|
An important piece of the puzzle in reaching your goals within the realms of health & fitness has to do with what you enjoy doing.
Many years ago when I worked in a “training” only establishment (no nutrition or lifestyle advice was allowed to be given) I had a client, we’ll call her Sarah, who decided it was time to lose weight and get healthier. It was coming up on her 65th birthday and she was fully aware that she wasn’t living the quality of life that she used to enjoy. She had a job that was strenuous and more often than not frustrating, so she thought she’d use her time at the gym to release her frustrations. We worked together for 3 years until her retirement. During that time she came to meet me 3 days per week and made minimal improvements here and there. Instead of releasing frustrations, she was building frustrations. We had several talks during our time together but as she was about to retire, she decided to open up and have a more truthful conversation about what had been going on… She told me that she never got on board with eating healthier or living differently. That she fully expected the 3 times per week of workouts to be enough to change everything about her body. Rarely is that situation going to work for anyone but then she told me another important thing- “I hate exercising! In fact, just walking into a gym makes me feel angry and frustrated!” Wow! Being that the gym was not my first love either I had some understanding of where she was coming from, but in that moment, in that place I had nothing else to offer her within my training. Well a few months later she retired and quickly moved to Florida to a wonderful retirement community where she found new friends and new hobbies. She came back to visit 6 months later and I was shocked! I almost didn’t recognize her! She had lost 40 lbs and was happier than I’d ever known her to be. I had to know what she’d done. How had she been able to turn things around in such a short time? As we talked, I found out that she had fallen in love with country & western dancing. She was enjoying it so much that she was doing it daily and along with a few dietary changes she had managed to find a way to enjoy the exercise she used to loath. Sarah’s story spurred me on early in my career to learning as many different styles of helping others as I could to make sure that the solution matched the person’s unique needs. The moral of the story is, if you enjoy something, you’ll do it…if you don’t, you won’t. Whether it’s where you exercise, how you exercise or when you exercise, it’s important to find the solution that’s right for you. That’s why as a personal training studio we offer one-on-one, semi-private, and small group training. And we don’t stop there, it doesn’t have to be a typical workout that you would see someone doing at a gym, it could be or it could be bodyweight work, resistance band training, Pilates or yoga work, boxing, or any multitude of other options. You are Unique, your solutions need to be unique and most of all….YOU NEED TO ENJOY WHAT YOU ARE DOING. |
