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Showing posts from January, 2018

Pushing the limits... and learning more about your real potential

"I can't do that" "My best is...." "I can't live with/without..." How often do we say things like this to ourselves? How often are we really sure it's true? When I am coaching , I work with clients on developing a "growth mindset", which is a fancy psychology way of essentially being a little bit more open to your own possibilities. "I can't do that... yet" "this is the best I can do...today, but I could change that" And it's fun and useful to talk about, but what I like even more, is seeing it in action. A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how our little slip ups can give us real insight to work with . Today I want to talk about what happens when we take ourselves to the edge of failure, on purpose. Gym revelations - or how I totally broke my RPE meter. For the last few weeks I have had Ryan at Project Barbell coaching me for powerlifting (he's a great coach, go chec

Have you fallen off the New Year wagon yet?

Have you broken your gym streak? Dry January suddenly got damp? Blown the diet ? Then let me be the first to congratulate you. Seriously. Well done. You tried something out, then you discovered something that stops it from working out. You are a pioneer of resolutions , an experimental scientist of life itself. Good job! I love it when my coaching clients have a "wobble". When something gets too hard, or they find they can't meet a goal they expected they could handle. It suddenly makes my job so much easier. It's a fabulous learning opportunity, there's no shame in that. Failure, is the process of growth revealing itself. It's great to set ourselves goals that we know we can reach. Most of the goals we set are based on the agreement between myself and the client that we believe they are going to achieve it with 90% certainty. I do that because achieving feels good, and it keeps the rock rolling as they nail more and more goals, week on week.

Wishing you a Bigger, Better New Year

This is a tricky time of year in fitness. It's kind of the best time, because suddenly everyone is very interested in what "fitness people" like me are up to. Many people are making a new start, figuring out what they need to do to be healthier in the coming year. Also Aldi and Lidl have what I like to call "Personal Trainer Christmas" where they suddenly have a tonne of low priced fitness equipment on the shelves. That's my favourite (do I really need another foam roller? Sure I do!). But it all comes from a very harsh place. For the last couple of months we have been bombarded with advertising telling us we need to buy and eat more rich food. Conform to the cultural norm of well, conforming to the sofa and none of it in moderation. Now, the tables turn. What? You actually DID the eating and the movie-watching and you ACTUALLY overindulged? But now your body is unacceptable! Of course all year around we are subjected to the message that ou