What is wellbeing and performance?

07/12/22 • 51 min

20 years ago when I started out as a personal trainer answering the question of ‘what do you do?’ was an easy one.

Over the course of the last 2 decades the scope of my work has expanded to include what can be broadly described as 'wellbeing & performance', but what do these words actually mean?

There are many definitions depending on who you talk to, and although I don't claim to have the definitive answer I do believe that a part of it must include something that relates to the 'dynamic tension between a desire for progress and a contentment with the present'.

But rather than try to come up with the perfect definition, this episode drills into the 5 'pillars' that I believe make up the concept of wellbeing & performance:

1) Wellbeing

2) Drive

3) Mindset

4) Resilience

5) Connection

I break each of these down into smaller chunks as follows:

Wellbeing - DASH - PERMA - Stress & Energy - Emotions

Drive - Goals - Motivation - Confidence - Purpose

Mindset - Global Mindset - Beliefs & Values - Optimism - Self-Talk

Resilience - Grit - Bouncebackability - Change - Acceptance

Connection - Relationships - Support - Belonging - Self

And then finally identify some of the common blockers that stop us from doing and being more of what and who we want to do and be!

Blockers - Procrastination - Self-Sabotage - Confidence - Overwhelm - Defaults

Finally finally, all of this is wrapped in habits, systems, planning and evaluation processes that if you're not careful can quite easily suck out all the messy joy from life so be warned: this is just a model!

My intention for sharing this is to encourage you to ask yourself the question: how am I doing right now with my wellbeing & performance?

Try rating yourself on a scale of 1-10 and make a note of any scores that come out lower than you are happy with, and then start to make a plan for what you could do to nudge them up by +1.

These are also all topics that I speak about regularly, at conferences, corporate events and in training rooms both in the UK and Internationally.

If you want to find out more about how I work with my clients please get in touch via email: [email protected]

20 years ago when I started out as a personal trainer answering the question of ‘what do you do?’ was an easy one.

Over the course of the last 2 decades the scope of my work has expanded to include what can be broadly described as 'wellbeing & performance', but what do these words actually mean?

But rather than try to come up with the perfect definition, this episode drills into the 5 'pillars' that I believe make up the concept of wellbeing & performance:

1) Wellbeing

2) Drive

3) Mindset

4) Resilience

5) Connection

I break each of these down into smaller chunks as follows:

Wellbeing - DASH - PERMA - Stress & Energy - Emotions

Drive - Goals - Motivation - Confidence - Purpose

Mindset - Global Mindset - Beliefs & Values - Optimism - Self-Talk

Resilience - Grit - Bouncebackability - Change - Acceptance

Connection - Relationships - Support - Belonging - Self

And then finally identify some of the common blockers that stop us from doing and being more of what and who we want to do and be!

Blockers - Procrastination - Self-Sabotage - Confidence - Overwhelm - Defaults

My intention for sharing this is to encourage you to ask yourself the question: how am I doing right now with my wellbeing & performance?

Try rating yourself on a scale of 1-10 and make a note of any scores that come out lower than you are happy with, and then start to make a plan for what you could do to nudge them up by +1.

These are also all topics that I speak about regularly, at conferences, corporate events and in training rooms both in the UK and Internationally.

If you want to find out more about how I work with my clients please get in touch via email: [email protected]

Previous Episode

Grief - a personal experience

There's been a bit of a pause on the podcast these last few weeks because my father sadly passed away at the beginning of the month.

In today's episode I describe the process that has been helping me navigate the challenging landscape of grief in what feels to me to be a healthy and adaptive way.

Often in times like this we know that we should 'take the pressure off' or 'go easy' on ourselves, but this can be a difficult thing to do in practice. On the one hand we don't want to let people down or let our high standards slip, and on the other we know that something has to give in order to create the space and time necessary for grieving.

Giving a eulogy at his funeral a week ago also gave me the chance to put into words some of the many life lessons he taught me through his life, and I share a couple with you today in the second half of this episode.

A couple of resources I mention in the episode include the book 'On Grief & Grieving' by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross & David Kessler, and this Huberman Lab episode on grief which I had been listening to on my several trips up to Manchester to be with my dad in his final days.

Next Episode

Intentional Mastery: what is it and how do you achieve it, with William Buist

We all know people who are the absolute masters of their craft, whether that’s as an artist, in sports or in their job.

We look at people who make it look so effortless and ask the question ‘how on earth do they do that!’, yet often when we have mastery of an aspect in our lives we dismiss it or don’t even notice it as being anything exceptional.

Parenting, in our relationships, in our own approach to exercise or perhaps an aspect of our own jobs, there are likely to be areas that we have achieved a level beyond ‘consciously competent’.

My guest on today’s episode is William Buist and he talks about intentional mastery and the stages that go before it. The area that he specialises in is small business mentoring, but the concepts and strategies that he offers are translatable to almost every other aspect of our lives.

William and I have worked together in the past and I recently read his new book by the same name - Intentional Mastery - and I was intrigued to see an entire chapter devoted to the importance of ‘Self’, where he discusses emotional wellbeing, physical wellbeing and mental resilience.

William also has his own inspirational story of making changes in his life to reflect the need to take better care of his health and energy, and I ask him about how he started on his journey towards losing 2 stone and keeping it off.

If you’ve ever yo-yo’ed with your weight loss in the past I think you’ll find this particular section of interest.

You can find out more about William's work (and the book) through his website or LinkedIn:

https://www.williambuist.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/wbuist