Fitness isn't just for people who already look “fit”

The fitness industry is really good at making people feel like they can't begin.

Too intimidating, too expensive, too much of a specific look required before you're allowed through the door. How many times have you seen "these 4 moves are essential for glute growth" or some variation of it? As if there is one correct way to exercise and you're doing it wrong. As if fitness is a club with a very specific membership criteria and most of us don't qualify.

It is alienating a huge chunk of the population from something that has been proven time and time again to be beneficial for mental and physical health.

I know this because I felt that ‘gym-timidation’ before the term was coined. I walked into my first gym at 19 feeling like I didn't belong there, and spent the next several years doing everything I could to look like skinny girls on social media — chasing a body type that was never going to be mine (because genetics), following advice that was never designed for me, and damaging my mental and physical health because I was sold an idea that health and fitness had to look a certain way.

And now I'm a personal trainer. So I get to do something about it.

Why "I just want to tone up" isn't enough on its own

When new clients come to me, one of the first things I ask is why. Why do you want to train? What's actually behind this?

"I want to tone up" is the most common answer, and I get it — there is nothing wrong with wanting to look good, whatever that means for you. But if aesthetics are your only why, we need to find another one. Not to take that goal away from you, but because it's not going to be enough on its own, and here's why:

You can get obsessed with aesthetics. At best that leads to disappointment in yourself and insecurity. At worst it leads to over-training and disordered eating. I'm not exaggerating — I've been there and I've seen it in clients.

It also just takes the joy out of it. If every session is about trying to change how you look, you're still playing by the same rules that made you feel shit in the first place.

And if you're a real human who is going to age — which, presumably, you are — chasing aesthetics alone for the next ten years is going to hit a wall at some point. Better to start building a relationship with exercise that isn't entirely dependent on what you see in the mirror.

So what's your why?

It can be anything. Community. The smug satisfaction of lifting your own suitcase off the overhead locker. Getting through a day without your back hurting. Health. Stress. Your kids. Feeling strong. Feeling like yourself. Joy — just the straightforward joy of moving your body and feeling good in it.

Aesthetics can absolutely be part of the mix. I'm not here to tell you that wanting to look good is shallow or wrong. I'm here to tell you that it works better when it sits alongside something else, something that keeps you going on the days when the mirror isn't giving you what you want.

Fitness looks different for everyone. Your programme should too.

Go and do something today — anything. A walk, a stretch, a dance around your kitchen. Something that reminds your body that movement is supposed to feel good. And if you want help building something that's actually built around you, not a template, not someone else's goal — you know where I am.