Chris Beardsley's Garage Gym

So far, in an Oscar Wilde-inspired set of off-topic posts, I’ve talked about the importance of being: honest and the importance of being: educated.  This time, continuing the theme, I am dwelling on the importance of being resilient.

Resilience doesn’t quite have the same ring to it as the honesty but it’s equally important, I think.

And I’m good at honesty (to the point where I can be insensitive) and you’ve probably worked out that I’m ridiculously over-educated.  When it comes to resilience, though, I come up a little short.  So it’s probably time to write about something that doesn’t come at all naturally to me.

  

But what is resilience, exactly?

Resilience is the quality by which we are able to withstand things.  Withstand things?  What does that mean?

For me, withstanding conjures up an image of a tree bending in the wind but not breaking, of weathering a storm.  I think of the rain beating down on the roof of a building; the building is battered and maybe the drains get blocked and need tending to afterwards but it stays standing.

Windswept trees by framesofmind

  

Where I need or have needed resilience

I need to remind myself constantly to be reslient in the face of adversity.  I have an all-or-nothing attitude, which makes me really motivated when things are going well (I am one of those people who can hold a diet perfectly for four weeks without so much as eating a chocolate button).  But it makes me really depressed if something goes wrong.

Learning to carry on doing what I know needs to be done even when it feels like I have lost the opportunity to get all the benefit from it has been a struggle for me.  Here are a few examples:

• Squats: I’ve spent a lot of time getting my squat to the point where I can squat to parallel without rounding my lower back.  It took me about six months of soft tissue and activation work followed by grooving the squat to progressively lower boxes.  I am quietly pleased with this accomplishment, especially given the sheer number of hours I spend sat on my ass.  Recently, though, I started falling forward on my heavier sets and I realised it was because I wasn’t tucking my elbows under enough.  I dug out the video camera and started pulling them under.  Two things happened: (1) my upper back tightened up (success!) and (2) my lower back started rounding again (argh!).  My first reaction to this was to throw a tantrum and break something.  When I calmed down, I realised that to be resilient, I needed to start the whole process again, grooving to steadily lower boxes until I got to parallel.
• Sickness: last week, I posted about the things I learned being sick.  I had a major episode of acute diarrhea after a holiday and it was so acute that I feel that I can classify it as a life event.  I see now how people can die of these things.  Anyway, my life was on hold while I was ill and now I have to pick up the pieces and run with the ball (Harry Harrison quote: if you can name the book you get a free guest post).  Having just got to a nice, clean one-arm chin, I’ve not done any one-arm chins for three weeks.  To be resilient, I need to build back up again slowly, without getting frustrated and without rushing and getting injured.
• Injury: I recently upset my left shoulder while benching.  I have been rehabbing it for about 8 weeks now.  It’s so much better than it was but it’s not quite there yet.  And the annoying thing is that the soft tissue work that I do to make the range of motion come back makes my whole shoulder really tender and sore.  So when I work out now it feels quite painful to do stuff.  To be resilient, I need to build benching back into my programme slowly, without getting frustrated and without rushing and getting injured.  I also need to make sure I keep doing all my physio and soft tissue work to reduce the knots in my shoulder and keep my joints in working order.
• Blogging: there are few things in the blogosphere more disappointing than writing an article that you’re really proud of and publishing it to the sound of absolutely no-one paying any attention.  (Writing a guest post for someone and having them completely ignore you is another but lets not dwell on that one).  Unfortunately, everyone has days like that and sometimes its that the content just isn’t as good as you thought it was.  Othertimes, maybe you picked the wrong day to publish that post.  Maybe everyone was off watching the football or something.  Who knows?  Being a resilient blogger means bouncing back after a bad day and writing the next great post without feeling sorry for yourself.

A wise man once said that the only thing you can control in life is your own attitude.  More popularly, people say that if life sends you lemons then you should make lemonade.

By controlling my attitude, I hope to be resilient to whatever life throws my way.  Even if it’s just loads of lemons.

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