The Importance of Support

Committing to a healthy lifestyle is about more than just changing the decisions you make. It has to be backed up with a sustainable, practical action plan that allows you to realize your goals. To maximize your chance of success, you will need help. Unfortunately, it's not always easy to find.

Any major decision you make in your life will invariably involve other people. Going to school, changing jobs, getting married, becoming a parent, all these things may happen to you, but they involve others as well. Getting fit is no different. Yes, you are the one who has to put in the work and eat the right foods, but the people in your circle will also have a role to play in helping you succeed. Frankly, they can play an absolutely pivotal role in how successful you will ultimately be. That's because fitness can be a tough road. There will be days where you don't want to exercise, or don't want to order the salad. It's at those times that the people around you can make or break your resolve to get healthy.

Unfortunately, all too often the supportive people you need just aren't there, and you run into trouble. And that says more about them than it does about you.

If you are the only person you know who is trying to lead a healthier lifestyle, that necessarily means you are breaking away from the pack. Your friends and family don't see things the way you do. They either don't want to get healthy, or they just can't be bothered. In either case, they can frequently become human roadblocks on your path to success. At best, they just keep quiet. You do your thing, they do theirs, and you tacitly agree not to talk about it. At worst, they become active saboteurs. They "support" you when you say you don't feel like working out; they "encourage" you when you are eyeing the dessert menu. Any of this sound familiar?

This issue came up for me recently when I found out that most of my family and friends assume that fitness is just a "phase" for me that I'll soon tire of. When I do, I'll go back to being the unhealthy person I was years ago. Apparently, the fact that I've been exercising regularly for eight years, and really applied myself to it over the last fourteen months isn't enough to convince those around me that I'm in it for the long haul. This website, flying across the continent to learn from Tony Horton, putting a dedicated workout room in the basement...none of this has earned me the respect you might assume it would. I don't mean that they don't respect my personal accomplishments, but saying that it's a phase that I'll soon outgrow trivializes everything I've done to this point. It also doesn't say much for the people I've actually helped to inspire to make their own healthy choices, either through this site, on the Beachbody message boards, or by actually designing programs for them.

So, then -- why not be supportive?

First, I agree that in the past, I have signed on to my fair share of fads. Cigar smoking, cowboy boots, a pierced ear: guilty, guilty and guilty. Given that those things were, to varying degrees, pleasurable, it might make sense to expect me to stop doing something that is physically challenging and often difficult. There's a difference, though: all of those things ran their course and were gone in a matter of months, or at most a year. Fitness has now been part of my life for nearly a decade. During that time, I've gone from 215lbs with a pot belly to 179lbs and 4.8% bodyfat. I approach my 40th birthday in better shape than at any time in my life. To suggest this is a fad diminishes accomplishments of which I am rightfully proud.

So as I said -- why?

The answer lies in something I said earlier. If you're doing this on your own, you're breaking away from the pack. You are doing something different that is improving your life. If those around you aren't doing the same thing, two emotions quickly rise to the surface: jealousy, and what the Germans call schadenfreude. Others become jealous when they see your physical condition improving while theirs isn't; they become jealous of your increased energy and ability to focus on tasks, while they still doze on the couch. Schadenfreude is the concept of taking satisfaction in the failure of others. In this context it manifests itself by acts of sabotage. Telling you that you deserve a break from your workouts so that you can go see a movie and eat a suitcase-sized bag of popcorn, or coming up with any excuse for a special occasion that will involve overeating. In essence, doing these things pulls you back to the pack, and makes those doing them feel better about their own shortcomings. If you can be brought down to their fitness level, they're no longer worse by comparison.

Statistics from the US say that if a morbidly obese person loses enough weight to achieve a healthy Body Mass Index, there is less than a 5% chance that he or she will keep the weight off permanently. Certainly there are a lot of factors at play, but a lack of support from family and friends is likely a big reason for ultimately failing to maintain one's health.

What to do about it? Remember that you can only control your behaviour, not anyone else's. You can either let them pull you back and resume a life of fatigue, illness and what-ifs, or you can use it to light a fire under you and prove everyone wrong. Personally, I'll take the second option.

If you're dealing with less-than-supportive peers, know that there's a whole world of people out there as committed as you are to getting healthy. Surround yourself with them. If you're into cycling, join a cycling club. If you're a runner, hook up with other runners. Make friends with someone at the yoga studio, or with that person at the gym who asked you for a spot. If you usually work out alone (like I do), there are countless internet message boards and websites where you'll find people waiting to give you real support and encouragement. I'm on www.teambeachbody.com regularly, and there's also many facebook pages devoted to health and fitness. And don't forget to come by www.fitnessinthebalance.com too.

Are you experiencing any negativity in your own fitness journey? I'd love to hear about it. How have you coped? Has it impacted on your results? Let me know!