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If you play basketball, baseball, football, soccer, or any other ball sport in your spare time, here’s a big piece of news and advice for you: Learn how to JUGGLE! More than just a unique trick to impress your friends, co-workers or any potential lady friends (and it will), juggling is a neuromuscular skill that can have a profound impact on your sport. Studies also show that taking just a few minutes out of your work day each day to juggle will drastically reduce work-place stress; juggling is believed to curb common symptoms of ADHD and studies have shown that it even increases your brain power (something previously thought impossible)!

 

Using the four simple steps outlined at the end of this post and devoting just a few minutes to practice a day, it’s never too late to learn to juggle. But did you realize that among other benefits, learning to juggle will improve: ambidexterity, hand-eye coordination, depth perception, peripheral vision, neuromuscular balance, quickness under control, and concentration? Fundamentals which are essential to activities such as hitting a softball or shooting a free throw.

According to a recent study, however, the benefits of juggling may go well beyond those just listed. As reported by BBC News in 2005,

“brain scans of those who had learnt to juggle showed two areas had increased in size. Jugglers had more grey matter - which consists largely of the nerve cells - in the mid-temporal area and the left posterior intraparietal sulcus, which both process visual motion information.”

That’s right; scientists have recently discovered that learning to juggle may actually increase brain power, something previously deemed impossible. Said Arne May, of the University of Regensburg in Germany, who headed the research team,

“Our results challenge our view of the human central nervous system. Human brains probably must be viewed as dynamic, changing with development and normal learning,”

Some doctors now believe that learning to juggle may help curb common learning disabilities, such as dyslexia or ADHD. In his book Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Russell A. Barkeley, PhD, explains that interspersing work or academic periods with brief moments of physical exercise – such as juggling practice – so as to diminish the fatigue and monotony of extensive work periods, may be helpful to reducing symptoms of ADHD.

Even if you don’t suffer from a learning disorder, a break in your rigorous daily routine for juggling practice may be a great way to relieve stress. Juggling encourages a mental and physical state known as “relaxed concentration”, in which the mind and body are able to be focused and alert while remaining calm and relaxed. Physically active study breaks in the middle of the workday can help you return to your work feeling refreshed and more productive.

Juggling provides a “right brain break in a left brain day” and stimulates the learning process in many different ways. Those with strong visual/spatial intelligence love to visualize juggling patterns, while the rhythmic nature of juggling (and especially juggling to music) appeals to those with musical ability. On the other hand, getting up, moving around, and throwing and catching develops kinesthetic intelligence. Meanwhile, the sharing and comparing that juggling affords appeals to those with strong interpersonal intelligence, developed through focusing on goals and striving for them. Logical and mathematical thinkers dominate the ranks of jugglers, too. Due, in all likelihood, to the experimental nature of the art; where practitioners figure out the number patterns, relationships and language of juggling tricks.

Once proficient, juggling can be used to help improve strength and agility and can tone muscles already present, by increasing the weight of your juggling props, especially in your secondary forearm muscles. For example, if you toss three 2-pound beanbags (called Exerballs™ professionally) for 20 minutes, you will be doing thousands of foot-pounds of work, gaining strength and coordination at the same time.

Even as a beginner, juggling provides a high-spirited and fun atmosphere. It is sure to be a hit at the bar (just be careful!), at a party and even in the office. Juggling is undeniably both healthy and fun. As author and lecturer Dave Finnegan explained to me recently,

“I was 34, a mid-career professional in Demography, overweight and out of shape and desperately in need of physical activity when I learned to juggle.

Now I am 65, full of energy and bouncing all over the world. People do not believe I’m 65. I present programs in about 80 elementary schools each year where I deliver a grueling all-day program that starts with a teachers meeting before school, involves 6 classes for up to 120 kids per class, an assembly at the end of the day, and Family Juggling Night that same evening. I’ve still got enough energy at the end of the day to drive to the next school; and this is important as I often do these programs five days per week in five different widely separated schools. My recreation on the weekends is swing dancing, and I can definitely say that the rhythm and precision gained through juggling have helped my dancing.”

Simple Four-Step lesson to learning a basic three-ball cascade:

Step 1: One Ball

Start with one ball. Throw it from hand to hand in a “figure 8” or infinity sign pattern, with scooping underhand throws. Let go of the ball toward the midline of your body, and catch it toward the outside, carrying it back to the midline to throw again. The “figure 8” pattern should extend about a foot above your shoulder on each side. Keep your hands down. Do not reach up higher than your chest to throw or catch! Keep the ball on a plane in front of you. When you are able to make a smooth figure 8 — without pauses, and without recoiling or cocking your hand before throwing — every time, you may move on to step 2.

Step 2: Starting and Stopping

Pick up two balls and hold them on the heels of your hands, as shown, so that you have room in the nest formed by your thumb, forefinger, and middle finger for a third ball. Pick up a third ball and throw if from hand to hand, from nest to nest, following the path described in step one. Remember the figure 8 (Note: you are not juggling yet, this is just a warm-up exercise to teach you how to begin and end the juggling routine). When you can throw one ball from nest to nest every time, you are ready to move to step 3.

Step 3: Exchanging Two Balls

Hold 2 balls in your dominant hand and one in your subordinate hand. Throw the ball from the nest of your dominant hand, following the figure 8 path. When the ball peaks, throw the ball out of your subordinate hand, scooping it underneath the first ball as shown, also following the figure 8 path (note: the 2 balls should cross in the air and change hands). When you can complete this step every time without dropping, you’re ready to move to step 4.

Step 4: Continue to Juggle

Start again, throwing the first two balls as you did in step 3. This time, however, when ball 2 peaks, throw the remaining ball in your dominate hand underneath ball 2 in a figure 8 pattern. When ball 3 peaks, throw ball 1 (now in your subordinate hand) underneath ball 3 in a figure 8 pattern and just keep going. Before you know it, you’re juggling!

Step 4b:
Learn to start with two balls in your subordinate hand. You should be able to start and finish with either hand.

REMEMBER:

1. Always start with the hand that is holding two balls
2. Every time a ball peaks, throw another underneath it with a scooping underhand throw
3. Alternate hands left-right, left-right, left-right
4. Throw to the same height on both sides
5. Focus on the peaks, don’t look at your hands
6. If you’re having a hard time with rhythm, it might be helpful to count with each throw or say “right-left, right-left, right-left” out loud
7. When you want to stop, stop cleanly by catching the last ball on your three-finger nest (described in step 2)
8. Remember every ball follows the same figure 8 path
9. Keep the balls in a plane in front of you – don’t throw them forward (if you’re having trouble with this, it is helpful to stand facing a wall, so you can’t throw far in front of your body)
10. There should always be one ball in the air, and one on its way up
11. Go slowly, wait for those peaks, and don’t worry about drops – a dropped ball is a sign of progress!
12. Eventually, when you’re comfortable, give up counting and lower the whole pattern down below eye level. That’s where more controlled juggling should take place.

(image by hughes_leglise)

Technorati Tags: Juggling, Learn to Juggle, Self Improvement, college, gradute

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