The Summit of Success

One languid summer day in Santa Barbara, I received a phone call.

“I would rather look like Princess Leia,” the voice stated on the phone.

“Rather than what?” I asked.

“Rather than Jabba the Hutt,” she replied gloomily.

“Well,” I questioned. “Do you have limbs?”

“Of course,” was her answer.

“Then that should be easy,” I remarked.

The self-proclaimed Jabba the Hutt on the phone was actually an aspiring actress named Liza. After being frustrated by numerous role rejections, which were later given to JLo-fit women, she became determined to say farewell to her favorite pastimes of beer, pizza, daytime soap operas, and her green microfiber sofa. She went on a strict no-carb diet and hit the treadmill. After two days of feeling starved, exhausted, and angry with her career choice, she plopped on her couch, pressed PowerOn, and ordered delivery while sipping her favorite lager. Hello old friends, goodbye Princess Leia.

A week later Liza decided she couldn’t do it on her own – she needed help. As Liza sat talking to her help, me, and answering some of my questions, I began to sum up the situation. One, her motivation to get fit was external – the fat-hating Hollywood. Two, she had no previous experience with good nutrition and exercise habits. Three, she tried to be perfect on her first attempt to change these habits, and four, when she became frustrated with her struggles to be perfect, she quit. Although Liza may have countless good qualities to her character, slacking off, or excuse-making, was one of her challenging ones.

Liza hadn’t so much as walked a mile in ten years, but on her first day I took her on an hour-long walk on the beach. Her boxer Sammy accompanied us. She had a tough time. After two weeks of hour-long walks three to four times a week, I took her on one with a slight incline. As she became accustomed to that, I told her that in two months I wanted her to hike Rattlesnake Canyon, a steep nine-mile roundtrip hike. For the next month, I moved her from walking slight inclines to decent-sized hills. The month after that, I had her begin to jog slowly on the beach. Two weeks later, she was running up slight hills. The following month, I had her hike halfway up Rattlesnake Canyon and then hike back. She did this a few more times, and at the end of the month, she conquered the entire nine-mile hike.

But she was not done. The next day, I informed her that I wanted her to run a local 5k race, that was taking place in three months, in under 25 minutes. She looked at me, aghast. I intentionally told her 25 minutes (a time I knew was above and beyond her current capabilities) so she would work even harder. I had noted so far during our training that she would work hard when I was around, but for training sessions without me, she either didn’t go at all or gave a pathetic effort. I wanted to get her motivated to give a consistent good effort throughout the week, instead of just one or two times a week. I started her on more cross-training exercises, like kettlebells and boxing, so she wouldn’t get bored. Her training started progressing into a more consistent regiment. And although on race day she actually did quite well, running the race in 27 minutes, I still acted slightly disappointed and compared her to faster runners so she wouldn’t limit herself to that one achievement. I kicked up her training a notch and told her to start competing in two races a week.

Eventually, Liza became a well-known running competitor in town. But I didn’t stop there. I started having her train others. She completed my certification program and started training others, not only for a little extra cash while she tried to make it as an actress but also to keep herself in the Princess Leiaesque shape she had acquired.

 How did I get Liza to go from couch potato to top local competitor and trainer? It’s all about perception. You have to tweak your client’s perception of reality. Michael Jordan stated, “My attitude is that if you push me towards something that you think is a weakness, then I will turn that perceived weakness into a strength.” With a small change-up of pronouns, this quote gives you a guideline as a trainer. You need to have this attitude: “If I push my client towards something that she thinks is a perceived weakness in herself, I need to turn that perceived weakness into a strength.” If your client is an excuse maker, like Liza, this means taking her perceived weakness – quitting when it gets hard– into a strength – wanting to push harder.

 Notice how I didn’t start Liza with failure. Had I, she would have perceived training with me as impossible. Instead, I implemented a program of slow progression with her. I started with doable goals for her weight and fitness level. I waited until she adapted to walking and then moved her on to walking up hills. When she adapted to that, I moved forward from walking up hills to slow jogging on flat ground. In this particular step of progression, she was regressing as well. She did move from walking to jogging; however, she went from going uphill back to staying on flat terrain. You often need to regress with your client in order to attain progress. Think in terms of a growing tree. For a tree to grow upward, its roots must extend downward. Likewise, I needed to make sure that Liza was growing a big and deep enough foundation to support and maintain her progress.

  Additionally, Liza’s progress was being stifled by inconsistent habits. She would go all out only one or two times and then give herself an unwarranted break for the entire rest of the week, not working out at all. She was yo-yoing. This was a reflection of her perception, which understood exercise as an end and not a means to an end. In order to get her past her self-stunting excuse-making, I needed to change her perception – stay a step ahead of her. This is when I told her to run the 5k. However, I also needed to start pushing her harder in our training sessions to lead her toward a level of competing. She had a good enough foundation to really get into gear, but because she was an excuse maker, the practical implementation of this required a little bit of trickery on my part. In my next training hour with her, the day I planned on telling her about the 5k, I made sure to tweak her perception within the actual session and waited until the end of the session to fiddle with her long-term perspective. Here’s how the session played out:

 

Perception change # 1:

“All right Liza,” I said with confidence. “You’re going to run twelve stadiums today.” She looked at me like I was crazy, but I knew that I was already one step ahead of her. I really wanted only nine stadiums, but I told her twelve so that her “quitting early” would really be quitting right on schedule.

 

Perception change #2:

After two stadiums, she was tired and breathing hard. For the third stadium, I had her walk, skipping steps. She thought she was getting a break from the original training program, but I had planned it all along as resistance training for the day’s workout.

 

Perception change #3:

I had her continue the run/walk pattern for two more stadiums. While she struggled through the fourth stadium, I walked alongside her, showing her breathing techniques to control the air going in and out of her lungs, distracting her slightly from the pain and also teaching her something new that made her feel a tidbit more in control of her body.

 

Perception change #4:

Even though I said not until the sixth stadium, I gave her a short break after the fourth. She thought she was getting off easier when this was also what I had planned all along.

 

Perception change #5:

I had her run the next stadium, the fifth, advising her to focus on the breathing techniques I showed her earlier. Again, her focus on the pain of the exercise was distracted slightly by her concentration on breathing.

 

Perception change #6:

After that she was really tired. So I gave her the biggest self-interest motivation: If she beat me to the top running every step while I walked every other step, I would subtract a stadium, decreasing from twelve to eleven total. She gave it her all on this one.

 

Perception change #7:

I saw that she really gave it her all on the previous stadium. I repeated the same deal but didn’t shave another off the “fake” total. She realized that if she legitimately gave her all for this seventh stadium, I would be more likely to give her bigger breaks.

 

Perception change #8:

I had her walk the next one, skipping steps. She thought I was cutting her slack, but again, she was getting resistance training.

 

Perception change #9:

The ninth stadium was the last one I wanted her to do, but she was starting to complain. I gave her an ultimatum: if she ran really fast, this would be the last one. If not, I would add another stadium and push-ups. Although it wasn’t much, she pushed herself on this last one. I called it a day.

 

 

 

Perception change #10 :

As we said our goodbyes, I told Liza that I wanted her to run a local 5k in three months. In that instant I raised her perception another notch, heightening her goals from running nine stadiums to running a race. By being a step ahead of her and focusing her mind on a bigger challenge, I drop-kicked the possibility in her head of getting the rest of the week “off” – she had to prepare for a race now.

The numerous distractions and tricks I threw Liza’s way only helped her performance in the workout. I perceived her weakness – quitting when the going gets rough – and turned it into a strength by getting her mind to believe she was getting huge breaks throughout the workout. In her mind, doing two more stadiums to reach eleven would have been impossible. If I had given her the real total of only nine stadiums, she would have wanted to give up much earlier. By telling her she had it worse, I actually made the workout session better.

However, I could not end there. Remember that while you are modifying a client’s perception, as a trainer you need to constantly be checking in on your own perspective. You need to stay in touch with your client and read their personality. If you have a client who can give 100% consistently, she does not need the “fakeout” of saying twelve stadiums when you really want nine. She needs the full twelve-stadium challenge, if not more. As a client progresses, you need to keep challenging her. Have her enter additional races and other competitions. As she slowly masters this, move on to the last element: training others. When Liza finally got to a place of consistently performing well and competing frequently, when she could rely on her own perception to push her, I still needed to push her one step further. I told her I thought she would make a great trainer and advised her to enter my certification program. When she passed that, I hired her as a trainer. At the end of all this, Liza not only had achieved her desired fitness goals but also had generated the habits to remain fit throughout her life. And one of her new greatest satisfactions is helping others achieve these same happy results and being paid for it!

On another note for trainers, do not use the concept of perception is reality just for excuse makers. It is a vital tactic for any client because you always want to take your client to the next level. However, there is an alternate level to focus on: instead of trickery, give awareness. Pretend I have one new client, Ben, who does exercise throughout the week, albeit minimally. He tells me that he frequents the gym, with a regiment of ten minutes on the treadmill, ten push-ups, and ten lunges. A star trainer will ultimately lead Ben to a possible workout for an Olympic athlete. So first, I progress him through several levels, like this:

High school athlete level

• Thirty lunges, twenty push-ups, jog a mile

 

College athlete level

• Jumping lunges, crunches holding a twenty-pound weight, push-ups with a twenty-pound weight on his back, five 400 meter sprints

 

Competitive athlete (professional, Olympic) level

• Jumping lunges carrying a one hundred-pound weight, crunches holding a fifty-pound weight, push-ups with a one hundred-pound weight on his back, and then five 400 meter sprints, five 200 meter sprints, and five 100 meter sprints, all with a parachute

 

Of course, progress like this would occur over the course of many months, but throughout it I am instilling in Ben a perception of reality for a more competitive lifestyle, giving him awareness of a higher level at each step.

The concept of perception is reality is not limited to the world of athletics and fitness. It can also be applied to the business realm. My personal training business did not start out as a giant, leafy, shady tree. It began as a skinny stick with measly roots. First, I started out training my high school friends, who were trying to gain weight and muscle, for free. Then, I helped their parents lose weight, at no charge. Between three of my friends’ parents, they lost 150 pounds in a year. As I witnessed this success, a new perception emerged in my mind – my training knowledge and ability to coach others was valuable! I soaked up this perception like water, and my roots and tree trunk grew. My friend’s father, who was a doctor, saw the successful results of my training and asked for a consultation with me. Now that my roots and trunk had grown and I had a stronger foundation of confidence, I charged him $60 for a consultation. With the information I had given him in an hour, he lost 40 pounds on his own. As I heard and witnessed more triumphant testimonials from clients, I started raising my rates, working my way up over the years from $100 per session to $800 per session. I started training models, Fortune 500 CEOs, and even professional athletes. Today, my tree provides a great deal of shade, i.e., I have an abundance of leaves or “success stories,” so I charge $2,500 for a consultation. But I still do not want to stop there. I have taught a few seminars, and after I have done a few more and develop a confident perception of myself as a seminar speaker, I plan on offering $20,000 seminar package to corporations.

Your entrepreneurial endeavors can benefit greatly from a tree growth-like progress and keeping one step ahead of yourself. Just as you wouldn’t expect to run a 5k in under 25 minutes with no previous training, you should not expect your endeavor to start a business to be perfectly successful on your first try. Expectations like these could potentially cause you to squash all your other entrepreneurial ambitions if they are swallowed by failure on your first try. Additionally, your business does not have to be perfectly mapped out and structured in order for you to start it. It’s all right to be honest and admit you’re in the beginning stage of your company. Better to get it started and improve the business as you go along, and learn from your mistakes, than delay starting for five years while you try to get your ducks in a geometrically straight row. Especially if you’re in the service industry, get started quickly. But, you ask, how do I get clientele if I have no one to vouch on my behalf? Well, start out by performing your service for free, like I did. If you’re a trainer, try helping your friends with their fitness goals. Then perhaps move on to their parents. If they experience success with you leading them, then you can get testimonies and start charging per hour. If not, you can keep tweaking your program until they do experience success with you. In this way, your perception is constantly being changed by the actual experience you are getting – your own training for training others. As your training methods lead more and more people to their fitness goals, you can slowly start increasing your rate. It is important to continue raising your rates and your own personal abilities of your service so your business can keep growing. Otherwise, you are setting a cap on yourself, putting limits on your success. Also, expand your clientele. Don’t be afraid to branch out. You can keep your current social network and have a new one.

Overall, in the territories of business or training, a change of perception creates vitality, whether it be your own perception or a client’s that needs altering. It keeps raising the bar, continuing to challenge yourself to perform better than you could have expected. It continually raises your knowledge and confidence. Furthermore, it keeps things moving and interesting. Perceive yourself in the success you strive for, and when you reach it, perceive yourself at an even higher level of success, greater than you could have previously imagined, infusing your life with continual achievement.

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One day, when I was in the African village of Embu doing some work for my Charity Water for Africa, which builds wells and provides villages with clean water, I noticed a group of about 20 children playing soccer. Suddenly I got an idea; I reached into my backpack and pulled out a Frisbee. Immediately, a little boy named Duante came over to see what I was doing. I tossed it directly to him. This amused him, because of the way it floated on the air he thought it was from another planet or something. He tried to return it to me, but couldn’t quite throw it. He ended up rolling it along the ground. I tossed it to him again, and this time he threw it back. Although it didn’t make it all the way, it was much better than his first attempt. As we continued to toss the Frisbee back and forth, other children crowded around to watch. Suddenly, Gamba, the leader of the group, came up and asked Duante if he could play too. Gamba caught on to the game quickly, and soon the three of us were passing back and forth to each other. Within ten minutes, other children trickled into the game.

After watching the kids play the game for a few more days, I noticed that Gamba was getting bored. I decided to teach him some tricks. like the underdog and around the back. He practiced these for about two weeks, until he became almost as good as me; he could even do forward and underhanded passes. But after about a month of group Frisbee and more advanced tricks, he started to get bored again.

To help him learn and stay interested, I pulled out a second Frisbee, and taught him and the other children how to play Ultimate Frisbee. Once again, I saw the group’s enthusiasm for learning, and just like before, Gamba excelled at the game. Before long, his skills were far better then the rest of the children’s and he began showing them how to improve their techniques.

One day, Gamba had to travel to Lamu, a village that was about 20 miles away. Before he left, I gave him a Frisbee. This made him very happy, and when he got to the village, he taught the children how to play Frisbee, just like I had with him a couple of months before. Of course, the new group of kids were fascinated with the Frisbee. Much like the first group, they quickly caught on to the concept of passing back and forth. When Gamba felt that they had mastered it, he taught them tricks, and then Ultimate Frisbee.

When Gamba finally came back home, he brought a surprise with him – his Ultimate Frisbee team. Since he had trained the children from Lamu to play Ultimate Frisbee, he wanted to set up a tournament between the two villages. All of the children were thrilled, especially Duante, the first little boy I played Frisbee with. Although he was excited to have the opportunity to play in the tournament, he felt a bit nervous and worried that he would forget some of the moves he had learned. The next day, the two teams played in their first tournament and Gamba served as the referee. The team I trained won, but Gamba’s team played very well too.

Using the Ultimate Frisbee story, let’s take a look at how you can apply SHEEPP-C with your own clients. Remember, your goal is to take them from clients to trainers.

Show – just like I showed Duante how to play Frisbee, you will want to show your client what to do so they get the basic idea of the activity. This should take one or two minutes.

Hear – when Gamba first came over, he stood for a while and listened to Duante and I play before he joined in. When you are training someone, they will hear what you are saying and get a feel for what they are supposed to do. The hearing phase should take about three minutes.

Explore – when Gamba first threw the Frisbee, he was exploring. In the explore stage, your clients try out the activity you have just shown them. Depending on their skills, this should take about five minutes.

Explain- once Gamba and Duante had a chance to practice the basic act of passing the Frisbee back and forth, I took time to work with them to explain proper form and other ways to play the game. In this stage, you will give close, hands-on instruction to help your client with the proper technique for the exercises you’ve just had them do.

The Explore and Explain stages are interchangeable and depend on your client’s learning style. Some people like to jump right in, but others need detailed explanation first.

Practice- in the story, Gamba spent the majority of his time practicing. First, he practiced the basics, then the more advanced moves, and finally Ultimate Frisbee. At each stage, he spent longer amounts of time practicing. This is the stage where your client will spend the most amount of time. Practice will include performing the exercises until he or she gets them right and building on them by doing harder, more challenging exercises. You want to balance how long your client spends doing the same thing because, like Gamba, once they become good at it, they will quickly become bored.

Performance – Duante and the children who were in the tournament were given the opportunity to showcase their skills to see who was the  best. In this stage, your client will compete and apply everything they have learned. It’s not unusual for them to be nervous, have anxiety, or even forget a few things they learned during practice. However, people who are successful in competition and in life are those who learn from their experiences and improve.

Coach – remember how Gamba went to Lamu and formed an Ultimate Frisbee team? He was essentially their coach. In the final step, once your client has mastered their skills and competed a bit, you want them to teach/coach someone else. If they teach others, their success will have a trickle down effect and they will become even better themselves. Think back to SHEEPP-C climbing the mountain, not only do you want to get up, but you also want to pull someone else up. When you both reach the summit, the accomplishment is that much better.

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Motivation can be a tricky thing. Whether it’s with a friend, an employee, or a family member—a personal or a business relationship—it can be difficult to find the balance between making them do something and failing to inspire them to do it at all. Yet it does not have to be difficult. The “Past, Present, Future” model is a simple and effective verbal tool that can be used to motivate others to mutual benefit. Often people think that they are using this model, when in fact they are not including all three elements.

The basic structure is this: Start by mentioning the Past, or the way things used to be. Then move on to the Present—the status quo. The last element is the Future, which is how the status quo can be improved upon even further.

That, of course, is very general, so let’s look at some more specific examples.

1. Past:

Again, the Past is the way things used to be, as they relate to the specific project that needs to be accomplished, or something this person has already done. It is usually something that has been improved upon, or can be improved upon in some way.

Example: You’re a fitness trainer, trying to encourage a new client to expand their workout and get into shape. The Past part would be, “Before we started, you weren’t running at all.”

It is important that any negative feedback when using this model is expressed positively. In other words, do not start with a personal attack. Instead of saying, “You need to do better,” tell them that they are already doing better, but can be even better. The past should be differentiated from the present.

But what if you just met someone? In this case, you’ll want to start with an icebreaker: something that you can relate to them about. Ask a few questions and get to know them a little—that connection is very important. Then you can move forward by using this common goal as the Past, which brought you both here to this point, where you stand at the Present. Or, you can use the Past as a question in connection with the Present. For example, when teaching a first time client boxing, you could ask, “Have you ever boxed before?” and then move forward to simple tasks like just trying on the gloves to “see how they feel.”

2. Present:

The Present, or the status quo, is used to express something that has changed from the Past, or what this person is doing now. Continuing with the same scenario:

Example: “Now you are running a mile once a week.”

In other words, the status quo is an improvement upon the Past, and a step in the right direction toward an overall goal. This puts the situation in a positive light, and positive feedback is a better motivator than negativity.

How do you make sure you’ve included the Present? Check the verb to make sure it’s in the present tense. Don’t skip this part!

This is also the time to possibly ask questions and gauge their confidence level about their own abilities.

Example: “Now that you are running a mile once a week, are you feeling stronger? In better shape? Do you feel up to more?”

This is not a court of law—feel free to ask leading questions! By involving them in the process, you solidify it. This is an opportunity for them to rise to the occasion and prove to you how much they already know. Chances are, if you ask them point blank if they feel they are ready, they’ll say yes—and then they’ll feel obliged to own up to it.

3. Future:

The Future part is what you want to motivate them to accomplish—the thing that needs to get done.

Example: “Great! Now start running a mile twice a week.”

Avoid phrases such as, “Would you like to…” or “How about….” Don’t give them the opportunity to say no. Also avoid disclaimers like “I think you should….” Keep it direct and to the point—maximizing your motivational power.

“Stepping” Into the Future

The purpose of Past Present Future (let’s call it PPF from now on) is to get from where you started up to an end goal—like climbing a mountain from base to summit. You can’t just jump to the top—you have to take it one step at a time.

Think of some easy steps to climb. What do these steps look like? Generally, they’re low and wide, with a broad platform. Difficult steps to climb are steep and narrow, like you might find in medieval European construction. You want to keep the steps easy enough so that they don’t give up—but of course, you also want to keep them substantial enough so that you both feel like they are getting somewhere.

In the PPF model, the Present is the flat you are currently standing on. From there you can see down to the step you just came from (the Past) and look up to the next step you are going to take (the Future).

When working with a client, you want to keep the difficulty of their next step comparable to the step they just took. Then they can see how far they’ve come, and know they’re capable of going that much further.

It is important to make sure that your future is not looking too far ahead. You don’t want to say, “Okay, so in two years, you can start running marathons.” Such far-off and (currently) unrealistic goals can be overwhelming and demoralizing. Stick to what can be accomplished in a reasonable time frame (generally, less than a matter of months). Even if you know it’s possible, they might not, so make sure it’s something they can believe.

BAD example; You’ve been with us a few weeks and you’ve lost five pounds. Now you’re pretty comfortable with our program. So in the next six months I want you to lose 60 pounds.

Also keep the size of the project to something manageable—break it down if you have to. If this is your first session with them and you start talking about plans for them to have their own fitness show by the end of the week, they’re going to think you’re crazy or just throw up their hands at how hard your goals are. Parents have a tendency to do this to their kids—a preteen boy has been playing football for a year, and his dad starts talking about how he’s going to rake in those college scholarships.

On the other hand, if you ask for five hours of effort, they’ll often put in a lot more, after getting caught up in the completion of the project beyond the bare minimum. The most important thing is to get the ball rolling. But a longer Past makes it possible for you to give a longer Future. Once they’ve climbed 20 steps, they can look ahead 20 more and know that that distance is possible, because they’ve done it. A long PPF can last you for a while, as long as you’re always moving in the right direction.

One thing to keep in mind is that the farther you go, and the closer you get to the summit of your goals, the more difficult the steps are going to get. Someone who is 100lbs overweight and starts eating breakfast—any kind of breakfast—will lose weight. Someone who is 20lbs overweight, however, has to work harder to shed the same amount. Another example is running the 50-meter dash. Going from 22 to 15 seconds is relatively easy for an overweight person. But for someone who is in better shape, to get from 9.3 to 9.2 seconds is a lot more difficult.

It is also possible to have more than one Future, and to build upon the progress that is being made—“If such-and-such happens, then such-and-such can also happen.”

Example: “If you start running twice a week on your own, then we can spend our training time on more intense activities.”

The Future can also be delayed, until after the initial step is taken.

Example: “Can you run two miles now?” And then afterward—“You just ran two miles; let’s make this your weekly routine.”

It is important to note that many people who think that they use this tool are often in fact only using two of the three elements.

Example: “Great. You ran a mile. Now run two miles.”

This lacks the motivational part, the sense of progress already made. It must be a conscious effort to use all three parts of the “Past, Present, Future” model.

Make sure that there is always a positive direction for the future, and that the client is aware of it—not just of the next task on the list. They need to have something to work for. Eventually you may find that they get so in tune with this process that they will start making their own PPF’s, based on their experience with their own capabilities and their own desire to reach the end goal. The idea is that they will continue to meet these small goals, and in the end eventually achieve something of which they might not have initially believed themselves capable.

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