Superbrain yoga: An exercise that can make you smart?
July 21, 2015 Ashley 0 Comments
I get so bored when I’m doing non-cardio exercise.
Weights. Squats. Scissor kicks… These things don’t bother me because they’re hard or they hurt – but because I can’t help but wonder the whole time how much other stuff I could be getting done. How many articles could I have written in this time? How many errands? How many more dogs could I have procured from the pound, sealing in my future fate for good as a hound hoarder? While I’ve found it’s tough to truly multitask attention demanding activities while doing tricep extensions (protip: never try to conduct a stove full of frothing hot pots into a meal while simultaneously indulging your somatic vanity practice), I did happen to come across something today that could be a good shoe in. It’s something that marries your efforts toward one popular exercise with something else that’s fairly productive too – like training your brain how to take over the world.
Well, kinda.
What it’s called is Superbrain yoga. Started by a dude called GrandMaster Choa Kok Sui (legit name, seeing as he sounds like someone who multitasks himself – namely in being a sushi chef who operates from the inside of a DJ booth), the idea’s that you boost your brain’s efforts by harnessing some deep, primordial power within yourself by doing a variation of that one thing you’re already doing so that you don’t have to wear a sarong all summer. I tend to like this primoridal concept in theory, too, though. The idea that I have secret fairy powers within me and the only reason I’m not capable of moving cars with my mind yet’s ‘cause I’m just not trying hard enough is insanely appealing. However, as a reluctant woman of science, I tend to require just a few studies and stats before I can give credence to what I’m hearing. So, let’s look at the process first and then see why it maybe works:
Per ehow, the process goes thusly:
Remove any jewelery and stand up straight facing east, the direction of the sunrise. Place the tip of your tongue just behind your teeth on the roof of your mouth as if you were about to say the word “la” and keep it there until you complete the exercise.
Grasp your right earlobe with your left hand. Place your thumb on the outside of the earlobe and your index finger behind the ear lobe. Squeeze gently.
Grasp your left earlobe with your right hand. Place your thumb on the front of the earlobe and your index finger behind the ear lobe. Squeeze gently. Ensure that your right arm is on top of your left arm. Keep your thumbs and fingers on your lobes like this until you complete the exercise.
Inhale through your nose while slowly lowering yourself into a squatting position. Hold your breath for a count of two while squatting.
Exhale as you come back up to the starting position.
Repeat the squatting movement 18 times as you inhale going down and exhale coming up. Remove your hands from your earlobes and let your tongue return to its normal position.
So… wait. That’s it?
Squats with my pinnas gripped betwixt my fingers?
Alright – I’ll bite. I guess. But at least explain to me how this peculiar practice works?
The idea is that, by holding onto the lobes of your ears with opposite hands, you’re not only activating acupressure points, but you’re also upping your alpha wave game while inducing synchronization between right and left brain hemispheres. By grabbing the right side with your left duke and vice versa, you’re forcing each side of your brain to wake up at the same time and thus cooperate. The two hemispheres synch up, and boom. You’re in the zone. That zone that athletes enter for a World Cup winning kick. The zone Van Gogh went into so hard that that’s obviously why he cut off one of his ears – just to keep himself from abusing this fantastic practice anymore. The zone Lady Gaga goes to that makes her talk about “honoring vomit”. And where’s that honorable, ingenious brain vomit come from? What’s so great about the two hemispheres meeting eachother halfway that turns New Yorkian Jane Does of the world into egg dwelling illuminati superstars? Well, I suppose it has to do with that feeling you get when you take a right versus left brain quiz and wish you were both. Can’t I be creative and logical? The answer is yes, according to SuperBrain Yoga practitioners (and the brain scans that’ve followed their routine). Sure, some of the greats (like everyone I mentioned above, probably) access that via other practices. But, if you haven’t found out how to get there yet – mayhaps you too can be both imaginatively artsy and mathematically rational by doing this for just “one minute a day”. Plus you’ll have a leg up on the competish since you’ll have a tap-able booty to boot. Which makes my final vote a yes. I nominate this odd looking activity as being worth a try. I mean, these dudes have nothing to sell. They’re just sharing for free something they think works.
Plus it’s something to do if you get easily distracted during fat blasting time like me.
Couldn’t hurt.
Unlike burning down your house while firing up your arm muscles.