The Mentor Mountain- When and How to Hire a Trainer.
Why the mentor route? Why should a person hire a personal trainer? To better understand this question, we should ask, why should a personal trainer hire a mentor?
When a trainer is in front of a client, what does he or she ask herself? Supposing one answer is, where does this client need a unique approach? As the trainer, how can I help this person to continue to enjoy moving?
As a trainer, it is easy to ask, am I competent enough yet? What would your reaction be here? In the past, most often, my reaction was to feel guilty, to feel bad. I would see how I was incompetent and incapable of helping the client reach their outcome. Still, I would ask myself, how can I help this person get to the next level?
Does the trainer have implied permission from the individual to “guess” a correct answer? What is the trainer’s role here? Supposing, the trainer’s role was to keep the individual moving, are you supposed to refer them to a person competent in the gap the client currently has? Are you, as the trainer, competent enough to know what gap in movement the client has? Are you supposed to teach them based on your current movement skill set? Are you supposed to discover new solutions? Essentially, to find the answers to the above questions within yourself, as a team leader, who or what population are you working for?
Once you know, what population and what part of the movement spectrum you want to serve on, a good next step for a Trainer to ask could be, what tools should I competent in, in response to these types of questions?
A personal story:
My path has been unique in that within a 6-month period I had both of my hips operated on. Therefore, I know through personal experience, how to develop a body over 15 years that had both hips operated on. I can say, I am a master hip healer because I have lived every minute of the past 15 years recovering from hip surgery.
I know the limits, the second thoughts that arise about what activity to do, to not do, and I learned how to evaluate the payoff. Suppose, I ______ then I will get _____ payoff. Do I really want _____ payoff? Is there another creative way I could get ____ payoff without risking _____?
As I see it, I have 3 options: option 1 _____, option 2 ______, and option 3 _________.
I will choose option 3 this time because ______, and I will determine if option 3 scratches my itch and satisfies the payoffs I seek.
As a student myself, trainer and teacher to others:
I have learned that when I am moving into a new level of physical growth and new movement I can be incompetent. I am trying to describe the level of fitness and health with words that do not quite mean what I seek. Therefore, I am incompetently describing my target. One could say, I am vaguely conscious of what I want to accomplish. Therefore, in these moments, I cannot clearly define what I need. And this is where, I have learned, a good mentor can help.
When working with clients, I developed a method where I concentrate on giving them the right narrative, the appropriate reasons, and a supportive program to help them reach their target. It is important that the client knows they can be successful and the program they need to execute is simple. In my opinion, a trainer or mentors role is to simplify the client’s target. The trainer could help to create a support structure that reinforces the exercises to easily be executed.
As a trainer, bodyworker, and coach:
You are immensely important to the success of individuals. You are an important person in their lives. At the same time, the work you do with each individual runs off into their attitude with family, friends, and into their work life. You are an extremely valuable part of their team. Keep hope alive, continue to refine your craft, and I identify your gifts. Your tribe is waiting for you, and they want you to lead them!
With sincere gratitude for the work you do,
Dominic
www.DominicSessa.com