Thinking With Movement & Rucking

Weekly Resource Roundup

Thinking With Movement

The book The Extended Mind, author Annie Murphy Paul writes about how our bodies, the spaces we inhabit, and social connections help us think. Here are some takeaways from the section on how movement help us think:

Studies on successful financial traders showed that the traders that the most successful had the greatest sensitivity to interoceptive signals. Interoception is the awareness of the inner state of the body. Successful traders were greatly attuned to how fast their heartbeat was without placing a hand on their heart or wrist. When they paid attention to their body’s inner signals it resulted in better decision-making.

Giving a name to what we’re feeling has a major impact on the nervous system and helps us to dial down our stress response. If we can be granular, precise, and diverse  with our feelings, and naming them, it helps to reduce stress further.

Fidgeting has been shown to help extend our mind’s capabilities. Studies show that when students were able to fidget or doodle they were better at solving problems and remembering information. Small rhythmic movement increases the brain’s alertness allowing for increased focus and attention.

Gesturing and moving our hands helps our brains think more intelligently. Gesturing has shown to enhance memory by reinforcing the spoken word with visual and motor cues. It can free up our mental resources by “offloading” information onto our hands. It also helps us understand and express abstract ideas, that can’t be expressed by words alone. 

Moderately intense activity has shown to increase focus, give us greater verbal fluency and cognitive flexibility, enhance problem-solving and decision-making abilities,  increase working memory, and improve long-term memory.

Moving while learning can help us remember information more accurately. It may also be the case that moving while learning can help us understand information differently and more in depth.

Exercise To Try

Rucking is walking with weight on your back. This is a basic human ability that isn’t required in today’s modern age but has many benefits including: 

• Builds strength and endurance
• Taxes the chassis which everything in between the shoulders and knees: hamstrings, quads, hips, abs, back, etc..
• Loads the spine which helps to prevent osteoporosis
• Can burn 3x the calories of walking