keep my head super-still) and I start to feel emotionally unsteady.
Unhelpful stiffening is the reaction
As I fear what may come next, I constrain all of my movements and stiffen up. I feel even more clumsy and more unstable. It turns into a vicious circle.
Other balance troubles can be similar
You may be facing your own troubles with balancing – with a diagnosis of Ménières disease or vestibular migraine. You may have picked up the habit of a defensive body posture following an injury, surgery or pain.
Whatever your reason for movements that have lost their vitality, spontaneity and fluidity, you may like to try the self-help techniques I used.
How I help myself, with the help of the floor
Lying down, doing what I feel, following my urges
When I feel unwell like this, I lie down. I respond to my urges for quiet, for stillness, for resting in different positions, for aimless movements.
Soft, gentle movements to de-stress lessen the symptoms
In this way, I have arrived at a very gentle movement exploration that works for me…
to settle myself down
find relief
and break out of the vertigo pattern.
I have called my practice (or lesson) - Becoming More Balanced.
Listen to it here and follow along in your own space.
Or read below about what I do.
Becoming More Balanced - what I do, step by step
Lying down, letting go
I lie down on a rug to feel the ground, to let go of my weight, to let it be carried without me having to apply muscular work to hold myself up, precariously in an upright position. I let go of the agendas of daily life – the lists, deadlines and duties.
No pressure, no goals
It is like taking myself back to the simpler world of being a young baby who has nothing to do at that moment other than to gaze at the ceiling, move her limbs around to roll any which way, while feeling inside the consequences of what she does.
Feeling my feet on the ground, with knees bent…
Next, I bend my knees and place each foot on the floor. I discover which places on the floor feel best for me. Places where I can start to let the floor beneath carry all the weight of that leg.
Can I rest my head? Cradling, massaging my neck to let go its tension
If I can persuade myself to do so, I let my head rest down fully on the floor. I may add my hands to gently cradle my neck, feel its shape and curve, and sense with fingertip pads where the muscles are contracting when they could be resting. My hands come away and as the lesson progresses, I can let my head be moved and rolled a little in response to other movements. My overworking neck is starting to take a break.
Tilting a knee softly this way and that…I roll as a result
I tilt a knee one way…then the other…to find out how – if I can be passive and not interfere – this tilting rolls my weight across the floor. Now, I can detect new places are travelling, leaning or spreading across the floor, echoing the journey the knee makes above. Each new place where I contact the floor can become a new ‘base of support’ – a new place from where I could feel balanced or from where I could carry on into motion. It becomes like a pleasurable massage.
Lifting and landing my foot…feeling lightness…heaviness
I make other small, easy explorations with one leg or both. Lifting a leg lazily to see how light it could feel. Letting go a foot back down to the floor to see how heavily and fully I can give the floor my weight. Pressing with one foot to feel the consequences elsewhere.
Connections, rippling movements…bringing calm, rest, stability
I start to feel a connection between my lower parts and my troubled head and neck far away. Movements of leg, foot, pelvis start to ripple through me to reach my head. I become calmer and more restful.
Stabilised.
BECOMING MORE BALANCED - how it works
At its simplest level, the lesson encapsulates these principles - to:
Feel the support of the ground
Let go of any intention to try hard, use effort or do things ‘properly’
Notice yourself as you move…detect if small amounts of stress, tension or tightness may slowly dissipate
Move with more flow and variety – little by little
mind/body re-balancing BONUS
If you are prone to spending time in your thinking mode – in your head – then, sensing and moving as the lesson describes can also bring about the bonus of more mind/body balance.
It gives you a refuge from word-based thinking. It can bring relief for busy, scrambled minds. It has the potential for you to feel yourself in a pleasant new way and uncover important self-discoveries.
Future Learnings for balance transformation
There are many other useful Awareness Through Movement lessons offering scope to discover details of self-use that could improve my balance.
I am drawn to exploring these transformative ingredients:
Sensing my base of support on the ground in different positions – from safe and easy (lying on my back or side), through to more challenging (all fours, kneeling, sitting, standing)
Shifting weight, changing positions - allowing all the parts of myself to be responsive and movable, as I pass through several changing bases of support…and returning
Softening and yielding more and more of myself to the floor - to allow a more fluid, expansive sense of breathing
Lessons which lead me to organising my upper body to be suspended over the ‘highest point of the hip’
Discovering a freer carriage of my head and neck, as tight shoulders give up their work and a static ribcage and breastbone slowly become part of movement
Playing with how I use my eyes – at times gently moving them in accord with my movement intentions; at others letting facial muscles relax and the focus of eyes become diffuse and dreamy
Embodying balance off the mat
As I grow my experience of Awareness Through Movement lessons, I notice how they often invite me to embody multiple principles of balance. These principles also come with me off the mat and out into the rest of my life.
How to use my skeleton as a support instead of relying overly on muscles
Developing a facility with moving my attention between the big picture whole and zooming in for little picture details
Switching attention from the outside world – my space, environment and other people - to myself and my inner world
Exploring a dynamic sense of balance, to shift smoothly from positions of relative rest and poise, through easy, efficient movement and back again
Feeling the effects on my autonomic nervous system of different states and styles of stillness and movement
Wider and wilder balance experiments
Beyond Feldenkrais, I like using other activities to fine-tune my balance.
Cycling can be a relief from walking
Even when vertigo is troubling me, I find cycling surprisingly easier than walking. Perhaps it helps that manoeuvres like changing direction and adjusting to ground level changes are smoother for me on a bike.
Cycling gives me the chance to relax and refresh my eyes and cast them to the far horizon – a relief if I have spent too much time inside on close work.
Expanding my comfort zone with neuroplasticity
When my vestibular system is working quite well, I take my chances to expand my comfort zone and maximise my options and capacities. I take the learnings from Awareness Through Movement into other domains.
I include key factors that boost neuroplasticity. This is our brain and nervous system’s ability to learn anew and change its connections at any age:
novelty - for freshness, curiosity and to keep evolving more complex skills
attention - directed towards what is positive, easy, possible, least effortful
meaning and emotion - only doing what is enjoyable and interests me right now
Surfing on dry land
I have a new toy to help me experience playing with sensations of instability. The CoolBoard was developed for surfers to practise in winter.
I can calibrate its level of difficulty to avoid arousing dizziness.
In the beginning, I used it like a wobble board – resting on a lightly inflated cushion. Once that was easy, I introduced new levels of instability by inflating the cushion more and more.
Now, I have progressed to balancing on the solid ball. This moves the board around even faster and over a smaller base. The cool kids can jump, dance and lift weights while on their boards. For now, I am practising how to balance up there without hanging onto a wall for support.
I can tell that mastering this skill will keep me entertained for a long time to come.
How do you practise your balancing SKILLS?
What balancing activities could you find novel enough to engage your attention and, at the same time, enjoyable and meaningful for you?
How else may you try to hone your balance?
