Although I was active in the world of artistic sports (gymnastics, cheerleading and dance) throughout my whole life, my true fitness journey didn’t start until my second semester of university. Coming up on three years, I’ve learned so much about myself, my body, and the fitness community since I started prioritizing my physical and mental health. I started working at GoodLife in May 2018, the summer after my first year, and surrounding myself with like-minded individuals who valued fitness and health inspired me to continue striving for greater things. Although I eventually moved back to school in September, I always came back to my home gym, and the recognition my coworkers gave me about the work I was putting in made me want to be better. So, in January 2019, as part of my New Years Resolution, I made a separate Instagram account to document my fitness journey. I was nervous at first, worried that making an account would give me some sort of bad look amongst my followers who may think I was just looking for attention or a place to post my belfies without judgment, but I reassured myself that it doesn’t matter what others think.
Unfortunately, the downfall to my fitness journey and account started in June 2019, after taking the canfitpro Personal Training Specialist course. I was enrolled in a summer school course that required a lot of my time, while also studying for my PTS exam, and working both a full time and part time job, so unfortunately, exercising and eating well were not the top of my priority for the majority of that summer. I noticed the changes in my body happening quickly, as going from working out five days a week right down to about one or two lost me quite some muscle and gained me some body fat. After failing my PTS exam, I was even more discouraged to continue to work out and post regularly on my Instagram. I felt like a failure, like I didn’t deserve to make posts about my experience and knowledge for others.
I started being more consistent in January of this year, but as COVID-19 hit us three months in, my fitness and health journey was once again put on the back burner. While I was doing workouts at my high school track, I found home workouts so hard to keep up with. I just didn’t enjoy what I was doing, so I gave up. Now that the gyms have opened up once again and I’m back at work, I’m more motivated now than ever to get back to the point where I was before I failed my PTS exam.
Since starting my fitness journey, and my fitness Instagram, I’ve learned and grown so much as a person. While in the beginning, I was mostly concerned with aesthetics, I’m now becoming more concerned with how I feel. I’ve cleared out the accounts I follow on social media who make me feel envious or jealous, and I only follow accounts that either inspire me or post things that are beneficial to me. While I do want to get back to the physical shape I was in during 2018, my journey is different this time around. I’m learning to treat myself with more grace and forgiveness, to not beat myself up if I miss a workout or eat a snack, but rather trying to find the balance of it all. I’m learning to love my body for all it’s flaws, no matter how it looks– no matter if I have extra fat, or lean muscle. I’m not going to beat myself up for eating snacks or ice cream or pizza, because eating the food that makes me happy is more important to me than restricting myself into a depression.
I’ve learned through having a fitness Instagram how impressionable some of my followers are. While I like to share tips and workouts that work for me, I have to work on reminding my followers that these are the things that work for me. The workouts that I love are not going to give everyone the same results. Promoting my own knowledge on my account knowing how impressionable my audience is without acknowledging the diversity of our bodies is irresponsible of me. I know that so many young girls who are either just beginning or looking into beginning their fitness journey look up to accounts like mine and so many others that I follow, and the last thing I want to do is post anything potentially damaging for them, simply to show off how “smart” I am. How do I know that people actually are influenced by my posts? I get a lot of DM’s when I’m consistently posting, mostly from people I know, letting me know that I inspired them to start working out or to take control of their own health journey. I have friends who have told me they’re “jealous” of my body, or ask how they can “get” my body. To put it simply, you can’t. If everyone in the world did the same exercises and had the same diet, we would still all look different. It’s about finding what works for YOU according to what you want to achieve. And this is something else I want to start promoting on my account.
I learned through my fitness Instagram how supportive everyone in the fitness community is. However, you need to be your own biggest supporter. After my long hiatus, explaining I was going to stop posting for aesthetics and start posting to create open dialogue of my own struggles, so many of my followers have reached out and shown me their support. However, no one reached out to check up on me after not having posted on that account for months. That’s not to say it’s my followers fault for not holding me accountable– the point I want to make is that you need to be your own biggest fan in order to hold yourself accountable. Knowing I was coming back to followers with open arms and hearts has been motivating me to keep going– but I didn’t come back until I knew I was ready. And how did I know I was ready? I was excited to start posting!
While my fitness Instagram has taught me so much about not only myself but also the fitness community in general, it’s also shown me a lot about the people I love. I’ve posted about my fitness account on my main account, and I’ve also reached out to my friends to let them know I created an account. I was surprised at some of the people I considered friends who either didn’t follow me, or who unfollowed me at some point. While not everyone is going to be there with me every step in the journey, and I understand my posts might not be for everyone, it’s been lovely to realize the people that are truly ride or die for me, the ones who will support me in all I do– no matter their own personal opinions on it.
While it’s scary to be so open with followers I don’t even know, I’m excited and inspired to continue on this fitness journey, and I’m thankful to my fitness Instagram account for keeping me accountable in times when I’m unmotivated to keep going. Although it’s scary to share my deep thoughts and feelings and struggles for everyone in the world to see, allowing anyone and everyone to form their own opinion of my writing, I know from experience that my posts can reach people and affect people who need to hear what I have to say. And, to me, that’s the best part of this all– knowing that there are people out there who will benefit from me sharing my experiences.