Use your eyes to open up tight shoulders and backs

Use your EYES to find a new range of motion in less than 3 seconds. How? By taking advantage of a simple reflexes that alters muscle tone.

The mechanism is called the oculomotor reflex or orienting reflex. It’s a basic survival reflex that ties quick eye movement to muscular activation. Read on below or watch the video below to learn more.

How it works: When we hear or see something around us that we need to pay attention to–imagine you hear a loud noise or notice something flying towards your face–our eyes and head will quickly move in that direction. Why? We need to know if that thing we heard or saw in our periphery is a threat to our survival; if it is, we need to know where and what it is so we can react appropriately.

When we look up quickly, muscles that help our spine or shoulders extend (spinal muscles , lats, posterior deltoid, triceps) are activated in anticipation of a head movement that is coordinated with the eye movement.¹ When we look down, muscles that help us flex (hip flexors, biceps, pecs, abdominals) are activated for the same reason… our brain knows we’re about to look down.

This coordination is instinctual, but like many neuro-athletic drills, we’re taking advantage of and tuning a reflex to boost performance. 

When to use it: Insert this quick drill during passive or dynamic flexibility work or during event warm-ups to get more of the mobility needed for specific skills and positions. Remember: move just your eyes, keep your head still. As with all brain-activating exercises, results may vary.

Give it a shot!

¹Hutchinson, Michael, et al. "Cervical dystonia: a disorder of the midbrain network for covert attentional orienting." Frontiers in neurology 5 (2014): 54.

The midbrain covert attentional network captures change in the environment and alerts the individual to a salient stimulus, which requires inspection and action that may be important for survival. …EMG responses recorded in the ipsilateral splenius capitis and deltoid, occur 80–90 ms following the sudden appearance of a cue in the visual field in a test of reflexive covert orienting… EMG responses in the contralateral muscles  diminish at the same time as the ipsilateral muscle activity increases.