Jim Houliston started feeling “too old to skate anymore”—and he was only 22 at the time. He’d been skateboarding since he was 12, but only using his dominant side, which he says completely misaligned his body. Not even multiple visits to various chiropractors gave him any relief, so he figured maybe he should start skateboarding in a switch stance, meaning on his left food instead of his right.
“The task felt impossible, but it didn’t hurt my body, so I kept doing it. After four years of skateboarding exclusively switch-stance … I was feeling great again,” he says. “I decided to try returning to my traditional stance, just to see how I would do, and I found that I was immediately able to do new tricks that I could never do before.”
He says the concept is known as manual transfer learning, where a person’s dominant side gains proficiency after focusing exclusively on the less dominant side. That was the moment when he asked himself what would happen if he started doing everything else in this switch/mirror direction? Nearly 15 years later, he’s been practicing what he calls mirror movement development—and still skateboarding.
Houliston, 42, lives in Ocean Beach and is an ambidextrous artist, bilingual tour guide, mirror movement development physical trainer, and the author of “BIG3MMD: History’s Ambidextrous and the Benefits of Mirror Movement Development.” He’ll discuss his book during his “Learn the Brain Growing Practice of Mirror Reading and Writing” workshop at 1 p.m. Wednesday at the Point Loma/Hervey Library. He took some time to talk about his practice of mirror movement development and the benefits he’s researched and experienced as a result.
Q: A few years ago, you wrote “BIG3MMD” and you also created your AmbiLife.org website offering education and programming around developing the dexterity in using both sides of the brain and body (what most of us understand as ambidexterity, or what you call dual dominance). There are articles from the National Library of Medicine that refer to mirror movement as involuntary, simultaneous, identical movements on one side of the body that mirror the voluntary movements from the other side of the body. Can you talk about the difference between mirror movement versus mirror movement development?
A: Mirror movement development (MMD) is the lifestyle practice of working to learn everything from your less-dominant side in mirror direction. Examples include throwing with your other arm, kicking with your other foot, reading in mirror direction, writing in mirror direction with your other hand, typing on a mirrored keyboard with a mirrored computer screen, telling time on a mirrored clock, using lefty can openers, lefty scissors, lefty handshakes, board sports become switch, etc. MMD produces incredible benefits for the brain and body, including spinal realignment, improved balance, increased memory recollection, spatial awareness, creativity, athletic skill, reaction time, caloric burn, and more.
MMD is a term I coined to better describe what traditional “ambidexterity” is missing from a completely mirrored lifestyle practice, in line with our human body design for movement (considering our symmetrical skeleton, symmetrical exterior features, and symmetrical weight distribution of asymmetrical organs). On the other hand, what you refer to as “mirror movement” is a rare neuro-physical disorder where your body sides miscommunicate movement (e.g. you go to use your right hand, but your left hand involuntarily engages instead).
What I love about Ocean Beach…
That I’m not the only 40-plus-year-old still skateboarding around Ocean Beach.
Q: Can you describe what the process was like for you during those early days/weeks/months of developing your own dual dominance beyond skateboarding? Of developing your own ability to purposely mirror your movements (as opposed to the involuntary movements from mirror movement)?
A: After my MMD breakthrough with skateboarding, my activities began very basic. I grew up doing everything right-handed, so I just switched to lefty: opening doors left-handed, turning on the lights left-handed, using spoons and forks left-handed, etc. I started writing left-handed (still in the traditional direction) during graduate school in 2016. By 2019, I began rail walking, which is the most symmetrical activity that exists (rail walking is done on rail trails, multipurpose public paths on the right of way of former railways). Once learning about Leonardo da Vinci in 2020, I adopted lefty mirror writing. Soon after, I started mirror reading, a practice I increased more heavily after learning that Benjamin Franklin mirror read for 30 years. In 2020, I began doing ambidextrous chalk art and I bought my mirrored clock in 2022. Just two months ago, I began typing with a mirrored keyboard on a mirrored computer screen.
Throughout this nearly 20-year process, MMD has always been a challenge, in the same way many adults seek brain and body exercises like sudoku, yoga, memory games and even novel things like drawing with the other hand, kicking with the other foot, or throwing with the other arm. This challenge gets easier over time with practice, thanks to neuroplasticity. The brain-body relationship is profound and MMD breaks new barriers.
Q: What did you begin to notice about the changes that were taking place for you, personally, in your own mind and body?
A: Feeling my memory increasing was very profound. It’s not perfect, but names, dates, alphanumeric patterns, and recollection of general information increases, which leads to being able to learn new things more easily. Think of Da Vinci and Franklin as notable polymaths (someone learned in multiple subjects). By the way, for as smart as Franklin and Da Vinci are considered, it’s important to note that they both lacked formal education, which is the major reason they were able to practice mirror movement development for decades since “traditional education” mostly discourages it.
Personally, in my 30s, I learned Spanish so fluently that I’ve even had some Spanish speakers around the world ask me if I was Mexican. Many of us think you can’t fluently learn a foreign language after a younger age, but it’s possible, and I believe MMD and what it did for my brain has helped me tremendously. It’s absolutely helped me as a tour guide to learn new assignments. I would mirror read facts about a new city and often trick people into thinking I was really from there.
Also, my balance feels incredible. I go longboarding all the time around Ocean Beach. Today, my athletic activities include longboard skateboarding, ambidextrous wallball, tennis, juggling, cycling, yoga, handstand walking, rail walking, backwards walking/running, dancing bachata, and paint pen street art.
Q: How did the book come together? What was your process for laying it out, selecting what was most important to you to communicate to others about MMD?
A: I wanted to share the story of how mirror movement development has benefited me, others, and how any average person can practice it. I was also wanted to include our best understanding behind the science of how it works. This ultimately became “BIG3MMD,” named for three most notable, historic practitioners—Leonardo da Vinci, Benjamin Franklin, and Lord Robert Baden-Powell, the British general, author, ambidextrous artist, and founder of the Boy Scouts. I also wanted the reader to be able to practice MMD while reading it, which is why it’s simultaneously printed back-to-front in mirror direction. My next book will be about today’s famous ambidexters, many of whom include the world’s top athletes.
Q: You’ll also be at the Point Loma/Hervey Library on Wednesday talking about your book and leading a workshop you’ll have a mirrored keyboard with you? What is that, exactly? How did you develop it and how does it work?
A: I had the mirrored keyboard custom made by the company Keybio. It’s just like a normal keyboard, but mirrored; so instead of typing “QWERTY” with the left hand, it becomes “YTREWQ” with the right hand. Ideally, you mirror type while looking at a mirrored computer screen using the MirrorRead.com web browser tool. Try it for five minutes and you’ll feel like you just had your brain put in a microwave.
Q: Can you talk about some other tools and programs, like the web extension for mirror reading, the Symmetry gym, and Theory Cafe?
A: The MirrorRead.com web extension was developed by Shelagh Robinson, a psychologist in Montreal, Canada specializing in visual perception. Inspired by the “looking glass letters” of “Alice in Wonderland” author Lewis Carroll, Robinson created the web browser tool to practice mirror reading and help science understand the benefits of the practice. The Symmetry gym (symmetrybraingym.com/events) is a brain-body gym dedicated to mirror movement development. No physical location exists yet, but workshops and activity sessions happen in the Ocean Beach area. Theory Cafe (theory.cafe) is a coffee shop I’m planning that will be dedicated to mirror movement development. It will be just like a normal coffee shop, except the majority of what’s on the walls will be written in mirror direction. The Young Da Vinci Club is an activity group for kids to learn mirror movement development. Many kids instinctively practice MMD and can pick it up the quickest. In fact, neuroscience shows the brains of young kids are more physically symmetrical before they learn how to read. This symmetry would remain and grow with mirror reading and general MMD.
Q: What’s been challenging about your work with MMD?
A: While MMD has been practiced by individuals and certain groups for centuries, the concept of it as a holistic lifestyle practice today is new to most people. And while it should already be taught by every school and educational institution for optimal brain and body health and peak performance, the opposite has happened. Many teachers and parents still discourage using the left hand and developing our less-dominant side, in general. Most of our culture is built for exclusive use and subsequent development of the right hand, which contributes to brain and body asymmetry. Inspiring others to practice MMD is often difficult, especially the older they get; but convinced that our optimal physical design is for symmetrical movement and subsequent brain-body development, there is no work under the sun more meaningful to me than educating and inspiring people to practice mirror movement development.
Q: What’s been rewarding about this work?
A: On a personal level, last month, my 75-year old roommate, Rosa, told me she’s been secretly practicing MMD for about four months when doing household chores and that her shoulder pain, which had been incessant within previous years, has gone away. Also, Diego Irigoyen, who is the best mirror writer I’ve ever known, recently told me that his traditional reading speed has notably improved since getting into mirror reading within the last year.
Q: What has this work taught you about yourself?
A: How beneficial it is to operate your human body according to its design for symmetrical movement.
Q: What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
A: When I think about the people I ire most, the common thread is that they all work hard. I just keep pursuing my dreams because, as long as I’m alive, promoting MMD will be something I always think about.
Q: What is one thing people would be surprised to find out about you?
A: That some Spanish speakers from other parts of the world have thought that I’m Mexican when they hear me speak Spanish. Also, that I’m as active as I am in the things that I do at my age.
Q: Please describe your ideal San Diego weekend.
A: An overnight trip to Tijuana for hanging out on Avenida Revolucion, La Cacho, and CECUT. Then, a hike in Julian and ending with longboarding at sunset in Mission Beach.
