What do you think of when you think about mobility? Do you think of physical performance and whether your limbs and joints move as they should? Do you think about how you get to place to place? Or do you think about less tangible concepts, like social mobility?
Life is defined by how we move, whether it’s physically, mentally or emotionally. Progress involves going forward, which means we need to avoid getting stuck in place. Loosening up may involve things like exercises to stretch out our muscles, but we also need to be in the right headspace.
You’ll never know just how far you can go until you try. Sometimes we find ourselves believing it’s impossible for us to go any further than we have already. That stops us from making the effort. We need to encourage ourselves to push on, even when it looks difficult.
Sometimes this means breaking things down into smaller steps and more realistic goals. Other times we might need assistance, whether it’s from a teacher or trainer who can help us learn the most effective techniques or a friend who can meet the challenge with us and make us feel like we’re not alone.
Once we get going, we have to find a way to keep it up. You complete the first stage, you stretch that little bit further than before, and then you might be tempted to say “that’s it” like you’ve finished. There’s always room for improvement, and that means you need to keep finding new ways to motivate yourself.
There will be slip-ups along the way. Perhaps you’ll get an injury, or maybe you’ll lose someone important to you and it will completely throw you off. Now you don’t just have to work to improve; you have to work to get back where you started. It’s easy to despair when it feels like all your progress is going down the drain.
These are the times when mindset is most important and you have to be patient with yourself. No one expects you to jump straight to the finish line. Again, it’s the little things that make all the difference. As long as you keep doing something, no matter how small, you can feel like you’re still fighting.
Whatever mobility means to you, it’s always something that can be improved if you approach it in the right way.
