Is Your Inner Coach Positive? Re-tune That Dialog

This week I had an aha moment and decided to blog about it and help YOU if you need to hear this. Energy Fitness recently was hired for our personal training and nutrition coaching services by two clients that need to make some significant positive life changes. For many years when we were located in Memphis, TN we had decided that our programs were not right for clients that needed to lose more than 60 pounds. Now that we are in Greenville, South Carolina/Travelers Rest area somehow we have decided to give this demographic another chance.

My aha moment came hearing each of them lead conversations with me or one of my trainers with LOTS of self deprecating and negative talk. They also seemed to be just frustrated with their body during certain movements by either having pain in the knees or the movement being awkward or having a hard time getting on or off the floor much like some of our older clients that are working on better mobility. We change variations and modify exercises as needed to adjust regardless of the client.

How someone can talk to themselves and about themselves out loud in such a self deprecating way befuddled me. I mean, I get it according to 7 Habits of Highly Successful People some people use the “call yourself out or point out your flaws before others can”. This gives the person power and takes the fault finding ability of someone else out of the equation. There is also a possible element of fear like imposter syndrome. How many times have you tried something new and just felt awkward and that you didn’t belong? This can either paralyze a person or give them fuel to get better. Which type are YOU?

No one likes to fail, but we learn from our mistakes or failures. The biggest thing is changing that voice or record in your head to be tuned to a more positive variation of what you want in YOUR coach. We have 60,000 thoughts per day and 40,000 are repetitive ones. Make sure more are positive.

This coach in your head should be your biggest fan. Ever heard the expression “If you don’t like yourself how do you expect others to like you.”?

We have worked with thousands of clients over the years and can see clients that just want to go through motions, no exercise or nutrition changes on their own time and wonder why they aren’t reaching their goals faster.While others are keen to giving it the old college try with a coach and their inner coach holding them accountable and leading them in the right direction.

In order to get in YOUR own head and ask you to think of changing, I feel I must share some of my backstory on my inner coach development. Remember, our pasts or events can help shape your inner coach. Many of you know I am a kind of suck it up kind of gal. Here’s a little background on me. I grew up as a shy kid that had to wear lots of hand me down clothes from my older sister, clothes my grandma made, the occasional name brand jeans at Christmas, no family vacations or eating out with my mother other than fast food. At one point we had food stamps and government cheese/peanut butter and macaroni and then I had some in college. I spent lots of time with my grandparents because my mom was always working odd jobs and just trying to get by and seeing my dad whenever it was his weekend until he and his wife moved from Arkansas to Texas. My grandparents were awesome and I was blessed to have seven of them!

My inner coach really started to develop when I found out I excelled at something. I started lifting weights and running cross country and track in the 8th grade. It was a great mental escape from having divorced parents and living in the lower income bracket. I also jut picked on for being skinny so I put on a little muscle tone.

Having a history of running cross country and track for more than 8 years (High School and College) I know what it’s like to have both bad coaches and great coaches. I had 8 different coaches. I had the same amazing one for my High School years. When I went to college I had a coach that merely had experience in pole vaulting. He would give what I felt like was fake praise. I swear he brought his how to train long distance runners to practice one day. You can’t coach from a book! It was his first college coaching job and he injured so many athletes and eventually got fired. One week I recall running 60 miles a week while the guys ran 80 miles. Granted I did have my fastest 5 k times ever but what could I have done if he hadn’t pushed too hard. That’s an injury waiting to happen. I was the last female standing. After I recovered from bout of shin splints which I never had in High School then I had a hamstring strain. I didn’t show up for practice for a few days (so unlike me) and coach came to my dorm room. It was a whole ordeal where I had to go talk to the Athletic Director and the Dean about his coaching and how all my passion for running was just sucked away. Long and the short of it was they had to beg me to run and compete because they had to have two women’s sports to be eligible for men’s sports. I was then responsible for training myself because my stipulation was that I would not be put with a bad coach again or the football and basketball coaches they then assigned over my sport which were terrible and out of shape.

So what kinds of things must you tell yourself to get your record in your head to re-tune? Here’s a few examples:

Let me just get my workout clothes on and do a few minutes and if I feel better I will keep going.
Don’t you want to check the box that you exercised today?
Shouldn’t we go for a walk or check in to see if a friend wants to go on a hike?
I’m gonna do a few minutes of stretching tonight and most every night before bed
I like how I felt after that cardio, I’m proud of myself and my heart rate isn’t jumping as high as it use to.
I can do more than 3 minutes on the EFX, I’m a bada**
I’m gonna cut drinking wine and see if that stops my “raccoon in the dumpster” binge late night eating
I’m gonna get a massage and be better at taking care of myself.
My skin looks better because I’m drinking more water.
I feel better because I’m making sleep a priority.

YOUR INNER COACH will make adjustments over time. Listening to your body can also help you from getting injured. Maybe you need a rest day due to an illness or some pain somewhere. Don’t just accept pain. Can you get a massage, stretch it out, get physical therapy, acupuncture, take a healing bath, switch the order of your exercises or the days of your recovery.

My inner coach use to be ADD I swear. I often lived by the guilt factor or mentally berated myself for not pushing myself hard enough. Then I adopted the philosophy that life is a journey not a destination. I have also enjoyed adopting (the majority of the time) that you must accept your situation or circumstance as if you have chosen it yourself.

Why dwell on needling yourself or ruminating
when you just press on and get better.

I do feel like I use to be so much quicker to anger which is really other emotions all together. Give yourself grace for the things you can change and acceptance for the things you cannot.

Try and create your inner coach to be a holistic caregiver of YOUR body, mental and spiritual state in which you may live now and going forward.

Having gratitude for what YOU CAN DO is essential.

There will always be someone younger, older, smarter, less common sense, more attractive, richer, poorer, more fit, less fit, more talented, less talented than YOU but your perception and how you press on is what makes you special.

My favorite extreme example of a positive inner coach is the Saturday night like skits from Stuart Smalley.