I want to follow up on my series of fitness principles and how they fit into our everyday lives.

The last column I wrote was on balance. Remember, unstable surfaces, like a physioball, help to improve core function by challenging your “proprioception.” This is your body’s ability to respond to your struggle with balance.

Before this, I wrote about movement preparation. This should replace the old school pre-workout stretch with an active movement routine.

Then I reflected on “Pre-habilitation.” This is where you must be proactive in your exercise to prevent an injury to avoid the need for rehabilitation. This concept is known as “elasticity.” These workouts are a combination of stability, mobility, flexibility, strength, agility, and balance.

This type of workout is usually performed with, but not exclusive to, athletic performance training. Everyone wants to have the ability to store and release energy efficiently.

Everything we do from walking, turning, taking the stairs, or playing sports has elastic components to them. A golfer generates torque as they prepare to hit the ball. A basketball player generates torque as they prepare to jump. You get the idea.

Every physical action we take part in is a matter of effectively storing, torqueing, and releasing energy.

For this, it is essential to have a good sense of your stability and proprioception so that you do not throw out a joint or fall down, causing injury. In sports performance training, this type of work out is called plyometrics.

Jumping drills over cones, hurdles, ladders are examples of this. Also, jump squats and “plyo” pushups constitute as part of plyometrics. Plyometrics are up and down, side to side, and rapid twisting movements that activate your central nervous system.

This stimulates fast twitching muscle fibers so you can generate more force quicker and efficiently.

These workouts also reduce the potential for injury by allowing you to have control to reduce force and slam on the brakes when needed.

Relating to reality, we need to be just as flexible and elastic to overcome barriers in our lives.

There are times we must give a little to get past obstacles to learn and grow from. Energy stored and released from life’s lessons make handling our sudden hardship easier. This should also apply to giving and receiving. The more you give, the more you will receive. Life will be enlightened if you help others to enlighten themselves.

You will find that just like your body, the ability to have elasticity in real life will make things easier to bounce back from adversity.

When you are pressed for time when working out, focus on elastic activity because of the complete physical benefits. When your legs start to burn, remember, no pains, no gains.