catching up on this month’s {coaching the coach} series? read week one, week two, week three and week four.

Four weeks to change. Four weeks to new habit-making. Four weeks to understanding more about my body’s potential and becoming confident that it can change quickly. That’s all it took.

I’ve never been more certain that all you need in order to see major results is a strategic plan and a willingness to try. I’m certain because I just did it myself. With the bari coach program, I dropped 3 percent body fat and 1.5 pounds in 4 weeks. If you’re like a lot of people, you’re probably thinking, but you’re a trainer. I could never do it. That worked for you, but it wouldn’t work for me. And I’m here to tell you the top 5 reasons why the bari coach program can catapult your results, too.

1. The accountability of a coach (or in my case sharing all my dirty little secrets week after week with you lovely Tribers) kept me (positively) on track. When you gave me your sweaty fist bumps or checked in on my progress or told me I was looking good, it made every healthy choice easier to make. Your bari coach is your personal cheerleader, your fitness Fairy Godmother and your enthusiasm reservoir. You can do it because you’ve got someone in your corner.

2. Small attainable goals increased my momentum. We want big changes right away but get frustrated when we can’t see them overnight. In the last four weeks I learned that any major changes I made were actually just an accumulation of little choices I had been making along the way. Sometimes we can’t see the tiny steps to our overall goal, and coaching lights the way.

3. Every week I learned to trust myself more. This past weekend I ran a 5k in my husband’s hometown and hit a personal record of a 7:37 pace. I’ve never come close to that before, and I did it with trust. I kept my eye on the woman in front of me and said, all you have to do is keep her in sight. I trusted I could do it because I thought about everything else I had accomplished this month - from drinking more water to improving my posture - I had built trust in myself that I was capable of changing my habits so I knew if I chose to run faster, I would do it. And I did.

4. It taught me how to give myself a break. Trainers in particular run the risk of overtraining, so taking days off and the self-care actions necessary to rejuvenate my body and mind catapulted my efforts. Measuring just how much rest affected my results made me aware of how much more mileage I could get out of my workouts if I simply went to bed and took better care of my rest schedule.

5. It made me happy. A lot of my life is about serving and supporting others, and I love it. But doing something for myself because I knew it was good for me made me 80 times better at everything else I was doing.

All of these major results (from the numbers to the lifestyle change to the happiness factor) can be yours, Tribe. All you have to do is choose them. Maybe you grab a coach, maybe you get your name on the wall for the sweat challenge, maybe you choose a package or membership to keep you accountable. Whatever you need, bari’s got the resources for you. All it takes is the first step: make the choice to live your best life. And from the other side I can tell you, choosing a healthy body and happy life is a choice you will never ever ever regret.