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Information isn’t always enough

INFORMATION ISN’T ENOUGH

If everyone has the information, why isn’t everyone ripped? Surely, there is more to success than information. Information and implementation are different things.

There are things that matter more than information, like connection. Studies demonstrate better outcomes for patients who like their doctors, even if the exact same therapeutic intervention is applied as those who don’t care for their provider.

Personal training is similar. I can write you a program, but there are situations in which an exercise video isn’t enough to really understand the exercise. A good coach can make small adjustments to your program based on your training response, something that takes years to master.

A lot of learning occurs on a pre-verbal level. While I can use all the right words, motor memory is an implicit understanding. It’s one thing to understand something conceptually, but quite another to intuit what it means.

Yes, having accurate information is essential, but without the emotional element there isn’t any motivation to do it. You have to be fully invested, and your coach should be fully invested in YOU.

Write a caption... INFORMATION ISN’T ENOUGH

If everyone has the information, why isn’t everyone ripped? Surely, there is more to success than information. Information and implementation are different things.

There are things that matter more than information, like connection. Studies demonstrate better outcomes for patients who like their doctors, even if the exact same therapeutic intervention is applied as those who don’t care for their provider.

Personal training is similar. I can write you a program, but there are situations in which an exercise video isn’t enough to really understand the exercise. A good coach can make small adjustments to your program based on your training response, something that takes years to master.

A lot of learning occurs on a pre-verbal level. While I can use all the right words, motor memory is an implicit understanding. It’s one thing to understand something conceptually, but quite another to intuit what it means.

Yes, having accurate information is essential, but without the emotional element there isn’t any motivation to do it. You have to be fully invested, and your coach should be fully invested in YOU.

Pairing exercises is an art that requires attention to equipment available, forethought into position changes and relative loads being used, as well as consideration given to what muscles are being worked. Ideally, you want to pair non-overlapping muscle groups, and neither exercise should be so fatiguing that it effects performance on the other.

Jamie has been training with me for nearly a year-and-a-half. She absolutely crushes it in her consistency and effort. These pictures were taken a year apart. Whether she felt like it or not, Jamie showed up for her workouts. That, if anything, is the key to her success.

We were able to focus on gradual, incremental progress; rather than crash diets or 6-week challenges. Now she’s one of my strongest female clients, and it shows.

Real changes happen gradually, through doing the same thing over and over. It doesn’t happen with a 30-day plank challenge or a detox. There isn’t a shortcut that isn’t overtly harmful. Sustainable changes require consistency and discipline, and while that may sound boring, the process becomes pleasurable in itself. You start doing it for its own sake. From there on out, it’s on autopilot.

A good reminder to manage your expectations and think for yourself. It is possible to outgrow your trainer, and that is fine. It’s a disservice to you and your trainer to maintain a relationship that isn’t beneficial for either party. This also goes for friends, colleagues, lovers, and even family members — difficult as that may seem. I’m a different person every year, even every day, as my understanding deepens. Things that I may have said 5 years ago may not apply now, and that isn’t a contradiction. It is expansion and growth. Many trainers (and people in general) don’t allow themselves to change and evolve even if they know better, because they have to much investment in their old modes of thinking. That’s a dead trainer. Find one that’s alive, and when you aren’t getting what you need, move on. As much as it pains me to say this, that applies to me, too.

OBESITY: It’s NOT your fault, but it IS your responsibility. I think it is more useful to think about obesity as a mental disorder (through no fault of the person suffering) rather than a purely biological one. That isn’t a case of “blaming the victim,” as the psychological coping mechanisms used to face a world that seems overwhelming are largely unconscious. They are a product of biology, dysfunctional families, and broken societies. While the medical model tries to address it in purely biological terms, it never gets to the route of the problem. In many cases, obesity is a way to deal with a series of negative experiences for which food provides an escape. In other cases, the sufferer is medicating significant trauma. The vast majority of obese individuals come from impoverished backgrounds, where the burden of life is so unbearable that high-calorie food seems like a ready escape. Almost in no situation is it just a matter of genes and hormones. Obesity is complicated. Is is a reflection of a dysfunctional lifestyle and unconscious behaviors that were adopted way before you knew any better, which are now so deeply entrenched that you can’t see the pattern. There are fantastic medications available now, but they don’t solve the route problem, which, if not addressed, condemns you to be reliant on them all your life. Medications are a bridge. They get the situation under control while you figure things out. You are a victim of your biology. You are the creator of it.

FITNESS FACTS:

1. Unless you are diabetic, glycemic index isn’t something you should be worried about. You shouldn’t be using a continuous glucose monitor if you don’t know how to interpret it.
2. While dehydration MAY cause muscle cramps, a much bigger factor is doing something that challenges a muscle beyond its capacity. When you do something your body isn’t adapted to, cramps can happen, and water or electrolytes won’t fix it.
3. While sleep, stress, nutrition, and consistency all play a part in your performance, you will have days when your performance is dogsh*t for no reason. Adjust accordingly, and try not to over-analyze it.