Monday 27 April 2009

Finally ......A post!

Well, all I can say……………………..I’ve got nothing! Been busy busy busy. Life is too short and so are the days!

Where do I start……..hmmmm…………okay lets go with injuries and recovery. Well I have been seeing a Sports Physiotherapist (Louise) and now seeing a (gorgeous hunk, shame he is married - Mike) sports massage therapist. I have some pretty tight muscles and they are creating joint pain for me. But hey I am up for a good hard massage that can take your breathe away at times. Mike was working on me the other day and making note how incredibly tight I am in my pecs. Then after about 20mins of pure pain (ahhhh but it felt so good) my range of movement increased immensely and considerably noticeable. So now I have to spend a bit of money to keep it up for a little while till I am a loose goose. Then it is just an upkeep and making sure I don’t get back into that tightness again. More stretching. Every doorway, I stop and do a pec stretch, every now and then I do a drop the shoulders, pull the scapula back stretch. Release, release, release………….ha, how funny is that, now I am thinking Elvis and the song “Release Me, Let me go!” Even my old knee injury is a result of tight muscles and here I was thinking that I tore a tendon or ligament. I just love my knowledge of muscles and muscle control, it makes my life so much easier when talking to therapists and coaches, also makes you more aware of correct technique and good form.


So work has been crazy mad (what friggin recession). We have been tendering like crazy and winning jobs – awesome! Not worried about loss of job at all anymore. But I may have it even easier in the office soon with the older accounts payable lady deciding to go part time. This will make life so much easier and also a lot more peaceful in the office for everyone. Unfortunately, she rubs almost everyone up the wrong way. But with that, it may also mean more work for me. I don’t mind, as I really have it quite easy.

Further on that, how good is it to have a coach! Last Friday, I had the pleasure of spending some time with my coach and we did some good preparatory work for my scapula and tight pecs. Discovered that when I do a back workout, that it is beneficial for me to do some pec stretches on the fit ball in between sets. My range of movement improved dramatically with each set. So all things are leading back to good lifting. Back to ‘how good is it to have a coach’. – someone who is there to nurture you towards your goals, but able to help with the hiccups along the way. I do a lot of training by myself, except 1 morning where I hang with some girls, and it is pretty darn good to be able to talk to someone and bounce ideas and issues with. A lot of people have coaches for many reasons, mine is to adjust and tweak my training and eating regimes that I do on my own.

What does a great coach do?

1: Powerful Listening
2: Higher Expectations

3: Raised Awareness


Where coaching conversations often differ from those between good friends is that although both can include supportive listening and constructive feedback, the coach will invariably be drawn more & more to see the client for what they are truly capable of achieving; though, as far as is humanly possible, always in non-judgmental and inspiring ways. Everything the coach does while working with a client should be with the intention of helping the client to raise his/her own awareness. An example of raising awareness might involve subtly alerting the client as to their use of disempowering language such as: "I can't", "I'll try" etc.


The bottom line of "raising awareness" is to help a client see 'further' than they did before - and if the coach's role can be compared to that of shining a torch on aspects of the client's current life that appear limiting, then an important goal of coaching is for the client to ultimately realize that by turning on their own 'room light', it is going to shine at least as brightly as any coach's torch. In other words, as much as the coach may see the client's potential and help to 'hold the dream', it is always the client's response-ability in the end as to the actual results achieved.


Creating Awareness - Ability to integrate and accurately evaluate multiple sources of information, and to make interpretations that help the client to gain awareness and thereby achieve agreed-upon results.


Did a crazy cooking session yesterday and made 6 breakfasts – protein pancakes cooked as a slice in oven (I took a picture on my phone but I don’t know how to convert it) oats, quinoa, almond meal, cranberries, egg whites all blended together and baked.

6 lunches – Lean lamb rumps roasted with greek herbs, snow peas, cucumber, lettuce, cauliflower salad.

6 snacks – egg whites, herbs and green beans baked like a pie (ditto on the picture, sori).

So I have 6 days of consistent eating and absolutely no thinking needed until dinnertime.

So all good atm. Will get back sooner than later

Ciao!

1 comments:

Fifi said...

Ahh...the massage. People can't understand how I love the pain..but I know it's doing so much. I'm still sore from mine on Saturday but I'm moving better. LUV them.