Two years ago Caesar Hernandez decided to find purpose in life. He wanted to make a difference in the lives of others—like he had in his own life—through health and fitness. In his living room with one client, he started Life Purpose Boot Camp and now he helps dozens of Central Coast residents change their lives by changing their lifestyle.
He said his boot camp has quadrupled in size in the last two years.
“One of the amazing things is we have so many systems in place,” he said.
With a holistic approach to fitness, Hernandez ensures his clients have access to information about nutrition, and he holds nutritional seminars and even holds Trader Joe’s tours teaching his clients how to shop. His clients also have access to fitness trackers for their phones so they can upload pictures, and the app generates graphs and reports for them.
“When you join Life Purpose Boot Camp you are basically joining a community of people that are there for every aspect, everything that you need to know about fitness—from the motivation to the nutrition to the workouts to the testimonies—everything you need to have, it’s there under one roof,” he said.
The biggest motivational tool Hernandez offers is an accountability coach. Clients are encouraged to check in at each class they attend, and at the end of the week the accountability coach runs reports.
“And if you haven’t been to boot camp, guess what? On Sunday when you’re sitting there and you’re sipping on your mimosa and doing stuff you’re not supposed to do, you get an accountability call. Which is an awesome thing,” he said.
He said losing weight to look good for an event shouldn’t be the main goal because it inspires a short burst of excitement but doesn’t give people a purpose to continue. He said getting fit for health and livelihood should be the goal.
“What about the substance, what about the stuff that truly matters? You have diabetes, your mom passed away from diabetes, your grandpa passed away from diabetes. You wake up in the morning and you hate yourself, you’re looking in the mirror and you think, ‘I don’t even want to look there anymore.’ Those feelings and those emotions—that’s what’s going to get you up every morning, or after work to work out and get healthy,” he said.
Life Purpose Boot Camp offers 5 a.m., 6 a.m., and 7 p.m. classes at the Santa Maria Boys & Girls Club.
This article appears in Nov 12-19, 2015.