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Muscle Memory

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It's no secret that the mind is connected to every part of our body. How else would we use our hand to operate a mouse and even click on this post to begin with? We tell our body what to do, and it does it (hopefully). Magic!

However it's not totally clear how it all works. Scientists like to think they have everything figured out when they really have very little knowledge on these matters. Such is the burden of comparing what an 'expert' knows compared to the layman. An expert knows so much more than the layman and it gives them a false sense of security.

Muscle memory is patterned subconscious behavior that is learned from conscious behavior, which is actually super interesting when you think about it (is that a pun?). There are many things in life which we never have to think about, and this ends up being quite convenient. Imagine what a nightmare it would be if you constantly had to think about your heart beating, or breathing air, in order to survive. Or digesting food. Or healing a wound. All these things happen automatically without us having to think about them. #Blessed.

Personally I believe it is possible to use our upper level brain function to tap into the subconscious and manipulate it, but honestly that seems like a lot of risk for very little gain. Certainly it works the way it works for a reason. What happens if we stop our heart on accident or give ourselves an autoimmune disorder? That's some real, "If you die in the Matrix you die in real life," type shit. No thanks! If it aint broke don't fix it!

However these are all examples of subconscious behaviors that are engrained into our very DNA. They are not examples of muscle memory, which is completely different. Muscle memory is something that didn't used to be subconscious but now is, which again is super interesting that such a thing is even possible. The autopilot is real. Too bad I can't write these posts automatically amirite? Actually some people can... as there are a couple pretty good writers here that draw from stream of consciousness which ends up having a very distinct style. Looking at you @tarazkp and even more egregiously @nonameslefttouse.

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Should have been the intro.

So the other day I went to pick up groceries from the store and subconsciously as we pulled up to the pickup area I saw our bags being loaded into another car. My subsonscious mind was screaming at me, but I wasn't listening. I was just kinda like, hm... that's weird.

The car "stealing" our bags was odd, which is what I chalked the weirdness up to. It looked like a hoarder's car packed full of all kinds of weird stuff. Right after that car left my girlfriend got a text message saying, "Thanks for shopping at Aldi!" It was at that exact moment that I had realized that I saw the 4 digit code on the bags as they were being loaded into the other car. Something like 'SMG', which are basically the initials of the person paying for the order. My brain memorizes weird shit like that.

So I go inside and lo and behold yep they had just given our order to that other car. That person's order (call her Sherell) was still at the Aldi. The employee that made the mistake was very flabbergasted and seemingly embarrassed over the situation. Good thing I'm not Karen.

The weirdness continued.

She called Sherell on the phone... well actually she called my girlfriend on the phone first thinking it was Sherell (the system was glitchy after a big upgrade to the mobile app). Then she called Sherell... and Sherell was at Weis market doing more grocery shopping, which is like WTF. Sherell said she'd come back to give us our groceries.

When I went back to the parking lot to tell my GF what had happened she was quick to bring up that it's shocking that the ALDI employee would even think it was acceptable to allow groceries from another car to be put into our car... and I was kind of like oh yeah huh. At least in California something like that would be an absolute legal nightmare. You can return a refrigerated item from the store and get your money back, but THEY can't resell that item, it goes directly into the garbage for legal reasons (basically food poisoning).

So we waited for like 20 minutes, my girlfriend had already gotten a refund from the app... and we left. She was already having a bad day and normally wouldn't even be there. Picked her up from work to head out early. Long story long she created another order later in the day, and that's where the subconscious memory kicked in again.

Normally when I do these runs I pickup an order from Target and then head over the Aldi. This time we had already gotten our Target order and just needed Aldi (which is much closer). But of course as I performed the routine one more time I just mindlessly drove to Target without even thinking about it. Probably doubled the length of the trip or more. The second I got there I was like WTF am I doing here, lol. Oops.

Muscle memory gone wrong.

Also when I switch to a new video game sometimes I'll push hotkeys from the previous video game I was playing it. Completely instinctively. My hand has a mind of its own. Even typing these words to the screen is largely instinctive. I don't wonder where the 'w' key is or even the '7' key. I have them all memorized and what I want just seems to magic itself onto the internets without me having to think about it. Of course there was obviously a time when typing was quite hard and I did have to think about it. No longer. Muscle memory has that handled.


The same goes for any sport.

If you know how to play tennis many of the movements (especially serving) are engrained into the patterned behavior required to play the game. Muscle memory seems to diminish over time. It's very much a "use it or lose it" scenario. However, if you do "lose it" picking it back up later and relearning seems to be much much easier than the first time around.

People go so far as to say that even working out at the gym employs this same type of memory. To the point that your muscles themselves get bigger faster if they were bigger at one point and the result isn't being pushed toward for the first time ever. "Like riding a bike," comes to mind, but perhaps such innuendo is not universal to the topic of muscle memory.

Conclusion

The subconscious is a powerful tool that operates in the background without us having to think about it. Once a behavior is engrained and memorized, it stops requiring as much upper-level brain function to accomplish, allowing us to divert those resources elsewhere. Commonly this is a known thing in physical sports, but it also applies to many other facets like typing on a keyboard or even driving a car. Patterned behavior is patterned.

There are drawbacks to this kind of memory. Sometimes we are programmed to perform a certain action that isn't appropriate in the current scenario. If a kid swears a bunch in front of their friends there's a much higher chance of them doing it in front of authority figures where they've been taught to behave more politely. There certainly are diminishing returns when it comes to subconscious memory, but the benefits clearly outweigh the drawbacks. It's such a good tool that we use it every day without even thinking about it, although I concede that this is exactly the entire point.


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Muscle Memory was published on and last updated on 20 Jul 2023.