Exercise - Not everyone does it in the gym!

Most people almost immediately link exercise and fitness programmes with a gym. There’s nothing wrong with that at all by the way, and it is more or less the place most of us associate with exercise.

However, if I were to ask you right now, if you had a choice of a particular place to train/exercise, where would it be, what would be your answer?
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Funnily enough, this is one of the first things I ask prospective clients!
It might seem like a daft question, but in most cases, a lot of people tend to take a few seconds to rethink their original answer.

​Put it this way, when you’ve agreed to hire a Personal Trainer, you’re expecting him/her to agree to meet you at their gym/studio/base for you to commence the exercise sessions you’ve signed up for.
However, the reason I feel it is important to get an understanding of a client’s preferred training location, is so that we eliminate any potential issues of stage fright, lack of confidence and so on even before we start meeting for sessions.

An example of this is a client who had a real issue with training in a gym, but she never once mentioned this to her previous Personal Trainer, as she just assumed that was the only option available. When I asked her this question she looked at me like I had 2 heads, and paused… Still pausing….
She finally admitted that if she had a choice, she’d skip the gym all together, and train somewhere a bit more private to start with, like a studio or her home. As a result of this, I designed circuit programmes for her that we carried out either in a studio, in the gym (away from the gym floor) or at her home.
She eventually started enjoying exercising more than she had ever done!
Even though she’d done most of her exercising in a gym (and never enjoyed a minute of it!), it had never occurred to her that she had the option to exercise anywhere else and it certainly wasn’t an option her previous PT’s had given her. She was as a result of this going through cycles where she’d train for a few weeks (or 2 months at the most) and stop!
However, once she gave it a bit of thought and realised that although she wanted to exercise, doing so in the gym was ultimately making the whole experience a negative one for her and the reason she didn’t stick with a programme or PT for long enough to see results.  Through starting her training and home and in the studio away from people, she eventually become a lot more confident and now uses the gym as well as training at home and also now does group exercise classes, and enjoys all of them.

We condition ourselves to just follow trends/ without even knowing it!
‘’I want to improve my fitness, so I’m going to have to go to a gym with my PT to do this’’. Eh, no you don’t!
You can workout at home, the park, a hall, studio, dungeon, and rooftop, back garden…you get my point!
It’s about the workout, how it’s designed, delivered and also keeping said workouts dynamic, varied and fun!  It’s also about what keeps you motivated as an individual (or with a group), to continue with your training, even in the dark days and this should be at the front of your PT’s mind without your journey.

This is why my consultation process begins with a meeting/conversation in a neutral environment, and not in a gym.

So when you decide to start that transformation programme, start by asking yourself…. Where am I most comfortable performing my exercise programme? Once you’ve decided, drop me a line and I’ll take it from there!

See you soon!