Long term behavior change is the ultimate goal for a fitness professional and their client The fitness and personal training industry is truly about so much more than just exercise. It’s about changing behaviors and habits.
Most people can make immediate changes that lead to short-term successes, like losing five pounds or running a 5K. These are great, but too often they don’t last. People tend to go back to old, bad habits.
The key to real success in meeting health, fitness, and weight goals is to create healthier habits for life. This means targeting and changing behaviors, and it isn’t easy.
Why is Behavior Change So Important in Fitness?
Every personal trainer’s dream client is the one eager to make changes. They follow all your workouts, show up at the gym on time and ready to go, and do their homework.
The truth is that a lot of clients start out this way, but not many last. It’s not a fault in the person, simply human nature. It’s easier to fall back into old habits than to make lasting changes. To really help your clients, you need to change their behaviors.
Fitness is a Healthy Habit
A habit is a behavior that you engage in automatically. When you no longer hesitate—or at least not very much—to start a workout first thing in the morning, it has become a habit.
Habits can be healthy or unhealthy. Regular physical activity is a healthy habit, one that is important to cultivate to improve health and meet weight goals.
Changing Habits Requires Long-Term Behavior Change
You can change your habits for a day, for instance going to the gym instead of playing video games. Most people can even do this for a few days without too much effort.
But going to the gym instead of sitting on the couch doesn’t become a habit after a few days. It takes lasting, long-term changes to break that old habit and form a new one. (1)
Personal training is all about helping people get fit, and this requires building new, healthy habits through lasting change.
The Science of Behavior and Habits
Human behavior is a complicated science. Researchers have learned a lot about how we make decisions, for habits, and change with time. You can apply these ideas to your own goals and to training clients:
How Habits Form
According to behavior scientists, habits form through what they call a habit loop. (2) First, a trigger cues your brain to engage in a behavior. This could be an alarm on your phone that tells you to go to the gym.
Next, you have a routine that involves engaging in the behavior, like completing a workout. Finally, a reward prods your brain into starting the loop again. For exercise habits, the reward could be the natural high from endorphins or progress in weight or fitness goals.
Habits Require Repetition
Performing the habit loop just a few times will not lead to lasting changes. Repetition is essential for forming strong, habitual behaviors. Experts suggest you’ll need to engage in your gym-going habit loop for five or six weeks before it becomes an ingrained habit. (1)
The Five Stages of Lasting Change
Behavior scientists have long recognized five stages in the process of creating lasting change and new habits:
- Precontemplation. Someone in stage one has likely not yet approached a personal trainer. They don’t necessarily think they need to make a change or feel hopeless about it.
- Contemplation. In contemplation, a person begins to weigh the pros and cons of making a change. They recognize the need but see a lot of barriers. This is a tough step to get past.
- Preparation. This person is starting to look at working with a trainer. They’re making a plan.
- Action. In the action stage, a person has made the change, for instance working out a few times of week to meet a weight goal.
- Maintenance. Maintenance means keeping up with the changed behaviors for a long period of time, about six months or more.
Relapse can occur at any point during these stages, but you don’t have to go back to the beginning to start again. Someone who relapses during the action stage can more easily get back into a routine and work toward maintenance.
Tips to Implement Long Term Behavior Change for Personal Training Clients
To truly help your clients, you need to push them to make lasting changes in their behaviors. Understanding the science behind behaviors and habits is the first step. Follow it up with these ideas for motivating and supporting clients.
Remove Barriers to Change
According to researchers, people report several common barriers to sticking with a workout routine (3):
- Lack of time
- Lack of energy
- Limited access to facilities or equipment
Instead of berating a client for making excuses, recognize these as genuine barriers and do what you can to remove them.
For instance, if you have a client that lives 30 minutes from a gym and doesn’t want to spend so much time traveling, create simple workouts they can do at home or outside with minimal equipment. Develop shorter workouts that a client can fit in between work or home commitments if they can’t do an hour-long routine most days.
Create Triggers
The trigger, or cue, is an essential part of the habit loop. It’s something that triggers your brain to engage in the desirable habit. Harness the natural habit loop by creating and using triggers.
For instance, have your client set up a series of alarms on their phone or fitness tracker to signal when it’s time to work out, drink more water, or have a healthy snack. Make healthy eating and exercise a planned behavior.
Try Habit Stacking
Anything you can do to make a habit easier to form will lead to more lasting behavior changes. Experts recommend a strategy called habit stacking, which involves adding a new habit to an old one to make it easier to stick to.
If a client drinks a cup of tea on an afternoon work break, use that habit to add in a new fitness behavior. For example, they can use that break to do pushups while the water boils for the tea. Adding to an existing habit makes it easier to begin a new one.
Work Toward and Celebrate Goals
Goal setting is a big motivator for change. Having something specific to work toward makes it easier to engage in healthy habits. You have to do it right, though. Start with an overarching goal and break it down into smaller, more manageable steps. And don’t forget to celebrate when you hit them with your clients. Positive reinforcement can be incredibly motivating.
Encourage Social Support
Studies of lasting adherence to a healthy behavior indicate that social support is an important factor. (2) Positive social support helps people stick with their gym routines. Encourage your clients to go on their fitness journeys with a buddy. You can train two people at once, providing both social support and added accountability.
Track Progress
Seeing your goals come to fruition is highly motivating. Your client is more likely to continue working out if they see results. Track their progress toward specific goals to keep clients going when they feel like quitting.
Long-Term Behavior Change for Personal Training Requires Patience
Don’t let your clients get discouraged by relapses or setbacks. Help them understand how hard it is to do what they’re attempting. Most people fail repeatedly when changing habits. The key to success is patience and sticking with it.
Lasting behavior change is hard. Acknowledge this with your clients while continuing to push them to develop healthier habits. By encouraging long-term changes, both you and your clients will see success.
Reaching fitness and health goals is not a quick fix, it’s a long-term process. Learn more about helping clients make those positive, lifelong changes with the ISSA’s Health Coach certification program.