Why Progression is Crucial for Success

The goal is always to progress and improve! If you stood on one foot with slight knee flexion for 15 seconds and then progressed to 30 seconds, that’s a win. It’s the accumulation of these wins, these small, novel disturbances in homeostasis, that force our tissue to respond and adapt.

That’s why the conservative, let’s-not-ruffle-any-feathers rehab, where you perform the same bodyweight exercise or mobility exercise, for the same amount of sets/reps, over and over, is an utter waste of time. Here’s why:

What we do in the gym or treatment center is simple – we have some hazy idea about what the “desired outcome” is and a path we believe might lead us there.

If you are looking to increase range of motion, you will use movements or modalities with the HOPE that they warrant a CHANGE (or adaptation), like more movement about a joint.

If you want to increase strength, you will choose a set of movements and progressively overload them in hopes that the tissue adapts, like being able to produce more force than previous levels. 

If the stimulus (tool, exercise, etc.) you use, doesn’t provide or stops providing a positive effect…what is its purpose? To kill time? That’s lazy.

Change the environment / stimulus and you change the organism!

So when I get a client who hasn’t progressed in months at PT, while doing the same thing, I have to ask, “What the fuck did you expect?”

Or my favorite are those who say, “My back hurts but I get adjusted every month! I love it, I’ve been going for years and don’t feel good if I don’t”.

I usually pause, and then with a slight sarcastic tone ask, “So you’ve been doing this for YEARS and your back STILL HURTS, but it’s working, am I hearing you correctly?”

I’m not going to repeat the definition of insanity – but come on.

So here’s what you need to do.

– You can increase the training load – if you were doing bodyweight squats you can add a dumbbell (earth shattering stuff, right?)
– You can increase the volume of work – if you did 3 sets of 10, you can do 4 sets of 8 (you’ve now gone from 30 reps to 32, small wins, remember?)
– You can introduce a new movement/stimulus – if you were doing leg press you can go to split squats or single leg squat to a bench.

Because remember, the law of accommodation tells us that our response to a constant stimulus will decrease over time! So if you stop trying to progress, you’re giving up on trying to improve, and at that point, just get a new job because your passion is gone.