Coaching : What Am I Doing Here?

I gave a bit of thought to being a Coach before I made the decision.  I’m sure many have.  Everybody has different reasons for wanting to do it.  Why someone else wants to do it is their private business.  Even if they are someone in my organization, it will still be their private business.  I respect everyone’s reason and I hope they respect mine.  I would like to share my thoughts on why I chose to do this.  Also, why Beachbody?  It all played a role in my decision.

I have chronicled my journey to fitness heavily through my blog.  Anyone can find it if they look for it but here it is:

Dick's Diet: The Tipping Point

First and foremost, I changed my life from a dangerous level of health to where I am today.  It didn’t start with Beachbody products…I didn’t use Shakeology or do P90X or Slim in 6 to get the excess weight off.  I had to go to a medically supervised diet to do it.  It worked.  It was also tremendously embarrassing.  For the first time in my life, I couldn’t manage my weight issues alone. 

All diets, applied with discipline and exercise, work to get the weight off.  The problem is that you can’t live your life on a diet and that is why diets fail.  You have to adapt to a new lifestyle.  A healthy lifestyle does NOT fail.  I am not Coaching to sell Beachbody products.  I am Coaching to sell that lifestyle…and that lifestyle is free.  It always has been…and it always will be.  If I try to sell that lifestyle, put a price on it and try to make money off of it, I then will feel like I am selfishly doing this as a pure profit venture and that will communicate loud and clear to all who look at my new role as Beachbody Coach.  I don’t think I can do that.

I had been maintaining my weight for better than two years when I decided to look at the Beachbody program.  It wasn’t introduced to me by a Coach…like many, I saw the infomercial one morning…and afternoon…and night.  That’s meant to be funny.  I have been blogging about my weight loss since 2008.  It became my life.  It changed me radically.  I blogged late in 2011 (and put on my Facebook page) that one of my 2012 New Year’s Resolutions was to do P90X.  In swooped my Coach, who was a Facebook friend.  I love my Coach dearly but I think even she will admit, I was an easy fish to pull out of the lake.  With her support, I joined the Challenge group and began to workout.  It was fun and the people were all great.  Some of us were on P90X, others did other stuff.  My Coach gave me guidance and encouragement the whole way.  But here is the bottom line…it worked.  The dedication to exercise and diet worked.

So why Beachbody?  Because the products worked and I got results.  Great results.  The DVD’s are very well put together.  The one thing I noticed was the way daily routines were sewn together to allow physical repair while working other areas.  The concept has been very thought out.  Compare Shakeology to some of the meal replacement shakes on the market.  It has no equivalent.  Just last night my wife received a complimentary meal replacement shake for a company called JuicePlus.  I looked at the nutrition guidelines and compared it to Shakeology.  No comparison, Shakeology blows it away.  I compared Shakeology to the shake I was on when I lost my 80 lbs medically…Optifast.  Honestly, Shakeology is better.  More nutrients and better quality ingredients.  That’s a fact. 

Are there other products?  Yes.  Zillions.  So, why Beachbody?  Because it worked for me.  That’s all you need to know.  People look at me and see someone who is using the system and changing himself.  You can look all day at the plethora of products on the market and try to decide which ones will work...or you can find the people who have had the results and use what they used.  One path is shorter and considerably less painful. 

As a Coach, I am giving away my knowledge on a lifestyle that changed my life…for free.  I have been doing it for years through my blog.  Everyone who knows me knows I will take fifteen to thirty minutes to tell anyone who wants to hear my story how I did it.  Beachbody products are the table legs that support that free lifestyle.  They make it easier.  In my mind, my job is to know when people truly want to commit to the lifestyle change and be ready with the products they need when that time comes.  I can only understand their readiness if I am making a real connection.  I can only make a real connection if I am sincerely helping them change to a new lifestyle.

Some of those people will want to help others like I have.  Why they want to do it is up to them.  I can explain the business opportunity easily and if that motivates them, great.  I can’t make the world do this…I can only try to find the ones that want to.  That’s how MY coach found me.

My personal opinion is that to truly do this well, you have to be living proof.  You have to be living proof of the system or the business.  I am proof of the former.  I think, but I don’t know, that by being the example, I may also someday be living proof of the business success.  I intend to always be proof of the lifestyle, and that is how I want to do this as a business.

As an Internet professional (my REAL job…lol) I know that every great offer or system has a “freemium.”  In my eyes, my “freemium” as a Coach is my knowledge and my Challenge groups.  I have never run one, my first starts June 1^st.  I will say this though.  I asked only a few people and almost all of them said yes.  A few asked to bring others.  Why?  Because every one of these people has seen me change my life and they want to know how I did it.  When I ask people verbally if they want to be in my Challenge group, they don’t look at me skeptically.  They look at me with guilt.  I have seen some of the saddest ‘no thanks’ you will ever see in your life.  They KNOW I did it.  They know I feel great.  They know I look great.  To say ‘no’ to me is embarrassing for many…but that is okay.  It really is, and I mean that.  In time, as I continue to be the example, they will seek me out.

The Challenge group introduces a free but exceptionally well designed Beachbody website for planning, execution and support in the fitness journey.  It's free.  The support from the group is free.  They are exposed for 60 to 90 days to all the Beachbody products.  If they are looking to change their lifestyle, you have two months minimum to point out the advantages with real live examples of success.  If they don't have an interest after that, you either have to reconsider your approach or let yourself off the hook.  Not everyone will want to change their lifestyle.

There has never been a better time for this opportunity.  If you do not understand how much of a national issue obesity is, then you need to do a little more research.  Offering a different lifestyle to counter the obesity epidemic for free should be a slam dunk.  There is no better time to offer this than right now.  If you can’t get someone to listen to the message, then you need to think about how you are packaging it.  Make sure you package your message properly.  This message is valuable and great…don’t wrap it in newspaper. 

This is not about selling Shakeology, it is about changing a mindset.  Once that mindset is changed, they will ASK you for Shakeology.

Here is an analogy.  The obesity epidemic is like a vast desert and nutrition and fitness are the water.  You are NOT selling the water.  You are giving it away for free.  You are selling the maps.  But, in order for anyone to believe they can find water with YOUR map…you need to look like you know where the water is.  You will have a hard time selling those maps if you are a dried out dehydrated mess.  You have to look like you found the thing that is free.  If you look like you make a trip to the oasis every day, they will seek you out.  Could they find it without you?  Sure.  The water is there.  But, the desert is large and you can die wandering around out there hoping to get lucky.  I’ll never sell the water.  I will, however, sell you a map.

I’m not looking for Coaches.  I am looking for Apostles and Evangelists who can be converted into Coaches.  I will know I have found a potential coach when I see someone embrace the lifestyle and exemplify the products.  Along the way, many will follow.  Some will continue to walk with me to the well and that’s fine too.

I love my new life of fitness and the opportunities that it presents.  Those opportunities don’t start OR stop at a business opportunity.  At fifty years old, I have been given years back.  I have been given opportunities to share more with my children because they won’t be carrying me or pushing me around in a wheelchair.  I have been given emotional freedom because I worry less about ailments and illness.  I have been given the ability to see things on this planet that you have to walk to and climb to truly appreciate.  No pictures for me…I want to touch the world.

I’m not selling that.  I can offer that to anyone for free.

Want to buy a map?

Weight Loss : Is Stress Sabotaging You?

“I don’t get it!!  I am only eating 1500 calories a day and I am exercising like crazy…but the fat doesn’t seem to be coming off!”

On the surface, when you read that, your first thought may be (especially if you are a Coach with incomplete nutritional knowledge), “You have to be cheating.”  There’s no way you can put less calories in and exercise and not lose an optimal amount of weight.

Right?

Wrong.

How is this possible?  Cortisol.

When your body is under stress, it produces a hormone known as Cortisol.  Cortisol’s roots go way back in our biology to the days when we were hunters and gatherers…not observers and keyboard peckers.  When you experience stress, your body releases Cortisol into your blood.  The effect of the Cortisol, as a response to the emergency conditions your body is under, is to preserve your fat for future emergencies and burn carbohydrates immediately to help you get away from the stress.  To burn the carbohydrates and use them in your muscle you need insulin.  So your pancreas jumps into overdrive and starts producing insulin.  All of this activity from stress starts your body into carbohydrate burning mode…and seriously inhibits your ability to burn fat. 

As a side note, the insulin in overdrive (when there is really no carbohydrates to burn) produces cravings for fuel that you may satisfy with short-term snacks that are not the best for a diet.  Many people reach for fatty foods.  Why?  Because the fat in things like Ice Cream and cookies goes into your system and dulls the receptors of the brain that process emotional response.  So you are craving sugar and fat.  Damn.  That donut looks good right about now.

Elevated Cortisol can also cause other issues in your body besides inhibiting your ability to burn fat.  The hormonal imbalance cause by the excess Cortisol can also cause electrolyte imbalance (hurting your ability to stay hydrated).  In this case, your body won’t get the right nutrients because your fluid delivery system FOR those nutrients has been thrown off.  Anyone trying to exercise in a dehydrated state can tell you how rough that is.  Your workouts have worse quality, which hurts your ability to burn fat.

High Cortisol also messes with our ability to sleep properly.  You need sleep, particularly if you are exercising rigorously, to allow your body to fully repair itself.  At least seven hours per night is recommended.  High Cortisol wreaks havoc with your sleep.  Your workouts get worse and worse, again, which hurts your ability to burn the fat.

Mainly, the point here is, Cortisol hurts your ability to burn fat.

But wait…I live a very happy life.  I have no worries.  I am not stressed!  So that can’t be it.

Right?

Wrong.

Stress comes in many forms.  It is not just emotional.  Your body can suffer other kinds of stress…and REMEMBER…ALL stress types cause you to produce that dreaded Cortisol. 

Certain stresses in your life are necessary.  Complementary and Productive stress are normal and actually push you through the necessary obstacles you face every day.  This stress makes up about 40% of the stress we experience each day.  The stress you need to consider and worry about is UNCOMPLIMENTARY stress…which impacts us about 60% of the day.

Uncomplimentary stress takes three forms, psychological, environmental, and nutritional.  Most of us think about stress in its psychological form.  If we have no emotional stress, we pretty much think we have the whole ‘stress’ thing whipped.  This is NOT the case.

Psychological stress actually makes up only about 20% of the stress you experience every day.  Your environment (or physical stressors) make up about 10%, after all, we are physical beings.  Nutritional stress makes up a whopping 70% of the stress we put our bodies under.  70%.

Let’s do the math.  Uncomplimentary stress at 60% and Nutritional stress is 70% of that…40-42% of the stress you experience every day is NUTRITIONAL.

Nutritional stress is not about eating sugary and fatty foods.  Nutritional stress is caused when your body is asked to process fuel that was not meant to be processed by it.  It CAN be excess sugar (particularly the refined stuff) and excess fat, but nutritional stress also comes from eating foods laced with chemicals and toxins.  Aspartame (or NutraSweet), Sucralose, Saccharin...these are some of the most popular chemical additives in our food that have to be processed in our bodies.  Those toxins are hard to remove.  Our livers are working overtime to do this because they weren’t designed for that process in such amounts.  Also, the liver is responsible for fat burning.  So while it is busy with the toxins, it is NOT burning your fat.  Your body is sensing that it is being poisoned and is under duress and stress, so more Cortisol is released as well.  Starting to see the picture?

As our food becomes more and more ‘created’ and not ‘grown’, our bodies are spending inordinate amounts of time removing the junk from our system.  Refined foods like white bread, where all the nutrients have been basically removed, are making your system work overtime.  Think about the ingredients in the foods we have adapted into our diets everyday.  High fructose corn syrup?  Dye?  Look at the ingredients label on what you really are eating.  How much of what you read actually shows up on a food chart?  Probably not a lot. Your body has to deal with all of these ingredients.

In addition to all the work your body has to do to remove the toxins in the additives and refined foods, consider HOW these products have been altered.  The ingredients in the food ‘creation’ process, if not chemical, are almost always high in sugar and fat.  They are the cheapest things to use in the food ‘creation’ process.  So after your body is done with the toxic ingredients, it now has to deal with the sugar and fat…and it doesn’t have a lot of time to do it.  There are only so many hours in a day.

Ever wonder why you can’t lose a ton of fat weight by drinking diet soda?  Yep.  You now know why.

But Dick, wait.  I eat lots of fruit and vegetable.  That is awesome.  No joke…it really is.  Consider though how food production in this country has been modified into a chemical laden process.  Consider all the toxic chemicals used to GROW the rest of the food we would consider healthy?  Pesticides?

If you are eating the good food, please don’t stop.  But when you can consider organic vs. non-organic, think about the toxins and how your body will process them and be affected.

That covers nutritional stress.  There is also physical stress to consider.  While it makes up about 10% of the stress, don’t underestimate the impact of a rigorous exercise routine that does not allow for recovery.

Cortisol is produced in ALL stressful situations.  Consider the impact of a rigorous workout (physical stress) combined with poor diet (nutritional stress).

Are you burning fat or producing Cortisol?

As you continue to hear the term CLEAN EATING, remember this...the goal of clean eating is to reduce the 40-42% of the Nutritional stress your body experiences every day.  And if you do that along with your exercise, you WILL lose weight.

Note:  Much of this content was obtained from my reading of the book “Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life”.  I highly recommend it.

Insanity: Preparation for the Next Level

I finally received the Insanity DVD’s this past weekend.  It was all I could do to NOT open them and just “Push Play,” as we say in the Beachbody world.  I will be starting on Saturday.  I have a Fitness Challenge group starting on or about June 1^st.  At least one member of the group will be doing Insanity with me.  I am going to start two weeks ahead and blog the experience.  I am leading the group so I will be kind of like a “scout’ on this one.

As many of you know, my success formula is built around four factors.  Knowledge, Skill, Confidence, and Motivation.  Right now, I am highly motivated and my confidence that I can do this, given my success with P90X is very high.  I need to work on my program knowledge to prepare myself and then prepare for the skills part as I review the DVD’s to make sure I have all the materials to execute the routines.

First, the knowledge.  I am reading the materials.  There isn’t much.  This routine does not come with the big instruction book that P90X did.  It is a pamphlet.  Basically, there are three things you have to know.

(1) Make sure your doctor says you can do this, particularly if you have neck issues, back issues, or are extremely overweight.  The program is an advanced workout routine, so you want to be careful.

(2) Do what they do on the DVD and try to keep up.

(3) Eat right.  They DO have a book for this and I am reading through it..

As far as I can see, I am pretty much set to start.  The program is advanced, but I just finished P90X, another advanced program.  I think I am ready for the work.  I love the Plyometrics and Core Synergistics of P90X and Insanity appears to be an extreme level of that kind of routines.

I think I can keep up with the DVD.  Ha-Ha.  Do you have any idea how many times I thought I could just 'do this?'  That is the watchword of the day...no matter how hard something is when you start, don't get discouraged.  It always gets a little easier.  If you don't believe me, read my P90X blog.  Can I just start this with no issues?  That one we will find out together through my next blog!

I eat very clean so I tend to look at the diet portions of these programs and actually criticize them for being too lenient.  My breakfast, lunch and dinner are about as clean as anyone you will meet.  I have one cheat meal per week and that is on Friday night…Pizza night.  If I have one concern, it’s making sure that I have the right level of nutrients to ensure that my body is performing optimally.  That was a challenge during P90X, but a Nutrition coach gave me some very helpful hints on it.

So as far as building my knowledge around the program, I think I am all set.

The skills portion of my preparation will entail simply scanning through the DVD’s visually.  I like to know that I have the right things to start.  Insanity requires, to the best of my knowledge, very few pieces of equipment.  I want to check out how much jumping there is and how high…because I typically do my routines in my basement.  If a lot of jumping is required, I usually remove a few ceiling tiles for extra height and try not to hit my head on a plank.  Nothing ends a workout faster than that!  Also, do I have the right type of mat for this?  All things I need to consider. 

I made the mistake a few times in P90X of thinking I had done enough DVD review only to find out that I needed a few dumbbells or stronger bands for the pulliups.  It also helps mentally to not be surprised by what’s coming.  Mental preparation is almost half the challenge of the workout.

I will let everyone know tomorrow how the review went!

Have a great night!  I am off to do P90X Plyometrics!  My favorite.

Four Reasons to be Fit Over Forty

“Yes, Dick, I get it.  You have been working out.  You are in the best shape of your life.  Good for YOU!”  And the next thought is, “Now leave me alone, I am fine the way I am.  There is no reason for me to care.”

Really?  I think there may be some things to consider.  Let me try because there are at least four good reasons to stay in shape over the age of Forty.

NOTE: if you are looking at the picture on the left...is this person truly 'old' or are they too big?  If this person were at a different fitness level...would they look younger?  Would they feel younger?

The first reason is:  The concept of ‘old’.

The mere “passage of time” does not make a person old.  If you saw a 1978 Pontiac TransAm (black with gold trim and a T-top of course…) that had only 3000 miles on it, it would most likely be in pristine condition.  Time does not make the car “old”.  If you had the choice between that car and a 1999 Toyota with 120,000 miles on it, you would probably take the TransAm (notwithstanding the idea that you might never be able to find parts for it).  It’s not the years, it’s the mileage.  An ‘in-shape’ fifty year old is no older than a thirty year old obese person, and he/she may in fact be ‘younger’…I found that out in Utah in the mountains.

‘Condition’ is what makes a person old.  It ages some before their time and gives others a lot more time.  Being fit over forty means you are in condition for the long haul.  

The second reason is:  Inactivity ‘ages’ the human body.

One of the key reasons that a body shows the symptoms of age is that our lives become sedate.  We stop moving around so much.  We are busy working and have families to monitor and parent.  So we sit at our desks, sit in the car (or train) to get home, eat a fast meal for dinner, plop ourselves into the car to drive the kids to their activities, and then sit there and watch them.  Then we go home to bed.

We sit.  We eat.  And sit.  And eat.

The symptoms of age in a human body are directly related to inactivity.  A human body regenerates most of its cells about every 6-7 months.  The body regenerates through metabolism.  As your metabolic rate slows, so does your body’s processes.  Your cells do not regenerate.  They hang around…literally.  Your skin begins to look older and wrinkled as it loses elasticity.  You retain less water.  You retain more fat.  All of your cells are getting older and staying with you for prolonged periods of time.  This leaves a nice nesting ground for illness and disease.

When you exercise regularly, your body rids itself of old cells and replaces them with newer and (if you are eating right) hopefully better cells.  New cells, and this makes sense to you, look younger than the old cells that you are metabolizing away.  Through proper conditioning, you can put the brakes on that physical perception of ‘old’ because you will be slowing all the ‘symptoms’ of what people think ‘old’ is.

The third reason is:  Inactivity increases the potential for illness…real illness.

Quality of Life.  We all have heard that phrase.  No one wants to think they will spend their last ten years in firmed or in a nursing home being cared for by others.  There are people who are there because they had an illness they couldn’t prevent, but there are many who just ‘let things go’.  As our cells stop regenerating, they become a breeding ground for illness.  They are great places for your body to store toxins that you pick up in everyday life from the food you eat to your environment.  Those toxins hang around those old cells and wreak havoc with the rest of your body’s functions.  Sometimes, those toxins become cancerous and they have to be removed or harshly treated.

A life of activity greatly increases the chances that you can bypass many illnesses that others suffer over the age of forty.  High blood pressure.  High cholesterol.  Type II diabetes.  Acid reflux.  Swelling of the limbs and joints.  Heart issues.  Knee and hip problems.  All of this can be directly correlated to a distinct pattern of inactivity.  You do NOT have to experience these things because ‘time has passed.’  That’s not how it works.  You don’t get these illnesses with the AARP card that you get at age fifty, they come to you because you have stopped moving.

The fourth and last reason is:  Being able to stay in the game.

Have you ever gone on a vacation or some kind of outing where some level of physical activity was required?  How many times do you see people over forty just look at it and say, “No, I think I will just stay here.”  Nothing ages you like simply feeling old.  And nothing makes you feel old like having to be left behind because you can’t keep up.  If you are ‘fit’ you can keep up.  Given the physical state of our nation, if you are ‘fit’ you can probably lead them, not simply ‘keep up.’

Life is a participation event.  You are either in or out.  When you opt for ‘out’ you have charted your own destiny.  We will live longer on average than any other humans before us.  We can either enjoy every minute with a high quality of life or we can painfully sit and watch others participate.

Is there anything worse than having to look at pictures of someone else’s vacation?

That’s what being ‘old’ really means.

Nothing will help you be ‘old’ more than NOT being physically fit.

Thanks for reading.  Have an awesome day.  Have a salad for lunch.  Go for a brisk walk or do a workout.   

You are here for the long haul.