One-legged exercise

September is medical check-up time for us and this year, my doctor surprised me. He usually asks me to stand on one foot, each of them, to see if I’m still somewhat stable. 

For the first time this year I wobbled a bit, which is a tell tale sign that I’m aging, in spite of my quasi-denial that it might be happening to me! 

Standing and staying upright might seem like a simple act for us, older guys to pull off, but it actually takes teamwork from three major systems: our vision, our inner ear, and our internal sense of limb position and movement, called proprioception. 

Take one away from the equation (say, by closing your eyes, or standing on an unstable surface), and balancing becomes much more challenging. This said, testing ourselves might be the best way to improve our balance, as we see and feel it when we do the following exercises. 

Working on our balance throughout life seems to me like a good idea by our senior years, when balance gets rockier, we’ll just need to maintain what we already have instead of starting from scratch. We can test it by doing this simple series of exercises, 

—Test 1: Stand still with your feet lined up heel to toe. 

—Test 2: Stand on one foot, raising the other so it hovers a few inches off the floor. 

—Test 3: Hold the position in test 2, then close your eyes. 

For each challenge, how easy was it for you to stay upright for at least 10 seconds? 

—Simple: We didn’t sway or touch your foot to the floor: great balance 

—Fairly easy: We may have wobbled slightly: normal balance 

—A bit trickier: We needed occasional support (like a countertop): mediocre balance 

—Difficult: We couldn’t maintain the pose, even with support: poor balance 

If you happen to be dissatisfied with your result, follow my doctor advice: From now on brush your teeth while sanding on only one leg and alternating during the two minutes it takes!