This week, I have a simple request for everyone: stop judging your neighbour … and yourself!
The average amount of time it takes a person to actually start a fitness program of any kind after they first start thinking they have to become healthier and more active is two years.
Then, they actually have to walk through a door in front of other people who, they think, are judging them for being there. How many of us have said, “I have to get more fit before I can go to the gym” or “I can’t go to the pool until I look better in my bathing suit”?
I know. I have said it before … and I own a gym.
We are so quick to judge other people.
Heck, we probably know more about Paris Hilton and Angelina Jolie than we do about the person next to us on the treadmill that we are so quick to judge.
The more and more I work in this industry with such a large variety of people, the more I realize we have very little understanding of those very people we are judging.
For the next couple weeks, I want you to start thinking about those negative comments.
You have no idea what the person is going through in their own lives. Maybe they have a medical issue they are dealing with, maybe they have extremely stressful lives at home and at work and this is truly their moment to step out of that stress, maybe they have lost 200 pounds and still have 50 pounds to go, maybe they have a hormone condition that they literally have to watch everything they eat and work their butt off in the gym just to maintain.
When you see an overweight person sweating it out on the Millennium Trail, think, “Good for you!”
If your friend has worked hard and lost a lot of weight lately, they are probably a lot more confident (or more so trying to become a lot more confident) so support them on their road to success, don’t cut them down for all their hard work and focus.
People start a fitness regime for all different reasons. Peoples’ lives these days are full of stress. Don’t ruin the best part of their day with your own self-doubt.
Think about how you think of yourself. Maybe by changing the way you think of others will change the way you think of yourself.
