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5 Ways to Live Healthier & Enjoy Your Career

Randy Meehan

1. How can people get in better shape and live a healthier lifestyle?

I think some simple key elements people can easily add to their lives are things like preparation and scheduling.  The biggest problems I see my clients and “gym goers” have is just being ill-prepared with nutrition.  By simply making a little extra food for later or 1 day; at least cooking all your proteins makes a huge difference.  Also guys and girls, please schedule your gym time, if it’s not planned something will always pop up.

2. How important is proper nutrition?

Nutrition is the biggest contributing factor to a healthy lifestyle.  I love the comparison to your body being a race car.  If you don’t put in the best fuel, you’ll never really live up to your potential.

Some simple tips to add to your day:

• Veggies in every meal
• Eat your carbs & grains after the proteins
• Eat vegetables
• Track water intake.

3. What do you enjoy most about being a personal trainer? Least?

I would say my favorite thing about being a personal trainer is building relationships.  The appreciation people have when you’ve  helped them and motivated them to do something they were unsure of is the best feeling you can feel.  As far as the least goes, hands down getting up early.  Every trainer knows how  that 5:30 A.M. alarm feels, but the morning clients tend to be the most loyal and motivated, so that helps.  I think it’s the mutual dislike getting up early that helps build a strong bond between me and my clients!

4. What are some common characteristics of your clients who get the best results?

I think one of the biggest characteristics of successful clients is not having a fear of failure.  The best are willing to try new things and if they finish 2 reps or 15 they took the challenge and a step forward in a positive direction.  You’ll see people who repeat the same work outs for years because they are scared to fail or leave there comfort zone.  Change is never easy but easy is never worth it.

5. What have you learned in your time as a Trainer?  Any advice for people wanting to find a career that they love?

One thing I learned from my work as a trainer is to treat your passion like a career, not your hobby.  I see a lot of trainers jump in the field because they liked working out, it was their hobby.  A lot of these people stick with what they know instead of striving forward to learn and better your self every day.

Randy Meehan is a Personal Trainer at The Sports Club/LA Boston.  Currently he’s certified through N.S.C.A-CPT and Precision Nutrition-Lvl 1.  His approach to training is results and non-traditional based.  Chat with him on Twitter: @RandyMeehan.

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The ability to focus on the process is a characteristic that most great players and teams share.  The most consistent performers I have coached were the guys that had the ability to focus on the process.  Their work habits were very consistent from day to day.

Baseball is a tough game to play because you play so many games and there is more failure than success.  Programs I have been involved in spend a great deal of time studying the mental game, teaching guys how to deal with failure, and how to stick to the process through failure and success.  Brian Cain and Ken Ravizza are the best in the business in teaching these concepts.  I would highly recommend looking into their work.

One of Brian’s phrases that I love is what he refers to as “the next 200 feet”.  The illustration is this….

If you were going to drive from Florida to California in the dark without street signs, how would you do it?  Of course you would have the GPS or a map, but how would you see where you were supposed to go?  The answer is very simple; you would utilize your head lights.  The head lights help you see approximately 200 feet in front of you.  You could make it to California, but you would have to do it in tiny increments of 200 feet and trust that you would eventually get there.

We will spend a great deal of time talking about this with our guys…focusing on the next two hundred feet.   What is the next two hundred feet? It is the next sprint, the next drill, the next swing, the next pitch, the next at bat, the next game.  This type of mindset leads to day-to-day improvement and helps players improve faster AND enjoy the game more.

Coach Rob Ramseyer is the Head Baseball Coach at Hesston College.  If you would like to discuss this topic further, you are welcome to email him at robr@hesston.edu.   You can also chat with Hesston Baseball on Twitter & Facebook.