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A baby learns to balance through practice and repetition, as impulses sent from the sensory receptors to the brain stem and then out to the muscles form a new pathway. With repetition, it becomes easier for these impulses to travel along that nerve pathway—a process called facilitation—and the baby is able to maintain balance during any activity.

 

Strong evidence exists suggesting that such synaptic reorganization occurs throughout a person’s lifetime of adjusting to changing motion environs.

 

We can improve this facilitation no matter our age.

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This pathway facilitation is the reason dancers and athletes practice so arduously. Even very complex movements become nearly automatic over a period of time.

 

This also means that if a problem with one sensory information input were to develop, the process of facilitation can help the balance system reset and adapt to achieve a sense of balance again.

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                                                           This is why it is so important to practice!