Semi-committed

The last two months have been pretty great for me, and it’s all because my frozen shoulder is getting better. Hooray! I don’t have much pain, I’m not taking pain medication anymore, my range of motion is SLOWLY getting better, and the fortress of pillows I used to build each night so I could sleep is no longer needed.

It’s been amazing.

While basking in my getting-better-shoulder state, I did notice another thing that changed. I haven’t been doing my stretches. I have 11 different ones that I am supposed to do twice each day. It’s a simple task, and they don’t take much time. At the height of my pain and misery, I was as diligent as could be. I did every single stretch morning and night. I never missed. My progress was slow—very slow—but I was determined to get better.

Motivated.

Committed.

Dedicated.

And then my shoulder didn’t hurt quite so much. It was such a relief! So I kept doing my stretches, but not twice a day. My commitment waned. I was getting better! Honestly, the stretches were starting to annoy me. I had better things to do with my time. Then I went from all 11 to my favorite 4 or 5. That’s all I really needed to do, right?! Seriously, what good were these stretches doing anyway? I convinced myself they were pointless.

This past week I noticed that I wasn’t stretching at all. And my little gains in my range of motion had almost disappeared. My shoulder, while not hurting a lot, was starting to ache in a way it hadn’t for a while.

Whoops.

Isn’t it interesting that the very thing helping my shoulder improve was the first thing I dropped when I started feeling better? I was committed, but only to a point.

Can anyone relate to this?

Sometimes we do this when we try to lose weight. We eat healthier food until we start to see results, and then we start eating the same old junk food, maybe just here and there at first. But gradually our healthy eating stops and the junk reigns supreme. And our weight stays the same. The food that was changing our bodies is the food we stop eating.

Maybe you want to get more sleep, so you go to bed earlier. And then you feel so energized and great that you stay up later and later and later. Suddenly, you’re right back to being exhausted each morning.

The new ache in my shoulder this week was a wake-up call for me. I did my stretches this morning, and I’m going to do them again tonight. I don’t want to be semi-committed. I am doing all 11 stretches until my shoulder is not just a little better, but completely healed.

Where are you semi-committed? How’s it working for you? If you’re ready for something different, something better than the status quo—let’s talk.