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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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Don’t read this set of articles, if you don’t enjoy working with people. Don’t read them if you haven’t got time to spend with people. Last but not least, don’t read these articles if you don’t believe that you can make an impact on others performance. A coach has to be willing to go beyond their comfort zone and learn they can’t control others and they have to think differently.
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Many people who experience some level of success have a coach or a mentoring relationship. Health and fitness are no different. A health coach teaches people to build on their successes, work on their skills, come up with a plan, monitor important milestones, and stay on top of the feelings that go along with it.
When talking about success on any journey we have to remember that success is never an accident. It takes planning, training, commitment and monitoring. The dictionary defines a coach as someone who trains people in order for them to prepare. Wouldn’t we prepare them for success? What better success could be achieved that optimal health and fitness? My goal as a health coach is to improve your performance in all of the areas of health. Do it in a planned and tested way and offer guidance. But like all forms of coaching, the steps of the journey are still up to the person being coached.
In order to facilitate success a coach should have a range of learning experiences to draw from to help their client bring about improvement. I honestly believe that the most successful coaches are either very teachable themselves (intense observers and learners) or they have walked the same journey before themselves. Take a coach that has both and you have a power-packed combination of skills to assist and guide others.
Check Back for Part 2 – Why be a Health Coach? Health Coaches Role
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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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Seems to be a lot more written lately about if being slim means that you are in better physical condition. I find this question lacking in common sense actually. Why? Because it relates to the idea of physical fitness. Not to how you are doing physically. Over the years as I had become bigger and my obesity started to really take it’s toll, I was often more active than many people my age. Now looking at me you would not have guessed it because at almost 3/4 of my height inches around my waist. I worked out each week. Many of my friends did not. I would often work harder in group situations than many of the people that where thinner and even younger.
You could say I had more endurance than some, but still I wasn’t physically fit. I could not have run a mile to save my life. Three miles before work like yesterday would have been out of the question. First of all I could not have done 3 miles in one setting walking or running. Giving it my best still would have wiped me out for the day. So active is not always fit. And slim is not always active. How to measure fitness?
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1. Determine if you are talking medical fitness or endurance fitness. Medical fitness can be tested and measured as well as endurance fitness. Each one is a different set of tests. Medical fitness is measured with things like blood tests, having check-ups, body fat percentages, and various other measurements of healthy body. Put them all together and you have a measurable results that tells you if you are healthy or not. Physical fitness has other tests. Length of workouts, recovery, intensity, endurance, and the list goes on. It too can be measured and tracked. If physical fitness is not being worked on, it is dropping.
2.Decide what needs to change. If you are at your ideal weight (determined by you and someone you trust) than you may need to look at the other forms of testing. Are there areas of either physical fitness or medical fitness that you need to look at? Start working on them and perhaps you can combine the two for “optimal health”. If you weight needs to change, stop fighting it and work on weight loss. If you have no endurance then exercise and come up with a plan to change it. If you have no ideas, than ask for help. It is available here and many other place on the net. Make a change.
3. Lastly stop making excuses for yourself. I hear it all the time. On of my favorites is that BMI charts are old science and have no bearing in truth. So frigging what! Adjust it for your body type and muscle mass and figure out if you are in shape or get your body fat measured. Stop using it as an excuse for not doing the work to reach a healthful state. Same with exercise. Here it is I am too out of shape or it takes too much time. How will that change if you don’t change something? As far as time goes you can pack life changing fitness into 20 mins a day or less. So time is not the issue. Commitment is! Way out of shape? Start slow and keep ramping it up till you get where you want to be.
You are not too big, too old, too young, too timid, too out of shape or too anything to not change something to make an improvement. You may need some help to get started. You may need a kick start on your weight loss or your physical program. You may even need some one like our team to teach and encourage you. But you can do it! You can reach optimal health no matter where you are now. And optimal health is the best that your body can do for the condition it is in, not in comparison to someone else and their abilities.
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One of the great advantages in blogging is the people you meet. Over the last year I have gotten to know various health care professionals, fitness people, life and weight loss coaches, hypnotherapists, and other various versions of people that are interested in weight loss and optimal health. Top that off with working with clients, learning and teaching, support groups, and the research that it takes to keep up with it, I finally feel like we can start putting it all together.
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I wanted to start out with the various folks that have followed my journey from morbid obesity and stuck with me over the last year or so and offer it up to them first. I am looking for those of you that want to be contributors to the blog and therefore the newsletter. I talk with so many passionate people that have something to teach on weight loss and fitness that just need a place to express it. It is time to start putting it down and archiving it. America needs to hear the facts on obesity. I am not convinced they need to hear the judgment and condemnation that goes with it from some. But, I am convinced that there are more than enough people that have made the journey that want to help others.
This weekend I have added the news letter sign-up again to the site. If you go to subscription options you can set it for everything from each post to a monthly newsletter. It is easily subscribed to and opted out if needed. I can tell you unless I get a graphics person it will have to evolve a while before it becomes pretty. Having said all that I can say that if you like the blog, you will like the newsletter as that will be where it comes from. We will throw in some extras along the way for those that subscribe when we can. We will see how it goes.
I am sure we will start out slow, but I am also sure that as some of the team gets the hang of it that you will find it an honest place to get information that will inspire, motivate and inform you on your weight loss journey.
Thanks for being apart of this new stretch for me as I reach out one more way to help people have the hope and faith that morbid obesity is not the “final answer”. It can be overcome! We can turn the tide and make sure our future children and grandchildren don’t live shorter life spans than we will.
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Well this week was a down week for me. After running a 5k, keeping up with a walking competition at work and traveling every night it finally all caught up with me this weekend. No I didn’t get the dreaded H1N1 but I did come down with a doosey of a cold. Aches and pain, stuffy nose and congestion all rolled into one. You can push your body till your body pushes back. So I got a few days off. I still did some walking to help clear my lungs and today I did do the Nike+ routine I am working with to work on my running form. Fortunately today was an easy workout.
Great thing about all of the recent workouts and hard work is that even though I was sick I recovered quickly and felt much stronger by the 3rd day than I would normally. Given that I am in a high risk group with all the changes in the last year and my age I suppose that beats the heck out of the alternatives.
Oh just to show the world doesn’t stop when you are down for the count I picked up two new health coaches to help with the goal to help more people this next year. They are coming on strong and excited to work with folks to finish this year strong and start out their new year even stronger and more committed. This will be a year to see people loose 1000’s of pounds and get off meds and live longer and fuller lives.
So the race is on, here is to the continued journey and the ultimate goals that each of us have for the soon to be dawning new year. Come on and join us!
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I was talking to one of the doctors on our team last night and asked the question on how it would be best to introduce a weight loss program to a doctor who had not seen it before. What I found may surprise you a bit.
I was told that it is close to impossible to get into a doctor’s office these days. That it didn’t even matter if you where a pharmaceutical rep, you would probably not get in unless you knew them personally. She suggested that our doctors are very busy people and they don’t like to be sold to. I said then how do they find out about programs or new therapies that may assist their patient care? Answer: They either read about it or get curious themselves or hear it from a patient or another doctor.
I had asked this question because we found out in Seattle that the doctors where very hard to get into their offices. Now the ones we did get into already knew the nurse that I was working with and readily admitted they did not have a weight loss solution for their patients. For instance they told us that the average OB/GYN patient having a baby put on more than 50 extra lbs per pregnancy and often that 50 lbs was still there when they became pregnant with baby number two and added even more weight.
So what advice does the medical profession offer? Eat less, exercise more. Or surgery is the other option. Then even with surgery you need to go directly to a bariatric clinic to have that offered because your family doctor most likely will not offer that solution either (mine didn’t even with a BMI of 43). Very few offer any kind of program for lifestyle change and weight loss coaching what so ever. That is why we do what we do. My personal experience was that my doctor never offered me any real solution except medications. Those very same medications had side effects that may help my blood pressure but they would also most likely slow my weight loss attempts even further.
What is a person to do? When they go looking there is all kinds of snake oil and potions. How are they to know? Doctors say eat less. Physical trainers say you can work it off. Then there is the lap bands and gastric bypass solutions. But no one offers a planed program that gets the weight off quickly and easily. Heck no wonder it took me over 20 years to find a solution to my weight even though it has been available for nearly 30 years.
Down 94 lbs and in better shape than I have been in 30 years and it took me less than 7 months to do it. No surgery, no diet pills, and now with the weight off I can concentrate on physical training and continue to improve my longevity and optimize my health. Is your doctor giving you an answer on what to do with your health or are they just giving you another pill? Share your story with me, I would like to know. Have questions about how to have your doctor help you? Just ask I have the information that if really looked at will show them how effective our program is.
Contact us now if you want more information we love to help new people reach their goals.
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