How to start changing your life….heavy title, right?
I mean, am I one to talk when it comes to changing your life? I’ve been through my share of life, and I have changed my life several times over, each time making it better and better, but this isn’t about me.
This is about you.
Helping YOU change your life.
You see, I admit some biasedness here, but I believe that there are many ways to change your life but we happen to focus on starting that process with changing your body.
When we see a client’s body change, evolve, and develop we also see the personality start to change to. Now it’s not a bad change, in fact, I think that the healthier body acts as an amplifier that allows a person to start becoming who they feel they are on the inside.
They gain more confidence, self-assurance, and acceptance. They become more supportive, caring. Better spouses, parents, friends, and examples to others.
Those traits were always there, BUT it took some change to allow that to come out, and that change that we start with is their body.
We coached HUNDREDS of people (that’s no lie) and had seen some amazing transformations but the ones that we, as trainers, a swell of pride in are not the ones that lost 50lbs, 80lbs or even 100lbs. Not even those that competed on stage or the platform.
It was the ones that while they were here, their LIVES change.
Seeing them get out of bad relationships and into better ones, getting promotions, starting their own business, or inspiring their families to lead a better healthier lifestyle.
What we have come to find out though, is those that completely change their bodies changed their lives. So the ones that did lose 50, 80, and 100lbs are the ones that used this as momentum to change other aspects of their life.
The ones that stepped on stage, a platform, did a MudRun or photo shoot used that confidence they gained to have balls to change something else.
Change starts somewhere and we start with the body, so if you feel that you’re ready for change then keep reading let me help get you started.
Start With One
When you sit back and take a look at your life you probably have many things that you want to change, or maybe not many but just a few big ones.
No matter how many, or how few, aspects of your life that you want to change it will get overwhelming to figure out how to get started so this is where I recommend starting with ONE thing.
Changing your life starts with changing one thing. One aspect at a time.
I’m sure that you’re a creature of habit if you’re reading this. You find comfort in your routine and know what to expect so changing many things about your life or routine at once can cause too much stress and chaos to your life. Thus, you’ll race back to your regular routine out of comfort living the same way as your living now.
The mistake is changing too many aspects at once, which we don’t recommend, but instead, change ONE aspect.
Pick ONE aspect to change and start there.
I recommend picking the easier one of your list first the use that as momentum to change your others.
Side note: This is how we change people’s eating habits, we find that the most successful clients we only changed one meal at a time then when that meal is a habit we focus on changing the next. People are less likely to go back into old routines this way.
When you decide what your focus is, then focus on ONLY THAT; don’t worry about anything else just yet because that one change will be new territory for you.
5 Seconds
All it takes is 5 seconds of insane bravery to change your life.
Think about it
How many times can you remember when you had a moment that you just took that leap? Whether it was for a job, a relationship or anything. There was a moment that you just said ‘F-it’ and did it. That was an insane moment of bravery, and your life is forever different, for good or bad, it is different.
How many times have those 5 seconds presented themselves to you, but for whatever reason you didn’t take action.
I’m sure you can think of a few.
That moment where you’re inspired to make a change, things are clearer, you know what you need to do, you can see it the action you want to take as clear in your mind like a movie screen. All you have to do it just take action.
But you don’t
Then those 5 seconds pass, which becomes 10 seconds, then 10 minutes and next thing you know you’ve talked yourself out of it.
Why?
I’m not going to pretend that I have all the answers but from my experience and coaching others it comes down to thought. In particular… over thinking.
“I once read that the fastest way to kill happiness is to overthink”
You overthought the situation. In those 5 seconds, your mind started racing to everything that could go wrong. “What if it doesn’t work?” “What will people think?” “What if it fails?” “What if…” You get my point.
Maybe you couldn’t help it maybe this is an ever going battle in your mind where you instantly start to think of all the bad that could happen, but this is where I challenge you to have ONE thought go through your head when you notice a slew of negative thoughts.
What if it didn’t go wrong… What if it had gone RIGHT?!
How would your life be different?
That kind of thinking will be opposite of what you are used to doing, and it will feel ‘weird’ to think that way since you may not be accustomed to it, BUT the results are way better.
Plus, all those negative “What ifs…” that you had overthought, I’m willing to bet hardly any of those would ever happen.
So, instead of thinking everything that can go wrong, start thinking of the things that could go right.
You’ll find that you let fewer moments pass you up and that you begin to design the life that you want.
Changing Your Life with Workouts.
We at RTC believe in challenging the status quo.
New people that walk in these doors tend to think that their best days are behind them, that their best body was 10 years ago or that as they get older pain is just part of life.
We challenge those aspects of people’s lives to show them that your best your best years ARE NOT BEHIND you, but instead yet to come.
Your best body wasn’t in your 20’s but yet to come, and that as you get older your NOT suppose to be in pain but instead living a better life.
We want to change people’s lives, but we just happen to be trainers that start this process with their workouts.
I admit we have a biasedness here that we believe we can change your life by starting with your body. We take those 5 seconds of insane bravery when your or someone reaches out to us, and we help you run with it.
We find that when people look better and feel better, they think better and take better actions and make better decisions.
It all starts with one action, and we find that focusing on your body tends to be an easier first step for most looking to change their life.
What To Do Now?
Make a list of things that you want to change or simply want to be better. Look at that list and think out of everything that would be the easiest to start change and focus on that.
What you will find happening is that you’ll notice little moments and opportunity start to pop-up presenting you the opportunity to make that change and here is where that time of bravery comes in.
Next time you have that moment of insane bravery to take a chance you’ll find yourself start thinking of what can go wrong as soon as those thoughts hit let that be a trigger to do the complete opposite and think of all the things that can go right!
If it’s your own business, then take the leap and go, if it’s getting out of a toxic relationship then take that leap, if it’s going to the gym just put on your shoes and go.
I’m not telling you it’s going to be easy, I’m telling you it’s going to be worth it.
In Health and Awesomeness,
Travis Merritt, BS, CPT, (and other cool letters behind the name) is the Owner of Rowlett Transformation Center in Rowlett, TX.
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