Latest / The ACL Athlete Podcast / 258 | The 24-Hour Rule: The ACL Rehab Mindset You Need in the New Year

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258 | The 24-Hour Rule: The ACL Rehab Mindset You Need in the New Year · The ACL Athlete Podcast

• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome everyone to the ACL Athlete Podcast.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: This is the podcast where we talk about everything related to the ACL, whether that's the injury itself, the rehab process, return to sport, and more.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Dr.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Ravi Patel, performance physical therapist and coach.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Between myself and fellow guests and experts, you'll learn through the lens of the patient, the healthcare professional, and the coach.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: The goal of this podcast is to equip you, the athlete, with the education to make the best informed decision about your care and your ACL journey.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now let's dive into today's episode.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: What is up, team, and welcome back to another episode on the ACL Athlete Podcast.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: So at the recording of this episode, we are into the new year, 2026.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: At the time you're listening to this, it is likely 2026.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: It might be 2027, 28, and on.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: So welcome to any time point if you are from the future.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: But as we head into this new year, I always love to talk about reflection-based work, which I've talked about before.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then also being able to get into a good mindset as we approach a new year because we have a full year ahead.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Or if you are listening to this in December of 2026, then you know what?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: The next year ahead or the next six months, it honestly doesn't matter.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's just nice whenever it's a new year because we tend to have these moments of slowing down and then being able to reset the tone for the year because a lot of people do some goal setting resolutions, whatever that may be.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I know for many of you ACLers, it's this is the year, right?
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is the year you do the thing.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: This is the time where you take control of the process, whether you've had a rough run at it, bad physio, bad guidance, just a hard time with the knee.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you've got the good guidance, but maybe the knee is not responding well, right?
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're getting the clean out procedure or the manipulation or the second procedure.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: It happens, right?
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: But you're like, this is my year to like make it happen, get back to doing the thing, and get yourself in a better place, right?
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so the thing I want to talk about today is something that doesn't necessarily have to do with like exercises or steps and reps of things, or just kind of complaining about the process, which I feel like I've probably had a tendency to do.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: I've just been very fired up with talking and consulting with people that I've just felt that weighing heavy on my heart, um, especially just so many reps of conversations and so many ACLs falling through the cracks.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: But that is not the focus today.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: The goal today is to enter after this episode into hopefully this year for a good mindset and whether it has everything basically to do with your ACL rehab actually working.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: So this idea comes from performance coach and author Steve Magnus, and he's awesome, brilliant author, thinker, very forward thinker, and puts out a lot of really, really great content.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: So I would highly suggest checking out his information.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of this is based on a post that I saw from him and just this concept that he talks about that I want to share with you guys, which is called the 24-hour role.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: And he references this based on his high school coach.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is something that I want to kind of bring into the fold for you ACLers who are entering this process this new year, to be able to just be in a really good headspace to be able to enter the year and your ACL rehab.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, it might be just one of the most important mental frameworks you can adopt during this ACL rehab process.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so the core idea of this is the 24-hour rule is super simple.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: No matter what happens, a great session, a bad session, a flare-up, a setback, a milestone, or a big win.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: You give yourself a window to feel it.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is super interesting because even before I stumbled onto this, I actually had this similar kind of mindset that I share with my ACLers.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't necessarily call it the 24-hour rule, but it was something where I would tell them, especially if they're feeling like a negative feel, like a setback or anything, I would just tell them, you know, don't just like overlook it.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's okay to feel it.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: And then just let's just move past this quickly, right?
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: But this creates a little bit more of a framework around it in this 24-hour rule, which I really like.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so you give yourself that window to feel it.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: You feel the frustration, you may feel the pride of essentially that milestone, you may feel the disappointment, you may feel the relief of what you accomplished, right?
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: But you don't live there.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Now, don't get me wrong, this can also exist over the course of days and weeks and months.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not saying like magically in 24 hours it goes away like a setback.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: But with that said, like you stumble upon the feeling of it, whether that just like kicks in, you hit this milestone, or maybe you hit this setback or something happens, right?
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna feel that whenever that does happen, but you don't live there after that window of the 24-hour period.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: You just get back to work.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Not because emotions don't matter, but because they technically need some boundaries.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're trying to do is create some boundaries around this stuff.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because if we don't create boundaries, it just can continue to control our psyche and the way we do things, and we very much are in this place of like if it takes over the mindset piece, then I am 100% on board with it also taking over like the actions you take.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: Your mindset dictates your actions, and I'm so much of a believer in that.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: So that's why I think it's really important for us to make sure we can create boundaries around this.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Now, why does this matter in ACL rehab?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: Y'all, this process is an emotional roller coaster, it's a physical roller coaster, it's all the roller coasters, but the thing that doesn't get looked at the most, and every ACLer can nod their head to is that it's an emotional roller coaster.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: One week you feel unstoppable, you hit these milestones, awesome.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: The next week your knee swells for no clear reason.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have any rhyme or reason to it.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: One day you're confident, the next day you're questioning everything.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: And what derails people isn't usually the knee itself.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's letting one outcome, whether it's good or bad, define the next week, the next month, or the entire process.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: So then a bad day turns into I'm behind, I'm broken, this isn't working, or even on the flip side, a good day turns into I'm basically done, I'm there, I can skip this thing, I'll coast for a bit, right?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I know that it's easy to probably get more down on the bad stuff versus the good stuff, but I think that there is merit to not getting too high on the highs and not too low on the lows.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: But we want to try and stay in the middle as much as we can because when we get on one side or the other too much, they both steal momentum.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: And the psychological boundary that we need here that Steve Magnus describes this roll through is so helpful.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about suppressing the emotion.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: We don't want to just, you know, put that somewhere and bury it.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: No one does well with just burying these emotions because it'll just kind of come up later, right?
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's about giving it a container.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: You're allowed to wrestle with the experience, just not let it become your identity.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that is so, so important in this process.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so your rehab is not defined by one flare up, one missed session, one PR, one confident day.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's defined by how you show up after, right?
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's going to be super important.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: So applying this in the new year, as we enter this year, here's how I want you to think about this.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: Your job is not to control outcomes.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: You can't control swelling perfectly, you can't control timelines perfectly.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's a big one.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: You can't control how fast confidence returns.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's just the reality of this process.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: But you can control the return, the return to how the structure is, the consistency, the intent, and to just showing up again.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes your 24 hours is literally a full day.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: You take that 24 hours and you live in it.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's like eight hours, sometimes it's eight minutes, right?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: And we all know this.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like, there's no just magical, like, okay, I get around the bike and then all of a sudden I'm celebrating for the next four weeks.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's like you get that rotation around the bike, it's an awesome momentary win, but then we're on to the next thing.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's the moving goalpost, right?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is something that I think is so important is to just be able to celebrate those wins and also have a container for those, but then also to be able to understand that in the negatives too, or whenever there's a setback or swelling happens, or you know, the timeline isn't progressing appropriately, right?
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the question is is how much time do I need to process so I can pivot?
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's what we're talking about when we come back to like emotional agility.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's so important here is how much time do I feel like I need?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: And this is gonna be depending on the magnitude of the situation, of you know, the outcome that you have, or maybe the setback that you do have, or the mismatch of expectations, right?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so the thing that's important here is that consistency is its own coping mechanism.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's not blind optimism, not grinding through pain, not pretending you don't care, but a rhythm of feeling, learning, moving forward.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: So as you head into this year, give yourself permission to feel it fully.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's super important here, but don't let any single moment linger long enough to steal the momentum, right?
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: We want to make sure that that's the momentum we need.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: I did an episode on momentum a year ago at this time.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: So if you haven't listened to it, that is super important.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: But just making sure it's never zero.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: That means even if it's 0.1%, you still have positive momentum in the right direction.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: But again, we're not looking for max out momentum.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome, but that's just not sustainable in life and just with this process.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: But you also want negative momentum either.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: You don't want that, that's just also gonna steal from this as well.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: So we want to be able to allow that momentum to build, but the thing is is that you don't control the outcome, you can control the return of what you're the controllables are, and that's exactly how ACL rehab works.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: So that's gonna be something that I want you guys to take with you this year that I think is super important is that no matter the win or the loss, the joy, the disappointment, the next day you just get back to work using the 24-hour role.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Don't get too high on the highs, don't get too low on the lows.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Allow yourself to have that container for it.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: And we're not compartmentalizing things.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's also not a healthy behavior necessarily.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is something where we're really just trying to work through this to make sure that we can just stay in the middle of this and understand we're not getting too low on those lows and too high on the highs.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I think there's so much value, especially when we're trying to attain something that has some uncontrollable factors in it.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: There's also other variables in our lives that we can't always control, like sleep and stress, nutrition, all those things aren't going to be 100% perfect all the time.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then we have biological healing, we have life existing, whether it's school, whether it's work, whether it's kids.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then we also have just things that we want to get after and really care about and do.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why you're here, that's why you're listening to this because you want to get better.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that there's no better time than now.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think that this could hopefully be a reset for you if you're listening to this, to be able to put this 24-hour rule in play.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not saying like, you know, you need to do this for the next six months or a year.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing if you do, but my recommendation is just give this the next week, next two weeks.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: Just try to do it for a couple of days, especially if you find yourself in a place where you might be talking to yourself a little bit more negative than positive.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because I think it's so important because it's easy to get down on yourself because there are going to be more lows in this ACL rehab.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's just by nature the way this is.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: No one's waking up every day like crushing it and positive throughout this entire rehab, right?
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: Even the ones who show that they're probably having their days that are low, they just don't show it.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's the thing that's gonna be super important with this is to be able to just be very agile with this, to be able to create a framework around it and to keep it super simple and just give yourself that 24 hours or whatever window you feel like is going to be best for this.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: And just remember, as he had shared, you don't control the outcome, you control the return.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's gonna be super key for something like this.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll tag his profile in this because I think he's a brilliant guy.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: I want to give him credit for this concept and bringing it to light.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: But I hope that this is helpful.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: If you found it helpful, please let me know.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: I would love to hear from you, especially as we start this year.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: If you have certain goals or things that you're gonna achieve and you're like, you know what, I want to send this to Ravi.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: I want to help keep myself accountable, then send me a message on Instagram, on email after you listen to this.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: There's also a way to message me one way.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: I don't see your phone number or anything.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: I just get that.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I would love to see it.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to hear from you guys, and I do appreciate all the messages in the sport week in and week out.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: Even from the past episode, you guys have reached out with messages and emails, and I've talked with some of you about working with us remotely because it just fired you up, and it just makes me so happy because that's exactly the goal is to just get people moving in this process.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I just have felt so much conviction about ACLers falling through the cracks in this process, and also just with the way that medical systems are, and especially our insurance system here in the US, it's it's wild, y'all.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's just wild.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I talk with so many ACLers who are just really cut short, generic PT, and they're just not getting the help and structure that they need.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, man, there's just if you could just be given the structure and the guidance, you would crush it.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the thing that is missing in a lot of places.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that this year, or when you listen to this, this is hopefully a reset to be able to also reset the mind and reset hopefully the path for you for the time to come and really do the thing.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm excited, y'all.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm excited with what we're bringing from the ASL athlete to you guys.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: We've got a lot of things in the works, and so we can't wait to share some of that with you.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, this is your host, Robbie Patel, signing off.