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Batten House Podcast
Batten House Podcast
Batten House Podcast
Ep 10 The Power of Positive Movement: Helping People Reach Their Fitness Goals
Dustin Beach shares how Positive Movement Fitness goes beyond typical gym experiences to create transformational changes for busy professionals, parents, and retirees through coach-led programs and personalized attention to each client's unique goals.
• Coach-led fitness facility in Kanata Lakes working with busy professionals, parents, and retirees
• Focuses on helping clients regain energy, improve posture, and address specific health concerns
• Named "Positive Movement" because they aim to help clients make progress toward their intrinsic goals
• Dustin's fitness journey began when his friend's firefighter father got cancer, motivating him to prioritize health
• Transitioned from marathon running to strength training after being called "skinny fat"
• Client success stories include regaining independence (starting lawnmowers without help) and pain reduction
• Debunks fitness myths: 30-day transformations aren't sustainable; women won't get bulky from strength training
• Emphasizes that consistency matters more than intensity for long-term results
• Strength training especially important for women over 40 experiencing hormonal changes
• Building muscle improves metabolism since muscle requires more energy to maintain
For more information about Positive Movement Fitness, call 613-806-7157.
And everybody's got these intrinsic goals that they want to reach. Those goals are kind of what we're after. We want to make positive movement towards people's goals.
Speaker 2:This is the Batten House Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbours come together. Here's your host.
Speaker 3:Sean Batten. Hello everyone, I am very excited to have our guest here today. Dustin Beach, from Positive Movement Fitness how are you doing, dustin? I'm well, sean. How are you? Good man, good. Dustin has an awesome business in the Canada Lakes area that I really love, and his trainers there. Why don't you tell the viewers what you do in your business?
Speaker 1:Sure, we are a coach-led business in Kanata Lakes. I would say coach-led because it's not a fitness facility where you come in and work out. All of our programs are run by a coach. We typically work with busy professionals, parents and retirees and we're often looking at folks. If we're talking about parents, usually they're exhausted and out of energy to keep up with their kids.
Speaker 1:Busy professionals have been sitting at a desk and typically haven't had a really good health habit since prior to COVID, so they're just a similar space to parents, though exhausted and looking to get their energy back. A lot of them are rounded from sitting at a desk, so they've got some kyphosis and they're looking to kind of get strong again, get that feeling of confidence back. And then our retirees are typically here because they're on the other side of their career and they want to stay as healthy and active as long as possible, Well, being able to do things and not feeling like in our climate we're just getting over winter here, especially today it's, I think, it's like zero degrees out there, but we're just getting today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, nice and balmy, we got the door open on the front. So in this climate a lot of folks notice when they get to the other side of their career in retirement that hey, things are getting a little more difficult in the winter to stabilize myself from the ice. I'm not as confident as it used to be. Myself on the ice I'm not as I'm not as confident as it used to be. I read this article about osteoporosis and and I noticed that my bone health isn't where where it should be. Um, familial history for heart disease, a lot of these kind of things start to creep up and you start to realize that you know, there there's a level of fitness that you're not, you're not meeting and I would say a lot of our clients are coming in for that. It's a lot of our retirees at least, are coming in for that. There's a health history or a kind of a health intervention that happens. They can submit.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, I I getting to know your business. I I. First of all, the name is perfect for what you do, because you're not a gym. You're not a local gym where you just show up and work out. You really focus on each person and improve their movement, and that's so needed, especially in our community and the way we are doing less and less movement as a people. So I think it's awesome what you guys do there. Tell our listeners about your journey. I know a bit about it. It's a great personal journey. Tell us your inspiration behind starting your positive movement fitness.
Speaker 1:There's a couple different directions I could go. I think I'll start off. So my best friend's dad was a firefighter and this guy was an absolute giant to me as a teenager, as a kid. He was just very strong. He's always lifting weight. He would bike from pretty much from Ashton to Bell's Corners for work. He was a monster. And then he got brain cancer. And firefighters we kind of know today that synonymous, anonymous, some of those chemicals with cancer. But back then I thought, wow, if this guy can get cancer, holy, I think anyone can.
Speaker 1:I got to start looking after my health as a college kid. You know you don't treat your body the best. So that was the impetus to get me into fitness. And then since then I've run almost 20 marathons and just marathoning was my way in um, trying to get that Boston jacket, and then, once I passed that, just continued on the running field with ultras and Spartan races and these different sort of things. Um, but then somebody one day said, oh, you're just skinny, fat as a runner and I was like what do you mean? I'm like in the shape of my life. I run this fast and you know I'm great. And they're like well, you keep the muscle you need, but essentially you're just, you're just fat, bones and organs, and I was like, oh damn, and I started strength training. This was probably back, I'm saying like 2016, and started to get into that field, and then I would be at my full-time job but on the side I'd be coaching people, uh, with nutrition or running, and I was part of this health coaching year course. It was. It was like a 12-hour week course in 2016 with the Kresser Institute it was a California Functional Medicine Institute.
Speaker 1:Okay, and what that taught me about coaching was there's this habit shift that needs to happen for most people. So when we start a habit, usually it it sucks. There's like this many cons, right, and there's this many pros, but you heard it was good for you, so you keep it going. And then just to learn that it takes most people, from a research perspective, about six months to get into this place where the cons start to squeeze and the pros start to go up. So a smoker let's see, smoking is a really easy example to go up. So a smoker let's see, smoking is a really easy example. At the start, you're like, ah, you know, I could use a smoke to get rid of the stress. And then you. You start to see this shift where they're like actually, I hate the smell of smoke, I've been off of it, I'm starting to cough up stuff, I'm starting to feel better and I think with fitness it's really similar. At the start it's like I'm uncomfortable, I'm sore, and then they get in this habit and they start to to feel like, wow, I'm actually energized, I can do things that are little wins, little aha wins in people's lives.
Speaker 1:So I have some clients that are like I don't need my husband to start the lawnmower anymore. Um, that's, that's huge, or it's huge right, it's a. She would need to get him anytime she wanted to cut the grass. And then I had another client yesterday. She's 66. And she was really hip shifted, low back pain for years and she came into our small groups and she's like this is when I got in here I was just tired of being in pain and now this is my place of comfort and safety and community. That's a beautiful story.
Speaker 1:When you think about transformation, sometimes you're. I think when you come into this field you're like, oh, 30-pound weight loss and jacked muscles. But it's not always that way. We've got another lady. She had a terrible knee injury with a couple surgeries involved and still limps. But her win a couple weeks ago was I stood up in the shower for the first time and didn't have to sit down out of fear. It's incredible win, absolutely it's an incredible win, awesome, um, and everybody's got these, these intrinsic goals that they want to reach when they come in here and and those, those goals, are kind of what we're after. We want to make a positive movement towards people's goals and we want to.
Speaker 1:If you look at some of these big gyms, it's just there's a very corporate nature to it. It's it's. We need to tick off boxes. We need to sign clients, sign clients, sign clients. But there's not, uh, a direction like let's make sure this client is getting towards their goals. It's a partnership. The client needs to do the work too, but if you have someone that's extremely motivated, you should have a trainer on the other side that is extremely motivated to get that person Absolutely. If it's osteoporosis, we're going to get that bone scan back a year from now and they're going to be elated that they've come here. That's the goal We've got to get you to your goal as best we can as partners.
Speaker 3:Well, it's like what you and I talked a while back and you had mentioned about ensuring people as you get older, ensuring that you can get up from the floor position and that really spoke to me about your approach and I know you're sharing your story, your heart is in this like 100%. But just like breaking it down to that simple for some people, simple for some people that well, being able to do that continually as you get older sounds like such a little thing, but it's really not. You're really helping to build the strength, the balance that that takes as you age and I just really appreciate about that approach that you have in your business. I digress like I typically do, but anyway, I just I've always thought so much about you Well, I think so much about you and your business that that it's that those little things that are really making a meaningful impact in our community and in people's lives, and I just want to help get the word out. So, dustin, can you tell us about any myths or misconceptions that you hear in your industry?
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's go over three. The number one myth is that you can have it in 30 days and get back online. We have a program called the Amazing 12. It's 12 weeks and we can do some pretty serious stuff. We can take 30 pounds off someone and then give them a bunch of muscle on top of that, which is crazy, but it's the number one transformation program in the world. But the problem is… in lies that you need to consistently do this stuff. Like 30 days you can. You can take 30 pounds off, but if you're going to put it back on like what are we doing here?
Speaker 1:Studies show that it's pretty easy to put fat back on after losing it. So I think the misconception there is that, uh, you know, people want to take off the weight or put on muscle and do it very, very quickly. But I think you'd be better off doing something over the long haul where you can look back and go, wow, I've been working out five years. This is crazy. I've got such a solid base. I've been pretty consistent. I've missed things for birthdays and, you know, vacations and sickness and stuff, but for the most part, for five years, I've really consistent. I feel strong, developed a habit. I've developed a really good habit and part of what I do nutrition, and that goes for nutrition, sleep, stress, exercise, cardiovascular health. We want to do something consistently. It doesn't have to be all out. We have this really weird thing in society where we want to be all out with everything. It doesn't have to be all out, it just has to be consistent. So I would say conception or misconception.
Speaker 1:One is that misconception. Number two is females think um, that adding strength is they're going to be big and bulky. I don't want to be like this and I don't want to look like you. Just, and I would say to most of them is that you got to work really hard for that. Like you're going to work hard in here but you'd have to be here an hour a day. Like you really have to bust your butt to build muscle. And the advantage is, if you feel like you're getting too bulky, what do you do? You just don't work and it comes off.
Speaker 1:So that's a misconception. I mean the bat, like having strength and muscle and the efficacy of that. The benefit of that is so much higher than any fear of being bulky should be. But it's this weird misconception in the field is that you know this is going to change me for the worse, but it's really really helpful. And then the third doing this high-intensity stuff all the time and body pumping, cardio that this is the answer. It's not Strength training is the answer, which is lifting really, really heavy weight, especially if you're a female over 40. There's a lot of hormonal changes going on at that point. Females over 40 are fed by estradiol and it's pretty much the testosterone of females and over 40 in perimenopause hits, the estradiol starts to pull back and it's just it's really important in that phase to start to do some strength training and not as much stressful stuff like that.
Speaker 1:We see out there which is pretty cardio dominant, whether that's running really hard, rowing really hard, um, so speed bikes, the yeah, cycling like there it has its place, but I think probably closer to twice a week and you want to be doing sprint interval training and hit training, but it should not dominate your, your life. Um, so I think that imbalance of of thinking that you know all of the cardio is going to I'm just going to burn the calories off, but actually having muscle on board will help you burn more calories off, because muscle costs a lot of energy to maintain. Muscle costs a lot of food energy to maintain. So actually having a lot of muscle makes your metabolism a little bit better. If you think about it that way, it's the biggest organ in the body. You want it to be efficient.
Speaker 3:Your knowledge. I tell you, man, You're full of knowledge.
Speaker 1:I nerd out on as much as I can and try and make sure I really absorb the information and understand it and I can disseminate that.
Speaker 3:And really you apply it every day when you're at Positive Movement and you're finding these awesome other trainers that are working with you that also embody this heart that you have, which is just really unique and and as as a customer, I value that big time at your, at your, your, your gym. So when you're not at the gym, you're not working with people, what? What does Dustin Beach do for fun? I know you're a father of of little monkeys and a husband. What, what, what are you doing for fun? I know you're a father of little monkeys and a husband. What are you doing for fun these days?
Speaker 1:Things are pretty busy with three, so I try and get home enough, but even my son and I were at Packingham on Saturday snowboarding, so he's learning that a little bit, uh, often taking the kids to their various activities. But I like to run, I like to rock climb, workout, um, I would say those are kind of my three. Walking my dog is my number one. It's, uh, my, he's 13, so he's my, he's my buddy, and getting in the back forest and walking him would be high on my list. Uh, yeah, I would say right now, though, uh, getting in the snow is is pretty fun, getting out there, yeah. My wife made a good point a couple years ago. She said people that hate winter probably don't have a winter sport, and people love winter probably have one or more sports. So I've got wise words free skiing, snowboarding, skating is amazing. Uh, this sort of stuff keeps me busy, that's great, yeah, no, absolutely, that's very wise.
Speaker 3:Um, uh, so so with your, your business, um, and and personally, can you describe a hardship or a challenge that you rose above and now you can look back and say, hey, because of this I'm better for it, I've grown as a father, I grew as a business owner, and so on?
Speaker 1:Yeah, there have been so many, sean, it's like going to school again. I think the biggest thing is that we hosted a race, a little community race. That one was maybe the most recent challenge. There were just some logistics around hosting the race and closing the road down and not having adequate maybe adequate promotion of that it was closing down was really hard. Maybe adequate promotion of that it was closing down was really hard. So I think we would do things differently. But you learn like humans. Humans make mistakes, right?
Speaker 1:So I think that that was a really hard one because it was one of the most exciting days I've ever had as a business owner, where we had all of these wonderful families and kids and we brought it together with this beautiful community in front of the gym and there were kids laughing and the kids had the medals and there were some parents like this is the best, the best day my kids had in a long time and our, our kids ran in in the race.
Speaker 3:It was their first uh race they've ever done amazing. The face, the, the, the sense of accomplishment on these kids, I mean it was just awesome.
Speaker 1:But but yeah, well, go on, because, well, that one just I think that one taught me, like, um for one, even if it was done perfect, people would not be happy. Like there's, you're all. You're not gonna make everyone happy all the time. It's just a false dichotomy. You need to. You need to maybe stay offline a little bit, um, but also plan for the worst. So, uh, we closed down the road and obviously there were people upset.
Speaker 1:So now iterating that plan, moving forward and and really trying to make it part of the community and getting community involvement and, um, these kind of lessons are so helpful. Even opening this, this place, was like such a risk, right Post-COVID. You're just consistently anxious about getting enough clients and that inner voice You're not good enough, you can't you know. So it's nice to be. We're two years in now in this place and then two and a half prior to this. So so many lessons. Opening a bricks and mortar is is just, it presents so many lessons, uh, that you take in and just prepare for and you continue to iterate and get better. So this year we've got a newsletter now and we we're on top of newsletters and we're blogging and we're um doing podcasting, podcasting, yeah, in-house promotion and stuff. So it's, it's. We're always adding things and getting better.
Speaker 1:And then for me, the biggest, another big lesson was to be a business owner and not just a trainer. So part of that entrepreneur's plight is you get into business and you're like the business can't function without me and, yeah, there isn't a sense the business can like that. That is true in a sense that you need to be here in your business, but yet you also need to manage the business. So that was a big thing of learning that these times where I'm not working. So I I was telling you before the call that my daughter was home yesterday. Well, I had to leave and go get her from school and I was home from 10 till three when I had to pick the other kids up, but I work from 10 till three. I had lots of stuff to do. I didn't actually get through my to do list. So that's a major growth in Dusty since he started the business is that I have become a much better owner. My training philosophies are still there and it's like riding a bike. I'm still a good trainer and I'm still going to learn, but yet I'm learning to be a better owner, which is managing the business and making sure we're doing the right things to grow the business. So I'm recognizing that my my job as an owner is to bring new people in and allow positive movement to be where our people might be, where these retirees and parents and busy professionals might be, so that we can find people that go.
Speaker 1:You know what this sounds like a place I resonate. I just got an osteoporosis diagnosis. I resonate with this. Or I'm going through menopause or perimenopause and I want to go to a place that actually understands what the heck it is. There's a lot of nuance towards that. So let's go to a place that actually understands what peri means and menopause means.
Speaker 3:For our listeners. What's your phone number there? Understands what peri means and menopause means For our listeners.
Speaker 1:What's your phone number there? We are 613-806-7157. Awesome.
Speaker 3:Well, listen, I appreciate your time. I know you're busy working in and on your business. I know there's so much more we can talk about, but appreciate your time and we'll get you on the show again. There's so much more that I want you to share with our listeners, but until next time, thank you really appreciate you, buddy.
Speaker 1:yeah thanks for having me on, and always nice to chat thanks for listening to the Battenhouse podcast.
Speaker 2:To nominate a favorite local business to be featured on the show, go to battenhousepodcastca. That's battenhousepodcastca.
