Diagnosis Of The Pain
I have always been someone that keeps in shape and looks after themselves from a fitness perspective, it has never been about having to exercise but an absolute desire to.
About seven years ago I was involved in car accident that left me with quite a severe back injury. After time recuperating for a couple of months and taking it a lot easier than I was used to, I was back at the gym.
Throughout the whole experience, I always believed I would recover 100% with no issues in the future, so was very positive and determined throughout.
My pain subsided, I was moving fluidly again and was getting on with my life. I was back to being focused on my fitness goals in the gym and pretty much feeling invincible as everything in life was going well.
However, seven years on and I still have episodes whereby my back weakens, and I have to slow down. I do a couple of sessions in the gym most days, and these involve lifting weights.
I realised recently that something I had done since my back injury was adapted my posture to enable me to keep lifting, a way that helped me put less strain on my back. When the pain gets too great to lift weights I could have visited my GP who would probably prescribe me medication, advise me to rest, and I might be referred to a physio, somewhere down the line, so I never bothered going to see him. I just went with it and let it fix itself, using over the counter medication if needed.
Recently when it flared up again and after a couple of months of niggling pains I had had enough, so I took it upon myself to book in with a specialist chiropractor. A professional who could diagnose the route of the pain and how to work on releasing it without the use of medication, which was important to me.
Because of this decision I have now been made aware that my back is not the issue, the problem causing the pain is actually with my hamstrings, not even relating to the historic injury anymore. I had referred the problem somewhere else through incorrect behaviour, changing my posture, due to a lack of knowledge. However, my symptoms are pain in my back, go figure?
On reflection, if I had initially been to see a professional chiropractor, they would have guided and advised me on how I should recuperate correctly and take measures to protect myself going forward. They would have given me instructions on how to manage my posture in the gym, as this would have been a priority for me, ensuring I didn’t refer the issue to another part of my body through bad behaviour.
The more I look back on my journey with my back injury, the more I realised the correlation with self-diagnosing issues with your own body and with a business and what you decide to do to correct them, based on your own beliefs.
When you are faced with a problem in business, it might be hard to get total clarity about the root cause. You might be focusing on where you feel the most pain is (costs) when the real problem is down to something that you don’t always get to see (customer service).
Making a quick or rash decision by self-diagnosing, trying to solve the problem quickly or not taking the time to understand the real problem, you might find yourself in more pain than you were initially.
The pain is a symptom of a more serious problem, so treating the pain without tackling the underlying issue will not make the long-term problem go away.
A good analogy for this is: you are driving a car, and the fuel light comes on as a warning. You are unable to get petrol, so you stop and remove the petrol light, problem solved, right?
I had to take time to reflect on my journey with my injury and relive the process I had gone through, to understand clearly what I had actually done to my body without being totally conscious of these decisions. In fact, I had been lifting weights using only one side of my body, putting all of the weight on my left leg. My glutes and hamstrings were suffering because of this and I had also weakened the right-side of my body in the process.
Again relating this to business, it is good to look back from where you have come to understand clearly where you experienced pain to ensure you can overcome any further pain going forward and not making the same mistakes again.
Luckily that is where a coach can step in and help with this process. As a professional expert. A coach can drill down into a business to uncover the real problem. They are not emotionally involved in the business so don’t feel any of the pain and are there to help ease the issues, so the business owner can begin moving forward positively and more profitably.
As a coach I work with companies both in distress and also those looking to advance their business to the next level, helping them to mitigate future pains as much as possible due to the implementation of the rights systems, checks, and procedures.
Being an ActionCoach is another desire of mine, like exercise. Helping business owners navigate what can be a hit and miss journey for some and make it fun and a lot less painful.
