As a small business owner, I’m always looking for ways to learn how to better run and grow my business so I can ultimately help more people achieve their weight-loss, fitness, and athletic performance goals. I recently began reading “Start With Why” by Simon Sinek. In Mr. Sinek’s book, he discusses how many businesses do a very good job of telling their customers what they do and how they do it. The big difference between these businesses and the very successful ones is that successful businesses start with their ‘Why’. They focus on educating their customers on why they do what they do, instead of only focusing on explaining what they do and how they do it, which brings me to why I decided to write about this topic. If you’re reading this, you probably visited my website to get more information on how Tenacity Performance Training will help you get results. My website does a great job of telling you I provide private and semi-private personal and performance training services (my ‘What’) through the implementation of science-based, personalized exercise programs (my ‘How’). But do you know my ‘Why’? Why do I do what I do? Why have I chosen to help people achieve their weight-loss/fitness/performance goals as my profession?
My story begins when I was a child. From about the 3rd grade to my sophomore year in high school, I was an overweight kid. Fortunately, I was never bullied for being overweight like many of today’s children are, but I would certainly get some ribbing from family members for being a little “husky”. Some of my aunts would tell me, “You’re so cute, but your fat!” I’m sure they only meant well, but it would be demoralizing nonetheless. I remember dreading wearing blue jeans or slacks because I never felt comfortable wearing them. Everything just felt too tight. Most of the time, I’d wear sweat pants even to family holiday parties. One of my cousins even asked why I always wore sweats and never wore jeans. I remember how happy I was when my mom finally found a pair of jeans I actually felt comfortable wearing. The thing was those jeans had a stretchy waistband with a draw string! Whenever I tried to control my eating, I would just get hungrier and break down and eat more. Eating a lot made me feel good. This went on for years until just before beginning my sophomore year in high school. I was going out for the football team and I needed to get a sports physical. During the physical, my doctor told me I was too fat. I was only 5’1” and weighed 167 lbs.! She said I had to lose weight. From that point on I began to eat better, watch my portion sizes, and get outside and play more. By the first day of school, I was down to 150 lbs.! I ended up not playing football, but I stayed focused on keeping the weight off throughout the rest of high school. When it came time to decide what I was going to major in college, I knew working in the health and fitness field is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life, so I majored in Kinesiology (the study of human body movement) and the rest is history. Since college, though, I’ve struggled with controlling my weight. Like many of you reading this, areer stress, family stress, and the arrival of children were constant challenges making it difficult to achieve and maintain my health and fitness goals. Ironically, as a fitness business owner, it’s been particularly challenging to stay in shape because of the added work and stress of growing a business from scratch. But I’ve realize I must be a living example for my clients every day. That’s what drives me!
So, back to my ‘Why’. I’ve chosen to help people lose weight and get back into shape because I know exactly what it’s like to struggle with being overweight and out of shape. I know what it was like to have a negative self-image of yourself and use food for comfort. I know what it was like to be too tired to workout because your newborn baby didn’t sleep at all the night before. I know what it is like to feel as though you’re too busy to squeeze in your workout because things need to get done at work. Why do I do what I do? Because I know what the struggle is like and I have the solution that can help people reclaim their lives.
If you’re goals are to lose weight, or to get back into shape, or train hard for an upcoming athletic season, tell me your ‘WHY’. Email me at paul@trainwithtenacity.com. I’d love to hear it!