Rhymer Fitness, Inc. turned 10 on June 3! It is crazy to think that a children’s theater actor/director with an Economics degree could fool train clients of all ages for 10 years!
I have learned many valuable life, business, and fitness lessons along the way. Here are 10 things that come to mind:
1) I like fitness. I love people. Fitness has been the best medium for me to try and make a difference in as many lives as possible. When I am old and grayer (already started), I won’t think back on all of the great fitness programs I planned or exercises I had people do. No! I will think about all the smiles, hugs, laughs, and times we spent “sweating in the trenches” together. As we are starting to expand our business, I am telling new trainers that you are in the people business, not the fitness business. At least, that’s how we run things.
2) Growing your business is about growing your relationships. Every client, bootcamp, corporate wellness opportunity, etc, stemmed from a great relationship. Every time I have spent money on advertising, I have seen almost no return. When I reach out to our best clients about more training opportunities, our needs have been met. I could do more to grow these relationships and that will definitely be a focus as I start decade #2.
3) Less is more. Most people are stressed, malnourished, and sleep-deprived. It has taken me 10 years to learn that backing off, taking a deep breath, and doing cleaner reps with less weight, will produce better results than pushing through with lousy form and too much weight.
4) True strength has less to do with muscles than you think. Muscles are basically fancy rubber bands. They get shorter and longer, but that is about it. All of that movement is determined by how mobile the joint is that they attach to. Poor joint mobility equals poor muscle performance. 10 years ago, I thought that if I could just get everyone stronger, all of their fitness and weight loss goals would be met. That is still a big part of what we do, but now I believe strength can’t compromise mobility, pain levels, sleep patterns, endurance, and other specific characteristics for each client.
5) Most underrated body part that no one trains…feet. Thank you Z-Health (www.zhealth.net)! Almost every week, I have a back, hip, ankle, shoulder, etc. issue with a client that is “fixed” by addressing the joints of the feet. Last month, I took 100 basketball players through a simple heel-foot joint movement. You should have heard the “ahhhs” in the room as a great majority of them increased their toe-touch by this one simple move.
6) Better to be creative than smart. Look, the body pushes, pulls, and rotates in 3 planes of movement. That’s it. (Ok, that is actually alot, but play along with me…) My clients don’t want me to tell them about the origin and insertion point of their vastus medialis. But they love it when we play ScrABble (AB- core game with Scrabble tiles) or it’s their birthday and I have an Exercise Buffet and I let them pick their favorite exercises off the menu. The body is amazing…make each training session a fun game or challenge rather than a nerdy, boring “workout”.
7) Chameleon Personal Training - I don’t mean this to sound insincere or like I have a multiple personality disorder, but I love the idea that for one client I need to be a good teacher. For the next client or group, maybe I need to be funny and lighten the mood a little. For the next client or group, maybe I need to shutup and let them vent about their life. Reading your clients and others in your life and understanding how they communicate and want to be led is the true art of this business and I think I do a good job of it, but will continue to get better.
8- Keep learning - Literally, just a few hours ago, Bobby and I were talking about new stuff we had been exploring with clients. He told me about this very scientific and detailed training program and I showed him a lower body nerve glide. He is 5 years into his career and I obviously have 10, but we were both learning from each other and sharing cool things about the body that will make a difference in our clients. When dealing with the human body, the most amazing machine every created, it is best to check your ego at the door and have an attitude that you will be a life-long student.
9) Knowing What To Do vs. Doing What You Know - Another way of saying this is don’t let “paralysis by analysis” keep you from getting results. Just do what you know, every day or every other day, and don’t worry about knowing all of the great programs and worrying if you are doing the perfect thing. See #8 above…you will never know it all, so just do what you know and when the results stop, do something different. Taking action on a few simple healthy things is better than trying to research and plan the perfect program for you to do every second of the day. Eliminate your 3 worst eating habits now! Set a timer for 15 minutes and do as many squats, push-ups, and jumping jacks that you can. Bam! Go! Stop thinking too much and just do it!
10) “All the Body, All the Time” - This is a basic principle from Z-Health that says that any weak or damaged joint could make any other part of the body weak or hurt. But in the broader sense, this concept has taught me a lot over the past 10 years. Your body is made up of several parts…the physical, the spiritual, the social, the mental, just to name a few. When one of these parts is “hurting”, any other part of the body will be affected. I have an article that explores this further at Faith & Fitness Magazine called “Train to Live, Don’t Live to Train.” Basically, I love it when I have helped clients positively affect the physical part of what makes them whole, and it produces a huge change socially, mentally, or spiritually. I could write a book just about this idea…hopefully you will let me explore it with you for another 10 years.
Live with Strength,
Jason
