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2torial #0418:
Learn2 Juggle
(Three Balls)
Yes, it's more than a metaphor!
Juggling has delighted people for centuries, and
in recent years it's also served as a handy synonym
for "doing more than one thing at the same time."
This is a little ironic, because juggling doesn't
involve multi-tasking skills--it's really just
doing a single thing repeatedly, albeit with enough
speed to create the illusion of confusing
complexity. That single thing is the simple act of
throwing a ball in such a way as to leave your hand
open to catch another. If you can do that, you can
juggle...with a little patience.
We're talking the basic three-item juggle here:
four items requires a lot more practice, and five
demands the speed and skill that comes from real
dedication. But if you want to enchant children and
gain a reputation as a paragon of dexterity, this
2torial will show you how to become an
honest-to-goodness juggler.
Warning: when learning to juggle, you
will look silly. Don't let this discourage you.
Just like the beginning horn player makes not music
but funny rude noises, the beginning juggler looks
like the comic antithesis of a juggler. When you
get the hang of it you'll probably never forget
how, but until then it's probably a good idea to do
your practicing alone, in a derision-free zone.
You can learn to juggle in any room with a
minimum of breakable objects, but we recommend
making use of a table as well, preferably of a
height between your kneecaps and your waist (your
kitchen table will probably do fine).
Clear away the chairs and stand so you're
brushing against it, facing forward. Using a table
has two advantages: it means you don't have to
stoop as far to pick up dropped balls, and you'll
learn good habits by confining your juggling to a
more-or-less fixed area.
 Make practice juggling "balls"
When learning to juggle, the last thing you want
to toss around is anything spherical and bouncy:
you'll spend more time hunting for it (and picking
it up off the ground) than actually learning. For
that reason, your juggling "balls" shouldn't
actually be balls of any variety. You want
something that'll stay in one place when it gets
dropped--beanbags are ideal, but not everyone has
three beanbags of equal size hanging around the
house.
You can easily create a good starter set by
raiding your spare change jar. Lay out three
old socks on a table, then place a
mound of change into each of them--about enough
change to fill your cupped hand. Try to get the
mounds as even as possible. Then knot them
as shown in the illustration.
These balls (we're still going to call them
that) may not look like much, but they'll do the
job. Try to make the knots good and tight, and
retighten them when they start to loosen: you don't
want a shower of change ending your practice
session. If loose knots become a problem, you can
get them even tighter by wetting the socks
beforehand.
As your practice develops, you'll get a sense of
how the balls "fit" in your hand: they should land
in your palms solidly (not bouncing out), and not
require a lot of effort to toss. If you find
yourself throwing rather than tossing them--or if
they just flop about in the air rather than tracing
a neat arc--try adding some more coins.
 Just toss a ball around
Now that you've made three juggling balls, the
next step is to lay two of them aside and
concentrate on playing with just one. That's right,
playing. Pick it up and do what you did thousands
of times when you were a kid: toss it up in the
air, then catch it (with the same hand) as it comes
down. Do it with your palm up and only lightly
cupped, and only toss it hard enough to send it
only a few inches higher than your head. While you
keep this up, pause from time to time to read each
of the following observations. Perform the
exercises prescribed in them...but by all means,
keep tossing! You should spend at least half an
hour on this step alone.
Observation 1: The role of rhythm
No big whoop, eh? Keep doing it for several
minutes. See how there's a rhythm to it? Try
standarizing the height of the toss, making each
one send the ball at more or less the same height
and location. With a little practice it should be
easy to make the ball go up and down monotonously.
But notice that monotony--see how the rhythm has
become stronger?
Eventually, that rhythm will help you tell where
balls are in the air, just as surely as your eyes
will. That's because the rhythm corresponds to the
amount of time each ball in in flight: toss a ball
higher or lower and you'll get a different rhythm.
Observation 2: Relying on peripheral
vision
Keep tossing. But now, instead of concentrating
on the ball, try paying attention to your hand (the
one that's doing the tossing). Eventually you'll
observe something important: the fact that you can
look at your hand and still keep track of the
ball's progress.
This might take a while, but it'll come. It's
peripheral vision at work; and an ability you'll
soon strengthen.
People often wonder which ball a juggler looks
at when juggling. The answer? None. He or she is
usually not tracking the motion of any particular
ball, just trusting to peripheral vision to get a
working sense of them all at once.
Observation 3: The tossing position IS the
catching position
This is one of those Zen-like observations that
can make a huge difference in understanding what
juggling is all about. Look at what happens to your
hand in terms of its physical position: not much,
right? You cup your hand to toss and it stays
cupped for the catch. The position for both is
essentially the same.
Why is this important to grasp? Because as soon
as you start juggling, you'll find one ball coming
in for a landing just as you've given another its
flight. You won't panic and get boggled if you know
your hands are already in the optimal position to
do both. You'll simply toss one ball to clear your
palm for the incoming one, and next thing you know
you'll be juggling.
Observation 4: The abundance of free time
Now that you're looking at your hand, notice
how little time it's actually occupied with the
ball. It's really got lots of leisure
opportunities, doesn't it, so long as it's there to
catch the ball when it returns. Heck, at least half
the time your hand is actually empty!
Much of juggling is simply taking advantage of
that time. Here's an experiment: keep tossing, but
this time try snapping your fingers while the hand
is otherwise unoccupied. Don't try to turn tossing
and snapping into a single hurried motion--you'll
find there's plenty of time to do both. You should
be able to toss, snap, then reopen your palm and
let the ball fall back in. If you can do this,
congratulations: you've just mastered a skill that,
in motor coordination terms, is every bit as
difficult as juggling itself.
Observation 5: The moment of apogee
Notice how the ball reaches its highest point,
then stays suspended for a fraction of a second
before it heads back down? That moment--the split
second before gravity takes over--is the
apogee, and it's the juggler's friend. When
you graduate to multiple balls, you'll use it as
your timer. When one ball reaches its apogee, it's
time to throw the next. Three-ball jugglers never,
ever have to do anything at any other time.
Next exercise: when you toss the ball, try to
visually pinpoint the moment of apogee. Now try
saying the word "beep" every time your ball hits
apogee (aren't you glad you're doing this in
private?). After several dozen "beeps," you can
graduate to the next step. Instead of vocalizing,
try snapping your fingers on your other hand (the
one not tossing) at that moment.
Now you've got a handle on timing. Quite soon
now, you'll be substituting that action (the
fingersnap) for the action of tossing a second
ball. Do you see why one ball's apogee is another's
ideal launching moment? Because it doesn't disturb
the rhythm.
Observation 6: Tossing doesn't require much
movement
To send that ball repeatedly up over your head,
how much motion does it really take on your part?
All you really need to do is push your hand up
smartly and keep your palms open. Try keeping
extraneous movement to a minimum. In the beginning
you'll be lunging all over catching stray tosses,
but as your tossing gets consistent you'll find you
need to move only the area from your elbows to your
hands. Let momentum and gravity do most of the
work.
 Arc
your tosses
We've got a little more single-ball work to do
before the fancy stuff. This warrants a step of its
own because you'll be mastering a new skill:
tossing a ball back and forth from one hand to the
other. Sure, you can probably do that right now,
but you'll need to streamline your technique for
juggling.
Take the ball and toss it up in the air, as in
the previous step. Only this time angle your hand
slightly--just enough to send it sailing not in a
straight up-and-down path, but in a gentle arc to
your other hand. While practicing this, keep these
thoughts in mind:
- The key word is "toss." You're NOT
throwing the ball at your other hand, you're
letting its arc spread so that its launching and
landing are two different points. Toss it no
harder or softer than you did in Step 2 and keep
your hand and arm motions as vertical as before.
You'll find just the slightest angling of the
hands is all it takes for ball's path to stretch
out so that it travels to the territory of your
other hand. We repeat: don't throw, just toss up
with a slight angle.
- Trust in the apogee. Focus your
attention on the ball when it hits the point of
apogee: that's how you'll know exactly where the
ball is going to land. It's like this: the arc
of a ball is a perfect curve, and the path taken
to get to apogee is ALWAYS mirrored, in exact
reverse order, by the remainder of the arc. What
comes down equals what goes up.
That means the behavior of the ball in
reaching its apogee is a preview of what's going
to happen next. If a ball hits apogee at a sharp
angle two feet away from the throwing hand, that
means it'll come down at an equally sharp angle
four feet from the point of origin. Catching it
is simply a matter of positioning your hand.
You'll note that the gentler the arc, the
less pronounced the apogee--because it doesn't
have to reverse direction, the ball doesn't seem
to stop in midair at any point. But you'll still
know it instinctively: it's when the ball's
flight stops being upward and starts being
downward.
- Use your peripheral vision. This
simple fact of physics--the first part of the
arc is the exact opposite of the last part--is
at the heart of many of the impressive aspects
of juggling. It's why jugglers seem to snatch
balls out of midair, without even looking. They
don't need to see where it's going, because they
know where it's been.
It's easier than it seems. Try this
experiment: cast your eyes upwards, in the
general area where most of the apogees seem to
occur. Pick a spot on the ceiling and keep your
eyes there. Try not to move your head, just
trusting to peripheral vision and your sense of
apogee.
Now toss and catch your ball, without looking
at either hand. You probably won't get it at
first, but with a little practice you'll find
you can watch the ball sail through your field
of vision and adjust your catching hand
accordingly. Just fight the temptation to track
the ball through its complete arc, and trust in
your hand's innate sense of position. After all,
isn't this just a variation on what baseball
outfielders do? They get a sense of the ball's
arc, then place their mitts underneath while
still looking skyward.
- Practice in both directions. You've
probably been favoring one hand throughout your
practice, and why not? You've only needed one up
'til now. But juggling is a bi-directional
activity, and you'll be tossing and catching
equally with both hands. It doesn't matter which
hand you use to start your toss/catch routine,
but now's the time to even out the flow. Keep
the one bag shuttling back and forth as much as
possible. To get comfortable with this motion
(and to strengthen your peripheral vision), just
look casually around the room while you're doing
it..
Once you get the hang of this, it's time to move
on to some actual juggling!
 Do
the "jug"
Ready to start juggling? You're going to
master the basic mechanism in this step, even
though you're still a few steps from tackling all
three balls. Let's move up to two for now.
What's "the basic mechanism"? It's what we noted
in the introduction as "the simple act of throwing
a ball in such a way as to leave your hand open to
catch another." Our term for this action is the
jug.
First, warm up by doing your arc-toss again of a
single ball from one hand to another. By now
you should have both throwing and catching pretty
well down: the tosses are all pretty consistent,
and you don't have to move much to catch them--and
when you do move, you're moving your arms and not
your whole body.
Now, do the same thing...only this time, hold a
ball in each hand. Hand One tosses a ball to
Hand Two--but oops, Hand Two is already occupied
with a ball. What does it do?
It gets rid of its current ball...by throwing it
in an arc that just happens to take it in the
vicinity of Hand One. That's a jug.
At about this point, it's natural for panic to
set in: When do I throw it? How do I keep the balls
from hitting? Relax.
You throw it when the first ball is at its
apogee--remember that second exercise you did with
snapping fingers?
Your balls won't collide, because you can judge
the arc of Ball One precisely. You simply toss Ball
Two in a slightly different arc, one that takes it
on a path to the inside of the other. You'll find
that only an incredibly slight inward tilt of the
wrist is all it takes to alter the arc.
In the beginning, don't even try to catch the
second ball. Just focus on how the second hand
clears itself by tossing what it currently holds.
 Do
the "double jug"
Okay, now we're getting to the point where
illustrations make the point more clearly than
words. The next step is to simply repeat the "jug"
in alternate directions, as in the image below.
With a little practice, you should be able to catch
the balls every time.
As you practice, keep in mind that the hard part
is past you now. Once you get the hang of throwing
and clearing with the same hand, you've perfected
the mechanism of juggling.
 Start juggling!
Got the "double jug" down? Good. You are now on
the threshold of becoming a full-fledged juggler.
It's time to introduce the third and final ball.
Real juggling is no more complicated than the
double jug, except that for the starting toss
you've got to hold two balls in one hand. That
shouldn't be too hard: try holding them side by
side (as in the illustration), and keep a grasp
only on the one you want to stay.
Which hand should you launch from? In general,
it's probably easiest to go start from your
"handed" hand--i.e., if you're right-handed, start
with your right hand, etc.
Eventually you should be able to start from any
direction, but it's sort of a moot point: once the
initial ball has been tossed, the pattern is
exactly the same: ball gets tossed. At its apogee,
next ball gets tossed. At ITS apogee, next
ball...and so on and so forth.
At first, it'll take some perseverance to keep
the juggling going beyond a few seconds. That's
usually because chaos intrudes into your
carefully-established order: one ball wanders a
little too far, and in moving your hand to catch if
you throw off the arc of the next, and so forth
until you find yourself wildly grabbing at thin
air.
Relax. This is a necessary phase, and not a sign
that you weren't cut out for this sort of caper.
Work on the regularity of your tosses and catches,
and when things start going wild, don't break your
rhythm and range of motion to accomodate them. Just
let the ball fall short or long, pick it up and
start again. You're in charge here, and the goal
isn't to keep the balls in the air at all costs,
but to find your own pace.
Hooray! Even if you can only keep 'em up for a
few seconds, you're now an official juggler. What
you've been working on is the primary juggling
pattern, often called the "basic cascade." Once
you're thoroughly comfortable with it, you might
want to try these variations on the three-ball
theme: try tossing all of them in big overhand
loops, or reversing direction suddenly. You can
also do a double jug in a single hand, sending two
balls up and down in that hand while you do
mischief with the other (this is how the old
eating-a-juggled-apple trick is done).
-end-
Learn More!
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