Allison - like the energizer bunny - could be described as all gas, no brakes. She speaks fast, moves fast and will always find a way to fit just a little bit more into an already full day. She recently graduated from Queen’s, and we’ve had the pleasure of having her contagious energy at the 9AM class over the last two years. Read on to learn how Allison prioritizes tasks in a busy schedule, holds herself accountable to her fitness, and exercised real humility while navigating a recent back injury.
Tell us about a day-in-the-life:
A day in the life… this is a tricky one – not because I don’t know what I do in a day, but because every day of the week has a very different schedule and routine, the only thing that is consistent tends to be my attendance at the 9:00 am class. However, I can give a general outline – more or less. First, I wake up at 6 am, then it’s a quick cup of coffee, and responding to emails. Next, I find the most dreaded task of my day’s ‘to-do list’ and tackle that. Then it’s off to the 9:00 am gym class. After this, I trek to campus and it’s a rotation of lab, meetings, class, coffee, and study/social breaks. Around 5-6 pm I leave campus and head home to scarf down dinner, quickly chat with my 5 amazing housemates, and then rush back to campus for one of my 5 clubs’ meetings, and my intramural of the night (water polo, volleyball, basketball, etc.). Then I come back home, study, socialize with whoever is at our house on a given night (we might as well install a revolving door) and get to bed, usually between 10 pm and 1 am. Then it’s rest, rinse, and repeat!
How does working on your fitness enhance your life outside of the gym?
Working on my fitness is essential to my life outside of the gym. I find it is extremely important for three different reasons: (1) It gives me goals unrelated to my role as a student, goals that have nothing to do with my academics, research, clubs, etc., (2) It allows me to enjoy the educational setting. I am highly energetic - and the requirement to sit still and quietly study as a student is not a key strength of mine, finding time for a quick workout helps me get rid of some of this excess energy, and (3) It provides structure, consistency, and benefits my health – sleep, motivation, mindset, focus, and much more. I cannot stress this one enough. In my ever-changing schedule – the gym is on my ‘must-haves’ list. (If you caught this reference to HBO’s love or list it show – we’re now friends).
What’s something you’ve learned about yourself while training at the gym?
I’ve learned so much – how much I value expertise, how I love country music when working out, that I can learn many different movement patterns, and much more. However, I think the most important thing I’ve learned about myself is that slowing down and listening to your body is not a failure in mental toughness, an inability to suck it up, or a lack of grit. In reality, it’s the exact opposite. I think that for most of my life, my approach to injury stems from my experiences in athletics, where my coaches endorsed a ‘suck it up buttercup’ mindset – and in this, I learned a lot about pain tolerance, how to ignore your body’s signals, and how to force yourself to keep going. I’ve played through countless torn ligaments, broken fingers, toes, bruises, sprains, etc., typically using ample amounts of braces and tape to do so, and always thought it was a good way to ‘build character’. It led to my mindset that the solution to an injury was to simply push through, anything else was simply a weakness in character. I don’t have this mindset anymore.
Last year, I hurt my lower spine (I won’t bore you with details), but pushing through and ignoring it was quickly making it much worse, not only in gym movements but in most aspects of my life (I was barely sleeping, wouldn’t dare attempt to sit down in class, putting shoes on required something to bite down on, and was completing most of my work lying on the floor). I honestly, had no clue what to do other than keep trying to push it. However, after some much-needed guidance, it became clear that my approach was not the right one. I learned about the acute phase, pain rules, recovery approaches, how to listen to your body, what these signals might mean, and how to add movements back into training slowly. I learned that taking it slow, stepping back, and putting in the time to recognize what movements are supporting recovery is arguably harder and requires a hell of a lot more discipline than merely pushing through. In previous injuries, my push-through approach tended to lead to less confidence in the injured area, and adaptations to avoid using it. However, in taking the time to properly respect my body’s healing process, I learned that injuries will fully recover and became confident in my ability to use my back within movements and to listen and understand the signals it gives. I am fully back to training now, playing intramurals, and even slipped in a quick ski trip out west over the winter break. Anyways, I’ll stop this one here and sum it up by saying that hands down, during my time at the gym – the best thing I’ve learned about myself was that rehabilitation for injuries also applies to mindsets.
Do you have any specific areas of focus with training right now?
Absolutely. Currently, I am working on developing strength through my entire range of motion (ROM), and on core and back strengthening. A fantastic coach who shall not be named (tall, very quick to notice new workout fits, occasionally struggles to come up with the morning question – yet I like all of them), is helping me work through imbalances between my front core and back core (yes, let’s pretend that the technically correct term). Additionally, I am quickly being humbled by strength training in full ROM, it is surprisingly harder to lift at the extent of your flexibility!
What is one thing you do everyday that is essential to your success in the gym?
This one is a no-brainer, I show up. Now hear me out- I think above all, success in anything is a matter of consistency, and consistency is simply a matter of routine. So, I have a routine…and a calendar. Going to the gym at 9:00 am is my routine, but once I put it in my calendar it’s set in stone. *Why do you make this so complicated, just answer the question* (this is Reshma’s voice in my head in reading my answer to this question). Okay, okay, so the one essential thing is that the day before the gym, I make the conscious choice to remove the 9:00 am class or leave the 9:00 am class in my calendar. However, I rarely remove it because, let's be honest, I love the gym. Anyway, this makes me feel like I have flexibility in the day and gives me the opt-out option but restricts this option to making the call the night before…. because once it’s in the calendar – no negotiations.
