Category: motivation

It’s fascinating meeting so many different people every day, and of all abilities at our gym.

The conversation i had this morning was with Allyson Ashford, who recently ran 50 miles in an ultra-marathon, in horrendous conditions through mud, darkness, torrential flood like conditions with just a map and a headlight as a guide across the Gower.

Allyson told me how many times she felt like giving up, but get got back up every time and just kept on going despite the obvious pain, discomfort, her feet were cutting up really bad, and every part of her body was aching.

I have ran a marathon myself but can’t imagine the pain of 50 miles, especially through that kind of course.

Allyson has been off for a couple of weeks after the race due to a severe infection in her feet that literally made her unable to wear any kind of shoes for a couple of weeks. So when i saw her this morning, i was expecting her to say she would never do it again, she would never subject herself to that kind of pain again, and distance and especially extreme distance running for her was a thing of the past.

What i saw and heard was calmness. She looked at peace because she has conquered a course which at least 38 others dropped out of that day. She discovered a mental toughness she didn’t know she had. She found that extra effort when she thought she was close to being down and out. She told me that the last 2.5 miles was the very worst, and getting over the line was naturally an emotional occasion and famous achievement.

Needless to say we are extremely proud of her as a gym and it’s inspiration to have her around a few times a week!

If you think of the things you really want and have been pursuing for a while, that extra effort when you think you are down and out is going to be needed. After all, if something isn’t worth working really hard for, then it can’t be that special in the first place.

When you think you haven’t got any more in you, it’s the mental toughness of seeing it through that’s going to drag you over the finishing line in whatever race you’re running, whether its a run, cycle, rehabilitation, or an emotional race getting your life back in order.

The main thing is to start in the first place, and don’t stop no matter what until you reach your own version of greatness.

Communication is a vital way you can improve your performance, your team and get yourself clear about anything in your life.

Once you know where you are, then the path becomes clear and all you have to do is develop the courage to stay on the path, and stay with that journey no matter what is thrown at you.

So the new programme has hit us all in a big way this week. Let’s get this straight and communicate very clearly. If you don’t show up for it, then it will be IMPOSSIBLE to get the results you hope for. This shouldn’t need saying, but it does so we can communicate what you need to do. No excuses, no wishing for a miracle, you need to do it full stop.

We always try to communicate loud and clear about your food. Are you going to take responsibility for your food and drink? Or are you going to have a “hope for the best” approach, some days you eat ok, then the next couple of weeks are rubbish? Always aim to eat well 80% of the time, allow yourself the occasional treat, it keeps your sanity and your body becomes fuelled by nutritious, energy-packed food that transform your performances, your body and your mind. That’s pretty clear i think.

Then you can do these vital two things really well but sometimes get thrown off by negative people, negative situations or negative GROUPS of people sometimes. Many of you talk about this to me daily regarding situations in your work place, negative friends or even negative social media friends.

We take responsibility as a gym to positively reinforce encourage and supportive behaviour and we pick our members at the gym, hopefully very wisely. Your people make you, your people support you and your people make your environment great. Massive thank you to you all for this. Our communication to you is huge, but we try constantly to make it better.

Leading with no communication is a disaster, fosters negativity and non-performance, so we want to keep being the OPPOSITE of that. Another week is in front of you, you have clarity on what you need to do, and you have enormous encouragement and support to achieve it. Doesn’t get clearer than that, don’t over-complicate it by taking any kind of short term “miracle” route that only ends up in tears. It’s all within your power.

Bad decisions don’t often come when you are feeling calm and under no pressure at all, they always come when you are under most stress and you have a million things going on simultaneously.

If you have a couple of young kids, you have to work, you have to organise dinner, then eating the “perfect meal” is going to be impossible without any planning ahead and relying on convenience stores for your “on the go food”.

Trying to fit three exercise sessions in a week “if things go perfectly” sets you up to fail, the pressure of everyday life is likely to swamp you and it may be thursday or friday by the time you even get the chance to train.

How do we stay on course, how do we get things done no matter what?

We need to return to the moment of how we initially started our exercise programme. We made time for exercise no matter what. We made sure we first of all shopped for good healthy food first, then it was always in the house so there was no excuses. We need to ACT rather than react to a stressful day and preparation becomes vital.

We all have maps in our mind on how we should act, our own “manuals” on how we should do things yet we get swept away in everything.

Sometimes we need to take a breath, breathe deeply and get the control back or life will sweep us away into doing things.

Sometimes we need to reset ourselves, reset our mindsets to the time when we first started and get that organisation of our lives back. We fixed up 3 times a week training way back then, so why not now, truthfully why?

We always had healthy food in the house when we first started, why not now?

Our circumstances may not have changed dramatically, but sometimes many things we had as a priority (that are hugely beneficial to us) have now gone by the wayside.

This is the perfect time for a RESET and get back to the fundamentals that served us so well to begin with.

Our new programme starts later this week, and our crossover from getting as fit and strong as possible, through to our extensive rehab work continues.

Our programmes focus firstly on getting you to move better, more safely and preparing you for everyday life and keeping you injury free.

Since we are all about the individual and that means YOU at the gym, an increasing amount of demands come into the gym, and will form a strong foundation in your programme so we can upgrade them regularly.

If you have a knee injury/replacement, then you have to develop a programme to get you better, and back to full capacity. Recovery shouldn’t be your only ambition, but performing at a much higher level full stop so your knee no longer holds you back in any way.

If you have a severe back issue/had back surgery, then it’s our duty to get you back to full capacity or as near can be. Bad backs have long been held in society as the ultimate “i can’t exercise” excuse, but so many of you have proved that wrong and we are inspired to dig even deeper and see how high your performances can develop.

If you have had a hip replacement, our programme must reflect movements that bring you back to full movement and the ability to lead a full and active life. Some of you are already demonstrating very strongly how you can bounce back from a hip replacement, when once upon a time this was thought of as a life without much movement for many full stop.

This new programme is very dynamic but very sound in principles that will get you moving better than ever before, will demand more out of you than ever before and get you excited by the new wide range of movements you will be suddenly capable of.