The year so far has all been about balance for the 23-year-old, as he works to overcome his second viral illness in 12 months.
After initially thinking the bout of glandular fever he contracted in December would flatten him until mid-year, Goldsack has made a remarkable recovery to play three games in the VFL and even be named as a Magpie emergency in round four.
"I've been trying to get my fitness back, which has been pretty hard and frustrating, but I'm ahead of schedule," he told collingwoodfc.com.au this week.
"Ideally, I thought round one of the VFL, if I could just be there and play a half to get things moving, that would be great.
"But I was probably four or five weeks ahead of schedule, and it's been a lot quicker than I thought, but still slower than I'd like."
Goldsack was warned about the importance of managing his training after it was identified his body naturally took longer to recover than some of his teammates'.
While there is no link between the meningitis he picked up before Christmas in 2009 and the latest viral infection, he has taken more care to ensuring his body is not overworked in case he has a predisposition to succumbing to such illnesses.
"We haven't really done any other tests because the meningitis was probably a one-off but when I got this, I did think, 'Well, maybe there is something there'," he said.
"I just have to make sure I don't run myself into the ground too much.
"I'm a pretty simple kind of guy. I don't go out much and I don't eat extravagant kinds of food.
"I'm pretty straight up and down. I don't know what it's been - the only thing we've been able to put it down to is just training and not recovering well."
He attributed seven weeks of off-season travel that started with the International Rules Series in Ireland last October and concluded with the Pies' annual Arizona training camp to potentially inducing the glandular fever.
It was upon return to Australia from the altitude camp he fell ill with headaches that saw his girlfriend Jess insist on visiting the hospital.
He stayed a week and left with the diagnosis of glandular, which would later give him the motivation to overhaul his approach to training.
"They say it stays in your system and you've always got a little bit hanging around so if I got too run down, or overtrained and let my body get run down, there was that chance I'd be infected again," he said.
"It was very tedious with how much I could do, which was based on how I was recovering between sessions.
"It's been a bit of a journey but I feeling a lot better now, I'm recovering from games a lot better and I've started playing 90, 95 per cent of game time, which is good so that's where I have to be to play in the ones."
He admitted watching his premiership teammates regroup and enter round five undefeated had been hard after he last played alongside them in the Pies' winning grand final.
"Everyone else who played [in the premiership] has been playing in the ones and having a bit of fun," he said.
"If you're not playing in the ones, you're still part of the team but there's just that little piece missing and you feel a bit out of it.
"I've very much looking forward to getting back in the ones and doing all I can."
Goldsack has not been named in the squad for the Anzac Day clash with Essendon and will spend another week gathering match fitness in the Pies' VFL clash with the Bendigo Bombers on Saturday at Windy Hill.
