Z Physique Journal • Volume 4, Issue 2 • October 20, 2026
A few years ago, I took my son to a trampoline park for the first time.
He was eight years old and a very active kid. I wanted him to have a chance to play with other kids, make some friends, and enjoy himself somewhere new.
Of course, when we got there, he wanted me to jump with him.
So I did.
I hadn’t really considered what it would feel like. I exercise regularly. I’ve worked in fitness for much of my adult life. I was just there with my son. He wanted me to jump, and I didn’t see any reason not to. Getting onto a trampoline with my eight-year-old didn’t seem like a big deal.
Within a few minutes, I was dizzy and nauseous. That was enough for me, so I got off.
My son noticed that I wasn’t feeling well. He was empathetic and compassionate. Dad wasn’t feeling well, and he understood.
Later, I had another surprise: my legs were sore.
I hadn’t expected a few minutes of bouncing to leave my legs sore. Once I thought about it, though, it made sense. I had asked my body to do something different.
Our bodies get used to the things we do regularly. We have our routines, our familiar movements, and the things we rarely have to think about. Then every once in a while, we do something completely different.
For me, apparently, that something was a trampoline.
What surprised me later wasn’t only that my legs were sore. It was how little interest I had in doing anything about it. I didn’t need to get better at jumping on a trampoline.
I never went back and tried again. I didn’t practice jumping or create exercises to prepare myself for another visit, and I didn’t see what happened as a weakness that needed correcting. I simply got off the trampoline and went on with the day.
That probably doesn’t sound like much of a fitness story.
Maybe that’s part of why I still remember it. There was no comeback, no goal I set for myself afterward, and no moment when I decided I was going to prove something. I noticed what happened, understood it a little better once my legs were sore, and left it there.
There is so much emphasis in fitness on progress, and understandably so. We work toward getting stronger, practice things that are difficult, and gradually increase what we’re capable of doing. I’ve spent years helping people do exactly that, and I believe in the value of it.
But somewhere along the way, we can start expecting ourselves to improve everything. We notice something we can’t do particularly well and immediately start thinking about how to get better at it.
Sometimes that’s worth doing. If there’s something physical keeping me from doing what matters in my everyday life, I want to work on it. I want the strength, mobility, balance, and confidence to keep living that life.
But the difference, at least for me, is whether it matters to the life I’m actually trying to live.
That day at the trampoline park, my attention wasn’t supposed to be on me anyway.
I had taken my son there because I wanted him to enjoy himself. I wanted him to play with other kids and have an opportunity to make friends. Whether I could spend the afternoon bouncing beside him wasn’t really part of that. The trampoline wasn’t a test of my fitness. It was simply where we happened to be.
He wanted his dad to jump with him.
So I did.
It didn’t last very long. Looking back, the soreness made sense. I’d moved in a way I wasn’t used to.
But noticing something doesn’t always mean we have to fix it. I never went back on the trampoline.
I don’t feel as though I left anything unfinished.
YOUR NEXT STEP
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