“I’ll try”… two words that are music to a fitness instructors’ ears! As a fitness instructor, it’s not only my job to lead a safe, challenging workout, but it’s also my job to try and get people out of their comfort zone, to teach them new things and to give them encouragement to try something new. Something that they may not think they can do.
But, there’s a fine line with being motivating and helpful and encouraging and with pushing people too far and making them feel UN-comfortable. So, I’ve always got this in the back of my mind when I go over to help correct someone’s form or ask them to try it a different way or to increase their weights. Some people take really well to this, but some get offended, which is always a tough situation. When I correct someone’s form, I NEVER intend on offending them; merely, I’m doing it to help them do things the correct way to avoid a potential injury.
In my class on Wednesday, I had a few new people. I like to ask if anyone is new at the beginning of class so that I can make sure to keep an extra eye out for them throughout the class to make sure they are using correct form and are doing ok (pushing themselves hard enough, taking it down a notch if necessary, etc.). I was having them do Goblet squats with the focus on squat depth, ie: feet a little wider than hip width, kness and toes at a 45* angle, dropping deep and keeping the chest up. One new participant was doing more of a plie squat, which is fine… if we were doing plie squats 😉 Since we were doing a Goblet squat, I went over, moved my mic away from my face and talked her through form correction for the Goblet squat, which is when she said “I don’t know if I can do that, but I’ll try”.
Burpees to Bubbly 