Fit2Fat2Fit (15 page)

My body was revolting: my legs were burning, my lungs felt as if they were going to explode, and I could already feel the soreness my body would punish me with the next day.

But the physical pain was nothing compared to how my mind felt. I had unnatural thoughts about hurting my brother and crazy ideas about how to force him to end the hike. I also considered numerous excuses, each a little more far-fetched than the last, to manipulate him into taking it easy. In the end, though, the best I could muster was to play on his sympathies, talking about how trying the journey was and the tremendous toll it was taking on my physical and mental health.

And yet … we continued up the trail. Erik toyed with my emotions by repeatedly telling me we were going to go only a bit farther, only to let minutes pass before he spoke again. But still I followed him.

By the time my brother stopped and turned around, I was profusely sweating, and my legs felt like jelly. I hadn't fully caught my breath since the bottom of the trail, and I wasn't sure I could make it back to our car. Then I looked around and realized just how far we had walked—and it was a long way. I had accomplished this; I had hiked farther than I could have hoped for, given my unfit state, and I felt an enormous amount of pride.

As my brother passed by me and started the trek back, I loyally followed him downhill. On my way down, something struck me: I hadn't gotten myself up the mountain at all. If I'd had my way, I would still be lying on the couch, working only my finger muscles as I channel-surfed.

My brother had pushed me into action, gently but determinedly forcing me out of my comfort zone. It was a strange feeling. In the past, I'd always been up for a challenge—the harder the better. But for one of the first times in my life, I would have chosen to do nothing on this day. And yet I did something—more than I would have thought possible. But only because someone knew what I needed more than I did. And that someone made sure I got it—in spite of myself.

There's no rulebook for personal training. To the best of my knowledge, no author has penned
Personal Training for Dummies
. Sure, there are classes and certifications, primarily focused around providing proper instruction, technique, and safety.

But taking on the mental and emotional challenges of a client is not something to be found in a certification. Not because those challenges aren't important, but because they're hard to quantify and even harder to manage. And yet, above all other characteristics, a personal trainer's approach to the emotional/mental aspect of fitness is what distinguishes one of us from another.

You have the screamers—militant personal trainers who believe they can scare any individual into proper fitness (and probably scare the actual weight off in the process). In shouting their commands, they generate a sore throat, concerned stares of passersby, and genuine fear in their clientele.

On the other end of the spectrum you have the healers—the walking version of
Chicken Soup for the Soul
. These trainers utter encouraging words of support, along with inspirational slogans and stories to stir the deepest motivation in their trainees.

I took a different approach—I was the jack of all trades. I tried almost everything under the sun to get my clients to reach their fitness goals. While I never resorted to out-and-out screaming or to visualizations, I
did
use a vast array of weapons to get my clients to take necessary steps for their own health.

If particular clients were down on themselves, I would try to pick them up through encouragement. I'd tell them that I believed in them, and that they could accomplish anything they put their mind to. If they were feeling lazy or not engaged, I would challenge their commitment to the cause, explaining that only they could truly change their lifestyle. I would be excited when they accomplished even the smallest of sets, hoping that they'd be encouraged and motivated to continue. When that didn't work, I would try guilt. And if that failed too, I'd feign exasperation (or let my real exasperation show).

No matter how many tactics I used, the results were spotty at best. Some clients listened for a while, but even they lost my message as time wore on. Others seemed impervious to my every approach, suspiciously countering any new tactic I tried to employ.

Yet after I gained 70-plus pounds, I realized exactly what the problem had been. I had come to believe, in the old days, that I just hadn't found the right “message” that would speak to my clients. I stubbornly believed that my own breakthrough as a personal trainer was just one more training session away. I was going to find the magic formula.

Well, I was wrong. The epiphany was not just a session away. Personal trainers can be a lot of things, but they're only one piece of the puzzle. And not the most important piece either. To truly change your approach to health, a support network is essential.

As I said before, when I was fit I believed that a person who is overweight simply needed to decide to get in shape and the rest would fall into place. When I was unfit and working toward becoming healthy, I woke up every day doubting what I could accomplish and trying my best to do as little as I could. I knew what my goals were, because I had mapped them out. I also had the knowledge and know-how to reach those goals. And yet it was a struggle every day.

In fact, if left to my own devices, I'd have made more wrong decisions than right ones. I'd have rationalized that an extra day off wouldn't be a problem. I'd have become my own worst enemy (and at times I was) in my fight to become fit.

Taking control of your health is quite literally a fight for your life. Now, having experienced being overweight firsthand, I understand both the importance and the difficulty of that fight. Your mind and body work against you every day, making what should be simple decisions very difficult, and enticing you with quick fixes, lazy days, and unhealthy choices that feel a little too easy to make.

It's in those dark moments of choice that a strong, established support network is vital. The support group can be made up of one or many. They can be family, friends, or a mix of both. But they have to be individuals who provide you with two things that you won't be able to provide yourself consistently every single day of the journey to becoming healthy—honesty and belief. And more importantly, they must be intimately involved in your journey; they have to know when you're struggling or need a dose of honesty or encouragement, sometimes even before you realize you need it.

This support network requires two parts in order to develop into the final key of your success; one comes from them, the other comes from you.

Prior to the birth of our first child, Lynn and I had extensive conversations about the type of parents we would be. We openly wondered which of us would be the disciplinarian, laying down the law at any given moment. Which one would melt like a Popsicle in the summer when our kids flashed their “puppy dog eyes” at us? And who would be the brave soul able to stomach the nightmares, colds, and flus that were sure to greet us?

When I was growing up, my mom and dad fell into different roles. I adjusted to those roles and knew who to go to, and for what reason.

Mom was there for the “softer” stuff—whether it be a hug, taking care of a scraped knee, or offering a cold cloth in the midst of a bout of stomach flu. Mom knew how to care, and how to make sure that we had everything we needed when things weren't going well. And she believed in and encouraged me, even when I was full of self-doubt.

Dad, on the other hand, was the pusher. He drove me to do more and to be more. He made sure that I was pushing myself in my sports and activities of choice, with a slightly stern approach. Yet his prodding made me try a little harder to reach my own goals.

He was also the disciplinarian. I wouldn't have been fearful of bringing home a poor report card with less than glowing marks to Mom. She would probably have gotten me a snack and told me to try a bit harder. Dad, on the other hand, kept me on the straight and narrow. He pushed when he needed to, and made me see the consequences of my actions. Tough love was a necessity, helping me to see the “reality” of the world and make appropriate decisions.

In truth, I so eagerly talked to Lynn about the various roles we would fill for our own children because I realized how important the balance that I'd had was. I'd had a yin and a yang growing up: I was in constant balance between someone padding the corners and someone else pushing me into them so that I'd learn to avoid them for myself. For my own children, I was anxious to keep that balance, even if it meant that Lynn would inherit the role of disciplinarian and I would be there with the princess Band-Aids.

Whether we're small children, unruly teenagers, confused young adults, or busy and distracted adults, something inside of us craves balance. Needing both sides of the equation, we tend to shy away from extremes.

So why should our approach to health and fitness be any different? Our bodies and minds react poorly to diets and exercise routines that require unsettling extremes. We search instead for options that balance our need to be healthy with our busy lives and time constraints.

We want great nutrition but don't want to break the bank to achieve it. We want healthy meals without having to cut our work down to part-time to find the time to prepare them. In other words, balance is essential.

Yet too often we approach a new nutritional goal or exercise routine out of balance. Taking a radical approach is a risk. Not only do we quickly realize that a three-hour lentil dish isn't feasible on a Wednesday night or that 90 minutes of cardio kickboxing is ill-advised (for both time and health reasons), but it becomes painfully obvious that our unbalanced approach isn't sustainable for the long haul. This is not to say that we shouldn't push ourselves. We should. But it's critical to realize that our chances of success are much greater when we have the necessary support. Part of balance is realizing that alone we're vulnerable; we need those around us to rally, encourage, and catch us before we spin too far in any one direction. We need our yin and our yang—our encouragement and our accountability.

The journey to fitness is one of self-doubt. Every day you're confronted with images of individuals in better shape and in better control of their own health. You come face to face with bad habits, strange cravings, and newly discovered weak areas. You're constantly reminded of how you ended up in your current state, and how quickly you could fall back into the same destructive patterns.

There will be moments when you don't believe it's possible to accomplish everything you set out to do. It's in those moments—the ones when you physically, mentally, or emotionally feel yourself failing—that you need a yin, an encourager.

That's not to say that you need an enabler—someone who's going to excuse you for breaking down too often in your meal plans, or skipping a week's worth of exercising. My parents, no matter how encouraging, never gave us the option of giving up or failing—they just made it easier to succeed.

An encourager will be there to listen on the difficult days and to remind you why you're on the journey in the first place. If the lentil dinner is making you rethink your new nutrition plan or the cardio workout led to a minor injury, the encourager will be entrenched in the journey with you, willing you to push through one more day or to prepare another week's worth of meals (or even to steer you away from the processed foods in the grocery store).

The encourager also knows your weak points and understands the emotional and mental struggle that being overweight (and trying to become fit) encompasses. He or she sees where you're slipping before you do and can give a supportive nudge to get you back on track.

But too much encouragement can be a problem in the journey back to health—because, as human beings, we know how to push the buttons of the encourager and to play on his or her sympathies when we're at our lowest. Hence the need of a yang, and with it the accountability.

For as much as we need to be understood as we fight for our health, we sometimes need a kick in the pants. We fall into ruts, or accept that it's okay to take a day off from the gym or have a cheat day with fast food. At those moments no amount of simple encouragement will get us back on track. We need tough love.

The disciplinarians in your life will provide you with a dose of honesty that you desperately need. No, they won't push it so far as to become demotivators, but they'll remind you of why you're on the journey and point out that you're not going to reach your goals without hard work.

Disciplinarians pull you off the couch and to the gym when you really want to stay home, and they keep you from the fast-food restaurant when a Happy Meal seems to be the only worthwhile goal in life. In short, they don't accept your excuses and don't let you keep yourself from success. They will you to succeed when it's easiest to give up.

Interestingly, both roles have one thing in common: they push you forward. A support team to better health has nothing to do with excusing poor choices, applauding a break in your exercise routine, or telling you that “no one will know” if you cheat. That's not support; it's a one-way ticket back to your old ways and waistline.

The true yin and yang of support provide encouragement and discipline in equal parts, and both keep you on track toward your goals. Like the balance you require in your workouts, you need balance in your support network to truly change your lifestyle.