At the start of a new year many people get caught up in diets and make that annual promise to eat better and exercise more in order to lose weight. After weeks of over eating people tend to stand on the scale and marvel at the weight they have gained.
This post is not about diets or exercise although I do encourage you to eat healthy and regularly engage in functional fitness activities. This post is about about narrow and fat, but it specifically focuses on what’s above the shoulders, not what is below.
“A narrow mind and a fat head invariably come on the same person”
Zig Ziglar
Sometimes as trainers and educators we develop a narrow mind. You stop looking at what other trainers are doing to see if you can improve. You fail to look outside of our industry for information, advice, direction and new ideas. You stop innovating. You stick with the same lessons plans because it is easier than redoing all of them. You stop going to conferences and courses. When you do go to conferences you discount anything that is different from what you are already doing or you just hang out in the halls and visit because after all there is nothing you could learn in any of those classes. You stop asking for feedback on your program.
Sometimes you also get a fat head. You read the course evaluations and embrace all the ones that talk about how great you are and discount the ones from people that were not that impressed with your program. When people offer advice or constructive feedback you discount it saying “What do they know?” You are the ‘lead instructor’ for your organization so you start to believe that puts you at the top of the instructor food chain. You get some articles published and maybe even have a book and you start to think there is nothing more you can learn.
OK, time for honest reflection for all of us. Have you developed a narrow mind? Have you gotten a fat head? Be honest. It happens to all of us at one time or another. The key is to recognize it and do something about it.
Take care.
Brian Willis
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