Man can change his pupil size on command

try peeing your pants - just a little and where there won't be serious repercussions. it kind of illuminates the line between the conditioned and the physical - y'know

The difference between impossible and merely rare is important: if something is merely rare, sometimes it can be trained and stop being rare.

Individual variability doesn't make people fly. It's reasonable to think there are things no one can do.

I never thought my my ability to move my ears as "impressive", thanks!

FWIW the muscle that surrounds the ear from behind is under direct control for me, like any other muscle. I can move the ears independently of one another.

But i sure can't raise the quizzical eyebrow over my right eye, despite being able to with my left. Funny how your nervous system can have something so dialed on one side but ghosts the other.

I'm surprised that that group apparently also includes me. I had an awful experience during my LASIK procedure. What should've taken a few minutes ended up taking like 40+. It was almost an hour of the doctor and nurses constantly repeating "please keep still", yet from the very start to the very end I was literally making myself as still as possible and from my perspective wasn't moving any part of my body in the slightest.

It felt like some Kafkaesque nightmare, being repeatedly told to do something I was certain I was doing the whole time. And also, since it was taking so long, they had to keep restarting the whole thing over and over, including jetting my eye with freezing cold water again and again, which wasn't a pleasant sensation even with the local anesthetic. It was so confusing to me because I just... was not moving and they kept telling me to stop moving. I was neither voluntarily moving myself nor did I feel like any part of me was moving.

After it was over, they said my heart was beating so fast/forcefully that I was involuntarily moving around, or my eyes were moving around, or something. (It was years ago and I forget the exact explanation.) I know in theory one has some indirect voluntary control over their heart rate, such as with breathing patterns, but 1) during the entire procedure, they never told me that; they just kept saying "stop moving", and 2) even if they did tell me it probably wouldn't have helped much. I think the only thing that helped was my breathing eventually naturally slowed and my body started relaxing.

I had no conscious anxiety or worries going into the procedure, but I guess some part of my "lizard brain" just automatically took over once I was on the table. And probably related to this, I also have a dire case of "white coat syndrome", where the first blood pressure reading I receive at any doctor's office is often unbelievably "go-to-the-hospital-now" high, and then a few minutes later they test it again and it's normal. Again, I have literally no conscious fear of or concerns about doctors, procedures, blood pressure readings, needles, etc., but somehow my autonomic nervous system begs to differ.

So, I would guess some of the patients you work with may genuinely be just as surprised as you are when you tell them they're moving.

I've only recently started taking control of my breath (despite my parents suggesting I learn it in childhood). It is hard to imagine the impact when you're not doing it.

When you start consider that you're going to try for a minute, then three, then five. It is truly insane the amount of change you'll experience.