Pat Your Head and Rub Your Belly

Remember the childhood game of trying to pat your head with one hand while the other hand rubs your belly?  Pat, rub, pat, rub.  It’s hard!  Our brains don’t want our hands doing two different motions at the same time.  Now, add in both feet tapping at different beats.  It’s enough to put your brain into total flubbed mode.  Well, that’s how I feel playing the drums.  I might as well sit there patting my head and rubbing my belly.  It’s so hard!  The good news is, concentrating on patting your head and rubbing your belly is actually a good brain exercise to increase communication between the hemispheres of the brain.  And, guess what!  Drumming works our brains in the same way – accessing both sides at the same time.  So, while I feel like a fool trying to coordinate my hand and foot movements, I’m actually giving my brain a good workout and, perhaps, someday my brain will be strong enough to coordinate the movements into something rhythmically pleasing and y’all can start calling me Ringo.