Health & Wealth Newsletter

Sneak Peek

Issue: December, 2002

Headline: The ODM Muscle and Those Pesky Obstacles

Suppose a client gets sick and can no longer train. Does your income take a hit? Suppose the club owner you work for changes the policy and cuts your percentage. Do you have trouble paying your bills? Suppose a media story hits about "Personal Trainers Endangering People's Lives with Flawed Nutritional Advice." Do your clients walk, leaving you penniless?

It would be nice if the road to your ultimate successes was really paved with gold, but the road takes many unexpected turns. Trees will fall in your path. That leaves you with only two options. Fall to the ground, break down and cry, and ask "why does this happen to me," or figure out, as difficult as it might seem in the moment, how you can either move or work your way around this tree, knowing the other side holds far greater promise than the ground where you feel stuck.

How can we best prepare to handle and overcome those obstacles when they arise? There lies the topic for this month's newsletter . . . becoming an obstacle destroyer! Develop the ODM. What's that you ask? The odeus-duo-medialis muscle. That clears things up doesn't it? Actually ODM is an abbreviation I came up with for a figurative muscle I felt it important to develop. ODM Stands for . . . . the Obstacle Destroying Muscle! Here's how you develop it. Start out overcoming small obstacles. Your car doesn't start? You have a client in 30 minutes? Be resourceful. Call a friend, take a taxi, start running . . . I don't care what you do . . . . just do something. Once you begin to challenge obstacles rather than allowing them to defeat you, you develop a new awareness, one that helps you see that a state of frustration is temporary, and you do have power to shorten its duration. The concept is not unlike weight training - the more you do, the more resistance you challenge, the easier it becomes.

So how do we develop the ODM?

Always anticipate, looking ahead at the following day, week, and month.

One of the consistent elements I've noted in highly successful people is their ability to look forward without losing focus of the present moment. It's far simpler to handle an obstacle if you can see it coming. If BLAM, a tree falls in your way only inches in front of you, the adrenaline rush, the panic, and the paralysis brought about by fear and a sense of powerlessness, will leave you far less equipped to work your way around the tree with any expediency. Let's take this into the real world.

Most trainers know how many clients they have "today." They might even know the number of sessions they anticipate conducting "this week." If, however, they fail to look ahead and examine the likelihood of client longevity, the bottom can suddenly drop out on their income. Maintain a figurative pulse on each of your client's commitment to continuance. If you sense you're about to lose a client due to the client becoming empowered enough to forego the future alone, or if a client indicates that his or her work schedule will become overwhelming for a period of time, you have the ability to get a running start and leap right over the tree. How? By marketing aggressively and loading up on scheduled sessions to ensure that the dropout rate will not negatively impact your finances.

It's not only about learning to intuitively sense whether a client is in it for the long haul, but it's also important to keep tabs on whether your business is growing. Even if you're happy with your present income, you must recognize by now that nothing stays the same. Things are either growing or dying. That's nature. A comfort level can be the worst enemy of anticipation. Wake up that ODM muscle and get in the habit of measuring your achievements against your goals. Get in the habit of, at least once a week, planning for the future. Get in the habit of learning to recognize when a downhill plunge is just beginning.

Have a contingency plan You have to be able to answer the question "what if" for every predictable scenario.

• · What if you have to go out of town for a week?
• · What if three of your clients get the flu simultaneously?
• · What if a client is training with you but failing to adhere to your nutritional suggestions?

The first time a situation arises, it might feel as if a huge obstacle has just been laid in your path, but with thought and perseverance, you'll overcome it, and from that point forward you'll know precisely how to handle that situation should it come up again. The art of anticipating allows you to predict the situations, even before they arise once.

• · What if there's a torrential rainstorm during travel time to a scheduled session?
• · What if a client wants his wife to train with him and he insists on paying the same hourly rate he's always paid on his own?
• · What if the power goes out and you can't use the motorized treadmill?
• · What if a client cancels his sessions at the last minute chronically?
• · What happens if the primary piece of equipment you're planning on using needs repair?

Can we anticipate every possible situation? Of course not, but with enough "what if" contingencies, we can develop the ODM muscle impressively.

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