you don't need everything to be perfect. Or even if you've got lots of future potential, then you've got years to build on it a bit. And bill to get better, even if you're 30 that's doesn't necessarily mean you're reaching your physical peak. That still means that you've got absolutely lots of time. As you keep playing more and more rugby. Ideally you're continually understanding the game better yes, what's going on, everybody. Welcome back to the rugby muscle YouTube channel or podcast. However you are listening to this. It's lovely to have you here. I'm your host as always TJ today, I am revisiting a topic that we already spoke about last week, which is keeping enjoying rugby and playing rugby. As you age now. Last week, we spoke a lot about the physical side of things, the ideas and ground, the concepts that you need to understand with training. But I think if you haven't already watched that, don't go and watch it. Now I will link it below, but I think you should go watch your offer because this is more of a mental model that I think a lot of. Can do with applying. And a lot of you that might be exploring the idea of either coming back to rugby or playing for one more season and the feasibility. And I think these four questions rather than mental models will, give you a much better idea of how you should go forward about doing this. This isn't talking about like the specifics of the training. This is going to be asking you questions, how you feel you should approach. You'll come back to rugby and hand how you should judge that and how you should therefore then dedicate your time to training or not. Not necessarily exactly going to be saying, oh, this means everything to you. You have to sacrifice to win. You have to suffer like this. That's not it. Okay. We're going to be asking some questions that are much more reasonable that amateur players can really understand. And really, maybe we are thinking a little bit deep, but you're going to get a lot out of it. So the questions that we are going to ask. Oh, number one. Why you playing rugby? Number two, where are your limits? Number three. What can you do? Kind of fade, right. But we're going to go into depth actually, what that actually means and what are your standards? And these four questions have no context right now. So let's put some bloody context of number one. Why are you playing rugby? Like this question is going to be answered a hundred different times by 100 different people. They are. It's not just the fact that, you know, it's different things and different reasons at the heart of it, but there's also lots of different combinations. So You as an aging rugby athlete needs to ask yourself the question, why are you playing rugby? And this aging doesn't necessarily mean that you're someone that's in your forties or fifties. This could mean someone that's getting towards your late twenties or mid twenties having taken it really seriously early on what are you playing? Number one? one of the main reasons that we should all be playing. Enjoyment. The game is bloody fun. It's, it's one of the coolest things that you can do. It's a combination of, you know, literally kind of like going to war with a ball, with the objective of getting that ball to the other line with 1500 players, including yourself. And like there's not many other realms of life that you can pursue, something like that. Right. I think we're playing rugby for glory, and then we'd take a step back and we realized that it's actually more of the enjoyment side of things. You also want to ask yourself, is it something like we see this a lot with athletes, particularly in the amateur level where they play, because it is a. To keep yourself physically healthy, right? It is a reason like they, or they might even just, that might be the only exercise they do is the two to three rugby sessions or including the matches that they do a week. That's the only activity they get in a week. That's their version of fitness. You're here on the rubbing muscle YouTube channel because we're looking for a little bit more, but that's a lot of people because of the enjoyment factor, they will be a, they'll continue to play rugby because it keeps them active. And that's a fantastic reason to keep playing rugby. If you can keep doing it, it's, it's a reason to keep going. Um, Number four, I've written here is the mental benefit. Not necessarily just playing on game day and how much fun that is or in the moment. You know, attack and defense or whatever. It's also the teammates that you get. It's the camaraderie that you get. It's the camaraderie also with the opposition, it's the, all of those social benefits and I think they're not exclusively necessarily to rugby, but they are a big benefit of rugby and rugby really does lean on those and you can use those to, to get a good benefit out. There's like great communities are had around rugby clubs and it's one of the best place that you can find groups of friends. I've done it several times. Wherever I've moved for rugby wherever I go. I will find the local rugby club and immediately you found a group of mates and wherever you are that will still be accessible to provide to them as a rugby club near enough to you. Right? So lots of reasons to keep playing re-up in. And for this reason, even if your performance might be deteriorating, your physique might be deteriorating. If you go back and watch the fiscal video that we did last year. I understand how to hold that off and why that not isn't necessarily the case, but for the most part, like, you know, other than glory, ideally you want to keep playing as long as you can. Like you see here, there's a picture of Mike. He plays rugby still in early to mid forties. After winning the world cup 2019 years ago, he still plays community rugby because of the enjoyment he's had the glories won a bloody world cup. He's reached the top. Yeah. He's still here playing. So obviously it isn't just about Gloria. It's a lot of other things that are going on. And so. I definitely do think that there are lots of reasons to keep playing rugby and you have to ask yourself, which of those reasons are there to gauge your level of the next few questions that we're gonna ask. So, number two, where are your limits? Right. So this isn't just about rugby. This can also be about I've put what there, I should probably have put kids and family first because they're going to be more important, but those two things are incredibly important for people as you go. So. You're going to have limits to what you can commit to as far as rugby is concerned or primarily around those two things. Also your social life. Maybe you will have golf weekends. Maybe you will have lots of more. We get family and friends and other times away, like we're not going to take that away from you or rubbish. Shouldn't have to take that away from you. You should integrate rugby into those things. But where are you prepared to extend? That is another question, right? How much time do you need to dedicate to your family before you're unnecessarily saying, oh, this, you know, I can't commit because of my family, when you can still have an hour to go and play rugby or an hour to go to dedicate to the gym. And that would be fine. This isn't me saying, that's definitely the case for you. This is me asking you, where are your limits? So where are your limits for how far you want to build your work and build your current? And how you can fit rugby around her. Where are your limits for your social life is like pulling back on your social life too much for you. Is that going to be too much so that maybe you don't have time to commit to extra training sessions because you've got to go for beers or, or whatever it is, you know, social commitments that you have outside of work afterward, maybe that's the case. Where are your limits for your injuries as far as your commitments? You know, it's going to go both ways as far as playing rugby, because yes, if you're playing rugby, you're always going to be subjecting yourself to a chance of being injured, but the better prepared you are, the less that chance happens. But then you sacrifice more and more time to do that. A big common problem that I see with guys as they age is actually they back off more and more and more from physical activity, which just suddenly makes them weaker or maybe not suddenly, but gradually makes them weaker and weaker or a weaker over time. And therefore. They're more, actually more likely to be injured because they're less prepared. Whereas if you're always active, you're going to be more robust. I mentioned in the last video about movement is medicine, it's that sort of thing. Right? So understanding your limits as far as what you're prepared to take for that. That can be something that you have to understand before you can figure out why your commitments lie for the gym and what, and for rugby, then when you're looking at your limits for your rugby ability, if you like, this is quite hard to wrap your head around, but, if you understand your limits, you can absolutely either find a new reason to replay or find a new challenge or understand that your commitment doesn't necessarily have to be all in because it's okay because you're just playing for enjoyment. You don't need everything to be perfect. Or even if you've got lots of future potential, then you've got years to build on it a bit. And bill to get better, even if you're 30 that's doesn't necessarily mean you're reaching your physical peak. That still means that you've got absolutely lots of time. As you keep playing more and more rugby. Ideally you're continually understanding the game better and your Rabi's constantly evolving. So you will be evolving your thinking. So you'll be evolving your understanding and your adapting and your ability to solve the problems that the rugby pitch presents to you. And therefore become a better player. So as long as you can actually just sustain your physical performance, you're actually going to be a better rugby player. The question is, where are your limits as far as rugby ability is concerned? Like how are you going to approach your commitment because of those limits, same thing for your future potential. If you no longer have ambitions to play for the first team, does that mean that you just completely want to stop? These are questions that you have to ask for yourself, same thing for your time. And how much longer you've got as far as wanting to play. Like, what do you want to dedicate? This isn't like long-term life. This is your time on a weekly or a monthly basis. What are your limits as far as what you can commit? Because once you've answered these questions, now you can figure out the next question. As to what you can do, right? Once you figured out your limits, as far as your abilities, your goals, why you're playing rugby, you figured out like your physical limits, your, your actual scheduling limits. Now, you know, Like you've got all your commitments together. You can figure out a plan of, okay. I can commit two sessions a week outside of the gym. My abilities skill-wise are great, but I'm lacking my fitness. Okay. So now I can figure out, I want to get fitter. This is what I'm going to do. So. Essentially just figure out like the minimum amount that you can do. Don't hit extra expectation for no reason. Don't heat extra pressure on yourself for no reason. Don't set a schedule that, you know, you're probably never going to keep, make it really easy, make it so that you've got a 99% chance of succeeding with these commissions. And go in and do it and get success and get success after one week and build an XSS after one week for two weeks, for three weeks for a month, then you've had a month of success. Okay. Now how can we keep moving forward with our goals? How can we keep executing if you fall? Don't just give up, don't say, okay. Ah, shit, I'm too old. That's it. I've got to give up like, oh, I've got I'm too busy or I'm too injured or whatever it is, no reassess where you'll come in short and keep moving forward And if moving forward means staying in the same place, then that can still keep you playing rugby for the enjoyment. You're still going to be enjoying rugby. You don't necessarily always have to keep moving forward. As I said already.. Physically just by playing rugby week on week on week, you're being presented with more and more stuff. You're going to be learning. You're going to be adapting. You're going to be improving your performance, especially if you're someone that is watching this video. So then that leaves us with the last question is what are your standards? How far can you slip away in these different areas before you think? Okay, I need to address that. Okay. I need to address that. Okay. I need to address. This comes when you fall short, maybe you've pushed yourself too much with ropy, and now your wife's she's not really mad at you, but she would like you to, you be at home Tuesday events you've got to ask yourself the question, where are your standards? You've got to ask yourself, am I the person that is going to know my standards? I'm always showing up to rub it on a Tuesday night. You're going to be a disappointed wife, or I'm going to make it up to you in another way. Or you're going to say. I'm I'm a good husband. I need to fix this. I'm gonna like, not commit to rugby for the next following few Tuesdays. And we're going to figure this out, whatever it is, right. That's just a complete scenario that I've plucked out of my arsenal. That is not necessarily how it's going to work, but you get the point. These are the sorts of questions that you're going to be asking yourself. So what are your standards, as far as you, your career, your kids, your family, your social commitments, as we already said, what are your standards as far as injuries? Once again, if you just commit to nothing, there's still a good chance that your injuries are going to go away. Particularly if you look at the last point here, as far as health and physique are concerned, like if you commit to nothing, your health is going to deteriorate. And if you're someone that wants to play rugby, because that's something that keeps you. And I it's like the little carrot that's dying Linda at the end of the gym session, because you want to keep improving rugby because that's fun. And you know, also going to the gym is something healthy and something that you should be continually doing for life then, like, you want to make sure that you don't let your standards drop in that. Same thing for your rubbish. If you're rubber, your starting to drop, maybe you commit to a vet's team, or maybe you say, okay, this, this is it. We've we've full-time Rabbim. Now I'm just going to commit to the odd vets tournament or the maybe I'm just going to play touch rugby with older people, which is great. It is great fun. I coach a guy who's just started playing only tucked up in and it's fun. It's still everything dynamic without the car crash every single weekend. So. Yes, this was a little bit of a ramble because these are questions that I cannot answer. These are more philosophical approaches and questions and mental models that you need to wrap your heads around. So if this has made things any clearer for you, I'd love to know in the comments below please let me know if you are someone that has a good idea of this and you think. I get this. I, I think I know where I'm at. I want to commit to this, but I don't know what star physically, number one, you can go and be a freeloader and watch all the videos that here on the rubbed muscle YouTube channel. Definitely make sure you subscribe because that makes that process a lot easier. You can check out the physical performance pyramid. We've done a whole playlist on that stuff. We've done lots of different playlists on how to program your Shanklin condition, or you can go straight to the source, which is team rubbing muscle. Oh, the team programming delivered directly to you on a monthly basis, or you can hire me as your coach links or those will all be in the description below. Once again, we've reached the end of this video. I'm not really sure how to finish this. If you've made it to the end, please give it a thumbs up comment below any thoughts that you have for why you play rugby for what keeps you going as you age? What are your goals in the long term? Or anything else, comments for the algorithm are always appreciate thumbs up, subscribe if you're new. And once again, check out those links for all the ways that you can work with rubbing also into the description below. And I'll see you in the next client.