Are You REALLY Motivated?

As health and fitness professionals we're often seen by our clients as an almost limitless source of motivation and inspiration that can be called upon to help them reach practically any of their health, fitness and lifestyle goals.

Whenever they're feeling stuck, unmotivativated or at a low-ebb they want, no, expect their instructors, trainers and coaches to say, do or be whatever is necessary to get them back on track and feeling great about themselves and their goals again.

And generally, we accomplish exactly that.

We say the things that need to be said, we do the things that need to be done and, with a cheery smile and an 'I know you can do this', we help lift our clients out of the dip they're in so that they can move onto bigger and better things.

So far, so good right?

After all, a happy, smiling client is what being in a service profession is all about... isn't it?

Well, not exactly.

I mean, yes, we want happy clients and we want definitely them to feel that the time, money and effort that they're investing in us is being well spent, but measuring our success solely by the happiness and results of our clients is the quickest way to ensure that we'll lose heart, burn out and, in all likelihood, end up quitting the profession altogether.

Just like the thousands upon thousands who do exactly that every year.

And surprisingly, it’s not the poor quality trainers and instructors who decide that it’s time to call it a day and quit. No, it’s the most motivated, most passionate and most dedicated of the profession who, after doing exactly as they were trained to do and helping others to achieve their goals, decide that they’ve got nothing left to give. So they quit, and the reasons they give for doing so are many, yet surprisingly similar.

“I’m just too tired”
“I’ve lost my passion”
“I’m not enjoying it any more”
“I’m struggling to pay my bills”

And, the most common reason to quit of them all “I don’t have any life outside of work!”

Make no mistake about it, quitting or even thinking of quitting comes from not taking care of the one thing that matters most in the trainer/client relationship.

Ourselves.

You see, it’s all fine and dandy saying that we’re super motivators and that we really add to the lives of our clients, but that’s only a good thing if we can do that without taking away from our lives.

Abraham Lincoln once said “You cannot help the poor by become one yourself” and this holds true in more than just the monetary sense.

If you have no passion, you can’t help people find theirs.



Ditto for motivation, energy or, indeed, any quality you can name. If you don’t have an abundant store of it yourself, then your ability to help others is greatly reduced until one day, just like an overdrawn bank account, you find that when you most need it, there’s none left. Your credit is all dried up.

At that point we’re of no use to anyone. Not the client and certainly not ourselves.

That’s the point that we take our most cherished dreams of making a difference, put them all in a box and move on to pastures new, convinced that this personal training ‘thing’ just wasn’t right for us.

That’s the bad news.

Yet, that’s not the way is has to be. In fact, if you take Lincoln’s quote and reverse it you’ll find that the answer to this problem is very simple.

Very simple indeed.

You help others by becoming rich. Not just in money (though that’ll be a likely result of doing what I’m about to explain) but in time, in passion, in energy and in motivation.

In fact, the more of these things you have, the more you’ll be able to give away without weakening yourself.

But how do you get them?

Easy!

There are five steps to follow that, if you follow them all, will make you the most passionate, motivated and successful trainer around and, if others results are anything to go by, the wealthiest too.

Step One: Create an excellence strategy that allows you to continually improve yourself, your work and your life on a day to day basis. The Japanese call this ‘Kaizen’ meaning constant and never-ending improvement, and it features highly in the lives of practically every successful person you’ll ever meet or hear of.

And it’s not just about how well you do your work.

How do you dress? How do you talk? How do you communicate? Who do you associate with?

When you’re on a path to excellence, you begin to create a life that is beyond the grey ordinariness that most people tolerate and make the conscious decision to settle only for the ‘extra’ ordinary.

Step Two: Develop and maintain a gatekeeper strategy to keep energy leeches and undesirables out of your work and out of your life. I know it sounds horrible when put that way but nevertheless it’s true; some people are simply so toxic that they contaminate us with their negativity or stinkin’ thinkin’.

Create an ideal client ‘recipe’ so that you can identify those who bring out the best in you and make it your business to ONLY work with those who fit it. This means, of course, that if you already have toxic clients in your life then you’ll need to let them go too.

Sounds like a tough call, but the truth is that as soon as they’re gone you’ll get your passion back and start to attract the very people you want more of.

Step Three: Develop a fashion for passion by only working at the times, places and with the people you most want to work with and who fit your Unique Market Identity (UMI).

This means that if your passion is kids fitness then don’t take on adults, if your passion is outdoor training then don’t confine yourself to a gym and if your passion is to go out in the evenings to the theatre or to play or watch sport, then don’t take on evening clients.

Sounds obvious, but we never really think of this and instead resort to what I call WAP marketing where we will literally take on anyone with a Wallet And a Pulse, even though this ends up costing us our free time, our relationships, our hobbies, our passions and eventually, our careers.

By maintaining your fashion for passion, you’ll always be playing at the top of your game and the results (and income) you’ll gain will be far greater than you’ll ever get by going through the motions.

Step Four: Know where the finish line is and what it looks like. Imagine running in a race where you were simply told to run and keep running until you were told to stop.

Wouldn’t be that much fun would it?

In fact, it’d seem rather pointless to most people.

Yet that is the situation that most fitness professionals find themselves in. Working harder and harder for longer and longer hours without ever knowing for sure when ‘the race’ will be over. It’s no wonder they lose heart!

Yet, the simple action of defining the finish line either by saying “I’ll take a vacation every 12-16 weeks” or “Once I’ve earned £10,000 I’ll go lie on a beach somewhere” gives us a very definite finish line and can serve as the motivation and inspiration required to keep us going during the tougher times that we’ll all surely face on occasion.

Step Five: Know what winning looks like. It’s shocking to think that although most fitness professionals complain about their lack of success in either the profession or life in general, that it is only the rare few that have any idea of what their definition of success looks like anyway.

This means, of course, that even if success walked up and bit them on the backside, they’d hardly notice and, instead, complain that they never seem to get what they want.

Yet, it’s the very act of defining success that will, ultimately, make that success a reality as you’ll then be able to plot your course more accurately and measure the effectiveness of the various strategies you employ over time. Are they bringing you closer? Further away?

In his book The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People, Dr Stephen Covey calls this ‘beginning with the end in mind’ and reminds us that as long as we know what the end is supposed to look like, we will, assuming we continue to take steps, eventually get there, and knowing that we will we remain happy and motivated along journey.


In Conclusion

People often talk about motivation or ‘being motivated’ without really stopping to think about what the word actually means. In fact, I often ask the fitness professionals that I present to around the world to describe or define motivation and rarely, if ever, is the correct answer given.

Motivation is simply the factors which cause an organism to behave or act in either a goal-seeking or satisfying manner.

Goal-seeking.

Satisfying.

If you’re not working toward a goal that satisfies or will ultimately satisfy you, then you lack motivation. No if’s, no but’s. And if you lack motivation, then just what is it that you think you’re giving to your clients when you work with them? It’s worth thinking about!

I challenge you then, to put the five steps of motivation into practice with immediate effect and use them consistently for just thirty days then send me an email to tell me how you got on. If you’re like all the other fitness professionals I’ve taught this to, you’ll be stunned by the change in your life in such a short space of time.

Dax

P.S - You can learn more about adding excellence to YOUR life by visiting http://www.personaltrainersuccessacademy.com/curriculum.htm