Keep The Main Thing, The Main Thing
If you’ve ever read Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey, you are probably super familiar with this phrase. It's one that gets passed around a lot in the athletic and professional sports world amongst athletes in regards to staying focused on the end goal. For me, this phrase is a pillar and cornerstone when it comes to not getting overwhelmed from life piling up and thinking small. Staying focused on the big picture and understanding how it fits the vision of what we want to achieve.
This concept of thinking bigger comes up a lot in conversations with patients. Of not getting lots in the weeds, perseverating thoughts of pain and limitation, and short sighted decision making. Let's be honest, PAIN SUCKS. Pain causes us to make sometimes dumb and desperate decisions. I get it! No one wants to be in pain!
What happens if we stay small, decisions can’t compound, or we plateau with our progress. We start to become frustrated and emotionally spiral. This is a hard place to live.
I evaluated a new patient 6 weeks ago and to say the least, she’s been through the wringer for the last few years. 6 orthopedic surgeries, atrophied muscles, and pain being a limiting factor. However, while pain was present, her biggest area of frustration was the fact she wasn’t performing at the high level she wanted or expected. This is a triathlete who exercises regularly. Someone who gets it, who wants to move, who wants to be active.
In her evaluation, we certainly talked about exercises and talked about how to address her physical deficits. But 75% of the conversation actually surrounded her process of decision making. So here’s what I mean.
She cycles, lifts, hikes, and exercises regularly….. through pain. The biggest concept I wanted her to walk away from our conversation was if she could modify her intensity for 4-6 weeks, not eliminate, but just adjust how she participated in exercise, this would give her body a window of opportunity. An opportunity to get on top of her inflammation, an entry point to be successful with exercise, and re-establish a foundation for her to build upon again.
She wasn’t resistant to this, but there was certainly some back and forth. It’s only 4-6 weeks right? To anyone outside of her situation, that's an easy trade. But physical deficits aren’t the end all be all of the conversation. In this case, we were up against her self identity of who she was, how she works out, and expectations. This is why so much of what we do goes beyond physical deficits and why psychosocial factors play such a big role and why we need to be aware of them.
I challenged her to think of the big picture. Keep the main thing, the main thing. At the end of day, what do you want to be back doing, how do you want it to go, and how do you want to perform.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve been having conversations on how these adjustments have settled in. There was some initial skepticism, totally justified, but there was a change in tone over the past 2 weeks when we were talking together. She looked at me and said, “You know, I’m actually feeling stronger again. Feeling like myself. Feeling like things are building momentum again. Better.”
Helping athletes RESOLVE THEIR PAIN by CLEARLY DEFINING THE PROBLEM and IMPLEMENTING EFFECTIVE SOLUTIONS to get them back doing the activities they love!
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