Practice: Eye Movement For Spine Mobility

Trent McEntire [00:00:06]: 

Hi. I'm Trent McIntyre. And in this session, I'm gonna teach you how to move your eyes to improve spinal mobility. You see your eyes and your spine have a very special relationship. And the better you can move your eyes, the better your spine moves in direct correlation. It's actually pretty cool. And it's very easy to do. So before we do the exercise, I want you to first kind of take note of what your spine is feeling like today. 

So to do that, we're just gonna take a small rotation. So really simple, without any strain or extra effort. Just rotate to your right and just see how far that goes. Again, not so far that you feel like you're cranking on your spine or creating strain or pressure. But just to the right, just take notice of what it feels like in your body. Where does it stop? How does it feel? Does it feel stiff? Does it feel loose? Where does it feel stiff? Is it uncomfortable? You know, just kind of get a sense of what it feels like. And do the same thing to your left. So just rotate. 

Really simple. Again, just the range that you feel like you can own. Take stock of what it's feeling like. Let's do one more to the right. And just make sure you're not holding your breath. You don't have to do any special breathing with it yet, but just nice and simple to the left one time. Just to give yourself a sense of where you are right now. Now today I'm gonna be using the brain speed ball. 

If you don't have a brain speed ball, you could always make your own. But in addition, you could use your thumb as a target. So I'll show both ways so you get an idea of how that would happen. So first, we're gonna move just your eyes, which means we're gonna keep your body very still. I'll give your thumb as a target. Just about a foot or so in front of you. And you're just going to take the thumb a little bit to the side and take your eyes with it just tracking it and bring it back to center. And just try that. 

Adjust your eyes and bring it back to center. One more time, adjust the eyes and back to center. Now if you have a brain speedball you'll find a letter or number on it. So there's a through z and 1 through 12 on the ball and hold the ball out the same kind of distance. Alright now I have an n. We do the same thing with just the eyes moving tracking the n and coming back to center. Just the eyes, and back to center. Now let's go left. 

I'll change hands. Just the eyes go left, best you can. You might kinda feel like your head wanting to go with it. That's okay. Do your best to keep your head still and just move your eyes. And back to center. One more time left. And back to center. 

Now we're gonna change hands again and we're gonna add head movement to this. So first, the ball starts to move and your eyes and your head move. But don't move your shoulders. Don't twist the rest of your spine. Just your eyes and your head and then bring it back to center. Again, no strain is allowed here. Only a range that you feel like you can own where your eyes and head can travel without turning your whole body. Keep that square and still, and then back to center.

We'll do one more time to the right. And then bring it back to center and let's go left. Eyes and head move, keep the rest of your body still. Again, not turning your whole body, keeping that squared off. Bring it back to center. Turn eyes and head. Only as far as you can go to where you own it, Not creating any strain. Let's do one more time to your left.

And bring it back to center. Just take a break there. Take a check of how you're feeling so far. Let's do a little check-in with your spine mobility. And just without really much effort or strain, just retest going to your right. For me, I definitely feel like it's looser. But get a sense of where you feel like that's going. Come back to center and then try left. 

Come back to center. Just try one more right and left. Really simple. No strain. Just the range that you own. And back to center. One more time left. And back to center. 

So it's okay if it didn't feel like it improved, don't worry. As you get better at the eye movement, you'll find that the mobility improves as well. But I want you to be checking in periodically so that you get a sense of when it is improving, what that feels like for yourself. So maybe you feel like there's just less strain, there's less stiffness, that feels more comfortable. You might even feel like the range of motion improves. So, keep keep some awareness and look out for some of those possible changes. Okay. So adding on now. 

Either your thumb or holding the ball in front, we're gonna add your whole spine. So, your eyes go, your head goes, and then you're gonna take your whole spine with it. Again, only to a place where you feel like you have control, no strain. And come back to center. Changing hands, we're gonna go left. Keep your eyes locked on. I have a bee. Lock on to that bee. 

Go as far as you can. Eyes, head, spine, back to center. Not creating any pain or strain, Making it really simple. And bring it back to center. You can always slow down if you have to. It doesn't have to be my speed. This is kind of a medium speed. If you wanna go slower, you're absolutely welcome to. 

And back to center. Let's just take a breath here together, whatever breath you can get. Now let's retest. So turn to the right. Come back to center. What'd you notice? Are you going further? Does it feel easier? Back to center. For me because I do have a bit of a tight spine, I definitely feel improvement when my eyes are moving better. So for me in this session together today with you, I feel like that range has improved. 

And you might be able to rewind and watch the video to see that happen. And I would also encourage you to really make this a regular practice. You make this a practice and you can start to build up more awareness over time to go, oh, my spine really is becoming more mobile without having to strain. It's all through your eyes. Your eyes and spine have a very important relationship that you can tap into so easy like this. So make it a regular practice. Keep it light and fun and doable. And that's the bottom line. 

If it's not fun, you're not gonna wanna do it again. So keep it light and fun and have a good time. See you next time. 

And remember, you are strong and resilient and the small moments matter. I'll see you soon.