One day I as a personal trainer had my body taken from me, at least that’s what it felt like.
I’m not sure what got into me, especially because I had already had quite a few bad instances surrounding my body and religion but I decided to give back to my church community at the time and offer a free workout, fitness, and stretching classes online via Facebook and a specially created email list.
The Facebook group grew fast – with various women from different states inviting others to join and it was so beautiful. I would film videos of the workouts and at the beginning of each one I would share a different bible verse that was then repeated all through the workout. To this day working out in this manner has alone given me the best workout that I had ever experienced.
This was a big step for me, growing up I would hear from some of the women how the different men at church were looking at me and to cover up more. Now that I’ve had my body awakening and I can see why it never mattered how baggy the clothes that I wore were. Not only did I feel bad in ill fitting clothing but what sets me apart is that my aura or energetic pattern is more feminine than most women. But back then I couldn’t see the world, or women’s bodies with the sight that I have now.
Right before the program began one of the women sent me an email and this email was so short but for me it ignited all the trauma around the insecurities of my body, how I didn’t know how to properly hide myself, how I wanted to feel comfortable in my skin, and I wanted to feel beautiful. As a fitness trainer today I don’t film (or at least I rarely film) actual videos of me working out. Nowadays it’s usually tutorials and the reason being is that for me working out is very private.
I’ve shot thousands of videos of my body being pushed through reps and I’ve enjoyed doing less of that. The other day I was watching one of my favorite filmmakers and she shared that one thing that she’s noticed after years of shooting video is that women often get harsher comments then men. And they are also judged and policed for their bodies – even when the video that they are sharing has nothing to do with it.
Well that happened to me, at least for me that’s what it felt like. Right before the church fitness challenge began a woman from it sent me an email inquiring if I would be dressed appropriately and she was concerned about my modesty in my workout videos. My blood still boils writing this. Here I am, scared because growing up I was taught to be scared of my body because I apparently was tempting so many men with it. I went to college and graduated with a degree in Exercise Science, taught large boot camps and 1 to 1 training sessions for years and for some reason this email hurt me in such a way, and I think it’s because I was trying to share something special that I loved, fitness with a group of women that I had often felt judged by so far me this was a huge step and in it I just felt really cut down.
Nowadays I might not let it get to me – although maybe not, I had encouragement from another church member to ignore it and reassurance that I was doing was beautiful and so I went ahead with the videos (which I received great feedback from others on). However the sad things is that with every rep in the back of my head I was wondering, “Is my body modest enough.”
“Am I being too much of a temptation right now as I do this plank?”
Which as trainer is the wrong mindset, you can hurt yourself if you lift weights not being mindful of what you are doing. But the people part of me was activated along with the hurt child in me that finally had courage to share her craft and instead felt like she was judged for it.
As innocent as this is I want to share this story because I think that perhaps we need to be mindful what we are telling our women in church and how we are using Christianity or any religion in general. Regardless of a certain spiritual belief we have it’s very important to understand the practical implications that we are passing on to the next generation of women.
Trainers don’t generally wear baggy clothes. And that’s ok.
It’s also ok (and this took me forever to get to this point) to wear your sports bra while you workout and not to have a shirt on top. Men do it all the time. And when your executing an intense workout that has you dripping in sweat sometimes you just need to breath.
It’s also ok to feel sexy and beautiful and put make on when you workout.
It’s okay to take off your shirt and run in your sports bra too.
It’s so vulnerable to be in our bodies as women and I wish that the church acknowledged that.
If that acknowledged that perhaps then we as women would have a different scripture to read too.
