The life of a fitness instructor often goes a little something like this…

You lay awake at night, thinking of all the ways tomorrow’s class might not go as planned. What if someone brand new shows up? What if someone has an unexpected injury? Will you be able to pivot? Will the speaker system randomly stop working?

The next day, you arrive at the studio, a little surprised you can’t even recall the trip there. Probably because you were caught up listening to your playlist one last time as you drove. Okay, more like creating your playlist, but hey you got it done right?

As you set up before class, you find yourself simultaneously listening to clients with one ear as you adjust equipment and mentally rehearse your notes for class.

Once class starts, you become preoccupied with worrying whether or not that one member actually likes what you’ve planned for today. And it’s not long before you catch yourself cueing on autopilot, never pausing to notice if your words are actually resonating with your students, and terrified you won’t know how to grab the reigns again if you do notice everyone’s doing their own thing.

As you finish wrapping up class, you notice you’re out of breath. Did you even stop cueing once?

Sounds kind of familiar, right?

Given all that you do, just in the few minutes before class is about to begin and all the moments leading up to it, it’s not surprising that practicing mindfulness as a fitness professional feels so difficult. Our lives are built around constantly moving from one thing to the next, multitasking along the way. But what would it feel like to slow down? How would it feel to return to the present?

I’ve been teaching classes that emphasize the mind-body connection since 2011 and have found mindfulness to be the secret sauce to turning everyday workouts into moving meditations, but this wasn’t always easy for me.

Believe it or not though, I really struggled with starting my own personal mindfulness meditation practice. I could never find the time to sit and the discomfort I felt from the thoughts that came up when I did, made me question how anyone could find this relaxing in the slightest. But when my anxiety around teaching and the pressure I placed on myself to please every member that came into the studio became too much for me to continuing carrying, and ultimately led to burnout, I decided to give mindfulness another try. And I’m so glad I did.

Instead of going it on my own, I enrolled in a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction course, started taking classes with a mindfulness meditation instructor, and opened myself up to looking at mindfulness in new ways. I learned that my original expectations surrounding mindfulness weren’t even really what the practice was even about.

I had been caught up focusing on the destination (i.e., peace, contentment, less stress) that I’d failed to recognize that mindfulness was more a journey, a continuous practice, and meditation just one of the vehicles I could use. Yoga, walking, communicating with friends, and intentional rest were some of the others. I learned I could practice mindfulness while out walking my dog, waiting in line at the grocery store, meeting new clients and listening to their stories, or even while re-racking weights after class. It seemed a natural progression when in 2020 I decided to enroll in a mindfulness meditation teacher training and since then I’ve been sharing mindfulness with other fitness instructors who also have a hard time “sitting still and doing nothing.”

I created 8 Weeks to Mindfulness first and foremost to help fitness professionals give back to themselves and not feel guilty for slowing down, and to help instructors like you create a mindfulness practice that works.

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