Ball is Life...Until You Have to Pay Your Bills

Tim DiFrancesco of the Los Angeles Lakers w/Jordan Clarkson

Question I received: "Gary, I really want to get certified as a trainer. I've been lifting since high school and I'm thinking about quitting my job as a pharmacy tech. I really hate it and want to leave as soon as I get certified. I love basketball, so I definitely want to train mostly athletes." 

First off I told him it was great that he figured out what his passion was, but also that it would be a long road ahead with a huge pay cut. If he was happy taking a pay cut to become a trainer then by all means full steam ahead and I would be more than happy to give him resources to be the best trainer he could be. But if he had responsibilities and things to pay for, that he may be better off as a part time trainer initally on his days off to really see if he enjoyed training and working with others for a living.

As a pharmacy tech or any health field background, becoming certified as a trainer isn't a big stretch. The science part should come easy, but those experiences won't cover coaching people. It's easy to train your friend who is young and healthy, but what do you do with the former athlete who has a surgically repaired ACL or bum hip? What happens when you get a difficult client that doesn't seem to take your advice on proper nutrition?

I brought up the point that he's currently employed with a steady job, by leaving the comfort of that job to become his own boss to "train athletes" right out the gate; he would be in for a rude awakening. Some trainers believe that within a year they'll be working with high level athletes. The problem with that naive line of thinking is this:

You've worked with ZERO athletes, what makes you think a million dollar body is going to take a flyer on a rookie trainer? 
(hint: the answer is none)

If he had only mentioned he wished to train athletes in the future I wouldn't have come at him hard with the truth. I've had the opportunity to meet plenty of well intentioned people who like this individual, they quit their jobs to "follow their passion" only to fall flat on their face after going independent. Wishing to be your own boss and actually cultivating all the skills required to succeed are two completely different things.

I've learned this: 

You cannot live wishing to be an entrepreneur when your skill-set and mindset haven't been cultivated to be one

Remember when you're out there on your own, there are zero guidelines on what to do next and how to spend your time. For many the risk of the unknown and leaving something "steady" is not worth it and I would advise this person to seek a different JOB instead of taking a weekend course to change industries cold turkey. 

Some simply can't get organized enough to get a business off the ground. Other's aren't wired to think on a deeper level strategy-wise.  I used to think "what do I need to do? I want to work but I don't know what to do!" If you really don't have any clue what to do, go get a job. I mean there are so many resources and you still don't know what to do!? I.E: Google it! 

It got to the point where I would pester my wife with "so what should I do?" which is an asinine thought considering I was supposed to be my own boss.
(Note: I knew what to do, I was being lazy and didn't want to own up to doing the work)

Being your own boss is a skill too, one that you may not have been born with. You can still be your own boss but to temper expectations if you don't end up rising to the top of your industry. You'll earn 45K instead of 1 million dollars each year.

It boils down to being happy > everything else. 

Ultimately he wrote back and said thank you for my input and that he would be getting certified to start training part time and see if it might be something he wished to pursue full time. He mentioned it hadn't occurred to him that it would be THAT difficult getting in front of ONE professional athlete. I gave him some more resources, said he should try his hand at  working at the high school level and left it off with an open invite anytime he was in Los Angeles to drop on by and I would love to host him for an hour at the gym.

Ball is life...until you have to pay your bills. 

Exercise Breakdown: Depth Drop

Everybody wants to get faster and jump higher. For most clients they have to learn to slow themselves down to go faster. 

This isn't some Yoda jedi mind trick, it really does mean that by learning how to effectively slow yourself down, you'll be better abled at accelerate safely out of said stop. 

There's not a whole lot to it except this cue: Land like a cat, not a dog.

Most cats at least, are pretty quiet when they move around. There's been times I'll be sitting forward in my chair only to lean back a bit and discover a cat behind me now. Gotta be nimble and quiet like cat.

If when you land you make a loud THUD foot slapping the ground noise, you're too loud. This also applies to box jumps where you're stomping onto the box. When you don't land controlled and softly it only shifts the weight more onto your joints, and that's a recipe for injury down the road. 

Book To Read: Smarter, Faster, Better

"Smarter, Faster, Better" by Charles Duhigg explores the science behind how we motivate, manage and become more productive humans.

In a nutshell it's more about how you think as opposed to what you think, which is a mindset I believe that can change your life. 

We make good choices based on our past experiences which allow us to forecast the future more accurately.

Charles believes “good decision making is contingent on a basic ability to envision what happens next.” This only happens when we have the ability to see how what's going on is different than how we actually believe things should be which is known as a mental model. 

Characteristics of individuals good at managing their attention

1. They create pictures in their minds of what they expect to see
2. They tell themselves stories about what’s going on as it occurs
3. They narrate their own experiences within their heads
4. They are more likely to answer questions with anecdotes rather than simple responses
5. They say when they daydream, they’re often imagining future conversations
6. They visualize their days with more specificity than the rest of us do

Motivation is not innate, it is a skill that can be cultivated and improved upon.

In the book he uses an example from the Toyota company where they are tasked with reopening a former GM plant with the same workers which forced this factory to close. They allowed workers to feel like they had autonomy over their actions and surroundings, which led to a successful relaunch of this car factory. Motivation often has more to do with the belief we are in control more than the actual choices we have to make. 

“Productivity is the name we give our attempts to figure out the best uses of our energy, intellect, and time as we try to seize the most meaningful rewards with the least wasted effort.”

At times when we look to be productive it comes at the expense of performing a task or unpleasant chore. Instead of groaning, we should take an opportunity to ask ourselves "why" we're begrudging performing this particular task. Only after we become aware of the why do we see that these small tasks are a part of a part of a much larger goal or set of values. 

We see that these small chores can have a massive emotional reward which allows us to have a more meaningful view on our decision making, Self-motivation flourishes when we realize that helping around the house or opening a door for someone on its own, might be relatively unimportant. But it is part of a bigger project that we believe in, that we want to achieve, that we have chosen to do.

Exercise Breakdown: Band Resisted KB Swing

The band resisted kettlebell swing is great when you:

1. Run out of heavier bells
2. Want to increase the rate of force development

The second reason is the one I'm usually interested in. By increasing the rate at which your muscles fire, you recruit greater amounts of muscle fibers and thus allows you to more efficiently grow muscle and get stronger too. Many let gravity do the work on the downswing, I say no thanks! I would put the prerequisite that your technique be spot on before increasing the speed of the kettlebell swing, which in itself is already a very dynamic movement.

How to:

1. Grab a band and choke it on the handle of the band. I like to have the band pulled so the band is on the sides and not in the middle where my hands go!
2. Set the kettlebell in front of you like a football and hike it to begin with a solid hinge and forceful hip extension. 
3. What you should watch for is as the bell hits shoulder height, the band will get taught and you will have to reverse the motion much more quickly than if it were kettlebell only.
4. Repeat for 8-12 repititions.  

Are Those Calories Worth Eating

Being a former professional cook and now fitness professional, this question is always a subject of debate. 

Let's be honest, healthful food can only taste so good. REALLY TASTY food often contains high calorie ingredients like fats (cheese, oils, butter) salt, sugars and less than optimal cooking techniques (i.e. frying).

I like roasted chicken but you know what's even tastier? Fried chicken. Greek Yogurt parfaits are good but Ice Cream is even more delicious. 

The following is my opinion for you to agree or disagree with: If I'm going to indulge it's got to be worth eating. 

On a day to day basis I eat healthy food. I indulge a bit but 90% of my day is composed of lean proteins, a lot of vegetables, seeds/nuts, black coffee, and water. I rarely stray from this. My only compromise is if I somehow end up at a place I really have been wanting to try or an unexpected lunch meeting where I try to order a healthy item off the menu. On the weekend I make time to go out with Sara. Here we tend to make similar decisions about where to eat opting to support a small business producing a quality product.

I believe most people would benefit by having this mentality. What you decide is worthy of eating is completely up to you. If you're consuming these "worthy" meals in moderation, you'll end up eating more home cooked meals and saving a lot of money too. I would rather eat zero "healthy" pizzas and burgers then eat a really delicious one on the weekend. Skip the diet sodas and have a regular one once a week. All these things are a great way to live life while being mindful about what you're putting into your body. 

OVERVIEW

• Opt to savor the foods you want to indulge in by saving them for the weekend. Instead of eating Jersey Mikes or Subway for lunch during the work week, bring food from home and enjoy a really tasty sub on the weekend. 
• During the week eat more home cooked meal. This allows you to eat more nutrient dense-lower calorie meals. 
• Support small local businesses, they are often more transparent about the quality of their food and will gladly talk about it if you ask politely. 
• Have a plan if you veer off your regularly scheduled meals during the week when possible. If I'm going out to a restaurant, I always scope out the menu for a healthy option.