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Your time has come. You have made the commitment to get back in shape. And you want to do it as quickly, safely, and painlessly as possible. You are in a good place.

Now it’s time to choose.

When it comes to starting a fitness routine, you have options. You could join a fitness club and try to figure out what all of that equipment does. You could join a fitness “program” and be forced to progress at a pace that works for the class you join, even if it’s not exactly the right pace for you. Or you could hire a personal trainer and have that trainer design a custom fitness routine based on your goals and current level of conditioning.

Without a doubt, working with a personal trainer is the fastest, safest, and most effective way to get in shape. Whether you are getting in top shape for the first time, or getting back to your
‘fighting weight’ from your college days, a personal trainer will make the process fast and easy. Best of all, you will never have to figure out what all that equipment does (and you will avoid getting hurt using it the wrong way) and your workouts will be private one-on-one sessions full of encouragement and significant progress.

But how do you find the right trainer? Is a man or a woman better for your situation? Will the trainer make allowances for your age and current fitness level or just try to make you look like Arnold Schwarzenegger? And, perhaps not least importantly, what about the cost – can you afford your own personal trainer?

Having been a personal trainer since 1987 (and having trained many other trainers) allows me to share the five attributes that all great personal trainers have in common. There is no doubt that working with a personal trainer is the fastest, safest, and most rewarding way to get in shape. And by using the checklist below, you will be able to quickly find the trainer who is just right for you!

You can consider these five traits your shopping list when interviewing a personal trainer to work with you:

1. A SINCERE DESIRE TO HELP YOU

Great Personal Trainers have a sincere and enthusiastic interest in helping people improve their’ lives through fitness. They will be genuinely interested in hearing about your exercise background and your fitness goals. They will be energized by the fact that you have decided to make fitness a part of your life.

There will be days when you may lack the desire to have a good workout. Perhaps you slept poorly the night before or had a calamity at work. Your Personal Trainer will provide the energy and motivation to get you through your toughest days. The days you feel great, your Trainer will help you achieve goals you thought were impossible.

The Great Personal Trainer is more than an individual who designs your workouts or simply teaches you new exercises. You and your Personal Trainer become a team dedicated to empowering you to reach previously unattainable levels on your lifelong journey in fitness.

2. MEET THE GREAT COMMUNICATOR

How does the Great Personal Trainer find out about your dreams and goals? They ask you! Every Great Personal Trainer has exceptional communication skills.

Your initial meeting with your Personal Trainer should cover your goals, your medical history, your schedule, your previous and current exercise habits, and anything else that might affect your workouts. Upon greeting you for each subsequent workout, the Trainer will gather information from you to ascertain your energy level, your general mind-set, any lingering effects from your previous workout, and your particular level of motivation for that day.

All these questions will be answered through verbal and often non-verbal communication. The communication will continue throughout your workout and adjustments will be made to instantly customize your program to maximize the efficiency of each session with your Personal Trainer.

3. A NATURAL-BORN TEACHER

The Great Personal Trainer is also a wonderful teacher, perhaps the best you have ever encountered. Unless you have a substantial background in exercise, you will be learning many new ways to change your body through fitness. Great Personal Trainers are skilled teachers, accustomed to working with a varied clientele and able to explain a single concept from several different points-of-view.

They are used to adapting their teaching style to fit each client’s learning style. If you don’t understand a concept or are having a difficult time with a new exercise, the Trainer will approach the situation in a way that makes sense to YOU. You will be made to feel comfortable with something totally new to you in a very short period of time.

Learning proper exercise technique is one of the keys to a successful workout program. Amazingly fast progress is the payoff for finding the right Personal Trainer for you.

4. A PERSON OF SOUND REPUTATION

Great Personal Trainers do very little in the way of paid advertising. Why? Because every client he has sends him referrals. He has no need to pay for advertising because his business is built upon the best kind of marketing, word-of-mouth advertising from his or her very pleased clientele.

You will need to seek out a Great Personal Trainer. The best way to find one is to ask a friend or acquaintance who has recently undergone an inspiring physical transformation. Another way to locate a Personal Trainer is to contact the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA-LIFT.org), the American Council on Exercise (ACEFITNESS.org, or the American College of Sports medicine (ACSM.org). Locating a Trainer through one of these organizations does not mean they are exceptional but will provide you with a list of trainers in your area to interview.

Once you contact the Trainer, ask for references. You should get glowing reports from the clients of a Great Personal Trainer.

5. A FITNESS EXPERT

A Great Personal Trainer will be well-versed in exercise physiology and will have the experience and credentials to prove it.

Just having the knowledge and the skill to pass the required testing does not make a Personal Trainer exceptional. As an example, what do you call the person who finishes last in his medical school class? Doctor. But there is a big difference between an intern and a board-certified specialist. When your health and wellness hang in the balance you want the most experienced doctor you can find.

And so it goes with Personal Trainers.

You want someone who excels at customizing creative and motivating workouts for you, not some Personal Trainer who basically serves as your own personal “repetition counter.” You want an expert with experience, credentials, and a long list of happy long-term clients.

Your decision to get fit again is a wise one, and one that will lead you to a longer life and more enjoyable days on this Earth. I applaud your decision and wish only the best for you.

Please feel free to print this article right now and use it as a checklist when shopping for your own Personal Trainer. It is my gift to you and will help save you time (and possibly money too) when finding a Personal Trainer in your area.

No matter how you do it, let me encourage you again to make fitness part of your daily life. I know you can do it, and I know you will love the results!

Cliff Wiese has been active in fitness, sports, and sport psychology since 1981. He is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist, as well as a Sports Performance Coach. He works with a varied international clientele, ranging from world-class athletes to pre and post rehabilitation patients to Special Olympians. A speaker and writer in high demand, Cliff can be reached by email at cwiese@lycos.com or by telephone in the USA at 979-229-6276.

Cliff attended Schreiner University on athletic and leadership scholarship and has done graduate studies at the University of Oklahoma. He is active in Special Olympics as a Powerlifting Coach and is a volunteer grant writer for a number of charities, primarily organizations involving at-risk children. Cliff is also personally active in sport and has won championships in five different sports. He is currently finishing his first book, aimed at creating and sustaining successful and life-long workout routines for non-exercisers.

Ok, are you ready for a mind blower? The secret power of bodybuilding nutrition is about to be handed to you on a silver platter.

You see for some time there has been a conspiracy afoot. It is a conspiracy propagated by the supplement marketers who want to be creating new products to attract your attention, and they do it by playing into your muscle greed.

You know what I mean?

Products with crazy claims.

Gain 8 lbs of rock solid muscle a week!

or

Drop 10 lbs of fat in 48 hours.

Sensationalism sells friend. If I can make a big claim, I will get your attention.

The problem is that sensationalism also distracts you from the one bodybuilding product that will actually get results. It is the product that has been sitting quietly on the shelf of your favorite supplement store for decades. It is the one that you never notice because you are dazzled by all the multi-colored posters of hot fitness models and hyper product claims.

It is the same product that was in the cupboard of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s kitchen back in 72 and it is in Jay Cutlers cupboard today.

Drum Roll Please…

The worlds best bodybuilding supplement is,

Good old fashioned Protein.

Boring?

Hold on a minute…

Listen, muscle is made up of What?

That’s right Protein. And when your body goes to add slabs of new muscle to your biceps what does it need?

Protein!

So what should the top choice for today’s bodybuilder be? It should be a high quality protein matrix where a majority of the protein comes from ion exchanged whey. Pound for pound this mass-building elixir supplies more muscle building nutrition than any other supplement on the market.

So next trip to the supermarket, or when shopping online, make a plan to avoid all the high impact marketing efforts and head straight for the protein section. Pick-up the highest quality protein you can afford and walk away knowing that you made the best choice for your pocket book… and your pecs.

Now for the rest of the secrets on getting t-shirt stretching arms and ripped abs. Get your hands on the Muscle Building course. It’s Free. Click Here: http://bodybuildingsecret.info

When you consider retiring from your business and handing it down to someone new and young, do you get nervous?  This is a very common issue with business owners who consider passing their business down to a more youthful employee. Many youthful citizens have a tendency to be rebellious and very disobedient.  This isn’t something all that new, but the numbers regarding this type of behavior seem to be increasing at an alarming rate.  Maybe this is a sign that America’s schools aren’t quite doing their job.  Maybe it’s just because the adults in children’s lives aren’t teaching them how to become responsible leaders.  It is a very important thing for the youth of our nation to learn to be leaders and to start to plan for a successful future.

If we do not try to help our next generation of leaders, it could lead to disaster.  There has been increasingly large numbers of young adults and this rise is projected to continue through at least the year 2015.   With most of these young adults only having the attention span of a thirty second commercial and thinking that they already “know everything”, could they have a positive impact on the future workforce?  Is there a way to prepare for the worst?

It is possible that if the workforce started to plan ahead for future generations of workers, started to teach, show, and even model the way for the next generation, it could build up confidence among the youth that is just entering the marketplace. By finding out more about current youth leadership research and studies and doing things like sitting down and having discussions with youth advocates, we might be able to find a way to stimulate youth leadership as well as produce a productive group of new workers.

Many young people need to have good examples to follow.  Positive role models could be the key to success for when the next generation of people enter the workforce. For example, a young person sees an individual who seems to make a lot of money and appears to lead a great life.  Later on, they may work to meet that goal and discover that it isn’t as great as it looked from the outside.  No one took the time to lead this young person and he chose to follow.  His unhappiness and disappointment in his own life may have been different if someone showed him how to lead instead of follow.  It is so important for young workers to become great leaders and not followers.

Accepting young people into the workforce in order to learn all about the business they’re getting into and letting them shadow those with more experience may help. Sometimes taking an interest in an individual who may be on a dangerous path and giving him a second chance by teaching him the importance and rewards of hard work, you can have a positive impact on his life.  Lead him and help him become a leader.  Starting a program in your business or the business you work in to apprentice or hire some of these younger people can ultimately lead to structure in their current lives and success in their futures. You could teach them how to succeed.

If you are lucky enough and your company already has a program of that sort, you might be able to donate your time by mentoring.  You might even be able to realize that it is a very important part of youth development.  If the proper steps are taken, maybe this generation of youth will become a new breed of leaders that can handle the constantly changing world around them.

Justin Sachs, author of Your Mailbox Is Full- Motivating Today’s Teens works with youth to develop a positive outlook on life, create a life plan, develop motivating goals, living a healthy lifestyle and more. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, California State Superintendent Jack O’Connell, and many others have recognized him for his success in motivating and inspiring today’s youth and for developing the next generation of leaders. His book and youth empowerment coaching services are available on his website at http://www.motivatingtodaysteens.com

Justin Sachs is the author of Your Mailbox Is Full~ Motivating Today’s Teens. A youth development book focused on transforming today’s teens into tomorrow’s leaders.

Justin has been recognized by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, Senator Bill Morrow, California State Superintendent Jack O’Connell, and many more for his outstanding level of service and contribution to the community.

His Company, Justin Sachs International was formed with the mission of empowering teens to take their lives to the next level through instilling life-skills and leadership development principles within today’s youth. JSI believes with the right motivation, inspiration and determination, every youth can accomplish anything they desire, and JSI is here to guide them through that process, and to hold them accountable along the way.

Do you remember the villain in the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie “Last Action Hero”? Do you remember his eyes? In almost every scene, he was wearing different and wild contact lenses. There are many examples in the entertainment industry of how the makeup and special effect departments are working together to create some amazing looks.

Some other examples of actors or entertainers wearing contact lenses to create wild eyes are Michael Jackson in his epic music video for “Thriller”. Haley Barry, who plays Storm in the X-Men movies, wears white contact lenses when her character controls the weather. Many actors in the Star Wars movies wore contacts including Darth Maul and the Emperor. The same can be said of many extras in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

In movies whenever someone is portrayed as badly beaten and their eyes are bloodshot or damaged, that look is created with contacts. It is a lot easier than editing the film to change the look of the actor’s eyes. Many actors portray characters that are blind. The cloudy look in their eyes is contact lenses.

Wild contact lenses are not limited to the entertainment industry anymore. Many companies have created hundreds of contact lenses, which they make available to the general public. These contacts are of the same quality as regular contact lenses. They can be made to correct your vision or they can be ordered without any extra power at all.

Remember, that all contact lenses can only be purchased with a doctor’s prescription. Once an optometrist has examined you, you can purchase these contact lenses either through the doctor’s office or you can shop for them yourself through catalogs or online. There are dozens of sites that offer discounted rates on hundreds of styles.

The choices are too many to mention them all. Some of the types of wild contact lenses you can buy are animal eyes like cats, reptiles, and wolves. Another category is based on horror or science fiction. You can have alien eyes or zombie or vampire eyes. Some are meant to look very grotesque like having the look of a gaping shark’s mouth with teeth in your eye or all black lenses that give the impression that you have no eyeball at all. There are many whimsical contact lenses, as well. For example, there are ladybugs, flowers, peace signs, hearts and even computer circuitry.

Wild contact lenses can be a great way to showcase your personality. Next time you are online, look up all of the different types of contact lenses and let yourself go wild!

Want more information on wild contact lenses and what to expect when buying contact lenses for the first time? Try visiting http://www.contactlensesguideonline.com, a popular website that offers tips, advice and resources related to contact lenses, daily contact lenses, night and day contact lenses and free sample of contact lenses.

Many coaches just starting out get impatient when they hear the stories of life coaches and business coaches with fabulous lifestyles and 6+ figure incomes because they want that for themselves…NOW.

It’s only human nature to want to skip the hard work and get to pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. But for most of us, the process looks more like a long series of baby steps. And we can no more skip the hard work up front than a baby can skip grade school and high school and get right to college.

If you have a strong business or marketing background, these four stages of the Coaching Business Lifecycle should look familiar. They’re at work in every business, every organization, every product, and every organism.

I. Birth

II. Growth

III. Maturity

IV. Decline

Birth of Your Coaching Business

Your coaching business comes into existence the moment you firmly decide to create it. It may be that you’ve experienced the ‘Entrepreneurial Seizure’ Michael Gerber refers to in his best-selling and highly recommendable book on entrepreneurship “E-Myth Revisted”. Perhaps starting your own coaching business is something you’ve contemplated for a long time and you’ve finally decided to move forward with it. Or, maybe, you’re adding coaching as a business line to an already existing business.

Regardless, your job in the beginning is to get experience and to get clients. Unless you’re coming in with strong relevant professional experience, you won’t have much credibility, probably won’t know exactly who you’re going to work best with, and probably won’t know your areas of greatest strength. (If you DO have a lot of relevant experience, this first stage will be a breeze!)

At this stage in your business you’ll want to experiment with different coaching formats, different coaching clients, and you’ll be spending most of your time working hard to get coaching clients. ‘Birth’ will probably be the ‘hardest’ phase in your development. It will require a lot of faith in yourself as you confront early challenges. And you’ll probably make the least money in your coaching career.

Growth of Your Coaching Business

Once you begin to get clarity and momentum in your business, you’ll enter the Growth Stage. At this point you’ll probably have been in business for a year (or two) and you’ll be confident in your coaching skills. If you did your job right, you will have worked with a wide variety of clients and will know who you work best with and what you’re best at working on.

At this stage of the game, you’re going to want to standardize on your coaching format or menu of options. You’ll work on developing sophisticated marketing materials and a website you can live with for a year or two. You’ll also have more clients, begin getting referrals, and be making more money.

This stage will require you to run hard. Everything will take more time than you think it will as you focus on developing the right marketing mix for your business. Have patience with yourself and with the process. No one gets to pass ‘go’ without paying their dues!

Your Mature Coaching Business

Keep at it for long enough and you’ll have developed a full marketing funnel and be a recognized expert in your particular field. To get here, you’ll probably have a line of products, services, and resources you’ve developed and effective marketing systems.

In Maturity, you’ll also be making a lot of money. You can actually take it easier at this point of the game. You’ll have figured out how to be successful and how to maintain that success, and you could spend years enjoying the fruits of your earlier labors.

OR… you could look for new opportunities to grow and expand. Because you know that all things eventually…

The Inevitable Decline

Markets and industries change. Just as psychologists who had very comfortable businesses prior to the advent of coaching and managed care, if you’re not careful, the same will happen to you.

Your coaching niche might disappear, the needs of your customers might change, or your service might become ‘old school’. Or, a super-competitor who consolidates the market you play in might emerge and steal all of your business.

Your challenge is to keep on growing, to stay on top of trends and new developments, to find new opportunities, and to continue to expand and evolve.

You’ve worked too hard to build your business, and learned too much to let it slip away by being complacent!

Takeaways

Growth takes focus, energy, and ongoing commitment. The 135 pound weakling won’t develop an Arnold Schwarzenegger physique over night.

As a coach, your job is to help move your clients through their own learning curves as powerfully and quickly as possible. And when you’re looking for a coach to help you build your business, look for someone who can dramatically cut your learning curve so you can move through the early stages of your business lifecycle as quickly as possible.

Lawrence Mortenson is a no-nonsense speaker, trainer, consultant, and coach. He helps executives, business owners, coaches, consultants, and entrepreneurs grow profitable businesses through smart strategy, good management, and solid marketing.

Learn about Lawrence’s book for beginning coaches The Truth About the Business of Coaching (Tao of Business Press) or visit his website at http://www.lawrencemortenson.com

From the Wikipedia:

“Tuna are several species of ocean-dwelling fish. Unlike most ocean fish species, which have white flesh, the flesh of tuna is pink because the tuna’s blood has a higher oxygen carrying ability than other fish species”.

Interesting.

Before you proceed, be warned that this post is not for the weak of heart.

Tuna has always been a favorite protein source for bodybuilders, dieters, and other athletes. Reasonably cheap, fast, portable, comes in convenient can sizes, low in fat and a great source of protein and omega-3 essential fats.

A regular can of tuna can contain up to about 30g protein, 1g carbs, 0 fats per 100gm. This means that consuming just 1 can of tuna a day can bump up your protein intake by 30g. You may also want to look for tuna in brine or spring water (the brand TC Boy has this). Stay away from tuna in oil or the fancy tuna such as chili tuna, tuna in mayo, curry tuna, tuna in crappy tasting sauce, etc as they not only contain less fish meat in a can, but are normally full of fat and added sugar (which is fine if you want to have a sandwich or something, but NOT FINE if you plan to consume 1 – 2 cans a day).

Though I hate tuna, I must admit that it is an easy way of increasing your daily protein intake without any messy cooking, extensive preparation, and wasting any brain cells. But like anything else – you WILL get a little sick of it after awhile. You’ll get sick of the texture. Sick of the pale, pink flesh. Sick of the taste. Sick of the smell.

To add variety, you may want to alternate consuming tuna with something else every now and then (try eggs/chicken breasts/beef) to avoid getting sick of it. As for me, I’m just sometimes too lazy to bother to prepare my meals – so I end up just popping a can or two of tuna and bringing it to work. If you’re wondering how I’m able to eat all that tuna even though I’m sick of it? It’s easy.

Just scoop >> chew well >> sip some water >> SWALLOW. Repeat until there’s none left.

Either that, or you could be like Arnold Schwarzenegger and actually blend tuna in a blender (with other ingredients for improved taste) and drink it like a protein shake. Unfortunately, that goes over my limit. No way can i ever drink liquid fish. He could – he’s not human.

Now, for those of you considering to make tuna a regular part of your diet – here’s a useful tip that could save you from getting into a stinking mess. If you’re like me and pack meals at home and take them to work – be sure to squeeze out as much water as you can from the tuna and ensure that the container you pack it in is tight and will not let water seep through from the inside, or better still – put the whole container in a plastic bag. I’ve had incidents where I would just chuck one of my food containers (filled to the brim with tuna) only to discover at work that my laptop bag stinks of tuna as the juices have oozed onto the fabric. And thats one stench thats gonna stay there to haunt you for the months to come.

Josh Stone, also known as DM, is the author behind the site http://www.dailymuscle.com which offers the author’s personal views on real-life fitness, bodybuilding, sports nutrition, cardio, fat loss, training information, and on all things that surrounds fitness.