Imagine life is a pool. Or maybe more accurately, an ocean. Sometimes it’s calm and peaceful, and sometimes it’s tumultuous and it takes everything you have to hold your head above water. No matter who you are, if you want to make it through the storms and keep swimming, there are a couple of important people you need on your side: someone to teach you how to swim, and someone to pull you from the water if you’re about to drown.
If you’re not a strong swimmer and get yourself in too deep, a lifeguard can jump in and pull you to safety. They might toss you a floatie. Maybe they even give you CPR! Hooray, you didn’t drown! A lifeguard’s job isn’t to teach you how to swim. They just save you when you’re in trouble.
To keep you swimming fast & strong, you need a swim teacher, too! The better you are at swimming, the less likely you are to need a lifeguard. Crazy stuff still happens, and even the best swimmers might need a hand sometimes. But for the most part, the best thing you can do to avoid needing life-saving intervention is to become a better swimmer.
Lifeguards & swim coaches both have important jobs. You need both in your life. The unfortunate truth is that many people prefer to rely on the lifeguard, instead of putting in the work with some swim lessons.
So what does this have to do with CrossFit? More than you might think.
In your everyday life, doctors are like lifeguards. Most of the time their focus will be on reacting to your current crisis or issue after things have already gone wrong. Most of the time, you’re not going to interact with them unless something’s already very wrong.
The “swim coaches” of your everyday life are the coaches at Ripple Effect! Our job is to increase your health & fitness as much as possible, to decrease your likelihood of needing emergency intervention from a doctor. It’s about much more than learning how to squat.
At Ripple Effect, we believe that improving your nutrition and exercise habits are the absolute best way to protect against chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, heart disease, and cancer. Even beyond fighting sickness, improving your nutrition and exercise habit improves your enjoyment and quality of life. You get to do the things you like, with less difficulty, for longer.
Our health can be looked at as a continuum. One one end, we see sickness, and on the other end, fitness. In the middle is “normal.” Every decision we make with what we eat and the exercise we do (or don’t) nudges us higher up towards fitness, or lower down towards sickness. The fitter you are, the further down the spectrum you have to go before you reach chronic sickness.
Our coaches help you get fitter, to decrease your chances of needing emergency intervention from a doctor, and to help your everyday life be more awesome. Prioritizing your fitness is hands-down the best investment you could make in yourself. We’re here to make sure you maximize the return on all the time and effort you put in to your health.
No matter where you’re at now, it’s not too late to start making some positive changes. Sign up for a Free Intro Session today to talk to one of our coaches via phone or Zoom!
