Introception and Extroception
Please simple observe three times for each of these physiological systems, 6 total. What do you notice? What is the environment? What is your experience?
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Interoception-
ReplyDelete1. Feeling my stomack muscles contract and stabilize my hips when doing a round kick in Muay Tai kickboxing class. The environment I am in has a myriad of external distractions: music, bright lights, people grunting, laughing,and making a whooshing sound when kicking or punching. Without in interoceptive awareness of my abdomen, my kick is weak and show poor form.
2. Walking down railroad on a windy fall day. I notice the lack of give in the pavement putting stress on my knees and ankles. I notice myself limbically regulating my emotional responses to people on the street due to their facial expressions, attention, smell, proximity etc.
3.Laying on my couch alone, and in the dark with my cat on my stomach. At first, my breath is shallow and I notice how loud my refrigerator is, and then I slowly melt into my body, noticing tension in my toes, hips, and neck. I notice that as my cat's body warms my body, I feel heavier and I notice the contours of the couch against my back. I feel a tingling awareness in my limbs the more my breath becomes deep and rhythmic.
Extroception-
1. Shadow boxing in the mirror in my martial arts class. I notice that focusing on the mirror distracts me from my kinesthetic and propioceptive sense. I start to judge myself against others next to me. My balance is more off and I hesitate more.
2. Listening to my friend Niko tell a story. I find myself drawn in by his voice and his hand and eye movements, I get distracted by the sound of him exhaling cigarette smoke, pausing for consolidation. I start to notice him noticing himself in the window and notice him falter in his story, becoming momentarily interoceptive and far off away in his own world. I notice that when I check in with my body that I am in a heightened state of anticipation-heart rate is increasing, I'm sweating, and my muscles feel ready to contract and spring at any moment.
3. Giving a massage-Though a melding of both senses, when I am aware of being exteroceptive, my palpation skills change. Suddenly, I feel and experience the body as a body and not an energy field. My mind is void of thoughts or images and I am not aware of my breath or my posture. All I feel is pure skin, fat, muscle, bone, fascia, blood. Suddenly, I feel like I'm reading an anatomy book and I realize that I'm not paying attention to the life force of the client-the energy, I'm just focusing on the vessel. This realization always jolts me into my body and then immediately following is a stream of energy up my hands and I suddenly take a deep breath and suddenly the music gets louder and I wonder what time it is.
Interoception - Old Town Cafe, Prep Cook:
ReplyDelete-At work, I boil 3 gallons of potatoes at a time. They come to a boil, and I have to quickly carry the 45 lb., searing hot pot, full to the brim with boiling water over questionably non-slippery floor to dump into the collander in the sink. Every time I start this, I feel the strength in my forearms, the contracting of my abs and pelvic floor muscles, my breath quickening as I become more aware of myself in relation to this possibility of extreme danger, and my peripersonal awareness of space heighten as I navigate around boxes on the floor and two compost bins.
- I often amaze myself at how well I navigate through the tight kitchen of the OTC. There is one particular part where two counters are really close together, and I have a particular hip swing that I do between them so I don't run into either corner. Tonight, a food plus recycle bin was sticking out and a janitor walked around the corner. Catching all of this in my peripersonal awareness, I was able to hip-swing, pivot, and swerve while still holding a full measuring cup of oil.
- I love making salad dressings. Everything mixes in a Robot-coupe (which is a fancy food processor), and the last thing that is added to recipes is the oil. In order for the oil to emulsify with the rest of the dressings, I have to add it slowly, pouring through a 2 inch-wide opening of the lid into the mixing concoction below. The act of pouring oil is slow, and something that just can't be rushed. I often take this moment to notice if I'm hunching my shoulders, tune into how much my feet hurt, if I'm still breathing deeply, if I have to go to the bathroom, and whether my posture is aligned. Checking in with myself in moments of slow pouring help keep me embodied while cooking.
-I can often know, kinesthetically, if there is enough milk in the opaque milk container for the gravy recipe. If I look, I'm usually off. But if I just feel the gravity of the container I'm often spot on. Tonight I thought to myself "This is almost enough, but I'll need another 1/4 cup after this," and I was totally right!
Exteroception- OTC, continued:
-Choosing the right kind of music is important when cooking. The timing of what kind of music plays during when is important. When I first get into work, I like listening to something light but with a steady beat. I hear the music and, being a dancer and intuitively responding to the sounds, my body gets into the fast paced stoccato of kitchen work. The middle of the shift is often when I make salads, and that job is often time-consuming. This is when I start getting grumpy. So listening to folk music at this point keeps my spirits up. I like rock or punk at the end of the night-- sound with a driving beat to boost my energy and bring me through the home stretch with enough energy.
-This afternoon, the sun suddenly came out from behind the clouds. The light streamed through the windows, and landed on my cutting board. In one moment, I noticed the texture of the parsley more. With that noticing, I was aware of the crunching sound of the leaves below the knife, the clear smell, the rich green, and the change of resistance under the knife when I minced leaves versus stem.
- I have gotten to the point where I know the timing of the dishwasher completely by its sound. I can judge how much time before the load is done, and I often hurry the pace of my scrubbing in order to finish filling the next tray of dirty dishes so I can exchange tray for tray without losing time.