Decision Fatigue, Solved

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Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Welcome to There Is a Method to the Madness.
My name is Rob Maxwell, and I'man exercise physiologist and
personal trainer.
I am the owner of Maxwell'sfitness programs, and I've been
in business since 1994.
The purpose of this podcast isto get to the real deal of what
really works and mostimportantly why things work.

(00:21):
Hence the name, There Is aMethod to the Madness.
Before I get to today's show, Iwant to thank Jonathan and Lynn
Gilden of the Gilden Group atRealty Pros.
They are committed to providingthe highest level of customer
service in home sales.
Why don't you give them a shoutand figure out what your home is
worth?
386-451-2412.

(00:46):
Good morning or good afternoonor good evening, whatever time
you're listening to thispodcast.
Coach Rob here, and I'm going totalk about some fitness items
with you again today.
Today I'm going to talk a littlebit about uh one of the pieces
that's in my new book coming outcalled Train for Life, Why

(01:07):
Personal Coaching is the realfitness solution.
Basically, the book is aboutwhat the problem is.
And the problem is that only 20%of our country, or actually
worldwide, are on an exerciseprogram.
Only 20%, so 80% of the peopleare not doing the minimum

(01:27):
guidelines.
And then what the solutions areto that.
And one of the solutions, or avery, very big solution, is
personal coaching, personaltraining.
And no, it's not just like apathetic attempt to draw up
business.
I think everybody knows that Ihave a waiting list and I'm

(01:49):
really busy.
It's really just the truth.
And but the book isn't aboutthat per se.
The book is about why it's thetruth.
Like why are the things that areso common in a personal training
relationship that leads toresults?
Well, I'm going to talk aboutone of them today, and it's

(02:11):
called decision fatigue.
It's a real thing.
What decision fatigue is, iswhen somebody really doesn't
want to make up their mind aboutsomething else again.
Like maybe they are making a tonof decisions in the day.
They might work for a company,they might be the boss, and they

(02:33):
are making all kinds ofdecisions all day long, you
know, what each employee shoulddo.
I mean, we can go on and on, butI think you get the idea.
And it doesn't just have to bework.
I mean, you know, there'sdecisions we have to make in our
day-to-day lives too.
And studies have shown that themore decisions people have to

(02:55):
make, the more decision fatiguethey have, the more stress that
they have.
And basically the end result ofdecision fatigue is they decide
not to decide.
So basically it's kind of like,well, I don't really know what
to do exactly on this.
I don't really want to thinkabout it.
So I'm just not going to doanything.

(03:17):
That is one of the leadingcauses of dropout in an exercise
program.
People don't know what to do, orthey don't know how to continue
to do what they're doing, and sothey stop.
They either feel like whatthey're doing is wrong, or they
don't have any idea what theythink they're supposed to do

(03:38):
anyway.
It's a big reason why peopledon't go to gyms because they're
not exactly sure what to do.
There's a lot of other reasonswhy people drop out of exercise
programs or don't get started.
And I talk about them in thebook, but this is one that I
really, really want to highlighttoday.

(03:59):
I can't think, I can't count theamount of times that somebody
has come into the gym in themorning.
Typically, I don't know, they itprobably happens all the time
during the day, but oftentimesin the morning, probably because
a lot of the majority of thepeople I train are going to be
in the morning.
But um, they'll say, you know,I'm glad I'm showing up here and

(04:21):
you're just gonna tell me whatto do because I just did not
really feel like going to thegym and trying to figure things
out.
You're just gonna tell me whatto do.
Now, to some people, they mightbe listening and go, well, you
know, that's not good.
I mean, people should reallyknow what to do.
Well, yes and no.
I mean, there's experts in everyarea of life.

(04:46):
And if somebody is alwaysalready like very proficient at
many, many things and they wantto do what is ideal for them, I
mean, why would theyautomatically know what to do?
I mean, I don't know.
I I don't I don't get thatlogic.
I've heard it sometimes, but thebottom line is it's like, why

(05:08):
not go and have that decisionmade for you?
I can tell you, like, I've beenon both sides of this.
So on my side of it, I make thedecisions for the person after
we do an assessment, after weset goals.
I write up the workouts, Idetermine how they're gonna be,
I determine everything theexercises, the sets, the loads,

(05:30):
the frequency, the rest betweenthe sets, the tempos, all that
good stuff, all the differentmodifications we might have to
do.
So all that is thought of aheadof time.
And for me, that's pretty easy.
I mean, I just sit down and Iknow my acute program variables,
which are what those things are,and I just sit down with the

(05:50):
person after I do an assessment,after I learn some things about
them, and I think, well, we gotto do this, this, and this.
Like to me, it's pretty much ano-brainer.
And then I know how to modifyit, and my trainers know how to
modify it when and if need be.
So from my end, it's prettysimple.
I just wait, they pop in, and westart.

(06:14):
And I'm confident in what we'redoing, they're confident in what
they're doing because they haveconfidence in me, they have
confidence in my trainers, theytrust, which is a very big part
of this, and I'll get into thislater.
I'll get into that later, Ishould say, but they're ready to
go.
But you know, I've also been onthe other side of this when I

(06:34):
was taking master's swim classesbecause, well, for that very
reason, number one, it wasreally hard for me to get
motivated to go to the pool toswim when I was doing trahlons.
Now, I actually kind of like toswim, but the whole thought of
just getting there and changing,getting in the pool and all that

(06:55):
was sort of a pain in the neck.
And it's not like I didn'talready exercise enough on a
pretty rigorous, normal scheduleanyway.
So it was one thing I was addingto the schedule.
Now, I definitely didn't want tohave to think about what kind of
pool workout, what kind of swimworkout to do every time.
And I'm an exercisephysiologist, I'm a personal

(07:17):
trainer, I'm a strength andconditioning coach, I'm a sports
nutritionist, I'm those things.
I'm not a swim coach.
So do I get the general idea ofwhat I should do?
Could I come up with some decentworkouts?
Of course.
But I didn't want to have to sitthere and think about it.
So it was really nice just toshow up.
That was the hard part.
There's the class ready.

(07:38):
I jump in the water, they'd saythe workout, and I would do it.
Like if there was ever asituation and it happened a few
times because in my area I'mkind of known for what I do.
And one of the coaches might belike, Oh, well, you know, you're
a trainer, so you kind of know,you know, and I'm thinking, no,
no, no, no, no, I don't, don't,don't say that.

(07:59):
Just, you know, what's theworkout?
What are we going to do?
That's all I want to do.
And it was so much easier tofollow.
I didn't have any of thosedoubts that we all go through
when we're writing our ownstuff.
Like, is this objective?
Is this something I should bedoing?
There was just none of that.
I just did what I could and thendid the next thing.

(08:21):
So I have been on both sides ofit.
And I know that it is a big, bigperk to get people going.
And the way we do that is wehave a coach or we have a
program that we show up to thatpeople have taken the decisions
and done it for us.
It just really, really works.

(08:43):
Now, a couple things.
You have to make sure, ofcourse, that the person you've
decided to make your health andfitness decisions with you and
for you is qualified.
In a study that was done, theyfound that 49% of people utilize

(09:05):
influencers of all types to helpthem make decisions.
49%.
So almost half the countryrelies on influencers to help
them make their decision, right?
So you think, well, that's coolbecause so many of these
influencers know what they'retalking about.
Here's the problem with thatonly 20% of the health and

(09:27):
fitness influencers actuallyhave the credentials to be
telling you what to do.
Most of them are models and theylook good.
So you think they know whatthey're talking about and
they're telling you what to do.
And you see it all the time,right?
You're seeing it online withdifferent diet programs, with

(09:49):
different um schemes, right?
With supplements, with differentworkout programs.
They're all over the place.
Sell, sell, sell.
I mean, it's all good if you'refollowing the right person.
You always have to look fortheir credentials.
That is very, very critical.
So one thing, well, well, Ialways do this.

(10:12):
One thing I always do is when Iget a potential client, I meet
with them first.
I want to make sure that it's afit for me, one of my trainers.
We sit down, we talk about whatthey're trying to do.
I want to make sure that they'recoachable, that they're the type
of person that is going tofollow the program because you
know we don't want people thatdon't get better.

(10:35):
And the only way we get betteris if people follow what they're
supposed to do.
So we sit and we meet.
And if we decide it's a fit,then we do an assessment and we
go over the program, or I goover the program with them.
Now, at this point, I have tobuild trust.
This is where trust is built.
This is where I let people knowwhy they can follow the program

(10:58):
safely and follow the programconfidently.
So once that trust isestablished, then the person can
automatically decide they canjust show up and do what they
need to do and eliminate all ofthat decision fatigue.
You know, there's a term that welike to use that's called

(11:22):
self-efficacy.
And self-efficacy means thatconfidence leads to competence
and competence leads toconfidence.
So once a person starts learningwhat they should do, they are
far more likely to continue todo what they're going to do.

(11:42):
So even though we lead the way,I lead the way when I'm working
with people, I write theprograms that the trainers
follow, the trainers are leadingthe way as far as the exercises,
as far as the reps, as far aspushing them to the best level
that they can be pushed, allthat good stuff.
The tempo they need to be movingat, the tempo of the exercises,

(12:05):
all that is being directed.
At the same time, I'm very bigon making sure people understand
why.
That's the reason, of course, Iwrote that my first book.
You can't uh uh that's my secondbook that you can't outrun a
poor diet.
Slow down, Rob.
That's why I wrote my firstbook, There Is a Method to the
Madness, because I've alwayssaid there is a reason why we

(12:29):
are doing the things that we doand the way we do them.
So it's very important.
So I always make sure and say,all right, so we're going to do
a circuit today.
We're going to do two differentcircuits.
That's one of my more commonworkouts.
We're going to do two differentcircuits.

(12:49):
Typically, each circuit is goingto have like a squat, a push,
and a pull.
And I'll explain what the squattype exercise is.
I'll explain this is a good wayfor you to set this up.
Then I'll explain what the pushtype exercise is, and I'll
explain what the pull typeexercise is.
I'll tell them how we're goingto do the reps and the load.

(13:10):
Sometimes it'll be starting withhigher reps and lower loads and
then progressing to slightlylower leps, lower reps and
higher loads.
And sometimes it's the reverseof that.
But in any event, I explain.
Sometimes they're like, well,just tell me what to do.
And it's like, okay.
Other times I'll explain why,because, like I said, building

(13:32):
confidence.
If we know why we're going to dosomething and we trust our
coach, we're going to be morelikely to do it.
Then I'll explain what circuitnumber two is going to be, and
then we'll do it.
And then after that, it comesdown to making sure that the
person is moving at the righttempo, meaning that maybe
they're not moving fast enoughand they're not keeping their

(13:55):
heart rate up, and they might beon a program that we need to
elevate it a little bit.
Or with some people, I'll haveto slow down because they're a
little too gassed going intoeach exercise.
But then we just execute theworkout.
And then after we've explainedit, we start doing it and we
execute it.
It's really a big win-win forclients.

(14:17):
Now let me tell you, themajority of clients that I've
had through the years, and I'vebeen doing this for 31 years
now, since 1994.
I've been in differentlocations.
I've been probably in this onethe longest, but I've been in
different locations.
Let me tell you, it's not alwayslike the acute cases that we

(14:40):
trainers get, you know, likewhat was that silly show that
was on, and it turned out somuch of it was fraudulent.
Uh biggest loser?
Was that the one?
Yeah, I think so.
But um, you know, they they werereally kind of like bullying and
uh, you know, making thecontestants do these outrageous
things and you know, they makeit look really cool, you know.

(15:01):
I think they had them on uh aroof of a workout building one
time, and they're flippingtires, they're doing all this
stuff that overweight and obesepeople really should not be
doing.
It was all for TV.
It was it was a total joke.
But those people, thecontestants of that show, and
you know, many others that wethink of are not the typical

(15:22):
types that hire personaltrainers.
Like I would call that an acutecase, like somebody who really
needs to get some fitness going,or there's going to be a cardiac
intervention really soon, andthey probably need to be worried
or doing something about thattoo.
That's what people think ofsometimes.
Or people think of likecelebrity, you know, celebrity

(15:44):
fitness, the perfect bodies ofmales or females getting like
trained to be a little bitbetter by a trainer.
That neither one of those casesare very typical.
What's typical is your averageguy, gal, your hardworking
business person, the person whohas an important job.

(16:05):
I mean, all jobs are important,but they feel like their job is
important.
They work a pretty rigorousschedule, and uh, you know, or
it might be retirees who haveworked hard their whole life,
but you know, people that arejust looking to get in better
shape.
Not, they're not in horribleshape.

(16:25):
It's people that are looking toget in better shape, whether it
be lose a few pounds or mostlikely increase their ADLs,
activities of daily living, getstronger, feel better about
themselves.
It's your, you know, youraverage busy Joe for the most
part.
That's your most typicalclientele.

(16:46):
And they're the types that justdon't want to have to think
about anything else.
They want to come to the gym anddo what they're supposed to do
and hit their goals.
Like that's what they're mostinterested in doing.
And the business people areusually the most efficient at
that.
Like they don't want to wasteany time.
They're like, they only got somany hours in the day, and when

(17:09):
they get to the gym, they wantit to be as efficient as
possible.
They want to cut through all thecrap.
So it's really just your averageperson who needs to be in better
shape.
Like that is the most commonclient.
And we need that.
Like the country needs that.
I mean, you figure if only 20%of the people are taking an

(17:32):
advantage of that, can youimagine how much more fit our
country would be if more peopletook advantage of that and
started exercising?
So decision fatigue is one ofthe things that good personal
coaching or an accountabilitypartner that knows what they're
doing can help you with.

(17:54):
And all the clients that arelistening to this, which I think
most of my clients do, they'reshaking their head going, Yep,
that's a big perk.
I just show up and they tell mewhat to do.
And so far, so good.
But for those that have nottried it and you are out there
kind of floundering around, andthat's the very reason because
you're going to gyms and you'rejust not doing it because you

(18:16):
don't know what to do when youget there.
I mean, really consider reachingout and getting a pro to help
you because that's what pros do.
And there's nothing wrong withthat.
Again, you don't have to be inan acute stage of being out of
shape to need a trainer.
It's just you need somebody toget you going, to show you what

(18:38):
you're supposed to do and tohelp you to do it.
Okay.
So I hope you learned a littlebit about decision fatigue.
And um, I'm gonna pick up onmore of these as we go on.
Please check out the book.
It'll be out very, very soon.
I'll be putting links in theemails and on the websites, and
it'll be on Amazon.
So until next time, be Max Fitand B Max Well.

(19:01):
Thank you for listening totoday's program.
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