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I get to enjoy going in to work every day and talking with some of the most interesting people. Many of them I am sure think I over-analyze stuff all the time. After all I am the computer geek so it is natural to be accused of this often. I am also the guy that talks way too much about weight loss, health, and fitness to make most people happy.
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Today was no exception. I was talking about the trip up to the summer camp on the bus with the “at risk” kids on their way to be treated to loving one on one care all week. I was then asked if I “had to” go back up on Friday to bring them back. Which I responded with “No I don’t have to, I get to!” Well you know what I meant was the response. To which I explained there is a difference.
The difference is in how you approach the task. I hear it all the time from clients. The ones that “have to” do something consider the sacrifice and the work they are doing as a chore or an unwanted task. It is all about the food they miss or how tough it is to stay on track. The one’s that “get to” consider it a chance to improve their lives and their health. The things they get to do are simply part of the process towards being a better, healthier individual.
You see I am blessed. I get to go to a gym 3-5 times a week. I get to walk 2 miles during my lunches around a beautiful park and river run. I get to pay attention to what I eat. I get to compete with other walkers and runners after years of hating to run or walk any distance. I get to go up on Friday and see the faces of a group of kids that this week may be the only week this year that they feel really appreciated and blessed. They will be excited, they will be energized and they may even be a handful. I am sure that it will be another blessing to be at their service and perhaps find one more opportunity to encourage and bless them on the way.
So if that is over analyzing then I will continue to do that to. Cause, I get to choose the way I think, the way I feel, the way I handle challenge and the way I handle blessings. You see I have found out it is a lot more fun to see life as a choice instead of a “have to”. I come at it feeling empowered and motivated, instead of repressed and forced. I get to enjoy life! Hey maybe even tomorrow I will get to write another story from the joy of having a job and having people think I am cut from a different cloth than many.
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It doesn’t matter if you are thinking of being a coach or a client of a coach it is helpful to understand the reason for the need of a coach. I hear it all the time. I can do weight loss and achieve health on my own. I have one honest answer to that. If you can then why aren’t you? When you look in the mirror are you happy with what you see? Why aren’t you at your optimal health then?
You see in today’s faced paced world many of us don’t have time to focus on all the education we need to optimize our health. I know personally I have worked on this journey for 20 years before I made the decision to focus all my spare time in that direction. Sure I had to give some things up. What I have gotten back was well worth the journey. Now it is a focus and one of my biggest purposes in life. Many of my clients simply can’t devote the time. Coaches are primarily self-made, self-developed. They work on themselves continually, learning, growing, and becoming more capable and competent over the years.
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People want results. They want the most effective use of their time and commitment to their health. A good coach can make all the difference if they are wasting their time or getting the most out of it. Why do you think when people yo-yo diet they often fail their attempts to lose weight and keep it off? It is because they don’t understand what is going on within their body when they diet.
Many give up even before they lose any amount of weight because they can’t figure out how to create a plan for themselves. They simply don’t have the time for it. But do they have time for the illness that will follow if they don’t do it? No, this is where you come in as a coach. You spend the time to sort through the noise of why they are where they are now and how to get to where they want to be. You help to create an individual plan for their success. You bring the panel of experts with you to make it all work.
After you get them going then your role shifts a bit. You still measure and adjust the plan, however your main role is to believe in them and inspire them to be accountable to their plan. Your goal is to get them to believe in themselves. It is important to work towards always raising that level of belief in themselves. This by the way is another area where many dieters have given up.
Look for the next in our Why Be a Health Coach – Part 3 Who to Coach.
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Looking back this week I notice that I miss the excitement of the Olympics. There are always such great stories of human triumph that come from the many participants from the various countries. This year’s Olympics where no exception. The women’s figure skating championships by itself, was enough to get even the toughest heart to shed a tear or two. (me I was a big baby)
I can’t imagine the pressure felt by the medal winner from Korea that had her whole country behind her as long as she won. If not she would live in shame before he whole county. And I get nervous talking in front of people. She not only gave a stellar performance but she went out on a limb to woe the judges. Just one piece of bad ice could have tumbled her hopes for the gold but she went all out.
Then there was Canada’s skater who won a medal even though her mother had died there just two days before her performance. I can’t imagine the courage and discipline that it took just to suit up and put her skates on. When she blew that kiss to her mother in the heavens I was weeping and touched.
I waited for a while to write this to not distract from their time in the spotlight and to think about what it took to do those things that most of us think of as superhuman efforts. I believe it has everything to do with vision and goals. You see both young ladies had the vision to be skaters and win from a very early age. Both had to put in hour after hour of practice. They sacrificed friends, family, and time to be everyday normal kind of people to do something that takes a committed effort and persistence.
This meant that when it came time to reach their goal, they knew that they could not stop. They had to go on and do what they had come to do. That would be to give their all. I heard that story told throughout the week by many athletes. No matter what they achieved they walked away giving it everything they had. That to me is true inspiration!
What if each of us gave our lives the best we had to offer each day. Does it have to be hours and hours of practice or working towards some endeavor? Or can it just be the best we can do that day to improve ourselves and our situation? See effort looks different for different people. I remember when it took effort just to walk up the stairs. It took effort not to give up. It took effort to even keep any hope that life could change. But, when I watch the achievers I am reminded that nothing achieved comes without effort. And much of the time the effort is always rewarded.
Take a moment out today, ask yourself what one thing you would change about yourself if you could. Then find a way to change it. Olympians use trainers and coaches. They don’t do it on their own. Together as a team they reach for their ultimate “perfect performance”. They got at it again and again, doing a little better each time at whatever they do. For some they come away with a medal, for some they just come away knowing they have to do better next time or they had some bad luck during the competition. All of them can come away knowing they gave it their best and got to participate in a competition that very few can qualify for.
Where will you compete? You will you inspire? Whose life will change by something you decide to do? I can say I will never win an Olympic medal but already this year I have done things I never thought I would be able to do. This year is still young and perhaps there is at least a medal or race that I can run for my age and win. Perhaps all that I will ever take away is knowing I gave it my best, and that my dear readers is always enough.
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I often find myself giving doctors a bad rap when it comes to weight loss care and obesity treatment. I use my own experience and in the back o f my mind I start thinking “Well on all the other fronts he seems like a good doctor.” Then I run across something like this report included in this video and I am reminded that obesity is a problem on many fronts. One of which is fair treatment of the individual.
Imagine if you will walking into your doctor and telling them you have a symptom that may be extremely important if you where normal weight and they would run all kinds of tests to find out what was going on. The same symptoms on an obese person might get, oh that is just a symptom of your weight, loose some weight and lets see if it continues.
Take a look at the video clip …
Obesity doesn’t pay at the doctor’s office
Now we all know that not all doctors are the same. I don’t want to start another prejudice in this country we have enough as is. What I will say over and over again is if your doctor won’t talk honestly with you about your weight, find one that will. Do not go years with the idea it is all your fault and all you have to do is work harder and eat less. Also be wary when they go to the other extreme and tell you that you have no self control so the only answer is surgery or pills.
Find a doctor that will discuss your options fully and look at you like a regular person with a medical condition, not some one that they don’t want to take proper care of because they judge you as someone that doesn’t want to take care of yourself.
I want to thank the folks at Obesity Thunder Bay for their emails bringing this type of information to my attention. The more you know the better you can take care of yourself.
This last week was the first time in months that I was feeling so bad I had to take some time off from work and workouts. I came down with a cold or flu and just before that I had pulled something in my back during one of my last weight trainings. Reminder to self remember to stretch more. So imagine for a few short moments coughing and sneezing with your back spasms that would normally bring me to my knees if I could just get out of bed. That was just two days ago and this morning I was back up and walked out 2 miles.
No, I am no superman. I did have to dig in and find that hero I wrote about recently. I had to get back at it as soon as I was able. Why you ask? Well because it was the workouts and the weight loss that turned what would have been a full weeks worth of illness to just half a week. That’s right my recovery was faster because my body was stronger. It wasn’t hauling around an extra 100 lbs. It was not in the constantly worn down condition of no sleep and no reserves. When I got back there where still people out from the same or similar bug.
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I went and got my back adjusted as I had gotten it out of alignment. Feels much better today. Again a recovery that would normally take a couple of weeks before I would even think of going back to working out. In talking to the chiropractor we talked about recent vacations he had taken this last year and I commented that I used to think that action, fun-filled things like hiking and snorkeling where out of the question for me just one short year ago. That this last year I had hiked the Grand Canyon for the full day and loved every minute of it. I look forward to my next tropical vacation where I can get back in the water and enjoy the fish and swimming without feeling like I was going to run out of breath.
To answer the question I used for the title, I realized on my walk this morning that the way to recover is to start back at it. It doesn’t matter if it was illness or lack of weight loss that slows us down. It doesn’t matter that we are discouraged or feeling a bit let down. It matter how we overcome that feeling. It matters that we do what we can do. Last week it was keeping the hands out of the chocolate jar at work. This week it was going for a walk rather then slacking another day. All of it based on choices that stacked up over this last year that made it even possible to do it in the first place.
That’s right loosing weight and working out made me stronger and recovery was faster. Small price to pay to have along with it more energy and determination to keep going. What goal are you working on today? What are you willing and able to do to get there? Think about it and DO Something about it today!
Lincoln University in Pennsylvania makes the news with a controversial policy of making students who are at a BMI (Body Mass Index) of greater than 30 take a special one-credit gym class to graduate. No other requirements to have their weight change or anything. The class will be required to graduate and receive their diplomas. The emphasis is on walking/conditioning for the class.
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So is this yet another form of obesity prejudice and an obsession of the thin against the out of shape? Or do you think it is a good thing? What if they where to just make everyone take the class? What should a institution of learning do with 20% of their students in the obese range? Should they just leave them to their own devices or make an attempt to educate them on the possibility of losing weight and reaching a more healthful state?
I am not in the camp that being overweight you can still be healthy. I hear that argument all the time and for me I was not vital, I was not healthy, and I was not at all at the quality of life I am now. I know what morbid obesity does to the body. Sure I got up every day and did my job. I was sick more often than my less hefty co-workers, and often suffered lower energy levels. I even resulted to drinking sugar free energy drinks to keep going. I see more and more people daily dealing with the same issues and seeing the drained look on their faces. I think we need to help them find their answers to health and strength, not that it has to be a certain BMI or a certain “skinniness”. Just a state of health that doesn’t take years off their life or put them at greater risk for disease.
At the same time it doesn’t mean that obesity can or should be used to discriminate against people. However , I can say now with a more healthy weight I do get treated differently. Same person, just closer to healthy weight. My BMI is now under 30. I get treated much differently than a year ago. You can’t tell me there is no weight prejudice in our country I have lived it and see it clearly every day. The question is: What choices do we have to change it? Do we concentrate on moving towards a healthy state and just let people alone? If so what will that mean to us when we are paying for each other’s health care? I know that we suffer from an obeseogenic trend in our society. We are moving in many of our states to a population of 30% or higher that are obese or morbidly obese. We are going to have the need to find some answers.
Your time to weigh-in on the issue, What do you think? If you were going to Lincoln University or working there what would you do or say to the administration? What would you say to the 20% of the students that have to take the class?
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To continue on the idea that dieting does not have lasting results when really it is that we set our eyes on the short term effects rather than long term. If you lost the weight then the diet worked for it’s original goal. However did you have the lifestyle change and the long term desire for optimal health in mind when it was done.
See this is why diets in themselves don’t succeed for much more then 2 years. Often times even less. The goal to lose the weight was about solving the problem and not a long term outcome of being healthy. Often people won’t even take it as far as reaching their ideal weight before they go back to the same habits that got them in a obesigenic state in the first place. Obesity will continue to plague them.
This manifests in the acceptance of poor habits being ok after you have been good for a while. Motivation cannot come from a half hearted attempt to fix a problem. It must be more outcome driven. There needs to be a destination in mind to keep the journey going. You build your habits around the outcome. When you get to the top, you have a much clearer view to pick your next destination. The journey continues from a better lookout point.
Now I am not saying that dieting is not important in the journey. Having a phased approach where Phase 1 is reaching your ideal weight is essential to creating some form of destination structure. It is one of the building blocks. Or better yet it is like a runner’s starting blocks on the track. It is where it all begins. It is where the race begins. But it is soon forgotten as they run around the track to the finish line. Hopefully that will help you see that it is but one step of the journey to health. It also from a coach’s point of view gives us an opportunity for a teachable moment.
Most people that come to us to lose weight are very much problem orientated. They just want to feel better about themselves, lose some weight, make a family member or friend happy, or make a medical issue better. They want to solve a problem. They really don’t have a fixed desired outcome in mind other than a short term problem of losing the weight. They want it to work. It does and the pressure is off either a little or a lot and then it comes time to talk about how good it can be now that they are moving in the right direction.
Next we can talk about how to keep motivated to go the distance to optimal health and longevity. We will talk about how to set yourself up to feel better and live longer than just a short term goal.
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