Fit pros are often the ones we go to for inspiration and motivation when we need to refill our energy well. But as coaches and instructors how can we avoid burnout and stay inspired and motivated not only for our clients but for ourselves? Today on the Work IN we’ll be talking about how to beat burnout and coaches' block to reconnect with your creative flow in your fitness business. 3 coaching blocks in particular. Finding rest, finding inspiration, finding direction.
As a part of my mission to bring a legacy of resilience through movement, each month you can join me for a hike on the bike trail followed by a free trauma informed vinyasa class back at the studio on Main Street. Go to savagegracecoaching.com to see the calendar and join my newsletter, Yoga Life on Main Street, to stay up to date on all the latest studio news, events and gossip. And now… on to this week’s episode.
It’s time to stop working out and start working IN. You found the Work IN podcast for fit-preneurs and their health conscious clients. This podcast is for resilient wellness professionals who want to expand their professional credibility, shake off stress and thrive in a burnout-proof career with conversations on the fitness industry, movement, nutrition, sleep, mindset, nervous system health, yoga, business and so much more.
I’m your host Ericka Thomas. I'm a resilience coach and fit-preneur offering an authentic, actionable realistic approach to personal and professional balance for coaches in any format.
The Work IN is brought to you by savage grace coaching, bringing resilience through movement, action and accountability. Private sessions, small groups and corporate presentations are open now. Visit savagegracecoaching.com to schedule a call and get all the details.
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Fit pros are often the ones we go to for inspiration and motivation when we need to refill our energy well. But as coaches and instructors how can we avoid burnout and stay inspired and motivated not only for our clients but for ourselves? Today on the Work IN we’ll be talking about how to beat burnout and coaches' block to reconnect with your creative flow in your fitness business. 3 coaching blocks in particular. Finding rest, finding inspiration, finding direction.
Just like the seasons of the year, I’ve noticed a seasonal rhythm in my business. Not only the highs and lows of class participation that follows the seasons of the year but also a rhythm of creativity, energy and inspiration in myself. Perhaps you’ve noticed it too? Are there times of year when you feel very energized and engaged with clients, times when it feels easy to show up with your whole self and then times when it seems more like a heroic effort to plan one. More. class. And you’re not sure you can do it, but you do anyway.
I believe those cycles are just as natural as winter following fall. They may not match the year. Maybe they flow over the course of 2 years or you might feel them every month.
In my experience Back in the day, when I taught at multiple different locations I felt that let’s call it “energy dip” about every other year and so I tried to refill my well of knowledge and creative bag of tricks with a fitness conference or training on that schedule. They served multiple purposes. I could stock up on all my cec’s and get tons of new ideas, but more importantly they were fun. I got to get away for a weekend. Hang out with colleagues and get inspired by hundreds of other fitness professionals. But what it didn’t do was offer any actual physical rest. It was just more of the same. Looking back that dip was the slippery slope into burnout.
So what I noticed was what I call coaches block. I’d sit down to plan a class or workout and stare at the page.Just like writers block. I literally had nothing. So my answer was to go get more ideas.
It never occurred to me that it was maybe more than that.
Fitness is very repetitive. We often say the same things over and over. To many different people yes but it’s the same thing over and over. The same cues, the same health information, the same prescription, the same song and dance. So while it might look different to our students and clients, if we’re not careful we can get pretty bored at the front of the room.
So when that happens coupled with the physical exhaustion that every fit pro knows it can set the stage for injury and burnout. And make you want to literally slash and burn your fitness career. I’ve seen it happen again and again and I think it’s why there’s so much churn in the fitness industry in the first 5 years.
But there are ways to refill your well that also renew and restore the body. When we do this on a regular basis, monthly, weekly, daily we’re actually creating a buffer against chronic stress and burnout in every aspect of our life.
So I’d like to share some of the things I use now that I wish someone had taught me as a young fit pro that would have saved me from several rounds of burnout and significant stress injuries.
How to find rest when you can’t afford to stop
Cultivate your beginner's mind and audit someone else's classes, or learn something completely new unrelated to your job or format.
Take a cooking class. Take an art class. Learn to throw an ax. Whatever it is, do it with no other purpose than to have fun.
Lean into your network of friends and colleagues. Fellow instructors are sometimes difficult to network with because we’re always teaching but it’s well worth it. Look for people like you who can engage without competition. Again this might take some radical trust in our fellow humans. But we can all become amazing resources and referrals for each other and it needs to start somewhere.
Create some traditions for yourself. You can call it boundaries but at the time of this recording we are approaching the holidays and what are traditions if not boundaries around a particular season. So why not create a tradition of some kind for yourself and your career. For example, last year during the holidays I took a 6 week sabbatical from this podcast. It was the first time I’d done something like that for myself. It gave me time to rest, plan, record and get ahead for the next year without deadline pressure. I’ll be doing the same thing this year and rerunning a few old episodes. You can do something similar with a quarterly long weekend or other blocked time off. I have a friend who takes a yearly yoga retreat somewhere exotic. It doesn't have to be big though. Yearly vacations and retreats are great but the danger is that we won’t do anything in between to take care of ourselves. Like weekly coffee with a friend. Monthly ladies' nights or a book club or a daily walk can be very restorative.
All these things and more can become rolling recoveries that build resilience and buffer stress. It is like regular release valves and can prevent burnout.
The smaller things are just as important and maybe more powerful in the long run. But in order for them to work we have to accept them and receive them that way. It doesn’t work if any of this feels like one more thing for you to do.
How to find inspiration on the regular when you’re feeling uninspired
We can’t always drop everything and go to a weekend training conference or a retreat when we’re feeling stuck, overwhelmed, uninspired. Those are expensive in time, travel and money.
Inspiration can come from anywhere. Outside of us and inside. Remember creativity is combination not origination. We don’t need to reinvent the wheel but we do need to have things to combine. So let yourself outside the box. Tap into those unrelated hobbies and the things you do for fun.Engage with your new network. Podcasts and Youtube channels are great free resources.
Visioning - One of my go to ways to spark ideas is through meditation. But not just any meditation. I call it visioning and it's a completely undirected brainstorm. The purpose is to entertain all of your thoughts. To follow them down rabbit holes, to wonder about them, to explore all the “what ifs” as if they’re all possible. And then sift through them, shake them around in your head until something interesting floats to the surface.
Usually I do this during a walk without headphones. Just let your thoughts run wild. No judgments. Resist the temptation to immediately reject any of them. Think them all through no matter how ridiculous. You might be surprised by what you come up with. Stuff like this podcast episode came directly from a visioning meditation I did last week.
I also keep several notebooks around to write any of those brilliant ideas down. Then I can read back through them later. I got tired of having brilliant thoughts and then losing later.
How to find direction when you’re stuck at a crossroads
We don’t have to slash and burn in order to restart in a new direction. But sometimes it can be difficult to know which way we need to go next, especially when you have people like me telling you that there’s no wrong decision, you just have to pick one. If you’ve done some visioning you might have a bunch of possibilities that all sound really good. You might be excited about all of them. But it's important that we can be intentional with our yeses and mindful no’s. Lots of ideas can be just as paralyzing as no ideas so how do we sift out a direction? Here’s some ways.
Sleuthing - ask your people - your current clients. I stole this right out of my business mastermind and launching course. This is a great untapped resource. They can help you understand your strengths as a coach and where you can improve. They might have other ideas for you as well. You might create a regular check in with them to offer their input. Now on the flipside of this, if you are looking to make a complete change sleuthing your current clientele might not be helpful at all. They may want you to stay exactly the same. That’s when you may need to seek out your new audience. Research in your new direction is also sleuthing. So dig in and explore.
Find an Accountability Partner - Someone in your field that you can bounce ideas off of. You can meet on a regular basis or set up calls as needed.
Get a Coach - And of course you can get yourself a coach. I would say in my experience having access to a coach or coaching group can save you time and money and confusion. For fit pros we often think of coaching as something we do, it's not something we need. But there’s this thing that happens that makes it almost impossible for us to coach ourselves. We are too close to our own issues to see them clearly. Obviously otherwise we wouldn’t get stuck.
A coach is going to ask the hard questions that we don’t necessarily want to look at. A coach can help you stay focused like it’s their job, because it is. In my experience fit pros can benefit from a little crossover life coaching. As much as we’d like to preach a healthy work life balance for our clients we aren’t very good at that for ourselves. So finding a fitness business coach that can help you balance a healthy lifestyle or a life/health coach that can help you with your business processes would be ideal. There are a lot of us out there.
There’s a lot of reasons that we can feel stuck. We can be tired, we can be overwhelmed, we can get confused by too many choices or not enough choices. I just want to encourage you. The world needs who you are and what you have to offer. So don’t quit. Rest. and look for ways to bring restoration into your personal and professional life.
Thanks for listening to The Work IN today!
I appreciate all of you so much and if you like what you heard and you are looking for a way to uplevel your own skills or step out of your comfort zone into a wellness business in the coming year I’m opening a couple private spots in my Clarity program for new entrepreneurs. Clarity is a year long 1:1 program. This is for solopreneurs in the wellness space and beyond looking to build a deeper foundation and are ready to go from concept to career. The program covers Clarity mindset, setting up digital, social media and email marketing systems, creating and pricing your packages and so much more. Basically all the stuff I wish I’d known and what I learned along the way. Except you get personal attention.
Head to savagegracecoaching.com and book a call and give yourself the gift of clarity in your business this year.