Build Your Empire On the Foundation Of The Fundamentals
The main reason why my athletes are always able to bust through their plateaus is that they are coachable. They are all willing to do the work of self-discovery, whether it's taking note of how they feel after eating certain foods, noting strength/flexibility differences between the right/left sides of their bodies, looking at acquired habits, etc.
They are all eager to learn and improve, even though sometimes they get frustrated with the process. Every one of them is insanely intelligent, very strong willed and comes with a good amount of knowledge.
Regardless of the knowledge base, working with a new coach requires trust and learning the "method to the madness."
I equate the process to ironing out wrinkles. We steamroll over the major creases which no longer serve them, and then progressively go back and finesse the little wrinkles made along the way. The key is great communication on both sides.
My coaching and training methodology stems from a fusion of years working at a teaching hospital with patients whose reading level capped out at the 3rd grade level, and from teaching a roomful of Prehospital providers with varying levels of professional licensure and years of experience on the job.
The goal was to deliver info that was valuable and applicable to each of those individuals, and work to keep it engaging so that everyone in the room-no matter where they sat on the knowledge and experience spectrum-would be able to understand it, find it interesting and somehow be able to apply it, whether it was in their personal or professional lives.
Over the years the topics were wide and vast; but I had a specific system: safety first, basics second, and progressing from there.
That's the same way we roll in a Fitness Consultation and all other Training Programs. We keep safety as our paramount beacon, and always tend to the basics first.
Basics definitely refers to information-general and specific knowledge of how things work, etc. But more importantly, when we work together, basics begins with your having full clarity of your goals.
Why?
Because clarity of goals determines priority of actions.
I only work with the committed.
Committed people are HUNGRY.
Committed people are COACHABLE.
Committed people are chomping at the bit to constantly improve themselves and always do "that little extra" to go from good to great.
They're all chips on the table and all in.
Committed people don't give a laundry list of excuses and what are essentially ultimatums.
Committed people have full clarity of their goals, are typically very structured and have tried a number of things to get to a certain point, and are seeking the means to get to the next level.
Even when they're discouraged and haven't been progressing as they would like, committed people vibrate differently. You can see it in their eyes, hear it in their voice and feel it in their energy.
To break through a plateau, I've got to learn what your goals are, and what you believe has you sitting with frustration at your current plateau. It's a story-much like if you had come to visit me while I worked in the ER. My work is to "peel back the onion layers" and find the causes (yes plural).
This is the part where coachability of the athlete is imperative. They can be functioning at super high levels, but perhaps keep on hitting the wall, spinning their wheels and not making the progress they so crave. Working together, we often find “silly” little things that are easily corrected. But then's when all hell starts breaking loose. Once those are mended, the deeper issues start revealing themselves and it becomes super frustrating, and the athlete believes we are moving backwards.
Nothing could be farther from the truth.
What we are doing is taking a SIDESTEP, to fill in information, tend to an underperforming muscle or instability, retrain for a new and different habit...and then we come right back where we left off and KABOOM!
PLATEAU BUSTED.
It all starts out with the basics and having a coachable spirit.
Education is paramount with my athletes whether it has to do with nutrition, how the body works, goal setting, developing the Champion Mindset...even communication style. Sometimes it's rudimentary information, but I firmly believe in leveling the playing field and building a firm foundation so that we both share the same understanding of the information and have an easier time properly managing expectations.
In the words of the great Lou Holtz: "Build Your Empire On the Foundation Of The Fundamentals." That's what we do, and what we train our athletes to do also. Success leaves clues. Why recreate the wheel?
