Transcription
Welcome back to the Elite Trainer Academy podcast, brought to you by Mind Pump. Today, we talk about how to get your clients to progress, or to continue progressing, without tracking nutrition. Uh, yes, it's possible, although it's not super easy. Um, sometimes you have clients that just refuse to track, or maybe they're just not in a place where they can track in a healthy way. So, uh, it's really important to understand these tools on how to make sure that your clients are still progressing without having them actually logging all their food in something like MyFitnessPal.
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Okay, let's talk about how to get clients progress without tracking nutrition. This is probably, um, I think this is probably one of the more challenging things as a trainer to try to figure out. Often times, you have clients that either aren't in a place to, you know, where it's appropriate for them to track, or they just really, really don't want to. And so, as the coach, we have to figure out how to get this client to still progress without tracking. So, what have you guys found to be some of the, some of the ways of doing that to make sure, to make sure that they're still within kind of the calorie range that you're trying to get them in?
Sorry, you can't. >> [laughter] >> You can't get them to progress without a, a calorie deficit. Yeah. >> No, I mean, I think that it's way easier if you're an in-person trainer than if you're online coaching. I think it's a lot easier if I'm coaching somebody in person. >> I do. >> No way. Yeah, completely. Why is that? Because I think online, like I can hold you accountable way easier because if you show me, you know, week after week whether you're doing it or not, right? So, for example, if I'm using photos, like that's how some people will go about progress without tracking is just take some pictures of your meals that you do so I can see and evaluate and figure out what that looks like. So, if someone's in person, they're probably going to, uh, I forgot about my photos. I didn't do that. They're not going to show me every day. Yeah, I, I think with online coaching, it's like it's just set up to be more conducive to that. Like you're just, you already have processes in place where you're constantly checking in on things. Like you're, you're viewing their programs and nutrition regularly. Like, you definitely can, as an in-person coach, do that, but I think just it's less conducive to that, whereas like in, as an online coach, you just have things set up that you're already looking at all those things. You're having the conversations very consistently around that subject. Um, I mean, I know the way our online coaching is structured, like training is a part of it, but it's like that's less of the focus, whereas the real focus is on the nutrition and the behavior stuff. So, it's a little bit easier in that, in that sense because it's like you're already talking about, you know, their food all the time. So, even if they're not tracking, you're having the conversations about it. You can do the photos, like you're saying. There's, there's some other things that we'll talk about in this episode, but, um, yeah, I think, I mean, in-person, like for sure you can. Um, I just, I don't know if most trainers do.
Well, here, here's why I think that it's easier to get them to progress without tracking in person. It's because you have so much control over what they're doing in their workouts, and I think that that's a big missing piece for a lot of people training online by themselves is they don't quite hit the intensity that they need to. They don't, uh, quite work the, the muscles the way that they're supposed to. The exercises aren't as effective. And if I can just get an in-person client to simply eat whole foods, like say, "Hey, just cut out the processed food, eat whole foods," and like, as we're going through the training, they're starting to build muscle, they're getting their metabolism up, and they're going to, like, kind of naturally do a reverse diet {slash} recomp in that period. So, I guess it would maybe depend on, like, beginner client versus, like, more late-stage client. If it's a beginner client, it's, I feel like it's super easy in person. If you just get them doing the right stuff in the gym, then like everything else just kind of snowballs from there. I can also get them to eat whole food. Like, if they're not tracking and you're just kind of, you know, [clears throat] nudging them about their nutrition here and there, getting them to kind of care about protein, that I've seen the best results like within, you know, the first 12 to 24 months of a client training with me in person and like not, not even caring about what, like, how many calories are going in or out.
Yeah, I hear that. That, that actually makes a lot of sense, for sure. Um, yeah, I mean, I think this is probably the, you know, to, to kind of get back to, like, the main topic of, like, how, like, one of the most important things that you can do or the conversation to have with your client to get them going on this without tracking is what you said, which is like, "Just eat whole foods." Like, that's pretty much where I'm going to start every client is like, "Let's just focus on the quality of the food that we're intaking." Like, "Try to avoid the processed foods, the things that come in boxes, wrappers, cans, things like that." Um, and if you're doing that, that's like already moving you in the right direction. So, yeah, I, I hear what you're saying because what you're saying is we can, we have a little bit more control over the workout, which is, in those early stages, going to be the thing that's like going to progress them the most because we're sending the muscle building signal. That combined with better quality food is, is going to move them in the right direction. I guess, like, from the online coaching standpoint, where I'm viewing it more so is, you know, maybe a little bit further down the road where we are trying to be a little bit more, um, specific with calorie ranges that we're trying to hit. And obviously, if you're not tracking, it's hard to know what those calorie ranges are. Um, but in an online setting, because we're viewing things a little bit differently, we are more focused around the nutrition and the behavior side of things. Like, I can tweak things a little bit more so in that sense. And then also, like, you know, sending photos or, you know, food logs where they're just writing it down as opposed to actually, like, tracking it.
>> Still considered tracking though? Well, I mean, that's, I was going to say that's a question. >> That's kind of the, yeah, I mean, that's kind of the point. Like, when we say tracking, you know, that, that is a pretty general term. Um, I would say there's some form of tracking that we can do with most people. I think it's pretty rare that you're going to have a client that you can't do any form of tracking. And I, I don't think you would want to. You'd, you'd want to find some form of tracking because tracking is bringing awareness, and that's like really one of the biggest unlocks that you can make for a client is bringing awareness around their nutrition behavior. So, even if it's not like, you know, actually logging into MyFitnessPal or something like that, just writing something down or taking photos or even just like journaling a couple sentence sentences each day of like, "How I felt about my food." Like, literally, it doesn't even have to be like, "What foods did you eat?" but like, some form of getting your client to stop and think about what they ate, why they ate it, like, bringing awareness around it. Um, that's going to, you're going to be able to make some pretty big strides with that if you have some form of that. So, yeah, when we talk about like, you know, "You don't have to track," "You do have to track," I mean, that's really like, to get more specific of what we're talking about is, um, more so like the logging into an app tracking. Um, because I do think that most clients can do some form of tracking. But if you don't want to do any kind of tracking, right? What would be the next step up from all whole foods? Is then we're actually talking about what do your meals look like structure-wise? Are we having a protein every time we eat? Like, those kinds of next steps, I would say.
I definitely, definitely. I think that, like, you get, you get a client eating 90% at least 90% of their diet whole foods, and then we progress them to the focus of, "Every meal that you eat is protein-based." That's going to get most people so far. Like, you're going to get some crazy results, especially if it's someone that's really new to working out and you're doing, like, really solid strength training programming, and then those two things, like, we're making great pro. And this is so funny because it's like, it's so simple, and I think most coaches don't even, I don't, I think most coaches don't do this. If, if most coaches were doing this, all their clients would get pretty phenomenal results.
Yeah, I, I've been like really hammering this in lately, this idea of like structure with your nutrition. And I, you know, started thinking in that way because whenever I was going down the rabbit hole of like building out the, the Great Eight webinar and like, kind of thinking of how to put it together as far as a, a first stepping stone for everybody, because I think whenever that step gets skipped of like, "Okay, I eat three meals per day, and these meals generally look like this, and they're like, this percentage whole foods, and they usually have about this many carbs on the plate." And like, whenever we're going from that structure, if we blaze past that initially, then it's just like these normal people that are really far away from their goal, and, you know, they're not really into it that much anyways. They just want to like look leaner or whatever, and they're just playing macro Tetris all day. They're trying to like fit in a slice of bread, and then a tablespoon of peanut butter, and then, you know, a glass of milk to like, make their macros look, you know, like they're, you know, filling in the the gaps there. They're getting 100% on all those, but obviously, that's not something that they're going to do forever. Especially not if they hit their goal. Like, once they get to their goal, there's like, there's no point for me to put in all this effort to just try to piece all these things together. So, if you can get that structure in place first, that is like, "Okay, I always have a breakfast, and that breakfast has at least 40-ish grams of protein. Who cares what's in there?" And then I usually have my lunch around this time, and I have my dinner around this time, and they look like this. And then you can just start changing up what foods you're throwing in there. Change out this meat for this meat, and this carb source for this carb source, versus, or whenever you're in a reverse diet or a cut. And like, as long as that structure is like leading you towards your goals, then you can't really lose because you're just, you're just eating. You're just eating the the way that your normal day like kind of plays out. And if that leads you towards your goals, and all you have to do is refine it a little bit, it makes everything just flow.
Well, that's the whole thing. If you have that structure, now depending on what phase of your goal you're in, it is just refinement. Like, we have the main stable structure, so I can then say, as a coach, like, "Okay, now that we're in this phase, we can add a little bit more of these things or take away a little bit of these things." So, it's super easy at that point.
>> I actually think that this is, I think this is actually right up there with the whole foods and the protein. And I don't think this, this third point gets talked about as much. Um, I think it's kind of always there. Like, when you hear, when you hear the MindPump guys talk about these things, you'll always hear them talk about the whole foods and the protein. And then this third point is like, kind of always there, but I don't know if it's necessarily like, uh, spoken about directly. And it's what you're saying, which is just consistency with the foods that you're eating. I think it's such, I think that's such a, like, uh, high leverage thing for a client to do. Like, this is a really easy way to to progress because if you're eating mostly the same things, which, by the way, like, I have so many clients that, you know, always fight me on that initially. Like, "Oh, that's so boring." But then once we get them going on that, then you can see how easy it is to actually make real progress because like, what you're saying is like, we have our foundation. Like, that structure is our foundation where we're eating kind of the same things every day. And then when we want to go in a period of maybe building some extra muscle or reverse dieting, it's very easy for us to just add a little bit. Like, we have a consistent structure that we've kind of adapted to, and then we just add a little bit, and all of a sudden we're in a small surplus. Or on the reverse side, like, if I want to go into a cut, I just, I just cut a little bit out of each of the meals or cut an entire meal entirely. Like, there's some different ways that we could play around with that, but if we have a consistent structure, it makes it very easy. Whereas if we're constantly changing up the foods that we eat every day, it's like every day we're guessing like how many calories we're at and we're trying to figure that out on the [clears throat] fly every single day. It's really hard to know if you're hitting that target unless, of course, unless you're tracking. So, having consistency with, you know, "I eat generally the same thing for breakfast every day," or "I have like two or three lunches I rotate between, two or three dinners I rotate between," which, by the way, is kind of the advice I give to most clients is just eat the same breakfast, the same lunch, and then have two or three dinners that you rotate between. And that makes life so much easier.
Yeah, my clients that usually end up there, too, are often times the clients that initially are like, "I can't do that. Like, I, I need a, I need variety. I, I have to have, you know, I can't eat the same thing every day." And then as we get closer to their goal and we start, you know, picking up some momentum, they just, they naturally move in that direction regardless, 'cause that's just what, like, somebody who's getting results does for the most part. You, you don't see a lot of, like, not necessarily like foodies in a way, but people who like to have a different meal every single day moving towards their goal. Not to say that you can't, but it's like, how much, it's really how much mental bandwidth do you want to put towards this? Like, that's kind of, it's kind of like playing macro Tetris where you're just trying to get it all to fit in.
Yeah, [clears throat] and then you also go back to, "How do you feel with these meals? How do you feel with your fullness and hunger?" If you have that foundation, you have better connection. And then you also don't end up in a situation where when you're trying to do something with a goal and change your calories, you feel overwhelmed and then you're like, "Well, I don't know how to do this for my body. I'm super full here. I'm super hungry here." [clears throat] Just is a much harder route.
>> It also, like, I'm constantly like having conversations about >> [clears throat] >> like, uh, inflammation, gut, you know, distress, like things like that. And it's so hard to know like what to cut out if you're constantly changing what you're eating. So, kind of aside from like what we're talking about here, but that's another major benefit of that is like, you know, if you're having gut problems or feeling inflamed or lethargic or whatever, like you have no idea where it's coming from because you're eating different things every day and you always feel like that. We start eating kind of like the same things most days, then it's really easy to like pinpoint that because then we could just, you know, do simple elimination diet where we just pull something out and then if it, you know, see if it makes a difference or not. So, that's definitely another benefit that I would think would help a lot of clients. But yeah, you definitely, you [clears throat] definitely can change up, you know, if for somebody that likes variety and just refuses to, you know, eat the same things every day, then like the conversation is, "Okay, well, we have to kind of pick one." It's like, "We either don't track and, you know, we have to have some consistency, or we can track and give you some variety, but like, we have to track to know that we're hitting those targets like accurately." Um, it's really, really hard to do that if you're not tracking. So, it's kind of like, you almost have to, you know, pick one or the other.
Yeah, the only way that you're going to be able to do the the latter, where like you have a lot of variety and you're not tracking in that scenario, is if you've spent years and years tracking beforehand and you have like a pretty good idea of kind of how many grams of protein, how many calories are in certain things. So, I think that, uh, that's sort of that would be like my next question would be, you know, like, late-stage client that is pretty progressed. They've been tracking for years, and they hire you, and they're wanting to like, kind of step back and like, take their foot off the gas, but they're still not quite to their goal, then like, how are you taking them through the like, slightly more advanced, you know, reverse diet, cut sequences without having them actually track their food?
Mhm. Is that because they don't want to track their food anymore? Is that what you're talking about? >> They're trying to get away from tracking. Like, I hear that pretty frequently, you know, somebody, you know, "I, I feel like I've been tracking my food forever, but they're still not to their goal." So, they're like, "I'll, I'll do it if I have to, but I, I just can't keep this up. It's not sustainable."
Yeah, I mean, if they're in that mode of consistent meals, consistent eating, then it's like, "Okay, let's start with one day of not tracking." If they're ready to like, pull off that band-aid. If not, then I'll walk it down where it's like, "We just start backwards and say we're not going to track this meal. Then we're not going to track that meal." Cuz it can be where it's just their habit, they're ingrained to do it, and they almost feel anxious not tracking 'cause they feel like, "Oh, no, I might not hit my calorie goal." So, I'd like work it down. But yeah, if they're ready to move away from tracking, it's like, "Okay, we don't have to anymore. Just follow this structure, and then we'll start to add some variety in."
Yeah, they, you know, that type of person probably has already found consistency for themselves. Like, they probably already have like some go-to meals and stuff that they already, you know, they know the kind of the general macros and calories of. Um, so, then at that point, it does become a little bit easier where, you know, we just kind of guide them through like, "If, you know, let's say it's a reverse diet scenario. We kind of just guide them through like, 'Keep eating the same things that you always eat, but, you know, we're just going to add a little bit here.'" Like, maybe it's adding some extra carb sources or something. Um, and then we slowly back them off like going a day without tracking, and then it becomes two days without tracking. Um, or we can also just change the the [clears throat] modality of the tracking. So, going from like a tracking app to maybe just like a food [clears throat] log, um, and then we're just having them write what they're eating. Um, so, that way we can see like maybe what's changing, and then as the coach, we can look at that and say like, "Well, you're probably eating about this many calories." Like, you can kind of just gauge that for yourself because because you can kind of trust that they have probably a pretty good gauge on serving sizes. Like, that's a hard thing to do sometimes with newer clients is, you know, they write down what they're eating, but they're like grossly underestimating the, uh, you know, the serving size that they're adding. Um, whereas someone's tracking, been tracking for a long time, like they probably have accurate serving sizes, and that's going to stay probably pretty consistent. So, it's a little bit easier to back them into, um, you know, food log or even just pictures of foods, things like that. And then as the coach, you can kind of like make that decision for them of of where they're at and if they need to add or or take away.
Mhm. And then as like a fail-safe, if you ever find they're going, "Oh, no, I feel like I'm really not moving towards my goals for some reason." Right? We see them, we know if they are aren't. They find there's that discomfort, we could always track at one time and just see if we're accountable to the serving sizes that we say we're having, right? And just make sure that everything's on point. [clears throat] Cuz then it becomes a tool that you can use from time to time.
What else have you guys found recently that are like recurring conversations that you're having with, you know, some of the coaches that work with us or clients of, you know, your own clients that you have? Um, I think that something that I've been trying to like really nail down for myself just because after a while of being in the coaching and especially whenever you have the same clients for a long time, I mean, you're working with the same person for a year, two years, it's really easy to get into a flow of just like, you know, not being quite as intentional, especially if they're still progressing. You know, if the client is still getting wins, they're still progressing. And just like the taking your foot a little bit off the gas of being so intentional every time that you get on a call and like having a desired outcome that like you're looking for or like wanting to move in a new direction. Um, I've been trying to like put a lot more thought into that before I'm like, you know, hopping on a check-in call or, you know, going to record a a check-in video. And, you know, it's not like because of the lack of intentionality or there being none there, it just is easy for that to start to fade, especially whenever you have been working with somebody for a long time. So, I've been working on that for myself, but then of course, you know, whenever I start implementing something in and then I'm like, "Okay, this feels good. I feel like this is something that we should implement." Then, of course, like I'll start to communicate that out to our other trainers and then see, you know, how they feel and if that's starting to help them as well.
Mhm. That's a good point because when someone's doing really good, it's like, "Hey, you're doing good. Just keep going." So, you can get a little bit laxadaisical about that. So, it's refreshing to think, "Okay, I got to remember like this is my first interaction with them. This is my first moment with them." And even though they're doing great, I need to still highlight why they're doing great. Like the effort that they're putting in, the, the that they're doing. I can dive into their training progression and just like celebrate that a little bit more so that way they can stay as consistent and stay as on top of things as they are.
Yeah, this is a real, this is a real problem I think coaches, really good coaches fall into. Is you start, you know, you, I think you'll see this with your clients, but then also like in your own life too. Like, you'll do all these things to get you out of a hard spot or to make a real change in your life or a client's life. You do all these behaviors, you make all these changes, and you start to see the progress, but then you stop the behaviors and the things that like kind of led you down that path that created that momentum. Um, you stop doing those things because you're kind of moving in the right direction already, and that's dangerous because those are the things that got you moving in the right direction, and so you don't want to just stop doing them. And so, um, sometimes with clients, it's like, you know, we'll have a client start to make progress and they're doing really, really well, and then we kind of let our foot off the gas of maybe the things that actually were the things that got them to the point where they were doing well. So, maybe it was the, you know, the consistent check-ins, it was the, uh, consistent communication with them, the support, the accountability, whatever it was for them that we do less of because we think, "Oh, they're, they're doing well, they're progressing." But then at a certain point, like when we've let our foot off the gas like that, then they're going to start to revert backwards. So, we have to make sure that we're continuing to focus on those things, um, because it's really easy for for some of those old behaviors for people to kind of like sneak back in. Um, but yeah, you see this all the time, like with people as they like, just generally in life, like as somebody starts to become more successful, you know, they, they stop doing the things that, you know, got them to the success because, you know, you know, "I've, I've quote unquote made it," or "I'm, I'm I'm much better, I'm in a much better place than I was a year ago or two years ago." Whereas a year ago or two years ago, you had a lot of pain of like, "Oh, I want this thing so bad that you're willing to do all this effort and, you know, make all these changes to get to a different place." And then once you kind of get to that place, you, you stop doing those things because you don't have the same like pain or or ambition or hunger for that thing. So, uh, I definitely think there's a parallel there. I don't know if you guys saw the, I actually don't know what this is from. I just happened to see this clip of, uh, it was like a marathon, I think, recently. Um, I don't, I don't know anything about races or [clears throat] marathons, but I think it was a big, I think it was a big deal. Um, but they, the person that came in first, he was, he was right on the heels of this other guy, like right up until the very end. And this other guy, like, you know, I, he within like probably 10 yards of the finish line, like he probably thought that he, you know, he had it in the bag and he was good. Um, and you can kind of tell he, he started to slow down a little bit, and then the, the second guy just like ramps it up in the last 10 yards and and takes first place. Um, and I think that's, I think that there's definitely a parallel with what we're talking about here, which is like, you want to keep your foot on the gas all the way through, even, even if you feel like you're doing really, really well. Um, and again, for our clients, even if our clients are doing really, really well, we want to continue to do the things that got them to the point of doing really, really well. Does that make sense?
>> Yeah, because I mean, you can get your clients like pretty fit, or you can get them like really fit. Like, especially if you have, you know, two or three years with the same client, there's no reason that somebody shouldn't be working out for three years and not be, you know, 99th percentile on like body composition while eating high calories and while also being strong and like feeling pretty good. Of course, there, there are the exceptions to the rule of people that just, that's not in the cards for them, which is totally fine. That's why you're there as well. But, um, yeah, not being quite as intentional once you get them like pretty fit is keeping you from getting them like, "Holy, this person's like really fit." Whenever somebody else looks at them.
Yeah. And also [clears throat] like, when you talk about training in person versus training online, when you were talking about even the intensity, when you're training someone in person, right? You can easily every week really monitor that. So, online, that's another place where we can almost take a step back and not be as, as attention-focused in training when you haven't trained someone for a year plus because you're like, "Oh, they understand progression now. They understand like how many reps in the tank I want them training with." And then I used to put weight suggestions, right? And now I don't do that anymore. And then I see, "Oh, hey, like, we're kind of, we're kind of hitting the same weights." Like, "I should try to push you on that again and make sure that you're progressing there because that can make a huge difference in where they get in progress." I've been doing that a lot lately, and I think once you get to the like, later stages with a client, you can't know if they're pushing themselves unless you get videos of them lifting. Like, you've, I have been obsessed with like trying to get more videos for my clients lately because I want to see the intensity. Like, I had this lightbulb moment go off whenever, uh, I was just looking over form for a client, and, you know, I was just like, "Okay, that doesn't look like a working set to me." But, you know, the whole way through, they had been like, on paper, they were progressively overloading. But if they're progressively overloading, but they're they're starting at an RPE six anyways, then they never even hit the threshold that they need to like actually grow. So, I've, uh, I've been doing that a lot lately. Like, just really hammering it in for clients, like making sure, "Hey, I want this last rep to look slower than the first rep did, and significantly slower. And it should be hard." And that's why we don't do a lot of volume is because every one of these sets should be hard. So, I, yeah, uh, I, I love that for, you know, just keeping somebody progressing because at a certain point, the intensity that somebody worked out in the beginning is no longer going to get them the results that they're looking for. Because a brand new newbie lifter can lift at RPE six and they're going to make progress for a year. But an advanced lifter that's three to five years in, if they're not hitting RPE eight or nine on their sets, they're not going to continue growing muscle.
That's that point I wanted to make, um, just to like, you know, clarify that for the listeners. Like, if you're talking about beginner clients that are just getting going, like you should be cranking them up. Consistency is the most important thing, so it's like, consistent RPE five is going to make them prog, like progress. Like, that's the important thing is just getting them showing up regu- regularly. But yeah, 100% what you're saying is spot on. Like, you got, you got a person that's been training for a year, they're consistent, like, you're not worried about them missing workouts. Um, that's, yeah, that's when it, it makes sense, like, "Let's, let's push the intensity on this a little bit. Let's actually, you know, really put some effort in on these workouts so we're not just going through the motions," so we actually make some real progress. Um, and that's again, like being intentional as the coach, it's like, you wouldn't have known that unless, because very easy for you to be in that space where, "Oh, this client's doing well. They're consistent. You know, they, they're hitting all the workouts. On paper, it looks like they're they're adding some weight." That's the part that really trips you up is that on paper, they are progressively overloading. Yeah, so that's, that's the intention of you as the coach is you're, you're the one that's pushing them to the next level. So, you have to be aware of those things. So, you have to actually be paying attention. So, don't just think like, "Oh, I have these clients over here that are that are doing well, so I'm going to pay less attention to them and focus on the clients that are struggling." It's like, all your clients need your attention. So, you have to, you have to be focusing on all of them. Um, and I love the sending videos thing too, by the way. Like, this, that's how we structure things here. Like, any online coach that's listening to this or isn't doing that, or somebody that is maybe interested in getting into online coaching, this is one of the best things you can do is have your clients just send in videos of certain exercises throughout the week. It doesn't have to be all of them. Like, you don't want it to be overwhelming for your clients, but this is what we found to bring some of the benefits that you get from in-person training into the online setting. Um, for a number of reasons, for, you know, one reason being exactly what you just mentioned, Cole. The other reason being like, just basic technique. Like, we want to make sure things are being done properly, making sure that we're getting the most out of each exercise. Um, yeah, there's, and then also like, it's just nice to see your clients too. As an online coach, it's like, you never get to see them face to face like very often. Yeah, from the shoulders down. Yeah, so it's like, it's nice to be able to like, see how they move. Yeah, it's not, it's not real interaction, but like, it gives you a little bit of a sense of that, like, you know, "Okay, I, I, I know you a little bit better because I'm watching you work out." Like, so it does actually help a little bit with that online relationship that's like one of the bigger challenges of of online coaching.
Yeah, and then as you send your videos back to them, they see you watching their thing, talking, so you do get more connection, both. Yeah. I think that just like a really weird side tangent, I think that the way that some people move plays into their personality so much. Like, I, I've heard that, um, or I think Sal's actually mentioned this like on the main, you know, Pump podcast, that, uh, a big piece of like what goes into attractiveness is like how somebody's movement quality is. And I think that everybody has like a, a very unique movement quality. This like has nothing to do with the like, what we're talking about, but I, I do notice that, you know, with all, all clients, like they, they move a certain way or, um, it, it helps to build like that personability. Just like small things that you don't really think about.
Now all your clients are going to message you and say, "What's my attractiveness and my movement?" >> [laughter] >> I, I'd less so in attractiveness, just a, a uniqueness to everybody's movement. >> Yeah, what's my personality and my move?
It also, it gives you some insights into what you need to program too. I mean, you might not realize that this person has some weird like shoulder thing, but then you see the way that they kind of move their upper body and you're like, "Oh, that's a little off. Like, we need to increase probably some mobility there." So, yeah, it gives you a lot of insights. Um, Kin, you have a note on here about reevaluating time frame of goals. Um, what was, what was the the point you want to talk about here?
Yeah. So, recently we had a conversation with a couple trainers of, you know, the time frame that someone sets out for their goals. Right? We might have that says, "In six months, I want to accomplish this." And it's like, "Cool. We can make that happen." Sometimes, though, as we're going through that six months, everything's not going perfectly. Right? Like, everything's not aligned. Either our body's not working with us, maybe we haven't been training as hard as we could. So, it's sometimes we have to have a conversation of, "This journey might look more like nine months or a year versus six months." And let's talk about why, and what are we going to do forward. And I also find sometimes it's just a, a hard conversation of, you know, like, "Are we willing to put in that work that's required to get to that end date, too?" So, sometimes we have to just think that time frame's got to change a little bit.
Yeah, I think, you know, before we really dive into that topic, like, just to make sure everybody's on the same page, like, the most important thing starting out is you that you're setting proper expectations out the gates. So, you know, making sure that you're not overpromising, like, you know, "In six months, we're going to get you to this point," that's maybe like not super realistic. So, making sure that we are setting proper expectations is really, really important. But then after you've done that, what you're saying, Corinne, is like, let's say something happens like maybe that we didn't foresee. Like, maybe there was some unplanned vacation or work stress or, you know, passing of a family member, like things that you can't really control that, you know, put us off track a little bit. Like, how do you have that conversation of reevaluating what that time frame looks like? And this is important to be very direct in your conversation. Like, you don't want to just put this off and kind of, you know, beat around the bush and like, "Ah, maybe we'll kind of, maybe we'll get there." Like, but having a very direct conversation of like, "Look, you know, these things just change in your life. Probably not super realistic that we're going to hit this goal in the time frame we initially set out on. And so, having a conversation about how we're going to adjust things and how we're going to actually reevaluate what that time frame looks like to get to this goal." Because you're right. Like, sometimes sometimes it's just not going to be worth it to continue like putting in the amount of grind that it's going to take to get to that goal. Like, let's say someone got a a major promotion halfway through working with you, and like, all of a sudden now, like their workload has doubled, and their stress has significantly increased. It's like, "Yeah, we're probably not going to continue doing the high volume, you know, training, restrict, like big calorie deficits maybe that we were doing before." It's like, "We're going to have to adjust things." And maybe that's going to push back our timeline a little bit. But like, that's probably the smart thing to do in that situation. Right? So, I think having that conversation and being very direct is important. Um, don't, don't avoid it. Like, I've seen trainers that will kind of avoid this thinking that maybe somehow like something will happen and, you know, they'll still be able to hit the goal. Um, probably because maybe you're afraid as the coach of like, "I don't want to let this person down. I told them like, we're going to be able to do this in six months." Like, so, I can understand why you would want to avoid it. But you can't avoid it. Like, otherwise, what'll happen is you'll get to the end of the six months or the nine months, they're not going to be at their goal, and then now they're going to be resentful. They're like, "Well, I just paid you for six months and we didn't get to this goal. What happened?" Um, but if you just roll with them, like, "Hey, look, things are happening, you know, that were unforeseen. And so, we're going to have to adjust things a little bit." People will appreciate that honesty.
I think most of the time, the timeline that you think in the beginning is a little bit shorter than what it actually ends up being. Just most normal people being normal people. And of course, like, you know, fitness not being at the the top of the hierarchy of what they're trying to do. If it was, they probably wouldn't be hiring a coach, or they, they might, you know, depending on the person. But a lot of times a six-month goal doesn't end up happening in six months. It's like nine or 12 months. So, like, going into it initially, and I, I don't think that it's always coming from a side of like the trainers trying to give like purposefully trying to give this malicious false expectation like, "In six months, we're going to be able to do this thing." I think that it's just kind of the nature of a trainer like just getting excited also. Like, they're, they're hyped up. They're like, "Oh, I'm so, I'm ready to get this client some results." And they're excited. It's not like they're thinking, "Oh, I'm going to portray this so they actually they sign up for me." And then, you know, we don't actually hit their goals so they, they continue afterwards. I, I think that as as long as you can like bring that that conversation up in the middle and like practice doing so, and then maybe lead that into, you know, a re-sign conversation. That that helps the the business side of things out, obviously. But like, being able to use that for your advantage if things do start to go awry [music] cuz they're almost always going to.