Muscle imbalance and the nervous system

Muscle imbalance is characterized by developing a musculature that is asymmetrical meaning that some muscles may overdevelop while others under develop in relation to one another. You are still experiencing muscle growth, but you are growing at different speeds. A simple method for dealing with this issue maybe to just alter your training program, using a bulk lifting program for under developed areas and lighter weights and more stretching for those areas that are overdeveloped. Your diet cannot target specific spots. Upping your intake will still lead to muscle growth but that growth will remain proportionate. Lowering your intake to lessen over developed areas will also reduce the size of the under developed areas, also proportionally. In other words, a change in diet will cause all muscles to either grow or shrink proportionate to one another leaving you with muscle imbalance.

Muscle Imbalance and the Nervous System

The issue may be deeper though than can be solved by altering your training program and taking corrective steps. Instead you may want to look at how your nervous system is operating.

You have your central nervous system, which is comprised of the brain and the spinal cord. From this originates the peripheral nervous system, which can be understood as branches leading from the trunk of your spinal cord. The peripheral nervous system controls (and receives feedback from) specific parts of our body; some branches will control our arms while others will look after our legs. These branches feed information to different areas exclusively. Those branches controlling our arms cannot also control our legs; similarly they cannot send feedback from different areas to the brain (via the central nervous system).

The branches of the peripheral nervous system pop out between the vertebrae along the spinal column. Here lies the potential for problems. If the vertebrae are too close and pinch a branch of the peripheral nervous system then communication between the spinal column / brain and the extremities of our body as well as other organs can be cut off. Indeed, if there is damage anywhere along the branch then the feedback loop is broken. The brain cannot send messages, nor can it receive input from areas beyond where the damage has occurred.

At the very top of the spinal column at the junction with the brain is the vertebrae known informally as the Atlas, so-called because it holds everything up. The Atlas floats. It is not locked into place as are the other vertebrae. If there are any problems with the Atlas vertebrae then your entire body can become severely messed up. Your brain is no longer able to communicate effectively with any other part of your body.

Now imagine that your Atlas is positioned in a suboptimal way; that it only allows reduced communication between one muscle group on one side of the body but full communication with the corresponding muscle group on the opposite side of the body. The brain, given the reduced ability to communicate with one muscle, will be impaired in sending messages and receiving feedback. This in turn will lead to irregularities in the growth of that particular muscle. Furthermore the brain is continually trying to achieve symmetry but because it is misreading the information from one muscle group the messages it is sending to other parts of the body (where it is trying to achieve symmetry) will also become skewed as these other muscles are trying to become symmetrical with a muscle that is no longer growing the way it should be (but the brain doesn’t know this owing to the poorly positioned Atlas). The result is warped growth.

So, if corrective strategies to create muscle balance continue to fail then you may want to look into checking if your nervous system is fully functioning. A chiropractor may be all you need here. If the problem of muscle imbalance persists then look at finding an Atlas Orthogonal / NUCCA practitioner.