'What are they thinking about me?'

Do you worry about what people think of you? How much time do you spend in your day worrying about others judgement? Does the energy that you put into this thinking help you progress forward? 

Today I’m going to share an experience that taught me a good lesson and got me thinking about these tough questions. 

A few years ago I was participating in a training camp for elite triathletes. The training was madness, each day started at 5.30am and consisted of 3-6k swims, 150-250k bike rides and 10-15k runs - the days were long and hard. The camp was designed to push each of us to the edge of our limit and at times it felt like we had gone well over that edge. 

One of the key factors to my success on this camp was a guy called Brandon. Our athletic ability was similar and we seemed to hit it off like old school buddies. Over the 13 day camp we would spend nearly 80% of our time together. If I was having one of those ‘I want to give up’ moments, Brandon would encourage me to push on through and I would do the same for him. We both bought something to each others experience which made both of us better athletes both physically and mentally. 

Once the camp was over I discovered that Brandon had been writing a daily blog, every day he had written about that day’s training. When I discovered that this had been published online my ego was looking forward to reading it, as I assumed I would get quite a few complimentary mentions. Well my ego got deflated, in all the writing Brandon had done over the entire camp, I only got two quick mentions. I have to admit at first I was surprised by this as we had spent so much time together. Then I started thinking about how I had been communicating my experience to others, I hardly ever mentioned Brandon. 

This experience taught me a very valuable lesson: most people spend most of their time thinking about their own life. I’m going to repeat that as it is an important point: most people spend most of their time thinking about their own life. 

Think about yourself. In your day how often are you thinking about what is happening in your own day to day life in comparison to thinking about other people’s lives? Once you discover that most people are thinking about themselves most of the time you can allow yourself to lessen your concern about what they think of you. That’s because the chances are they aren’t thinking of you.

Time worrying about judgement from others is a lost opportunity for you to be spending this time creating the life where you get to be what you want to be and do what you want to do.  Imagine if you were to spend all that accumulated ‘worry time’ on things that contributed to your own growth in areas that are important to you. Where would that lead you? 

Next time you are worrying about what someone may be thinking of you, say to yourself ‘they probably aren’t even thinking of me at all’ and put your focus back into how you can progress forward. 

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The Burst of Motivation

If you hate being woken to the sound of the alarm at 5am I have one piece of advice for you: Don’t work in fitness. Fitness professionals live to help others achieve their health and fitness goals and as most of our clients work during normal working hours, mornings and nights are the necessary times for us to work. While this could be seen as a burden there’s one thing I love about working before the world has woken up: The drive to work.

One of the pleasures of driving to work in the morning, other than the fact that you have the roads to yourself, is seeing those impressive people who get up and go running. It’s the same people every morning. There’s the girl who always seems to be pushing herself really hard up the hill, I seem to remember someone told me she was an amazing netball player. Then there’s the guy who looks like a bit of a hippy who runs on the road and I’m always worried that I’m going to hit him. There’s also a couple of older ladies who seem to be enjoying each others company as they are beating the streets together.

I don’t know these people but I feel I have an affinity with them. While the rest of the world is getting the last of their precious sleep, these characters in the story of my drive to work remind me that I need to keep challenging myself in my life. By them doing something that is good for them they remind me what is good for me.

Occasionally there will be someone who breaks the routine of my drive to work. They are new, someone I have never seen before. They are out there running or walking but for some reason they don’t have that look of ease that my regular runners have. Inside I wonder if they are someone who has hit a moment in their life where they know they need to create some change.

On this particular day they have set the alarm early, motivated themselves to get out of bed and head out the door which is an awesome achievement in itself. Unfortunately I never seem to see these people again. Why is that? I’m sure when these people get home they feel good about themselves. That getting up and going for this early morning run sets up a momentum of good behavior for the rest of the day. They have probably even let the people in their world know that they got up early and went for a run in the morning. So why don’t I see them again?

For many of us we experience what I call the ‘burst of motivation’. It can come from that moment when you have let your habits fall off the wagon for a long period of time, and you know that you have to change. In this moment you get a burst of motivation and determine that tomorrow is going to be different. You create a plan where you get up much earlier than you normally do and go for a run, two things which are big challenges for you.

The downfall of this burst of motivation is that the actions we put in place at these times are often a massive stretch forward from our current ability and experience. This burst means that you can pull if off, but only once or twice as it’s just too hard. Unfortunately on that third morning when you have stayed in bed after the alarm went off there’s a chance that you will see yourself in a negative light. This might tell you that you’ll ‘never be good at exercise’.

There is value in the burst of motivation but you need to learn how to use it effectively. When you feel it coming on don’t aim for the most challenging activity, instead ask yourself ‘how can I build a habit and what are the ways that I can be most successful at doing this?’ By asking this question you will look for the best times of day for you to train, what types of environments work for you, who will guide you and what is the appropriate level for you to start at. If you figure this out you’re on a much safer path to success, one where the odds aren’t against you, instead they are in your favour.

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What Story Are You Telling?

What’s the story of your life? Let’s cut to the chase, I’m starting with a bang today.  I’ll repeat my question, what’s the story of your life?  

Imagine if we lived in a world where once you hit a certain age, that was nearing the latter stages of your life, you had to quit everything you do to write your life story. You’d be given three years and you would be funded to do it. It’s an interesting thought, where would you start? Who would you interview? What memories would you want the world to know about and which ones would never be committed to ink? What do you think you would learn about yourself through this process? 

There’s a saying ‘everyone has a book in them’, to me this isn’t about us being creative, it’s not saying that we can create stories, it’s saying that we all live lives that are full of twists and turns. So once again, what’s your story?

We often don’t realise it but most of us are constantly telling our life’s stories. It would be an interesting exercise to have a recording device on you for a day, recording your conversations. This would help you to become aware of your story. It would show what you tell your world about yourself and how you represent yourself in the different areas of your life.

Here’s a harder question: Which of your stories justifies you holding yourself back?

Working in fitness you hear a lot of stories as to why people hold themselves back. People often share well crafted words, words that have been repeated many times of why they aren’t any good at fitness. I understand these feelings are real for the story teller but I wonder if that story is helping them progress? Do they know how this story influences their life? If they were to focus on being aware of it and perhaps changing their story maybe things would be different.

I’ll tell you my current story: ‘I’m working too hard’, I don’t have that recording device but I can hear those words or some form of those words when I communicate my world to others. Deep down I know I want to have a slightly different story but when the words come out that’s what I tell. To be honest I only noticed that this was my story the other day. When I look back I realise that I’ve been telling it for a few months now. I don’t want this to be the story I’m telling so this realisation helped me take action towards the path I prefer to be on in my life. By listening to my own story I was able to see what areas I really needed to work on.

So what is your story? What does it tell you about yourself? By identifying it will you realise that you aren’t on the right path, or that you are justifying staying in the same place? Maybe it’s time to start becoming aware of your story, listening to yourself and your message, and then creating a story you would love to tell.

If you enjoy my pieces you can get them emailed to you when I put them on the internet. This way you won't have to come back to my website to check when a new piece is out. Don't worry I won't spam you. If you want to join up just put your details in here: