at the gym for a while now, which is doing him good. He feels stronger, more in touch with his body, and more confident in what his body is capable of. But his shoulder started to play up, so he tried to take it a bit easier. A bit less weight, more focus, a slower pace, but nothing helped.

We’d discussed it before: move in a way that’s pain-free. But what I realised during our session is that, up until then, ‘pain-free’ had meant to him: ‘the sensations I’m prepared to tolerate’. Which is something quite different.

He discovered that if he actively pressed his back into the floor whilst moving his shoulder, it felt a lot more comfortable. He was pleased with this, because it worked. But I saw what was actually happening: he was compensating. He was creating a movement to get round the pain, and that sort of solution doesn’t solve anything; it merely shifts the problem elsewhere.

So I asked him: “Let go of your back, soften your body, move your shoulder from a relaxed body and notice what that feels like.”