A taste of the high life

I have always thought of personal trainers as one of those things that rich people do.  A luxury mostly afforded by celebrities and CEOs with lots of cash and no time.  Certainly a thing I would never have for myself.

Yesterday I had a session with a personal trainer for the first time and I gotta say I understand the appeal.

I didn't actually pay for it, of course.  I haven't suddenly become the sort of person that spends money for luxuries!  Last year at a charity auction I found a workout package that had a bunch of stuff in it that I wanted, and along with it came 3 personal training sessions.  The whole thing cost about the amount I would pay just for the physical objects normally, so I bought it and I finally got around to using the training just this week.

This first workout left me really sore.  There are multiple reasons, but high on the list is that I push myself harder when there is someone else around to see.  I don't want to be that sort of person, but I have to admit that I slack off a little when it is just me around.  I cap out at 31 pushups on my own, but when the trainer told me to do pushups so he could check my form I cranked out 35 - social pressure is a force to be reckoned with.

It wasn't purely social though.  The trainer got me to do exercises in ways that I am not used to and his way of doing things burned my muscles a whole lot more than my way.  Instead of just yanking the weights through the distance with my arms he got me using my whole body.  I am sure that doing it his way is a far better workout long term because everything we did used a whole variety of muscles and burned me down in places I am not used to feeling it.

I like this whole personal trainer thing!  I don't need it for the motivation to get into the gym, that part I have nailed down.  But the motivation to do all the exercises properly, to keep my form on point, this is a useful thing for me.  When I am alone I just get the reps done rather than take the extra mental effort to constantly evaluate exactly *how* I am getting the reps done.

I have often said that if I won a lot of money I wouldn't know how to spend it usefully.  I suppose that is slightly less true now - if I suddenly got rich, I think occasional personal training lessons would be great.

But I am not rich.  So until that changes I will just take my lessons when they are free.