EP43: Fitness Behaviour Change and Transformation Coaching with Sartre Jean-Gilles

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Welcome everyone, I'm thrilled to share with you this episode of winning with wellness. Thank you so much for being back and taking the time to be the be here and allow us to be in your space and time to listen and learn about all things wellness. Really excited to have my guest here today. His name is Sartre Jean-Gilles, and I pronounced it wrong. So say it again. For me. I know I just butchered your last name.

No, Sartre Jean-Gilles

did I get a right? Oh, it's a miracle. So I am really thrilled to have you here. Thanks so much for being on the show.

Thanks so much for having me. I really appreciate it. Grateful. It's my

pleasure. So you guys want to share about Sartre to end what he does for a living. He's a personal trainer, Kinesiologist fitness, behavior change and transformation coach and a solopreneur. What I really want you guys to know too is I've actually had the pleasure of working with him in the fitness realm. And he's fantastic at what he does. He helps home base female entrepreneurs to achieve their fitness and weight loss goals without having to give up their favorite foods, which is important, am I correct? Or spend a lot of time in the gym through you know, so uses that through a coaching style and approach to get us to the goals that we're working for. Welcome to the show, let's dig into this.

Thanks, Jenny.

And like I said, I am blessed to have actually worked with you and experience you know, working with you through that fitness piece. And it was amazing actually to be able to work out my own home and have you cheer me on. But I really want to focus in on that coaching piece that you talk about. Because for many of us, I feel and you know, not saying that we shouldn't talk about the actual tactical pieces around it. So if that comes up, don't hesitate to speak on it. But for many of us, it's this belief system around not having enough time or, you know, I don't want to cook 15 different meals in the household or prep takes so much time and all those kinds of things. So I'm hoping you're open to digging in more about that, how you coach people through that process and some tips to help people get started.

Absolutely. Yeah, fitness, behavior change. And transformation coaching is something that I've just delved into this fall, and to complement my personal training aspect of my business. And yeah, it's definitely looking forward to chatting more

awesome. So why don't we start with what drew you to, to wellness and Helping People Achieve Wellness in their lives?

I think just you know, one of those individuals who, you know, shaped by their childhood in adolescence, I was into sports, not always the fittest kid and just something that I was always striving to get better at, along with the fact that my parents, while my mother is unhealthy was in health care as a nursing aide. And you know, I've got a lot of cousins and uncles who are nurses and dentists and whatnot. I've a lot of people in healthcare industry who've who've influenced me and my family. So that to combine together with my interest in sports and athletics drove me to becoming personal. Well, can you see ologists? And yeah, and the personal trainer.

Now, you mentioned your mom, I'm curious to see the reason why you've, you've navigated or are really wanting to work with women in the business in business world, like what what drew you to working mostly with women? Obviously, you work with men, it's not like you're limited. And yeah, you know, what drew you to working with women specifically?

I guess most of the solopreneurs, whom I've been interacting with, I've been doing a lot of my face to face with my marketing on Zoom. With groups that contain mostly women, so they've gravitated towards me and over the past year and a half. My company has grown to where I'd say about 80% of my clientele are Women and you know, seeing them excel, I have clients who, who have, you know, destroyed their past marathon times, who have you know, are getting better, I have a whole array spectrum of clientele from people who need more rehab, to people who need to, who are really challenging themselves and going for the Ironman competition or doing marathons and whatnot. And so, I think also with women, they might be a little more pragmatic than men. And I, myself am very pragmatic when it comes to fitness. And for the solopreneur entrepreneur, who's very busy spending probably 16 hours a day working. They need a solution, where we often enough for most people where we can take out the the commute, it's such a big factor for people right now. In terms of time, and also in terms of pandemics so close to their huge reasons why I've been able to probably have, have some leverage there in terms of my marketing and growing my business. It's not

amazing. So when you think about wellness, what drew you to wanting to, you know, what, how would you define wellness for you, when you think of people and you you're striving to to inspire people to wellness? What does that look like for them? What are you hoping for them to experience?

I'm hoping you have you heard, like, you know, off the top of my head, like, have you heard of the state of flow, for example, you know, people were in a state of flow, well, kind of that on a macro level, like, where your habits are in line, you know, you know what you need to do every day, or at roughly speaking, and, you know, that decision fatigue is not there, which also takes away with which also can be at least some type of stress, mentally, right, so to take away that decision, fatigue, knowing what you want to do, being being prepared, being in a state of flow where, you know, you're you have a nice rhythm of, of workouts, for example, and you're just in that state where you're not in that constant, just like what do I have to do? And what do I do, and you're never planning and whatnot. So for me, wellness is just, if if things are in line, if the big rocks are in the bucket, let's say for example, that analogy, then a lot will just fall in line. So that for me is is what I want people to to achieve in terms of wellness is that they know what they're doing everyday when they wake up, and it's not causing them. undue stress.

Well, and you know, I love that you bring this up, because many of us don't realize, and I have this conversation with my clients, my coaching clients. Motivation is a lot of energy expended, like trying to be motivated to do something when you work and build it into a habit, it becomes natural, it becomes like you say that flow state. So we we actually gain energy and we motivations a lot of work, it's a lot of work to stay motivated. And that's why these resolutions tend to not work out so great, because you pick five or six things you're going to do and and it's impossible to implement them all because you're trying to motivate so many things. So I love that you highlight that being in flow and making it habitual. And I say this all the time, habits equal freedom. Part of that is really creating that habit of wellness, and not having to think about it. I you know, you and I've talked many times in reference to my fitness regime. And there are some things that never change. I walk five days a week, no matter what, actually I probably walk seven, but usually I don't get to, but I you know, I'm out walking every single day. I don't think about it. It's the same thing as you know, I get up my workout clothes are where they are. And I work out. I don't do it differently. Because if I do it differently, it doesn't get done.

Yep. And you know, willpower is finite, you know, and that was making that statement earlier is that, you know, decision fatigue is a real thing. Mm hmm. If you can take that out, like one thing I learned in an in my past job when I was managing and it was It wasn't blue collar, but it was like, I was a manager and I was managing a building to a certain extent. And what I noticed was once I figured out what my outfit was for my for my job, um, I was a pair Dickey is a pair of like work a t shirt, and a blue hoodie. And my boots, my work boots, my steel toed boots, once I figured that out, like a year two or three, because before that I was dressing up and, and all this stuff and I didn't need to. But once I figured that out, I'm telling you the decision fatigue in the morning just went away. And once I learned that, and once I learned that, you know, Steve Jobs and all these people, these leaders, these thought leaders, these gurus, they do the same thing. They just wear that one outfit. And it's it was just an eye opening experience that yeah, you once you can get away get take away that daily that one daily thing or what do I have to wear for example, it frees you up so much. So same thing with fitness, and wellness, prepping your meals, prepping your workout plan, knowing what you're going to do having things already ready, having the video accessible bookmarked, whatever you're going to be doing. So that when you do it, it's it's simple. And there aren't these little obstacles that get in your way.

Can we talk about obstacles? What do you think are the top three obstacles that people experience when trying to implement fitness, nutrition, change of this type? What do you think of the top three barriers?

Oh, they would surround probably at least the things that I work on is when I dig for payment, I would be pertaining to family and friends. And like people around you. Maybe pertaining to like who you are. So we save faith. So but not faith in terms of religion, but faith in terms of like your value system. So if that is not in line with who you want to become, then how can you also add on a really good fitness program. And that's something we really dive into is working with coaching tools, with the fitness behavior change so that you know who you are, you know what your value system is. And so that as you embark into this new journey of fit fitness, and wellness, and nutrition, things are a lot more in line. So family, friends, family, friends, faith in terms of who you are your value system. Maybe finances, so in terms of your your, your your occupation, like the external forces of of your job, and having to be accountable for your for whatever you do. So having to be somewhere, things of that nature, that can get in the way. And yeah, those are three really big things I would say. And just your own your own mindset, which I mean that kind of alluded to it in terms of the faith, but your belief in yourself, that's probably the biggest thing. Those are some big things there.

Those are powerful. So in Okay, so can we just dig into the people piece a little bit? Yeah. Because I do you know, we all we've heard this 1000 times over the sum of the five people we spend our time with. Yeah, it's very interesting. I share this story. Often I keep saying I quit drinking five years ago, I can't remember when it was I think my husband's like you've been saying that forever. It might be like, might be 10 years ago. Now. I can't remember. It's been so long. I don't remember when. But I remember it making people extremely uncomfortable. Yep. So and unfortunately, I had to wean people out of my life, because they were trying to find 1000 different ways that they could help me drink with them. Yeah. And it was interesting. And by no means I'm fortunate I quit drinking by choice, not because of I had to. So when you think of people with fitness, similar, it's similar, isn't it?

Yeah. And we were just talking about this in a coaching call about purchase thinking about how can we, you know, the personal training piece of my business, thinking about how can we get more clients and whatnot. And, you know, that's the dynamics of if you give a complimentary session and, and one thing we were just saying is that we people will often if they, if they do it together, they will often regress to the to the least receptive person like the chain is as strong as its weakest link is greed, all that salutely. So people will feel it. Oh, yeah, this this and this workout wasn't that great when they in their mind might have felt that that sample workout was great. rate, but their colleague didn't think it was great, or their friend or their girlfriend or boyfriend or with whomever, whoever. And so they're just going to, they're just going to try and appease that person. And, you know, not necessarily think that this was a great workout or you know, a great a great idea or whatnot. So it's really important. You know, when you embark on a wellness journey, if you are the provider, is that you ask the individual, you know, if you have a partner, if you have you know, who's close in your life, you need to know that, because you need to know that dynamic, you know, if the person, hopefully, hopefully, is not someone who would sabotage them, but you know, there, there will be some jealousy in a lot of ways sometimes. So, you know, maybe having that person join you, this, there's a lot of things that you need to just keep in mind. And when you have, when you have a loved one was really close. We were in saying like, you know, sometimes they've seen people have seen, you know, marriages dissipate. Yeah, because one person Yeah, because some person, one person, the lady, probably she's she's embarking on this woman's journey, and he or she, or partner's not receptive to it, or is jealous about it. And then all of a sudden, it causes friction in the marriage, when it was supposed to be something so productive. So family and friends is a very important piece that we need to dig. When I when I have somebody embark on my wellness, my behavior, change program, family is definitely a big piece that we need to dig into.

And then I'm thankful this came forward because many people borrow barking on any type of journey. It's not something that's always thought of what is going to be the impact. And it's interesting, because not everybody grows and evolves at the same rate. And like you say, it can be very threatening, and people are used to you a certain way. So when you rise up and change, it can be unsettling.

Right? Because they have to look in the mirror themselves now. Right? I mean, they always do, but it's like an indication sometimes to them, they feel that they have to look in the mirror and see Oh, my goodness, I'm not what's my excuse? You know? And so yes, really important to keep that in mind.

And that's why you know, I share the my story often about deciding not to drink alcohol anymore. It was a, that was when the light bulb went off is when I realized I was holding up by my decision, I was holding up a mirror that people were looking in and questioning themselves. And they weren't necessarily liking the answers. So it was very interesting how that and that happens in all areas of our lives. When we do something differently. And it's out of the norm, people tend to measure themselves stepping into things becoming a way of life. And I think that's what you and I are really talking about an anchoring in is you do what you do, because you want people to step into a new way of life and a new way of being so they're healthy for the long term. And I think what's really valuable for people that are listening today is understanding it's not just getting on the treadmill, it's not just doing the workout video, there's so many pieces attached to making it a life changing experience. Would you agree?

Absolutely. I'm in terms of coaching individuals with my wellness, it'd be my fitness behavior change program. It's about giving people tools that they can also translate and other aspects of their lives. Yeah, it's quite transformative. And it's just like, it's almost like, Yeah, this is like, the fitness is just like one. One aspect in which you can apply all of these different. These different tools as you start to expand and vision, who you want to be. Even if it's only 12 weeks later, like you want to you're going to be someone else. So Oh, great. Those tools are amazing in terms of its application in other parts of your life. So

as we finish our time together and curious, what do you do to support your own wellness? What are some of the modalities you do? How do you how do you stay the pillar of you know, your vision?

Um, I do some journaling. I have a journal for a brain dump journal. I do. I have a gratitude journal. I I have this program called if I can say, your hidden mind. Yeah. And it is a tool that can help me too. It's it's, it's a tool where, where you listen to this pros, and it helps to. It's this online platform and it helps you to forget about, or to diminish the severity of, of past traumatic memories. So I do that every day, it's only a five minute audio clip. And then I do, of course, I exercise almost every day, I focus more so on body weight, or in a nutshell, body weight, but it's like closed chain movements. So I do that a lot. Rather than the more Bob bodybuilding type of workouts, movements, Mm hmm. And that's some of the things that I do.

And I know it's so interesting, because I love finding out, especially as practitioners, like, what do you do, because we all do it differently. And we all have our different and we all have our trust me, I have my own Achilles heel, I see all ever things that, you know, we're always working towards. And I think that's something that's so important as, as people embark on a wellness journey is understanding that there's always something to redesign, reshape, look at analyze, is it working, if it's not working to change it, it's it's never cookie cutter. And I love that you do a gratitude journal that's so healthy for your mind, people don't realize it actually impacts the gray matter of your brain. So it's not just about feeling good. And focusing on that mindset, like you were talking about, it really actually impacts the health of our brain, which is pretty amazing.

So the reticular activation system or something or other? Yeah, so it's the system in your brain where you if you have positive mental images, it feeds back and reinforces them over time. We don't even know it. Most people don't need to know that term. But there are there are there is some physiology involved people in terms of positive mental attitude, for example,

honestly started, Sartre I can't thank you enough for being on the show. It's amazing to have you and so inspiring. For those of you that are curious, we will make sure that you have all the contact information in the shownotes so that you can find Sartre, and if not, you guys, he is an incredible member of your holistic earth. All you've got to do is go into the directory, search his name, and he will show up and you will be able to find him that ways. So thank you so much for being on the show.

You're welcome.

And thank you everybody. For listening. This has been another episode of winning with wellness. We can't thank you enough for stepping in and putting yourself first we are really excited and honored to help ignite the wellness warrior in you. Thanks for listening.