Thursday, April 4, 2013

Progression.


Three months ago I took (and passed!) the ACE personal trainer exam. It all began last fall when I sat down and thought long and hard about what I really enjoy doing on a regular basis- and how I could turn that into something bigger in my life. Unsurprisingly, I landed on health and fitness. (Pretty much a no-brainer, I know.) Over the past couple of years I've had many people ask me if I was interested in becoming a trainer and I always shied away from answering definitively. Why? Honestly, when it came down do it I was scared of letting people put their trust in me. I put so much trust into my own trainers as well as the instructors at every class I take- from bootcamp to yoga to dance.  I expect them to know what they are talking about and to guide me in the right direction. Thinking about other people trusting me to guide them in the right direction- or more importantly not in the WRONG direction- gave me a the heebies jeebies. I didn't want that kind of responsibility. Actually, I was afraid of it. 

So what changed? Aside from some soul searching I also reached out to a couple of my trainer friends for advice on what I should do.  My friend Amy was nice enough to act as a sounding board for me to bounce my fears and concerns off of and she gently guided me towards the realizing this:

I know way more than I give myself credit for. 

Everybody starts somewhere. I remember her asking me to name teachers and trainers that I admire and then she asked if they were instantly awesome from day one. Of course they weren't! This may seem like basic information but I realized that I was putting all kinds of unneeded pressure on myself by thinking I needed to be the greatest, most knowledgable trainer that ever existed or not be one at all. I may not have years of experience but I really DO know lot and there are people out there that I can help. From years of dancing and running and training I have learned an incredible amount about health and fitness that I sometimes forget not everybody knows. It comes as second nature to me now but because of this I forget to give myself credit. 

So here I am training. I'm teaching bootcamp classes and I have a couple of one-on-one clients but the most exciting thing is that I'm LEARNING. Every session I learn something new and I come away with more ideas for the following week. I had another friend tell me that everything would fall into place once I got out there and started training people and this couldn't be more true. The reading and the memorization and the test was important to an extent but taking that knowledge and applying it to real people is where the magic happens. I want to help people get stronger and faster and better and I want to see them do it with a smile on their face (ok, with the occasional grimace and some sweat thrown in.) But the moral of my story is that I was scared of something, I acknowledged that fear and proceded to conquer it with authority. And I think that is something special.

What are you scared of?