Injury recovery period
From personal experience, there is little that it more crushing to motivation than having an injury. You’ve set goals, perhaps have created milestones on the way to get there, and now you’re sitting in your broken down car on the edge of the highway watching the traffic speed past.
The answer is that you never give up. Everyone suffers setbacks, even the best. Think back to the last season of your favourite sport – how many sportsmen suffered injury?
Setbacks are what defines those who will succeed and sets them apart from those who will fail. Setbacks are there to challenge us. Do not ever let them get you down.
OK, now there are some injuries which will put you back a long way. If your wheel falls off then you need to wait for the tow truck, but otherwise it’s time to start pushing. This is where a social network really helps because if you’ve got a friend to step in and help push then it gets a lot easier.
Some injuries you need to sit and wait on. I pulled a muscle on my ribs, don’t ask me how, but it made almost every exercise impossible until it had healed enough. With my current one, there are going to be exercises that I can’t do, so instead I’m going to work on gentle stretches on the damaged muscle and then exercise around it. I’ve had a few days off and next week I’m away on holiday for a week so it’ll be a complete break from the weights.
Tomorrow I’m going to see what I can do with my normal routine. I’m pretty sure that I won’t be able to do overhead press, so I’m going to try bench press with lighter weight. While I’m away I’m going to switch over to a bodyweight routine.
Bottom line – don’t give up.
