How to meet with a personal trainer
How I did it: My gym provides three sessions with a trainer free. I had mostly been putting this off because of the cost, and even when it was provided free I was a little hesitant and nervous. One day a trainer from the gym called me and asked if I wanted to set up a meeting. When he contacted me, I couldn't say no. So we set up a day and with an appointment, I couldn't skip out or change my mind.
My first session was an orientation sort of meeting. We went through some assessments to see where I'm at in terms of physical fitness, diet, sleep and stress management. We defined my goals and talked about what might help or hinder me reaching those, and how much time and effort I want to devote to getting fit and reaching my fitness goals. We did testing to see how many calories I burn, where my heart rate should be at during cardio exercise, and so forth.
In the second session he took me around the fitness floor and he showed me how to use a bunch of machines and then watched me to see if I'm doing them correctly. We talked about which muscles to work together and how long to wait before working out again, and we got a progress card started with a beginning routine. He designed a couple of routines for me for cardio and weight training. We decided to skip diet as part of my routines because I was already on track.
The third session was a few weeks later and we went over my progress. We went back to the fitness floor to make sure my form was still correct on the weight machines and we did some new exercises with medicine balls and exercise balls, the bosu, resistance bands, and dumbbells.
Overall the sessions were really helpful. My trainer says hi to me and checks in with me when he sees me at the gym. Knowing he's going to ask me about my progress and watch me makes me want to do better, and it's nice to have someone to go to when I have questions or need advice. Having a trainer has kept me on track and he makes me feel like my goals are attainable, so overall I'd say it's been very worth it!
Lessons & tips: Most gyms offer some sort of gym orientation for free so you can learn to use the gym's equipment. When you join, just see if they offer it and ask to schedule one. The orientations are run by trainers so they'll be able to give you more advice than just how to use the machines.
