I get asked this question on a regular basis….”How do you get your clients to exercise if they hate it?”
It would be awesome to have some profound, magical answer that in turn would sprinkle you in “wants to workout” fairy dust.
But no…I only have a relatively simple answer…but I could probably gather up some pet hair to sprinkle…?
Seriously, why do you read this blog and my nonsense?
Right, back to the subject…
The short form answer to ”How do you get your clients to exercise if they hate it?”
Is…that I don’t.
People are funny creatures and they usually won’t do what they don’t want to do – regardless of all the benefits that might come with said thing.
And there’s a lot of people who hate exercise. Not everyone gets addicted to working out. They view it as a form of suffering. Some people just do not enjoy it, no matter what.
And that’s ok!
I don’t view my job as a personal trainer as one that has to get clients to love working out (it’s a bonus if they do!).
I believe, that as a personal trainer, my job is to help clients figure out ways to exercise even if they hate it.
To get clients comfortable with sometimes being uncomfortable for the sake of growth and health.
Instead of trying to convince them that they should love it, I focus my energy on understanding what they hate about it.
I spend time acknowledging those feelings and even agree with them (yup, running does suck big time and burpees are complete bullcrap!).
But then I pour energy into figuring out what they hate least…because that’s where we can start!
They might still view it as a struggle, a form of suffering, but it’s a chosen, slightly more tolerable suffering…
The point is you don’t need to love working out to exercise consistently. You can definitely grumble about it and curse about it and not love it while you do it on a regular basis.
There are some things in life that need to be done but don’t make our top 10 favourite list. That’s okay, it’s normal and we can begrudgingly do them.
It still counts and we still get to reap the benefits.
So, if you are one of those among us who don’t like to exercise, it’s not the end of the world and you’re not broken.
You can find a workout that you tolerate through some complaining that’s good for your stupid body and your stupid health.
If you need help accepting your fate as a human and discovering your preferred crappy exercise, I can help! I’ve been pretty good at finding things people only somewhat dislike…
(See why I’m a personal trainer and not a sales person?! Who markets this way?!)
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