Pushing boundaries in personal fitness | Cabel McElderry | TEDxRedDeer

what's up they say we're here talking about pushing boundaries I've never thought of myself as somebody that pushed boundaries but tonight maybe tonight that will all change because you see this afternoon this afternoon you're gonna help me accomplish something very important in fact you're gonna help me accomplish a childhood dream something I've said my whole life somewhat jokingly because I was afraid that someone might think I was serious and tell me I couldn't do it in the words of my favorite iconic cartoon duo pinky in the brain what are we going to do tonight brain well the same thing we do every night pinky we are going to change the world now I know what you're thinking that's not what brain said brain said they were going to take over the world I actually don't have any desire to take over a rule the world I just simply want to change the world and today we are going to do that together you see I'm going to teach you something I'm going to teach you something that's been near and dear to me that has transpired throughout my life without even knowing it until only recent years so I'm going to teach you something that has been applicable in many facets in my life because if you're from Red Deer Alberta you probably are might know me as a personal trainer or as a fitness columnist here in Red Deer for the last 15 years but what you don't know me as probably was a junior high peer support counselor you don't know me as a life insurance agent you don't know me as an electronic salesman you don't know me as a backhoe operator a film director and now even a franchising executive but I have been or M all of these things but for the record I was a really lousy backhoe operator tonight I'm going to teach you an equation my math teacher would be proud because I'm going to teach you an equation this equation will help you with just about anything for instance we'll talk a lot about fitness because it's what I know if you're one of those people that's preparing for this crazy thing that happens at 12:01 a.m. on January 1st this will help you achieve that fitness goal and not be one of the ninety one percent by January twenty one that's given up however if you're in sales and you wish to sell more this will teach you to sell more if you'd like to have a better relationship if you'd like to get that next job if you'd like to get that bigger promotion if you want to be able to be one of those people that didn't stand up earlier today say I'm living my dream life I truly believe this equation can do for you again my math teacher would be proud but let me tell you the story to telling you the story of how I discovered this equation or how I came across it I don't want you to see before you this below average height hunk of a man on stage today I want you to see an insecure fifteen-year-old with very crooked teeth that was very uncomfortable in his own skin okay that individual that clearly struggled with self-esteem that tried many things but never stuck with anything and spent a large part of their life saying I am doomed to fail I do not have what it takes I'm not going to amount to anything I was not given the tools or resources I needed to succeed but weird things happened along the way whether I took notice at the time or not I don't know but weird things happen it started when I was 15 years old a bunch of friends it was a friend's birthday and of all things they decided to drag us to this god-awful place called the gym I was working out for the first time and I still remember my so-called personal trainer teaching me an exercise called the squat I'm sure many of you have tried it and hated it okay the squat went something like this if you've ever worked out in a gym you know those 7-foot bars that we use they weigh approximately 45 pounds remember I was 98 pounds my trainer decided it was a good idea to put another 25 pounds on each side yes if you're doing the math that's almost my body weight he sort of drugged me up and down in this squat like motion and for the next 10 days I was realizing how much I hated working out but for some reason my friends kept dragging me back and soon my friends stopped going but I kept going to the gym and I kept asking myself why am I here I've tried so many things I've hated it I don't even like looking at I don't even like working out I've never wanted to do this and even my own habits with the gym started to dwindle and then something really strange happened an individual came up to me and they said hey did you hear about what those two big guys said about you the other day I'm like no what they said that you're looking good and if you stick at it you might look good enough to compete one day compete in what will bodybuilding that's disgusting ten years later twelve or thirteen contests three times to the Nationals I had gained and lost more than a thousand pounds because two individuals said something not even directly to me but to someone else who happened to say something to me I hadn't stuck with anything in my life I had tried many things okay I was so busy thinking that I was doomed to fail and that I would never succeed that I failed to take notice that weird things happen or that I continually seem to go through periods where I had this plan this plan that would change everything that would inevitably fall apart and fail and I'd move on to the next thing but for some reason this working out thing I stuck with it and I was doing all these shows okay and I've been competing and and when you're competing you remember these weird things so for instance I remember it was three weeks after one of my trips to the Nationals I was 179 pounds not 180 I was 179 pounds and I was setting up in the gym on a Monday evening if you've ever been to the gym on Monday you know what it's like because everybody that feels guilty after falling off before the weekend is back there with renewed vigor on Monday so it was like being in the middle of a rock concert I'm setting up to do that god-awful exercise called a squat again this time at 179 pounds there was 545 pounds on the bar I was determined I was determined I was going to do this I set up you know you're going through the motions you're trying to find your mental place to say it's just me against the iron I can beat this I can do it I get under the bar and it's still one of those things I think with pride that I wanted to have that photo to show mom and dad and Grandma and Grandpa because I had to set the pins on the rack one lower than I actually needed because the bar would Bend so much when I lift the bar off I couldn't lift it up otherwise so I set up to do my squat and I'm prepared and I go down and I am stuck suddenly that rock-concert becomes a library you could hear a pin drop with cable are you okay I was embarrassed completely my confidence was shattered I was disgusted embarrassed myself I couldn't believe this happened they climbed off the rails like with a sound like you've never heard it was awful I had completely failed I was crushed I wanted to just pack up and go home but what did I do instead we unloaded the bar we put it back up we loaded it up again and my anger became a source of vigor to say I'm going to beat this I'm going to try again and foolishly perhaps in hindsight stupidity before getting under the bar what did I do I took out the safety bars I would succeed or die it was that simple would succeed or die I never thought I could succeed at anything I spent most of my life thinking I was going to fail but for that moment I was willing to throw it all away for just what might seem the silliest thing to face this massive amount of iron for no other reason than to succeed well as you can see I'm here today so I survived I completed that squat a few times it was something I look back on as a monumental moment in my life and I wonder what happened and I think back to my whole training experience that thing that occurred when two people said something to somebody else and not to me that allowed me to make all these kinds of strange decisions for instance growing up through high school doing what high school kids do going to parties on weekends being out late with my friends being the weirdo walking around the bush party fire with a canister of milk as opposed to a glass of alcohol my friends who started to get into volved in recreational drugs I would go with them and hang out with him I would roll joints for my friends but I have yet to ever have a puff off one I would always pass it over to them and hang out with them and continue to drink my milk I know what you're thinking I can hear with the two dudes chuckle in the back there saying dude you missed the best part of the party I think back why what what child what child does these things what child makes these decisions in light of these pressures to move on and carry forward well as I think you can see by now when we're talking about an equation an equation that will change our life what the I possibly means that I is inspiration inspiration is the fuel of dreams you think about it when we are in spa like that magic moment at 12:01 a.m. on January 1st when nothing that happened just one minute before no longer matters nothing is going to stop you from achieving that fitness goal you can do it you can give up sleep you can give up food you can give up everything that you enjoy for the sake of looking and feeling the way you want that one time inspiration will allow us to run through walls it will allow us to remove the safety bars in light of certain death and conquer something that we just recently failed at inspiration is that thing that will allow us to give up air imagine remember those blissful moments as a teenager when you meet your first true love when you're exhausted and it's 3:00 in the morning because you've already been on the phone for five hours but you just want to sit there one more hour just to listen to that person breathe we will give up air we will give up sleep we will give up food beyond all reason when we are inspired we truly can do anything what if we could harness inspiration what if there was a way through a mathematical equation or a simple process that we could have ourselves more inspired than not imagine what life could be like imagine the lives that we could change imagine how we could change the world if we knew how to harness inspiration now I'm going to talk about Fitness because Fitness is where I spent most of my time and it's what I know when I was a young fitness trainer you know working with many people it started like this I actually became a trainer by accident you know because as you can tell I'm five foot four which is something that I was terribly insecure about for a long part of my life but as a bodybuilder at five foot four something really strange happened you see people would come up to me in the gym because I was that big muscular guy that they thought they wanted to look like but I wasn't as intimidating as the six foot five guy so what people would come up to me and ask me how do I look like you what do I need to do to look like you do or how do I get like that so I would I would share with them or what I thought I needed to share with them was how to workout and how to eat but soon I realized that it didn't matter what I knew it didn't matter what I shared with them because people would follow it for a while and then they would fall off and they wouldn't stay on track with their plan it didn't matter what information I shared with them and look at society today in spite of better technology better science better medicine better information access to information at our fingertips we are failing faster than ever before North America is locked in this thing they call an obesity crisis we have children with mortality rates this generation that are less than their parents we have believe it or not the average Canadian is over 25% body fat by 36 years of age and even 61% of Canadians are considered to be obese by medical standards in spite of all of this information for fitness we fail faster than ever why why is it even though we have the best information that we keep failing well because inspiration is fleeting when we are inspired we can do anything but when inspiration begins to fizzle we carry on and move on how do we stay inspired so many people ask me about motivation what does it take to stay motivated motivated is a verb it's an action is something we do you can't stay motivated the human body mind is not designed to be motivated it's designed to be inspired to latch on to an idea that is bigger than oneself and carry on with that idea so how do we do that well let's talk about the rest of this equation e a s e is for emotion our life and all of our decisions are governed by the motion if we want to make a decision about anything the ruling factor will be emotion okay we want to get in shape we don't like the way we look in the mirror we think about that favorite pair of jeans it is in the back of the closet that we haven't tried for months that we just want to be able to fit in and do up and feel great in each morning I guarantee all of us have some sort of kind of ill feeling in our stomach because we just don't quite look or feel the way we want okay we really want to now here's another demonstration of how powerful emotion is and decisions think of the last big thing that you purchased you probably thought about it we're excited about it you decided you have - have you had to have it didn't matter if you could afford it was simply a matter of how do I get it you do all of this research as we do as consumers today we go online we look at reviews we decide yes this is the best choice and when you're on route to go buy this thing from the store you happen to run into your friend that says what are you doing well I'm going to buy this big bad TV it's so awesome I did all this research it's awesome and they say oh don't get that one that one sucks instantly your confidence is shaken yours begin to second-guess the whole decision process that you made because that one person that you know like and trust could make you emotional about that decision in a way that you didn't expect they begin to shake your whole confidence emotions are at the center of our decision so how do you harness the power of inspiration step one is you have to understand emotion emotion is how what are why questions what is it that I want to accomplish why will it be important to me how will it make me feel if I achieve this goal we have to be so emotional about something that it allows us to reach that point where nothing else matters we become so focused on that that one thing and it's critical that you succeed or die a stands for affirmation once we're emotional about a decision when we are about to make a decision we must gain affirmation and this is where you are going to help me change the world because this equation does not work as a solo venture you must seek out affirmation from the people that you love and care that care about you and they must be programmed or taught to give you that out from affirmation all it takes is for one person at the wrong time to say you can't do that that'll never work and your dreams are shattered you have to back up and become emotional again you have to react you self how will it make me feel if I do this why why is this important to me emotion must be followed with affirmation every time affirmation doesn't follow a motion with the backup and become emotional the last step of this is by virtue the least important which is what as a personal trainer I thought people first needed to know which was the solution it was the how to do it it was the what to do - how to work out - what to eat but it's actually the least important thing because I couldn't change their life in 30 to 60 minutes all I could hope to do was inspire them enough to make the right choices those other 23 hours a day which I had to do so by becoming their friend being able to make them emotional about the problem to understand why it was important to them emotion affirmation solution through each of these is the path to being inspired now I'm going to tell you something that's literally just happened to me in the last two weeks this individual heard me speak at an event and it was some time ago and they had contacted me about consulting after the event and then I never heard from them until recently I got an email from them saying cable I heard you speak he was very helpful I've got a lot of great things for you I tried things I failed my family and I are now homeless and what you're thinking almost guy doesn't have email I thought that too but at the core of it this individual was distraught you could tell that they were broken and they were asking me what would you do in this situation I had to think about it for a moment the first thing I do would call friends and family and make sure that you know my family was safe and taken care of but then the more I thought about it what would I do what would I do if I lost everything that I've worked so hard to gain and I had to start over and it really came down to this you know I would begin to ask myself why why is it important to me that I not stay where I am what is it that I want to accomplish how will my life change or how will I feel how will my families change if I reach that point and it becomes emotion affirmation solution it doesn't matter what you want in life whether you want that next job that next promotion to get in shape to be a better friend to be a better spouse all it takes is a little inspiration you have the tool to do it and here's my close of my final caveat be forewarned inspiration can be positive or negative and the process is the same this equation can work against you through negative inspiration in the same way so always ask yourself first why thank you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 128,316

Rating: 4.6980491 out of 5

Keywords: tedx talk, TEDxTalks, ted x, Canada, ted talks, tedx, English, Health, ted, ted talk, tedx talks

Id: 3O1yYuOBFrE

Length: 18min 19sec (1099 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 27 2015