Everything needs to be seen within the correct context.

Unless you know English landscape history fairly well, this is just a man standing next to a rock. And even if you did, you couldn’t be certain what you were looking at.

If we zoom out and look at a larger scale, is becomes this:

Stonehenge 2016, Copyright T. Saltmarsh

But even then, this is not fully seen within the true context of its historical environment, with the additional burial barrows, the ditches and the surrounding landscape, mythological and physical.

The same comes when we are treating or working with clients, whether elite athletes or older people.

If we cannot see the bigger picture, or insist on just treating the problem they presented with, we will not be able to solve the problem effectively. A knee sprain may not heal if we don’t work with the coaching  staff to ensure the athlete gets corrective exercise prescription or time off lower limb loading. An older patient may not regain full range of motion if they are afraid of falling and therefore do not attempt the mobility plan you recommend. A desk bound client will still have the recurrent shoulder problems if they don’t tell you the whole story about the work and family related stress, or at least acknowledge to themselves that it exists.

So don’t just look at the rock, block or restriction, zoom out and take into consideration the environment it exists in.