Technique, Instinct, and Automatisms

Conscious movement or instinctive movement? Are these concepts in contrast with each other, or are they complementary? What is instinct? From a scientific point of view, it can be defined as an innate impulse, not determined by will or learning, such as survival or reproduction. Instinct is species-specific, has a fixed action pattern, and occurs in ignorance of the purpose. In a broader sense, it is used to indicate a propensity to act in an unreasoned way, driven more by an impulsive urge than by a rational motivation, but in this sense, instinct refers to personal history and each of our experiences, thus to the behaviors we have learned. Saying that climbing is an instinctive act has no meaning. It would be like saying that skiing is instinctive. In reality, those who have learned the technique will tend to make the right movements derived from “voluntary automatisms”, while the self-taught will tend to make more or less random “instinctive” movements, which thus derive from “involuntary automatisms”. Voluntary automatisms – positive – are those that come from a conscious choice: I study the technique and the right movements, or better yet, first I need to know and understand what the best techniques and right movements are (this was the first objective of the Method’s research), then I repeat them with training to the point where I try to move in the best way without thinking about it. It’s a bit like when we have to brake in a car: at first, I have to learn a new movement, when I have assimilated it, I no longer think about it and brake instantly. But what would happen if I hadn’t learned the best gesture or worse if I had learned the wrong gesture? And let’s not forget that climbing is much more complex than braking in a car… Involuntary automatisms – negative – are those that do not derive from voluntary learning and free choice: for example, I start climbing, I don’t trust my feet, I don’t learn the technique, I start “feeling” with my feet… as a result, I will continue to feel with my feet forever unless at some point I decide to undertake the difficult path of correcting mistakes and, even before that, becoming aware of them by learning to distinguish the correct movement from the wrong one. Every involuntary automatism is a limit to our freedom. Knowledge and awareness are the true ways to move most freely. And Technique constitutes a precise possibility, an indispensable tool for combining body movement with awareness. “Mens sana in corpore sano,” as the ancients said: a complete sports discipline does not separate the body from the mind; on the contrary, it surpasses the limits of dualism to seek a harmonious improvement of the being in its entirety.