Relieve Low Back Pain | Reduce Low Back Pain | Canada's Leading Authority in Human Movement | Dev Chengkalath

In my last post I listed 7 reasons why I believe New Year’s Resolutions fail.

Over the next little while I’m going to explore each of those reasons and relate it back to movement, injury rehab, fitness and health.

First on the docket is accountability.

What does accountability really mean and why does it even matter?

The definition above is taken from Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary and I think it encompasses the main idea quite well.

Are we really willing to accept responsibility for our actions or lack thereof? Are we ready to admit that our results are based on what we have done or not done? That these results are based on what we’ve chosen to do or chosen not to do?

Are we willing to put the blame from lack of results squarely on our own shoulders? Are we willing to accept that our achievements were our very own?

Basically, as stated by Merriam-Webster, are we in a position to accept absolute responsibility?

At this point you’re probably scratching your head and wondering how this ties in with movement, injury rehab, fitness or health?

If you want to lose weight, it’s simple. If you want to gain muscle, it’s simple. If you want to rehab your injury, it’s usually quite simple. If you want to improve your health, avoid diabetes, obesity, heart disease or any other life-altering ailment, it’s definitely simple.

(For the record, simple DOES NOT mean easy).

But are we willing to say no to the extra serving of pasta and increase our activity levels regularly? Are we willing to slam down those extra 2000 calories a day and hit the gym when we just want to crawl into bed and sleep? Are we willing to take the appropriate recovery breaks or practice the same “boring” rehab exercises over and over again to retrain our faulty movement patterns or fix our mobility issues when we know there is something more “interesting” on the TV? Are we willing to take charge of what we put into our bodies, eschewing the toxins, the chemicals, the processed crap we call food? Are we ready to take responsibility for what we subject our bodies to, or how we treat them every day?

Then we have to ask ourselves, who are we responsible to?

Who would we be letting down if we fail?

Is it ourselves? Our friends and families? Our parents? Our children? Our neighbours? Society? The healthcare system?

Is is to all of them? Some of them? None of them?

In the end, I guess I’ve asked more questions than I’ve answered and they’re questions that only you can answer.

Just realize that if there is no built in accountability to your health and fitness goals or resolutions, the odds that you’ll follow through on them diminish dramatically and all you’ll end up with is a written wish list which will leave you in the same place you were in yesterday.

Yours in movement.

Dev Chengkalath

First off, I’d like to wish everyone out there all the best for 2010!

Next I’d like to reflect back to a post I made over a year ago which I still think holds true.

If you’re interested, you can check out my first post about overcoming inertia HERE.

Key to success

Coming back to the present I came across this short but very insightful TED talk that I think will help people not only set goals (hey, isn’t that the basis of New Year’s resolutions?) but GET THEM and achieve the success they seek.

To your success.

Dev Chengkalath

Sir Issac Newton: Movement Guy

Though this post doesn’t deal with Human Movement directly, it does touch upon a broader sense of “inertia” which loosely defined from Sir Issac Newton’s 1st Law states that “a body in motion tends to remain in motion and a body at rest tends to remain at rest, unless acted upon by an external force.”

In my case, it was my own resistance to moving beyond the status quo, my comfort, my excuses. I was staying at rest. Immobile.

And it was my fault.

Have you ever wondered what you could really and truly accomplish in only one hundred days if you focused all your energy on it?

Think about it.

The only real difference between those that are successful and those that don’t enjoy the same success is usually related to two words: “taking action”.

Adding that external force. Action.

A while back, I came across a fantastic step-by-step success blueprint created by one of the United Kingdom’s most successful personal trainers and fitness entrepreneurs, Dax Moy.

Me and Dax: He really is that much taller than me.

In my excitement I immediately invested in the same program that so many others had used to craft their own success.

I was tired of, as Dax calls it, “serial goal setting” and was finally ready for “serial goal getting“.

Note the incredible difference between the meaning of those two phrases with just one word changed!

That evening, I read through all the information and listened to all the audio. I was stoked and jazzed as I downloaded the program and was ready for my next 100 days towards success. I was going to get things done!

Then what happened?

Life.

My work schedule as a physical therapist and human movement specialist filled up and expanded, surprise medical-legal reports from years long forgotten popped up, a few personal projects with pressing deadlines “suddenly” appeared.

It was like the world conspired against me.

Inertia struck again.

Isn’t that typical?

We end up being our own roadblock to achieving our success.

With all those “immediate” obligations, I didn’t even get started on my own journey of a hundred days. I didn’t write out all the things I wanted to work towards in those few months; the trips; the financial achievements; the educational pursuits; those personal and professional goals that would lead me towards self-actualization.

Serious Goal Getting

Now that things have settled down and I have some time to truly start the habit forming, I’ve dug out the powerful message extolled by Dax and am going to start (again!) immediately.

Through this blog, which was one of the goals I had set for myself to accomplish in the past, I hope to share with you a bit of my journey and perhaps encourage you to work on your own magic 100.

This program definitely gave me the push I needed to get working with Rocco and he’s definitely been a tremendous asset in my corner. Thanks again Rocco!

If you’re interested in learning more about Dax’s incredible program of self discovery and empowerment, check it out HERE.

Set those goals. Get those goals.

Let the journey begin.

To your success.

Dev Chengkalath

Have you ever wondered why it gets “harder” to learn new movements as we age?

These and many other fascinating human movement questions keep me up at night!

If you take a quick peek at the above video clip, one of the biggest reasons is demonstrated quite clearly.

Did you figure it out?

If you said:

“The baby, after every time it fails, tries again”

You’d be right.

As adults, we are afraid of trying something new and then failing. We get embarrassed. And then we quit.

Infants and children in various stages of motor control development, don’t understand failure. They will keep plugging away until they actually succeed. Quitting is not an option for them.

Do like the babies do. Go out and try something new.

Pick one new movement a week. Even something as simple as changing the hand you brush your teeth with. If you’re more adventurous try swinging a kettlebell or lifting sandbags.

If you can’t do it right, keep working on it.

Don’t be afraid to fail. Be even less afraid of succeeding.

Yours in movement.

Dev Chengkalath