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Understanding and conquering pain and discomfort in sport

Discomfort is common when you do anything that involves effort. This is just as true for us non-painters as we paint a ceiling and get shoulder ache, as it is to cycle up an Alp at our maximum limit. The discomfort, burn, ache we experience from a given task, varies greatly among different people. The experience of pain and rating of pain intensity is very personal. How we interpret the experience is central in the unpleasantness and intolerance of it.

Sports psychologists believe that the athletes who can push themselves and endure more intensity do so because they view the experience in helpful ways. For instance, they view it in one or more of the following ways:

1. It is discomfort, not pain
2. It is tolerable, not something to stop
3. It is there for a good reason (helping me get fitter, beat opponents…), not a bad reason
4. Or, as much as they are feeling this discomfort, other people are experiencing the same or more and that is fine

Knowing this, we can start to notice how we view the discomfort and choose to interpret it in a different, more helpful way.

Dr Victor Thompson
Clinical Sports Psychologist
http://www.sportspsychologist.com

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