“For rehab, is this a fair summary: find the drills that hurt and do more of them… gently?”
-Laurie
Kind of.
If you go into pain you’ve gone too far. Pain is a signal that something is wrong, so you want to be sure to not go that far, though sometimes come up right on the boundary of it. As if there is a clear boundary. Discomfort is okay, pain not so much. Our language is fuzzy around these terms which makes it a difficult conversation.
I wrote more about this in this earlier article: Why I Don’t Agree with Pain is Weakness Leaving the Body
More so than avoiding pain, you want to seek out movements that make you feel strong, opening, good, fluid, etc. around the area in question. And this is the difficult thing because we’re not taught this…
(Just imagine if P.E…physical education…back in your school days actually taught you how to use your body and interpret its signals. Wouldn’t that be a useful skill to have?)
Understand that it is a skill. It is something you can learn whether you’re 7 or 70. But it will take some knowledge, some practice and some time.
Beyond Biofeedback: The 4 Levels of Intuitive Training is the deep dive I created on the subject.
And I evolved it a bit further inside of Intuitive Mobility.
Ultimately, it is THESE signals (strong, opening, good, fluid, etc.) that will lead you to rehab yourself out of the pain.
Doing so you should be able to do more movement over time without getting into the painful area. Ideally, eventually, it disappears completely.
And that is how you do rehab exercises.