There Is A Method to the Madness
This is a podcast where I will be discussing all aspects of physical fitness. I am an exercise physiologist and personal trainer and owner of Maxwell's Fitness Programs for the last 25 years. My passion is health and fitness and I am excited to share my views, some stories, interviews and much more with you.
There Is A Method to the Madness
Fitness Freedom: Overcoming Decision Fatigue
Welcome to there is a Method to the Madness. My name is Rob Maxwell and I'm an exercise physiologist and personal trainer. I am the owner of Maxwell's Fitness Programs and I've been in business since 1994. The purpose of this podcast is to get to the real deal of what really works and, most importantly, why things work. Hence the name there is a method to the madness.
Speaker 1:Before I get to today's show, I want to thank Jonathan and Lynn Gildan of the Gildan Group at Realty Pros. They are committed to providing the highest level of customer service in home sales. Why don't you give them a shout and figure out what your home is worth? 386-451-2412. 386-451-2412. I have a solution for you. I have a solution that's going to help you with your physical fitness and your health and it's absolutely going to help one of your problems the problem of not being in as good a shape as you want. Now, if you're listening, you might be in as good a shape as you want and that is an awesome thing. But for the 80% or so out there people out there who are not doing enough exercise sustainable exercise to get the benefits I have a solution for you and you know what the solution is personal training, and I know how that sounds. It's like man. This is like one huge advertisement for what I do, but that's not really what that is. But this is an advertisement for personal training and I'm going to explain all of this. This is going to be one aspect of what personal training does for people that can help them, one of the big reasons why it works. Now, I can only state that it has worked for me and my clients, but I absolutely believe it works for many people out there who have done the same thing or similar things, doing this going on 31 years now. So I really don't think I'd be in business if there wasn't a demand of people saying this has really helped me and I'm going to keep doing it. They're really. There's just no way people are that silly with their money where they would continue to spend money if something doesn't work. So I know that it works if, of course, the trainer and the training situation is right. Again, this isn't like sitting here saying, oh man, 30, 31 years, you know I'm the best. That's really not what this is about at all. What this is about is that personal training done right can work, and I'm going to explain some of the reasons why and I'm really going to just simply really talk about today what is called decision fatigue. That is one of the reasons why that it works.
Speaker 1:Now there are a lot of things that I think go into a good personal training environment. Like I believe one of the reasons why I've been able to do it all these years is because I have passion for it. Like I absolutely believe in it. I do it myself. It was a game changer for me in my early 20s. What I mean is exercise and eating right. It has impacted in a positive way every aspect of my life. So I believe I can continue to coach it because I believe in it so much. And I believe when we do want to master something, we do everything in our capabilities to get better at it. So we continue our education, we continue to learn. So I think that element has to be a part of personal training. The trainer themselves have to be authentic, I believe, and really be into it themselves.
Speaker 1:And you know, before I move on to the main topic today, I'll just say that not every trainer is for every client. Like I believe I'm a good trainer, but there's been clients I just don't gel with. So you know there is that there are trainers that just gel with clients very, very well. So it takes a combination to make it work, but the key is it does work. It's a solution, and I'm going to go over the next few episodes of this podcast. I'm going to talk about some of the problems and some of the solutions, and this is one of the solutions that I'm going to give you today, and one of the reasons why personal training works is because it eliminates what is called decision-making fatigue, and that is a real thing.
Speaker 1:I listen to a lot of different podcasts myself on health and fitness, on well-being, myself, on health and fitness, on well-being, and you know, one of the things that continues to come up in some of the mental health and, you know, wellness podcasts that I listen to is is the stress response and decision fatigue is a real thing. I mean, you know, in a way it kind of sounds like a first world problem, because one of the problems or one of the characteristics of decision fatigue is we have so many decisions to make nowadays, when we didn't used to have as many, you know, and now that we have so many things the main things kind of taking care of for us. We don't think about those things as much and we're thinking of all these other things and there are so many options for people in so many arenas of life that they become overwhelmed with having to make more decisions. And just if I stay and that's really where I want to stay in the physical realm, the physical exercise, the working out, the wellness industry alone, I mean it could drive somebody nuts if they're not aware of all of the kind of scams and disinformation that's out there in the health and fitness world. So the stress of the decision making can be overwhelming. And if you know anything about stress, there is the flight or fight that goes along with anxiety. But there's also the point of just getting overwhelmed, a feeling of learned helplessness and a feeling of just saying you know what, I'm throwing in the towel, I don't know what to do, so I'm not going to do anything. Or some people go in with both arms and both feet, jump in and they have the whole you know I'm going to fix it or kill it mentality. Both extremes only happen in extremely stressful situations, when people are overwhelmed with stress. And we do have a lot of physical stresses, of course we do. We have as many now, as ever, and one of the issues again is what is called decision-making fatigue, and it really is real.
Speaker 1:One of the things that personal training or you know, when I say personal training, it's really having an accountability partner like that's the big thing. And if you're paying for it in the realm of a service like personal training or you know, getting personal yoga instruction or whatever, I mean, it is still an accountability partner. And I want to reiterate again that asking for help is not a sign of weakness. Not asking for help is a sign of weakness, like you want to be strong, and asking for help is strength, because it takes strength to say, hey, man, I can't tackle this on my own, I need your support, I need your help. So an accountability partner, so whatever you want to call it, it could be like a really trusted workout partner. It could be somebody that you just go into all of these different things you want to do together, we run together, whatever. But personal training is also that. It's an accountability partner. It does other things as well, and I'm going to get into that stuff.
Speaker 1:This is actually part of the new book that I'm writing and it's basically all about what the problem is, which is people aren't doing it Only 20% at the largest number that I've seen. I've seen some as low as eight. But 20% of the population is on a sustainable exercise program to get benefits. And that's pretty sad in many ways because the American College of Sports Medicine guidelines tell us that we only need 150 moderate minutes per week of cardiorespiratory exercise and two days a week of strength training to get benefits. I mean, more is better, yes, not a ton more. There is a point of diminishing returns, but that is the minimum that will get us some pretty good benefits. That's not asking a lot. So the cardio alone, that's basically 30 minutes five times a week of brisk walking, and then the strength training can be done in as little as 25 minutes.
Speaker 1:I mean, I have One of my clients I train remotely and she's really fit, so there's an advantage to that. We use body weight mostly training because she's a physician and she literally does it like during one of her breaks and she doesn't live real, real close and you know her workouts can be as short as 20 something minutes some days like literally between 20 and 25. Most days are between 25 and 30. Literally between 20 and 25. Most days are between 25 and 30, but a lot of times they're like 20 and we just really get on it and we crank and we hit it with intensity. And that's what I meant by. She has the advantage of being super fit, because she can really move fast and get a lot of work done in a short period of time, but for anybody it doesn't take a ton of time to do it. So that's the problem People aren't doing it enough.
Speaker 1:And I'm going to give you the solutions, and one of them is with personal training is it eliminates decision making fatigue. All you have to do is show up Like if you trust your trainer and if you don't, you need to get out of that situation. I tell clients that all the time. I mean I literally will fire a client if they don't trust me, like if they continue to, yeah, but me, or well, not even yeah, but because sometimes that's just not them doing the work that they need to and they're justifying it. But if they're constantly challenging me on stuff, I'm like look, you know I'm in the driver's seat here, I know what I'm doing, and if you really don't trust me, for whatever reason, you know, I don't think I've earned it, but if I have, I'll own it and but we need to move on, because if you don't trust your trainer, then there is no point in seeing that trainer, and really that's true in any realm. If you don't trust your doctor, if you don't trust your nutritionist, if you don't trust whatever your dentist, whatever, you need to move on, in my opinion. So when the person shows up, all they have to do is that and that's not easy for some people, you know like not everybody just flies out of bed and say I can't wait to get to the gym. But having that accountability partner, knowing that the trainer or the accountability partner is there, they're trustworthy, they're going to be there, they set the appointment and you know that they're going to be there, and all you have to do is show up because you do trust them.
Speaker 1:You don't have to think about what you're going to do. I mean, I don't mind when people ask Sometimes I like when people well, no, all the time I like if it's coming from a good position of, hey, why are we doing this over this? And they're not challenging why they're doing it, but they're curious. I like that, like I like to explain and say well, you know, our body gets used to things and we're going to do this today, but it's really still the same movement, like if we're doing a machine chest press versus a typical dumbbell chest press. You know I'll say, well, you know, we're giving your brain something to think about. The recruitment process has to think about something slightly different, but you're still working the same muscle groups and you're still working the same muscle groups and you're still doing the same joint action. So it's not like you're going to lose ground on any other of the exercises that you've been doing. I like to explain those things. That's great, and if you have those questions, ask. But you don't have to because with that decision-making fatigue, you can just put that on hold and say I don't have to, because with that decision making fatigue, you can just put that on hold and say I don't have to think about it. You know, I show up, he's got this or she's got this workout ready for me, and we do it. You know, literally, get on the treadmill, do this for this long, get off the treadmill. Okay, now we're doing this, this and this. I don't have to think about it, and that is a huge I don't want to say luxury, because it's a necessity.
Speaker 1:For some people, it is a stress they can eliminate that will help them continue to do what they need to do. The opposite of that is what so many people go through all the time, which is they know they should exercise. They know it and they've even done it before and it worked for them. But then they read something on the Internet. They see some influencers post on Instagram or Twitter that says you need to be doing this, this and this, and then they question themselves, or they question what they've been doing, and they go man, I don't know. And then they get told well, you know, cardio's out. You know, I don't know if everybody listens to all these things. I really hope you don't.
Speaker 1:But for a while, there every well, not everybody, but many influencers were telling people not to do cardio and it's making them fat and it's causing problems with their hormones and are overtraining, you know. And so so many people were like, well, I don't know if I should do cardio anymore. But you know, I don't know about this weight training. I mean, there's always these guys and gals that are going to feed you this information and that's what they do, and I've talked about it before. You know we've got to be adults and not blame them per se. You know they're making a buck. It's buyer beware. There's been snake oil salesmen since the beginning of time, where people are going to sell you something, sell you away, you know.
Speaker 1:But if we trust the science and a good trainer has a science background that can cut through all the crap. And typically in almost every situation the funny thing is the scientific answer is usually the simplistic answer, which is funny. All the other stuff is usually just a joke. There's this guy that's a famous, famous endurance athlete coach and he's written tons of books. You know and you know. I'm sure he really knows what he's talking about in some regard.
Speaker 1:But the way he senses information out there, I would be a nutcase if I was a triathlete trying to follow his plans. If I was a triathlete trying to follow his plans. I mean he takes all the zones like one through five and then he adds a 5A, a 5B and a 5C and the heart rate differences might be like three beats between them, like zone 5C might be like 98% to 100% of max heart rate, or I believe he uses lactate threshold or whatever. But the point is it's like a couple of percentage points. I mean, my God, do you really think the body knows that kind of a difference? I mean, that's just silly stuff, you know.
Speaker 1:So that's that kind of fatigue that would make a lot of people quit. That would make a lot of people just go man, I don't know. This is too complicated. I don't even know what to do anymore. I'm just forget this, you know. And then they lose their way because they lose confidence, and one of the things that personal training or a good accountability partner does is it eliminates that for you.
Speaker 1:You know, if you're not the alpha, let's say, and there's an accountability partner, and you show up, you know, and I know people that are friends of mine that are like alphas and betas, so to say, in those kind of groups, and one of them is those leading the workouts for the runs and the bikes and things like that, and everybody else just shows up and listens. I mean, that's a perk. You don't have to think about it. And trust me from somebody who does think about it all the time, in fairness, or to be fair to you, the fatigue I feel for making decisions for you isn't nearly as high as it would be making it for myself. So when we tend to make decisions for other people with stuff like that, we are far more objective as individuals. So the fatigue factor isn't there. But when there's a confusion to it and it is regarding ourselves which we take ourselves very, very serious, then all of a sudden there's going to be that fatigue. So one solution is understanding how effective personal training is. For that there's a lot of perks, but one of the biggest perks is it's going to eliminate decision-making fatigue and stress for you All right, so if you trust your trainer.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to today's program. I ask you to please follow the show wherever you get your podcasts, and please select automatic download, because that really helps the show. Now I want to thank overhead door of Daytona beach, the area's premier garage door company. They have the best product. They have the best service. I personally vouch for Jeff and Zach Hawk, the owners. They are great people with a great company. If you have any garage door needs, please give them a shout at 386-222-3165.
