My Daughter and My Muscles

My daughter saw me the other day with a sleeveless shirt on and said to me "wow daddy, you’ve got some muscles". That’s pretty cool coming from a 6 year old.

Earlier that morning the two of us went to the recycling center and her job was to recycle all the magazines. I had a few fitness magazines in there, some with some big body building guys on the covers. She was very intrigued by their muscles and couldn’t stop looking and commenting on them.

So after commenting on MY muscles that night, she then went on to say "If you work hard you could look like those muscle guys too." This is a funny conversation I’m having with a 6 year old girl (keep in mind that she’s always around fitness and a healthy lifestyle being in my family).
So we sit down and have an education session. I go on to tell her that no matter how hard I try, daddy will never look like those guys. I explained to her that my genetics won’t let my body do that. She actually understood that part. So then I said I’d probably have to spend 5 hours a day, everyday working out to even come close to looking like that years and years from now, and I would have to eat about 3 or 4 chicken breasts every meal every day.

So she said "daddy, because you work so much, you’ll have to get to the studio in the middle of the night, around 2 o’clock and workout before you start training people." She said "set your alarm, you need to start tonight".

I told her I would do it but only if she came with me every night. She said "okay daddy, I’ll set my alarm too." Then she added "But wait…Maybe I should ask my teacher first. She might not like that idea".

Chad Cannon is a certified personal trainer, fitness professional, owner of Shaping Concepts of Bluffton, author and speaker. Get your free trial at http://www.shapingconceptsbluffton.com