Monthly Archives: November 2009

Boot Camp Success Story

By Daniel | Published: November 30, 2009
Kerri and Jessica after!

Kerri and Jessica after!

An amazing boot camper wrote to me and wanted to share this:

“I was trying on my skirts and they were all zipped and buttoned up, and okay if I was standing still, but the minute I tried walking they started to fall down and ended up around my legs!!  I love skirts, and tried on all 17 in my closet, and not one fits!  I packed up 15 sweaters/sweatshirts that are huge on me.  I packed up 8 pairs of p.j. bottoms.  Everything I have had to get rid of from last winter is an x-large, and I am now wearing a small.  I had packed up all my size 10 jeans  a few months ago and was able to buy size 8′s, but now those have had to be packed up as well because I am now in a size 6.  I packed up four beautiful dresses all size large. “

IMG_0971_3

Kerri and Jessica before...

Way to go, Kerri.  You’ve earned it.


Posted in Motivation | Tagged | 1 Comment

An Exercise in Mental Fitness: Sharpening Your Boot Camp Focus

By Daniel | Published: November 7, 2009
(Boot Campers: What follows is a reprint of an older blog post from my other, older blog. 
But I thought it was timely and worth re-posting here)
Change your focus to break out of your mental cage

Change your focus to break out of your mental cage Image by Desiree Delgado

I know better.

Yesterday I found myself fretting about my public speaking event on Sunday.

Why? Well it all started in 1988…

~~(cue dreamy Brady Bunch dream sequence music)~~

I saw a copy of my yearbook photo from 1988.  And the past came reeling back.

I started focusing on all the mistakes and problems of my past.  Which made me feel tension.  Which made me feel negative.  Which led me to worrying about whether or not I could deliver on Sunday.

Now, the funny thing is, I am used to speaking publicly.  I do it daily in my women’s boot camp class But by simply focusing on my mistakes I got into a mini-mind-funk and started projecting “what-if” scenarios into the future.

What if I don’t deliver?  What if people don’t understand me?  What if I get nervous?

I was literally focusing on what I didn’t want. And it did not feel good at all.

The thing is, the “subconscious” mind cannot distinguish between what you don’t want and what you do want… it only knows what you are focusing on.  And what you focus on automatically produces mental pictures which produce automatic emotions.

Fortunately, I am quickly able to catch myself doing this.  So I instantly relaxed and immediately focused on what I wanted.

I created mental mini-movies of how I expect and want my fitness seminar to go.  I saw myself feeling happy.  I noticed how the happy crowd looked.  I felt my feet planted firmly on the stage.  I heard myself delivering a powerful and uplifting message.

And as the good images got clearer,  “The Ghost of Foibles Past” faded into the ether from whence he came.

And I was myself again.

Focus on what you want.  Not what you don’t want.

Especially in boot camp.

Cheers,

D

Posted in Mindset | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Drop Your Boot Camp Excuses Like a Handful of Burning Coals

By Daniel | Published: November 6, 2009

I was on the phone with a very close friend a while back.

She NEEDS to lose about 100lbs.  She wants to.

Her blood pressure is so high it makes her doctor speak in slow, hushed tones.  She can’t walk 20 feet without hearing her feet beg for mercy.

Her BMI is impossible.

She has sleep apnea.

The first thing she thinks about in the morning is what she is going to eat for lunch, whether or not it will fill her up, and how much it will cost.

Here’s the thing:

While I was on the phone with her, she brought her weight up again.  Followed by a litany of reasons why proper eating and exercise are impossible for her.

But they aren’t impossible.

Difficult as heck fire, yes.

Possibly the biggest struggle of her life, yes.

Needs to be supervised and helped, more than likely.

But impossible… absolutely not.

I’ve seen, known, and coached hundreds of people who broke through and lost the body fat.

And, as remarkable as it seems, the key for many of them was to drop their excuses like a handful of burning coals.

Once they decided to drop them… the very moment they made an irrevocable commitment to themselves…and just surrendered to the process of eating less…once they reached out and accepted help… once they started moving… once they took the FIRST STEP…everything changed.

What they discovered is, you can change your destiny in as little as 10 seconds.

Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and drop those coals.

Yes you can.

Cheers,

D

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment