Understanding Sensory Motor Amnesia

Why You Can't "Just Relax" Those Tight Muscles

Have you ever been told to "just relax" when dealing with muscle tension or pain? If you've found this advice frustratingly impossible to follow, you're not alone—and there's a neurological reason why simply deciding to relax doesn't work.

This phenomenon has a name: Sensory Motor Amnesia (SMA). Today, I want to explore what SMA is, how it develops, and most importantly, how somatic movement can help you overcome it.

What Is Sensory Motor Amnesia?

Sensory Motor Amnesia is a condition where your brain loses conscious control over certain muscles, keeping them involuntarily contracted. Despite the word "amnesia," it's not about forgetting memories—it's about your nervous system forgetting how to sense and control your muscles.

Think of it this way: your muscles have only two functions—they contract and they release. When functioning optimally, this happens voluntarily, allowing you to move freely and then relax. But with SMA, certain muscles stay contracted all the time, regardless of whether you need them to be engaged.

The most frustrating part? You can't voluntarily release these chronically tight muscles simply by trying to relax them. That command pathway from brain to muscle has become dormant through lack of use. It's as if those muscles are no longer fully accessible through your conscious control.

How Sensory Motor Amnesia Develops

SMA isn't something you're born with—it develops gradually throughout life in response to:

1. Stress Responses

When we experience stress, whether physical or emotional, our muscles contract in predictable patterns. These are often referred to as the Red Light (withdrawal) reflex and Green Light (action) reflex. If stress becomes chronic, these muscular responses can become habitual and unconscious.

2. Physical Trauma

Injuries, surgeries, and accidents cause our bodies to protectively contract around the injured area. Even after healing, these protective contractions often persist.

3. Repetitive Movements

Daily activities like working at a computer, driving, or even hobbies that involve repetitive motions gradually train our muscles to stay contracted.

4. Sedentary LifestyleLack of varied movement means we use only a small percentage of our muscular capability, allowing the rest to fade from our sensory awareness.

The brain is remarkably efficient—when it notices you're holding a certain posture or performing certain movements repeatedly, it begins to automate them. This "muscle memory" is helpful for developing skills, but problematic when what's being automated is chronic tension or limited movement patterns.

How Sensory Motor Amnesia Affects Your Body

The effects of SMA extend far beyond simple muscle tightness:

• Chronic Pain: Muscles that stay contracted build up metabolic waste and restrict blood flow, leading to pain

• Restricted Movement: Limited range of motion and stiffness

• Postural Distortions: Pulled into patterns like rounded shoulders, forward head, arched back, or rotational imbalances

• Increased Risk of Injury: Tight, imbalanced muscles put stress on joints and other structures

• Decreased Sensory Awareness: Reduced ability to feel what's happening in your body

• Fatigue: Constantly contracted muscles require energy, leading to unnecessary exhaustion

Most importantly, SMA creates a self-perpetuating cycle. The less you sense and control certain muscles, the more the condition progresses, further diminishing your sensory awareness and voluntary control.

The Three Reflexive Patterns

Thomas Hanna, who coined the term Sensory Motor Amnesia, identified three primary reflex patterns that become habituated in our bodies:

The Red Light Reflex (Withdrawal Response)

This pattern contracts the muscles at the front of the body in response to stress, fear, or anxiety. It pulls the head forward, rounds the shoulders, tightens the chest and abdomen, and can contribute to shallow breathing, neck pain, and a sense of being "closed off" to the world.

The Green Light Reflex (Action Response)

The opposite of the Red Light pattern, this reflex engages the back muscles to prepare for action. When habituated, it creates an arched lower back, tight back muscles, and can contribute to back pain, sciatica, and a constant sense of being "on alert."

The Trauma Reflex

This pattern involves rotation or side-bending in response to injury or habitually uneven use of the body. It can manifest as a hiked hip, rotated pelvis, uneven shoulders, or scoliosis. It often develops from specific injuries or from regularly carrying weight on one side of the body.

Most of us develop some combination of these patterns, creating our unique posture and movement signature.

Why Traditional Approaches Often Fall Short

When faced with tight muscles and pain, most conventional approaches target the symptoms rather than the underlying cause:

• Stretching attempts to lengthen tight muscles, but doesn't address the neurological pattern keeping them contracted

• Massage provides temporary relief but doesn't retrain the brain's control of the muscles

• Pain medication masks symptoms without addressing their source

• Even surgery often fails because it doesn't change the habituated muscle patterns that may have contributed to the structural issue

The missing piece in these approaches is addressing the brain's role in maintaining muscle tension.

How Somatic Movement Releases SMA

Somatic movement works directly with the nervous system to restore conscious control over habitually contracted muscles. The primary technique used is called pandiculation—a specific type of movement that helps the brain reestablish the neural pathways to both contract and release muscles.

Unlike stretching, which works on muscles from the outside, pandiculation engages the brain's control over the muscles from the inside. It follows a three-step process:

1. Voluntary contraction: Gently tightening the already-tight muscles

2. Slow, conscious release: Gradually letting go while maintaining awareness

3. Complete rest: Allowing the nervous system to integrate the new information

Through this process, you're essentially reminding your brain how to sense and control muscles it has forgotten about. You're creating new sensory motor pathways and breaking the cycle of involuntary contraction.

What makes somatic movement so effective is that it addresses the root cause of muscle tension at the level of the nervous system, where the pattern is maintained. Rather than forcing a temporary change, it creates lasting improvement by retraining the brain.

My Experience with Releasing Sensory Motor Amnesia

In my own journey, discovering the concept of SMA was illuminating. For years, I couldn't understand why certain muscles stayed tight despite stretching, massage, and conscious attempts to relax. Learning that my brain had literally forgotten how to release these muscles was both validating and empowering.

Through regular somatic movement practice, I've experienced firsthand how pandiculation can restore sensory awareness and voluntary control over chronically tight areas. The practice has been particularly effective in releasing the Red Light and Trauma reflexes that had become deeply habituated in my body.

The process isn't always linear, and it requires patience and consistency. But unlike other approaches I've tried, the changes from somatic movement tend to be lasting because they're created through learning rather than manipulation.

Beginning Your Journey to Sensory Awareness

If you're curious about addressing your own Sensory Motor Amnesia, here are some starting points:

1. Develop body awareness: Begin by simply noticing areas of tension in your body without trying to change them

2. Move slowly and mindfully: Quick movements bypass the sensory feedback needed to retrain your brain

3. Focus on sensation: What you feel is more important than how far you move

4. Be consistent: Short, regular practice is more effective than occasional longer sessions

5. Be patient: Remember that you're retraining neurological patterns that may have developed over decades

Somatic movement isn't about achieving perfect posture or forcing your body into an ideal form. Instead, it's about restoring your brain's ability to sense and control your muscles, allowing your body to find its natural balance and ease.

When we release the grip of Sensory Motor Amnesia, we don't just experience less pain and greater mobility—we reconnect with our internal sensing, allowing us to live more fully embodied lives.

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Interested in exploring how somatic movement can help you address Sensory Motor Amnesia? Contact me to learn about upcoming classes or schedule a private session.