Exercise and Movement Can Be FUN?

Moving my body for health IS fun but this was news to me at first.

I became a Certified Life Coach to learn more about this and other ways to better serve women who struggled with food, weight, eating, and body image.

What I didn’t realize starting out, was how much I would learn about myself.

Part of becoming certified taught me how to ask the right questions and create a safe, non-judgmental space and environment for a woman to be heard, listened to, valued and appreciated. This began with me. I needed to do the same with my own internal thoughts and feelings … allow myself to bear witness to my thinking without judging.

A Judgement-Free Zone

As I began my own journey to pause, reflect, renew, and reconnect with myself, I also needed to hold myself accountable for the next step. I committed to forward action to achieving my own goals, dreams, and vision. I like to call these goals my “destination postcard.” It helps me to envision where I want to “be” and it motivates me to keep moving towards it.

It immediately became clear that, for success, non-judgmental support and accountability were critical. And this needed to come from myself first and from the people around me who supported me as I worked toward my goals.

We Need Other People

It’s no surprise to me now that professional sports teams like the Patriots, business executives, entrepreneurs and influencers (like Brene Brown and Oprah), and the most successful individuals we know, all seem to have coaches. Not only is it a challenge to go it alone, but for many of us, it makes the journey close to impossible.

The Shift Around Exercise

My world was beginning to open up. Here I had spent over 35 years in the fitness profession, obsessed with food, eating, weight, and nutrition and using my dysfunctional relationship with exercise as my “great equalizer.”

My approach to exercising was only to burn off the calories that I ate or to punish myself for “cheating.” I spent my whole career agreeing, buying into what I had learned … more is better, harder is more effective. I truly believed that if I only exercised long and hard enough, my body would cooperate and reward me. Right?

Absolutely WRONG! It wasn’t working for me and, as I took a long look at the clients I was working with, it wasn’t working for them either. And it wasn’t us … it was the approach.

Beat Your Own Drum

In the midst of all this change, I heard about a program called Drums Alive. Intrigued, I signed up for my first Drums class. Exercise would never be the same!

Drumming started a process that broke apart my whole philosophy around exercise and replaced it with something less judgmental, less punishing, and more sustainable!

This was the first time I was just having fun, laughing, smiling, while moving. Not once did I look at the clock or wonder what my heart rate was. I was fully present and enjoying the experience. So, this is what exercise is really about.

Up until drumming, I was missing the joy in movement and exercise. This new way brought a wave of new hope, commitment, and success. The old way of hard, long, and painful was unsustainable!

Exercise Can Be a “Want To Do”

I had always made exercise a HAVE TO, NEED TO, SHOULD DO, rather than a “WANT TO DO.” It was more of a chore and a task than an activity. As you can imagine, approaching it this way not only made it less enjoyable but it presented all sorts of challenges about getting started, sticking with it, or being grateful to be physical. It was quite the opposite.

With this newfound joy and understanding, I hunkered down to devise a practice that really made sense, was sustainable, and enjoyable. The result? My 2x2x2 movement formula .. a pillar philosophy and core component of our approach at Shaping Perspectives. Read more about 2x2x2 here.

2x2x2 Brought Joy and a New Job

I was probably most surprised that this new knowledge around movement and exercise brought me so much peace, joy, and contentment. I welcomed this to take the place of frustration, anxiety, worry, and self-hatred that was before.

I no longer exercised 3-4 hours a day with drudgery. I was eating more intuitively, enjoying foods and treating myself with much more kindness and compassion. I was feeling success and I brought this practice to my clients.

Out of the blue one day, when I was teaching drums to a bunch of kids, I received a phone call from the Executive Director at Green Mountain at Fox Run, a treatment and retreat center for women, … and BAM! just like that I was offered the job of my dreams!

To have the opportunity to share my new learnings and practices with other women in the same struggles … food, weight, eating, and body image? This was a dream! I imagined I’d live out my career, right there in Vermont.

As with many dreams, things shifted and Green Mountain would become more of a step on my journey to further growth.

An Unexpected Gift

On staff at Green Mountain, I uncovered a piece of the health journey puzzle that I didn’t even know was missing.

With other women telling their stories, themes emerged and their experiences had many commonalities … shame, guilt, frustration, intense self-loathing, people-pleasing, and perfectionism. Story after story, week after week. I could relate. These were part of my story, too.

As I talked, listened, shared and validated these women I could see, as plain as day, what was needed. It was the combination of self-acceptance and confidence, body appreciation and respect, non-judgmental support and encouragement along with worthiness and self-compassion to create an atmosphere for healing and reducing stress.

The magic missing tool? Self-Care. The final piece of the puzzle.

The Power of Self-Care

We’ve all heard the story of putting your own oxygen mask on first (and filling of your own cup) before helping others. It’s the recipe for less stress, increased self-respect, self-confidence, and self-worth.

I saw firsthand, the women who began to put themselves first, began to experience more joy, more peace, more connection, and more love. This was a blueprint for success … once and for all!

Putting it All Together

For success when it comes to addressing the challenges of food, eating, weight, and body image, there are 5 pieces to the puzzle. All five are key pillars to “shape your perspective” at Shaping Perspectives!

These 5 components make up our Finally! Free, Fit and Fabulous formula. (<—-Click for our free guide). They are 5 steps to peace with food, eating, weight, and body image.

1. Eat Intuitively.
2. Play, Move and Exercise with more JOY.
3. Practice kind, compassionate, and supportive self-talk.
4. Have body acceptance, respect, and appreciation.
5. Implement daily self-care to stress-less.

I know firsthand that there is hope. I saw it in myself and in hundreds of other women. You can have it, too.

No matter how tired, overwhelmed, and frustrated you are, you are worth taking time to connect back to yourself.

And if you’re ready to explore putting these 5 steps into practice, sign up for a free Discovery Call today.

Isn’t it time to start walking down your own path to peace and live your journey to joy?