How can Muscle Activation Techniques™ help you achieve your New Year’s exercise resolutions?
Every year in January, people make exercise-related resolutions, such as “exercising more,” “losing weight,” or “getting stronger.” Maybe you’re one of those people this year. If you are, Congratulations! At AIM, we applaud your effort to exercise because we know the incredible health benefits that you can gain by making exercise a consistent part of your life. Sadly, by February we see too many people quitting because they’re too sore, injured, or not seeing the results they hoped for. Muscle Activation Techniques™ can be the tool to help you stay in the exercise game all year long and achieve those resolutions you set. Additionally, if you are returning to exercise after a long absence or exercising for the first time, MAT™ can benefit you too. Here are 4 ways Muscle Activation Techniques™ can help you achieve your New Year’s exercise resolutions.
#1: MAT™ can help identify weak areas (muscles) that need work.
One of the most unique elements of MAT is its ability to assess a person’s body joint by joint and muscle by muscle. This high level of specificity provides detailed information about what muscles are working well in your body and what muscles are performing poorly. An MAT Specialist will work to improve the function of those inhibited muscles during a typical session.
Here at AIM, our MAT Specialist often conclude a session by assigning homework exercises that will help reinforce the weak muscles identified during the session. This allows you to have a Plan of Action when you next head to the gym for your workout. So often, we see gym members wandering around aimlessly at the gym with either no plan, or the same plan week after week. With MAT, you and your Specialist can design a plan to specifically address the weak muscles that need your focus in the gym. This makes your time at the gym that much more effective and helps move you more quickly towards your goals.
#2: MAT™ can correct muscular imbalances thus preventing future injuries.
One of the reasons we see people quit the gym 6 weeks into the New Year is due to an injury. These injuries often arise from muscular imbalances within the body that become more pronounced when we start an exercise program. By adding MAT, you create a checks and balances system that checks to make sure all your muscles are contracting optimally and your body is in balance. If an imbalance appears because some muscles are contracting poorly and other muscles are overworking, an MAT Specialist can correct this imbalance placing the muscular system in balance again, and therefor stop an injury before it happens.
The incredible, life-changing health benefits that come from exercise are only gleaned when you regularly participate in exercise. If an injury puts you on the sidelines, you are no longer able to reap these health benefits which is why we believe MAT is crucial in helping you continue to exercise and avoid injuries. It will take you a much longer period of time to reach your health and exercise goals if you can’t workout due to an injury.
#3: MAT™ can help you return to exercise sooner if you over do it at the gym.
The mindset of gym members in January often looks like #crushit. If you haven’t been to the gym in a while or you’re new to exercise, an intense workout often exceeds the current tolerance level of the body. This leads to muscle soreness that may even impact your ability to do daily tasks, such as sitting and standing from a chair. Soreness is an indicator of inflammation. When inflammation is present in the muscular system, it alters the communication pathways between the central nervous system and your muscles leading to muscular inhibition. Inhibition means the muscles are not able to contract and do their job. MAT is specifically designed to identify and correct muscular inhibition! This means an MAT Specialist can quickly identify which muscles were overused or stressed in the gym (inhibited), correct the communication pathway between the CNS and the muscle(s), and get you back to the gym quicker. As stated earlier, the less time you spend on the sidelines waiting for the soreness to go away, the sooner you can be back in the gym chasing those goals and improving your health.
#4: MAT™ can make your time in the gym more effective.
Here at AIM, we believe the best use of MAT is proactively instead of re-actively. In other words, MAT can be used once you’ve already noticed something is not feeling or working right in your body, but we believe the best use of MAT is to schedule regular tune ups BEFORE an issue arises. You handle your car this way, right? You take it in for regular checks of the brakes, tires, oil, etc. versus taking the car in only when the dashboard light goes on or you’re stranded on the side of the road.
The best way to make sure your body is tuned up and ready to perform in the gym, is to make sure your muscular system is performing at its best. Instead of pulling the car over mid trip when you hear a bad sound and stopping for a tune up, wouldn’t it be better to have the mechanics check it over in the pits so that when you put the car on the track, you can really push it and have fun?! It’s the same thing with your body! If you have an MAT session prior to your workout, your muscular system is now fine-tuned and ready to perform at its top level. This means the time you spend working in the gym is now much more effective since you’re working at a higher level, moving you much closer, and much more quickly, to your goals.
If you don’t want to be a part of the group that quits the gym in mid-February, we highly encourage you to incorporate Muscle Activation Techniques™ into your life. An MAT Specialist can be an excellent addition to your wellness team that supports you in reaching your health goals. Visit https://muscleactivation.com and click on the “Find a Specialist” tab to find an MAT Practitioner in your local area and if you’re located in NOVA, contact us today for an appointment.