The other night my husband and I had another couple over for dinner. At one point in the conversation my husband started to talk about how in high school he never enjoyed sports. He never got into any athletics and loathed physical education class. Yet today he loves to hike, bike and walk. Before his knee started giving me so much trouble, he could often be found at the gym on his lunch break.
When he made the statement, my mind drifted back to my school days. I’ve already shared a little bit with you about my elementary school P.E. trauma. In high school, I also dreaded any type of physical education class. I identified with that scene in the opening credits of “Daria” where the volleyball goes whizzing past her as she makes a half hearted attempted to bump it with her hand. There was no way if you had told me THEN what I am TODAY that I would have believed you.
What happened was I reinvented myself. Not necessarily on purpose, but a transformation none the less. When I started this journey to get healthy and fit, that was the goal. Nothing more, nothing less. I felt bad and I wanted to feel good. I didn’t like the way I looked and I wanted to fix it. At the time, in my mind, those two things had nothing to do with reinventing who I was as a person.
However, that is exactly what had to happen for me to be successful. I couldn’t live the old life (going out all the time, late night dinners in diners and an erratic schedule) with the old attitudes (I don’t want to look silly, I don’t want to fail, I don’t want to get up early or change anything about how I live) and be a healthy and fit person. They simply didn’t work together.
I think this is where most people hit a roadblock. They want to have all the benefits of living healthy and fit without actually living that life. Sorry, it just doesn’t work that way. At least not in the long term. If you are going to lose weight, feel good and keep it that way then paradigms have to shift.
I think by framing it those terms, it helps me better communicate with clients the reality facing them on their journey to reach their goals. Sure, the idea of “reinventing yourself” can be a little scary. It’s unknown territory. What brings most clients to me, though, is that they are unhappy with some aspect of themselves or their life. So if someone is unhappy with something that should be a signal to change it. Yet most people don’t get the connection between their underlying lifestyle and their overall health and fitness. As a trainer, it really is my job to help them start connecting those dots and making those shifts.
I guess that is one of the reasons why I say diets don’t work. Diets are temporary and address something on the surface. They give you a map that you don’t really think about, you just follow. In most cases, they have nothing to do with creating new habits, just temporary steps for you to follow to a finite point. Once you’re there, you are back on your own with the same habits and behaviors that caused you to be unhealthy and unfit in the first place.
Reinventing yourself is not something that happens over night. For me the transformation happened over many years. That is part of the reason I call this is a journey. Your destination will not be reached in a matter of days or weeks. It takes time for a true transformation to occur. That is what I seek to help my clients find-their healthy and fit self through transformation.
