#28 Get married*This is a featured page


In the first lesson of a business course during my undergraduate degree, the lecturer opened the class to 200 odd students with “Only one person in this room will ever become a major corporation CEO…and that person is most probably me.”

For a future CEO I can tell you that he wasn’t very inspiring.

But once you look past the arrogance he did have a good point, and I can relate this to fitness. “Only one person on this email will ever be considered an elite athlete…but no it will definitely not be me (my knees have already retired and moved to the Gold Coast).”

Elite athletes are few for one of two reasons (or both):
1. They were born with better gross motor (physical) skills than the rest of us.
2. Their brain is wired differently. Basically that they want it more than the rest of us.

The second one is of most interest for us, because you can’t really change your genetics. One major sportswear company (their name escapes me at the moment…somebody help me out) has the slogan “to be the best you just have to work the hardest”.

But in order to work the hardest you have to want it more than the others…and that is completely psychological. So below are two psychological tricks and tips I have learned as a personal trainer that may help you train that little bit harder, and get a lot better results.

1. Count down not up

If you are only going to learn one thing from this email, make sure this is it.

Typically, most people have been schooled to count up. For example if you are doing a set of 10 repetitions, you will count 1,2,3,4,5…..10.

This is fine…if you do all 10. But more than often what happens is you get to say 8 repetitions and your brain is thinking “well 8 out of 10 is good enough”, and you stop.

But if you had been counting down 10,9,8,7….1 instead of up, at the same point your brain would be thinking “I only have 2 to go” and you will complete them. Those extra 2 repetitions just made all the difference to your results.

This theory also works for cardio. If you are going for a run, use a countdown timer instead of a stopwatch. If you have to get to a certain distance within half an hour, you are much more likely to push yourself when your brain thinks “there is only 5 minutes to go and counting”, rather than “you have just run 25 minutes it is time for a rest”.

2. Get Married*

It is probably about time I explained why I called this fitness tip “Get married”

Well basically I have trained some very motivated people in my time, from elite athletes to armed forces soldiers, but no one… and I mean no one in my experience is more motivated to get in the best shape they can than a woman who has their wedding coming up.

I have banged on about goal setting in many of these tips, and I will keep banging on about it until you all set a goal that is measurable, within a set timeframe, then reach it.

Training for a wedding is a great example of goal setting with a set timeframe, but obviously not all of us can look forward to getting in to a frilly white dress.

Whatever goal works for you…just set one…today. Or I will come around and let all the gas out of your office chair.

Myself, on the weekend I set a goal of training outdoors at the famous Venice ‘Muscle’ Beach during my trip to California in July.

No matter what I do between now and then, I will still probably the smallest guy out there, but the fact of knowing that I have pushed myself as hard as I could for three months leading up to it will be enough for me.

* As this tip has been prepared without considering your objectives, marital situation or needs, you should, before acting on this advice, consider its appropriateness to your circumstances.

Bonus just for fun…15 questions to determine if you are a fitness freak

  1. Have you ever made yourself so sore that it either takes you a full minute to sit on the toilet or you have to fall down onto it?
  2. Have you ever broken a bone and tried to "train around it.”?
  3. Have you ever mentally calculated the protein content of a piece of your own birthday cake?
  4. If you had the chance would you vote for Arnold Schwarzenegger regardless of his views, policies or even what he's running for?
  5. Does everybody you know ask you to help them when they move because you can lift heavy things?
  6. Does Navy Seal training "look like fun”?
  7. Do you ever have to scratch your nose in the middle of a set and you use the weight to scratch it?
  8. Can you remember your personal best for 76 different exercises but can't remember your family and friends birthdays?
  9. Do you do bicep curls with your grocery bags as you bring them in?
  10. Do you need to go to therapy if you miss two workouts in a row?
  11. Does the thought of lifting a car sound perfectly reasonable to you?
  12. Have you ever clocked the calorie counter on a cardio machine back around to zero?
  13. Do you have to add extra weight to a machine because there's just not enough weight on it for you?
  14. Are you regularly the very first, very last, or only person in your gym?
  15. Have you've laughed at any one of the items in this list because it describes you perfectly?

Til next month,

Chris

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