My experience as a fitness and yoga instructor has been a great experience in my teaching journey. I haven’t always had a love for fitness. In fact, I spent most of my life avoiding physical activity and only participated when I felt pressure to lose weight. My main objective was to use physical activity to punish myself for making unhealthy lifestyle choices and, of course, was never able to maintain any kind of schedule. It wasn’t until my daughter was born, and I was suffering from severe postpartum depression, that that perspective started to shift. I was diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder and PPD and was put on medication for a few years. I knew that medication wouldn’t completely solve the problem, so I started looking at other ways to manage my depression and anxiety. In my research, the most common suggestion was physical activity. A good friend of mine was working at a dance studio and offered me free classes if I volunteered for a few hours a week, so I started going. I was introduced to several varieties of dance, yoga, and fitness, and the more I participated, the more my anxiety and depression became manageable, and so I fell in love with movement. I decided that I wanted to shift perspectives on physical activity away from diet culture and more towards movement for mental health. I became certified to teach Fitness and Yin Yoga, Zumba and Barre and spent the last 5 years trying to change people’s minds, but diet culture has its hooks in a lot of people, and I was finding that I had a lot of work cut out for me. Fast forward to the present, where Covid forced me to pivot my career and I had let go of my hope of helping adults change their minds about movement. Physical education is a necessary part of mental health, and can be fun and inspirational! My philosophy is that the body wants to move, and any amount of movement you do is going to make a difference to your overall health. It doesn’t matter how hard you push yourself; it only matters that you try! Physical activity is so important in keeping us happy, and peaceful. It moves energy through us, and it’s what our bodies were made for! I know that I can still change the minds and hearts of people when it comes to physical activity, I’ll just start when they’re young! 😊
