It is not as easy as you think to ascertain your level of fitness because the appearance of health is not always the same as true health. I remember when Frank Warren, then a thirteen-year veteran with the New Orleans Saints, dropped out of football to coach. After a while, Frank decided to get back into the game because he felt that he was better than most of the players he was coaching. When Frank came to me for preseason training, he looked as if he were in decent shape. But the in-depth health evaluation that I recommend for all of my trainees showed that he had developed coronary problems and needed angioplasty. If Frank had stepped onto the playing field without assessing his health profile, there is a strong chance that he would have died on the field.
Your career and your passion might be calling to you to put forth your most energetic effort, but no one should ever jump into the stresses of life’s battles without a clear understanding of whether or not there is a weak link in your health chain—a point at which you could literally break down. Following a recent decision by the office of the commissioner of Major League Baseball to create a division known as Umpire Medical Services to manage the health of their umpires, my PEP program was hired as a consultant. I discovered that one umpire, whose weight had soared to 357 pounds, didn’t know that he had type 2 diabetes.
When this man didn’t want to consider the health ramifications he was facing if he didn’t lose weight and begin eating and exercising right, I appealed to his better judgment. “How can you be calling the balls and the strikes for every player when you won’t look at your own score? Your body already has two strikes against it. The next one could be your last.” I explained how easy—and even likely—it was for him to develop complications such as heart disease that might lead to premature death. Finally he took my suggestions seriously. He lost weight and reduced his waist measurement, thereby getting his blood sugar back to normal. Amazingly, he accomplished all this without taking medication, just by following my nutrition, exercise, and lifestyle management programs.
Many people are walking time bombs and don’t even know it. If you don’t have the internal physical health to deal with the stresses, demands, and performance standards of your personal life and career, then it doesn’t matter if you look as if you are fine or even feel relatively good.
Your career and your passion might be calling to you to put forth your most energetic effort, but no one should ever jump into the stresses of life’s battles without a clear understanding of whether or not there is a weak link in your health chain—a point at which you could literally break down. Following a recent decision by the office of the commissioner of Major League Baseball to create a division known as Umpire Medical Services to manage the health of their umpires, my PEP program was hired as a consultant. I discovered that one umpire, whose weight had soared to 357 pounds, didn’t know that he had type 2 diabetes.
When this man didn’t want to consider the health ramifications he was facing if he didn’t lose weight and begin eating and exercising right, I appealed to his better judgment. “How can you be calling the balls and the strikes for every player when you won’t look at your own score? Your body already has two strikes against it. The next one could be your last.” I explained how easy—and even likely—it was for him to develop complications such as heart disease that might lead to premature death. Finally he took my suggestions seriously. He lost weight and reduced his waist measurement, thereby getting his blood sugar back to normal. Amazingly, he accomplished all this without taking medication, just by following my nutrition, exercise, and lifestyle management programs.
Many people are walking time bombs and don’t even know it. If you don’t have the internal physical health to deal with the stresses, demands, and performance standards of your personal life and career, then it doesn’t matter if you look as if you are fine or even feel relatively good.
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