Welcome back to Fit Body Happy Joints. My name is Shannon. Today we are continuing our conversation about the nervous system.

We're talking about the somatic nervous system today.

Last week we talked about the autonomic nervous system, the fight or flight and rest

digest side of your nervous system, but there's so much more to your nervous system than just

fight or flight and rest and digest. The somatic nervous system is what we're going to focus on today because

improving sensation can improve activation. Improving sensation can improve

muscle activation.

Many people can't effectively engage their muscles,

which can limit strength and cause joint aches and pains after exercise.

If you're not an Evelyn member or if you don't have great

programming this could be because of the workout program that you're following.

Many workout programs choose exercises that overuse muscles which can cause

inflammation which can block muscle activation. Many people are also not

choosing exercises that mechanically load a muscle effectively so they're like

this is supposed to target this muscle but I don't feel it here and that's because the resistance isn't mechanically

loading the muscle that you're trying to target for example a woodchop exercise where you're kneeling or you're standing

and you're kind of swinging a weight in a diagonal motion kind of around your body.

A lot of times this wood chop exercise is programmed to target abs and obliques. But a woodchop is actually

loading the shoulders, not the trunk. The trunk is actually neutral and acts as a stabilizer

as the arms move around the body. The weight that you're holding and lifting is

loading the deltoids or the shoulders, not the trunk. So it really isn't a great

trunk exercise. It would kind of be like calling a bicep curl a good back exercise.

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