I’m currently reading through a really cool book called Mastery by Robert Greene, which was very generously given to me by Matt Mcgunacle. The major premise of the book was to show the process by which some of the timeless masters of their craft took in order to gain their sense of mastery over their specific subject matter. To break it down, there’s a predictable pattern:

Intense passion in a subject matter

Desire to learn outside of the constraints of formal education

Working directly with a mentor during an apprenticeship which typically lasted 7 years

Outgrowing their mentor, either moving on to another mentor or developing their own way

I’m sure this enthralled everyone, but I’m sure everyone out there could find some parallels through their own professional development, and some could find some of the holes in their own process to mastery.

Here’s the funny thing about personal training and strength coaching: most people don’t get in contact with a mentor and are left to figure it out on their own. A few manage to begin working at a great studio or gym where they can pick the brain of someone who is really successful and that person is willing and able to share their knowledge to help others get better, but that’s about 1% of the population.

For most trades this is known as an apprenticeship. The apprentice works under a master craftsman for a period of 2-4 years, learning everything they can about the trade, the business, and helping to sharpen their skills to themselves become masters once their apprentice is complete. Since this is something that is missing from the fitness industry, it’s a hard sell to get trainers to further their education and put their egos in check by stepping under the wing of someone who has been there, done that and managed to find a level of success the apprentice wishes to attain.

Now the funny thing is in the past few months I’ve had a lot of people asking me about whether I offered a mentorship. While I haven’t and had no plans of offering a formal one, the emails and Facebook post got me to thinking: What if I actually did offer a mentorship?

 

So here’s the deal. For me to mentor individuals wouldn’t be very time or cost-effective for the people looking to be mentored, and there would be a lot of people who I wouldn’t be able to to work with. A better option would be to have a 3 or 4 day intensive where we cover everything under the sun and I try to throw down with the best info I can come up with on everything regarding training.

I polled my Facebook friends last night to see whether it would be something they would be interested in, and the response was much greater than I thought it would be. The overwhelming majority thought the program should be either in Edmonton or Las Vegas, which meant either my own back yard or a trip to Sin City with my wife keeping a tight leash on me to make sure no one decides to drag me out to the strippers and get me married to a hooker or anything else that would resemble a scene from the Hangover.

Now the itinerary would have to completely kick serious ass. I know everyone who would want to attend would probably have a decent level of experience with exercise physiology and anatomy, so we would still cover some of those bases, but it would be way deeper down the rabbit hole than most courses would ever go, and the connections would be much more concise than simply looking at fascial trains or stuff like that. Plus, I want people to walk away feeling like they have more answers than questions, and managed to get a tremendous value from it, so I’m planning on breaking down some complex systems into very easy to use processes. I’m talking about the entire metabolic conditioning paradigm on a single user-friendly slide for easy reference, and also flowcharts for assessments to corrective strategies.

Off the top of my head, here’s some of the stuff I would cover:

Anatomy & Physiology: Beyond the Textbook. Putting together intersegmentational relationships and how you can do that voodoo so well too.

Assessments: Seeing the underlying meaning, and whether it matters or not

Connecting the Dots: Building a program from the assessment

Corrective Exercise Strategies: rehab that doesn’t feel rehabby

Advanced Coaching Skills

Breaking Down the Basics: deadlift, squat, row, neutral spine, and how to coach them effectively to get the best results

Advanced Concepts: foot tripod, (actual) core function, breathing, mobility beyond stretching

 

What would you think of something like this? More importantly, would this be something you would want to attend, and if so, what would you want to see covered? Let me know in the comments section below.