sreda, 5. marec 2014

PAIN IS TEMPORARY...

Well not really. If you ask me, pain is permanent. Especially if you train in competitive sport and more so in fighting sport. And especially if you are trying your best to be the best that you can be. I don't know if there is an athlete that is pain free. But for sure I know that I don't know one. Personally I can't remember time that something wasn't hurting me. It could be sore legs from low stances back in my Karate days. It could be mild pain from punching and kicking the heavy bag in Kickboxing classes. Sometimes I would wake up and my whole body would be in pain from strength and conditioning session the other day. Now I train in MMA and I can tell you that plethora of different pains haha just got a little bigger. There is always something. Muscles hurt more often because of weight lifting and sprinting. Neck is almost always sore because of all the neck wrestling. Whole body is banged up because of sparring. There is always pain, but it is almost all good pain.

"Good pain, what are you talking about Ivan?"

Yes, good pain. You see, not every pain is bad. When you push yourself to reach new levels of strength, endurance, power... Essentially you are breaking your body down to build it back up stronger. And it hurts! But it only hurts a little. Most of the time. Sometimes it really hurts like mother#uck3r  (:
But you go through it and become even stronger. Bad pain is when you injure yourself and you feel this horible sensation of pain. But even that pain is arguably good. Because it tells you that something is wrong. That you are injured and you need to rest and take care of it. You know good, old RICE protocol. But too much of the good thing can become bad thing. So don't overdoo it. I think that resting after injury is overrated and overused. And that is because as a society we are afraid of pain. And we do everything to avoid it. Even the good one! Just think about it, every time people feel something close to pain they pop the pill and hope for relief. No, I'm not saying that you should play your sport injured. But you shouldn't wait idle for all the pain to go away before you resume your activity. Last year I pulled my hamstring and it was 2nd degree tear.



I have been told that recovery after that kind of injury usualy lasts 3 to 6 months. But after only four weeks I did some deadlifts with 100kg and felt great. That is because I'm not afraid of pain so I worked through it litle by litle. Instead of just lying down and do nothing. Ok, first two days after injury was just RICE because I couldn't even walk. But then it was time to move. And I did move, first by limping around like my leg was broken. Than every day a litle bit better but all the time through pain. Pain dictated the pace and showed me reachable range of motion. And I listened.


Remember that pain is only weakness leaving the body! Or as living legend Bas Rutten once said: "It's only pain, it can't hurt you." So don't be afraid of it. Deal with it.

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