Episode 18 - Uncharted Bodies

Your body walks with you into every room, including church, including the gym, including the mirror moment you didn’t ask for. From a live recording in Calgary at McDougall United Church, we sit down for an honest, practical conversation about the stories we inherit about bodies and why so many of them leave people feeling ashamed, judged, or “not enough.”

Bill Weaver is joined by Ricardo De Menezes, Rev. Vicky McPhee, Rev. Karen Medland, and Geoff Starling, founder of Every Body STRONGER, a Calgary fitness space built on inclusion and body diversity. Together we unpack Christian theology that pits body against soul, Catholic and Protestant guilt around “temptation,” and the modern fitness culture that sells perfection while quietly punishing anyone who can’t or won’t conform. We also name the real-world harm of anti-fat bias, queer body standards, social media metrics, and medical stigma that too often treats weight as a diagnosis instead of seeing a whole person.

Then we pivot toward hope. What does discipline look like when it’s life-giving instead of punishing? How can language become a signal of safety? What would it take to build communities, in church and in fitness, where people can safely fail, learn, and still belong? We make space for disability, chronic illness, injury, accessibility, and the privilege differences that shape how bodies move through the world.

If this conversation gives you a new way to relate to movement, faith, or your own body, subscribe, share the episode with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find it.

Check us out at www.preparedtodrown.com

Continue the conversation over at our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/PreparedtoDrown

Transcript

Bodies At The Intersection

Bill 0:00

Alright, here's the deal, friends. We are in the basement of McDougall United Church on a Friday evening here in Calgary, and there is coffee on the tables, and there are people in the room, and we are going to talk about something that every single one of us brought with us into this room without even thinking about it. That is our bodies. And every single one of us walked in here carrying a slightly different story about what our body is supposed to do and be. Fitness culture has a lot to say about that, and faith has a lot to say about it too. And those voices don't often stay in their own lanes. They follow us every time we're in the kitchen, when we're in the gym, when we're looking in the mirror, even when we are at prayer. So tonight, we are not going to pretend that it is simple, and we are not going to pretend that we have it all figured out. When it comes to our bodies, a lot of us are already in over our heads, trying to be healthy and faithful and still be okay with ourselves somewhere in the middle of it all. So tonight we are going to talk about it honestly. I'm Bill Weaver, and this is Prepared to Drown. And we are here on a beautiful Friday evening here in Calgary Elbird in the basement of McDougall United Church for our next episode of Prepared to Drown. I am Bill Weaver, and I have a fantastic panel of people here. We are going to be talking tonight about something that every single one of us carries around with us every day, and that is our bodies. Whether we realize it or not, our bodies are being shaped by the culture that we live in and by expectations and by systems and by stories that we have inherited and by stories that we are still trying to unlearn. Fitness culture tells us a story about our bodies. Our faith traditions also tell us another. And for many of us, these stories don't always sit easily together. So tonight we are not going to try to fix that, but we are going to talk about it. So I cannot have this conversation on my own. I have a panel of folks here that are going to help me with this. We've got Ricardo Di Menezes down at the far end of the table from me, who all of you know because he is a regular on this podcast. He brings a lens of advocacy and labor and lived experience as well as a queer lens to all of our conversations. And if you listened to last month's episode, he uh closed off talking about this very issue in his closing comments. So thanks for being here, Ricardo.

Ricardo 2:04

Good evening.

Bill 2:05

And uh sitting next to him, we have Reverend Vicky McPhee, who is joining us from Simons Valley United Church. Uh her work has taken her all over the world. And as she's about to go on another uh Camino sabbatical, actually, in a few weeks, uh, she has come here tonight as well to talk about uh uh fitness, culture, and faith and the intersection between the two. Uh as a runner and cyclist and uh active um uh what's the word I'm looking for? Mission trip and awareness trip leader uh of many years in the United Church of Canada. Uh so thank you for being here tonight, Vicki.

Vicki 2:38

I'm glad to be here.

Bill 2:39

And then sitting next to her in the middle, her rounding out of the table here is uh Jeff Starling, and he is the founder of Everybody Stronger here in Calgary, which is a fitness space that is built around inclusion and body diversity and a fundamentally different way of relating to movement and strength. So uh thank you for being here tonight, Jeff. It's gonna be great having you in this conversation. Fantastic. Thanks for having me. And sitting right next to me, our final guest is Reverend Karen Medland. She is the Pastoral Relations Minister of Chinookwin's region, which is the United Church region, kind of southern Alberta, a little bit of BC on the eastern side, I think a little bit of Saskatchewan on the western side. Uh but uh she is here tonight uh stepping into this conversation about bringing her pastoral experience and some theological reflection into this conversation as well. Thanks for being here, Karen.

Karen 3:27

Thanks for the invite, Bill.

Body, Soul, And Christian Inheritance

Bill 3:28

And uh with that, that is our panel for tonight, and we are gonna jump right into it. So I want to start with something that I have been wondering about as I've been preparing for this episode, because I think I wonder if in our Protestant tradition, especially throughout history, uh, we have struggled with how we understand our bodies in the midst of our theology, because so much of our language in the church is shaped around the soul, the spiritual journey, uh, and what comes next after this life. And sometimes the body ends up feeling like a secondary, almost cage to our soul. And in fact, some of uh some of our older theologies in the Christian tradition would actually speak of the idea that uh at the time of our death, our body finally decays and our soul is released. Aaron Powell So romantic. I I I am here to woo you, Ricardo, but nothing else.

Ricardo 4:19

Yes. Once your body rots, your soul is free.

Bill 4:22

But certainly throughout the Christian tradition, there has always been a complicated relationship with our bodies as things either to manage or control. Um and even now, I would say, in some of the resurgence of some of the rhetoric that is coming up from some of the more fundamentalist or nationalist uh theologies that we are hearing something that that's is merely a commodity and a means to an end, whether it be for desire or for um you know productivity or you know, that there is a value placed on it. So, Karen, I'm gonna come to you first and ask you what do you think about that? What do you think about our theological uh relationship with our body from a Christian tradition perspective?

Karen 5:04

Oh, thanks. Um good question to start the night off. Uh I do actually think there is a real struggle in in the church and with for people in faith around what does it mean to have a body and a soul. And I was raised in the Presbyterian Church in Scotland, and so have a very strong sense of that kind of Presbyterian sense that the body is actually a very sinful thing, that the body is built for desire, the soul is built for God. And and I think that actually puts us in a really hard situation when our body fails to do what the soul should be kind of pulling us towards. So in the terms of our as a faith, as faithful people, I think we do have this struggle between body and soul. And actually, when I was thinking about it, I was thinking about the sermon I gave here uh a few months ago at the learning day or the learning weekend, and I preached on Ephesians 4, in that sense of Christ is the head, the body, and then we are the body. And what does that mean around the sense of the wholeness of the body? How does scripture interpret who we are as body? And what really kind of struck me about that Ephesians passage, especially when you read it out of a more contemporary uh translation, is the sense that the spirit is in some way, or the our faith is in some way the ligaments that holds the body together. So, how do we start thinking about the body, not as in that kind of uh Calvinistic, uh sinful expression of our humanity, but rather as something that is held together both spiritually and physically by our sense of who we are as faithful people, that the spirit is the ligaments that holds us together, and that we are also okay about not being perfect, physically, not being perfect. And that would, for me, is is always been a really strong personal struggle. Like, what does it mean not to be physically perfect when it feels like, in in Calvinist interpretation, that puts me into that real I'm very sinful because my body is not perfect as a perfect vessel for my soul.

Bill 7:28

And Ricardo, you grew up in the Catholic tradition. Um, so I know the Catholic faith has a lot to tell you about your body. Uh, what did you learn growing up in the Catholic Church?

Ricardo 7:38

That God doesn't like fat people. Um That God does it's it's it's uh I can't think or remember of a time when um my body was um ever criticized or judged in the church, but I can think or or of numerous times, and I'm sure most churches would say this, where like if you did things that were in a front to your body drinking, smoking, uh sex before marriage apparently was a hard line to disrespecting your body. Um that it was just a ticket straight to or another step closer to hell. Like, you know, as I say in previous podcasts, my mother was the only one who'd sent me straight to hell for small things, right? But the church is is small cuts, right? And it felt like, and and you know, I left the church just shortly after I came out at 18, but it felt throughout my my teenage years and my youth that like um there was an inability for a child to be a child, um, and for a teenager to be curious about even even the temptations around them and w whether or not society or the church sees them as bad, like marijuana or smoking or drinking, um it's it's it's an affront to your body. And in the long run, not only will you be unhealthy and unhappy and perhaps die, but you you've you've you've sinned, right? And so it's not enough that you're you're you're doing these things, um, but quitting quitting them never meant um or stop doing them never meant like um for your body or for your mind or for anything like that. It was like for God, right? He's the one that you have to please the most. And that screws with you a lot um when you fail because you've not just failed your butt you've you failed God. Right? Yeah. So when you're unable to quit smoking, like when you be those people that started smoking when they're 14 years old, or the person or the kid who too who who suffers from obesity and has a food addiction at a young age because of trauma or whatever the reasons it might be, when they don't lose weight or they don't overcome those temptations, because that was always the word, right? Temptations, they've failed God. And that puts a young child in a very conflicting and toxic relationship with an institution that has a lot of control over their personal life. Right.

Bill 10:08

So it'll land with you, Vicky. What do you think?

Vicki 10:11

Well, I in this conversation, I'm remembering a book I read by Karen Armstrong. It was her memoir of being a nun, becoming a nun at a very young age at 17. And she entered entered into the convent life being, as it turns out, allergic to dairy and not understanding that in that time. I think it was in the 60s. And the she she was not permitted to leave any food uneaten at her because that was wasteful. And yet her first meal there was baked macaroni and cheese, and it was literally making her sick. And the nuns were telling her she was failing because she was not having uh enough control over her body in mind over matter, and that if only she prayed hard enough and if only she worked at controlling her body, would she um be able to um be submissive to God? And no matter what you do, you can't uh overcome uh an allergy just because you will it away. As with so many other illnesses or um situations, like if you are damaged from overtraining for years, as I have done with one of my feet, there's no no matter how much I pray, I can't walk without taking seriously the use of orthotics or the proper set of shoes. And so this mind, this idea that our bodies are separate and apart from our minds, and that the our our bodies can be controlled, and that if you are failing, quote unquote, failing to stop eating, to stop smoking, to stop having sex, to you name it, then that's because you're not strong enough psychologically, mentally. And that I can't help but feel has set so many of us up for failure and for and and not failure in that we're failing, but feeling like we're failing. And how much time and energy are we spending on worrying about failing when we could be using that time and energy to be compassionate, to be helping one another, to be, you know, I'm justice oriented, so I want to see people thriving. But if I'm so if I'm overly concerned with um things that I cannot control, that nature is doing to my body, then that is wasted energy. Um, you know, and I say this as a person in her mid-50s who is realizing that I never will do again some forms of exercise or some activities because I no longer have the capacity. It's not because I'm failing at it, it's because I'm now 54 rather than 24. And so I just yeah, so for me, this is such a important topic because it goes along with that. Well, if you just prayed hard enough, yeah, you would be fixed.

Bill 13:40

Yeah, per your personal piety.

Ricardo 13:42

It's interesting, it's an interesting vicious cycle that you that you bring up because like in so many church circles, if you're unhappy or if you're not to a standard, you need God and you should pray to God. But if you're not successful with that combination of prayer, you've failed God. So it becomes quite psychologically damaging, I would say, in many ways, right?

Vicki 14:03

Yeah, yeah. The prosperity gospel tells you that um you're blessed because you have made God happy in some way. And so if you don't have wealth, if you're not skinny enough, if your children aren't perfect, it's because somehow you failed God and therefore you don't have prosperity.

Fitness Harm And Why It Persists

Bill 14:23

Yep. Yep. Yep. So, Jeff. Um by the time folks come to you, they have probably experienced some of this crap in their lives and have an interesting um, should we say, bent relationship with their perspective on uh their body, on on their the their their body image, their relationship with their body. Um I imagine you see this. I imagine you encounter this all the time.

Geoff 14:54

This is for better or worse why we exist.

Bill 14:57

Yeah.

Geoff 14:57

Um unfortunately, it is so rampant um and from so many different places. It can come from family, it can come uh through faith, it can come from school, it can come from friends, it can come now, it's coming uh with the population we serve less so online because they're a little older, and that's less of their kind of early stage of life. Um but I have two kids, uh 13 and 15, and they are definitely receiving messages around body perfectionism and and yeah, um, kind of your um kind of right to exist in the world based on how you look, uh how you're allowed to operate, um the choices you have available to you, the people you can be friends with, uh kind of the life you can lead based on your physical appearance. And that is now I really thought we were doing okay with this uh up until a few years ago, and and we just seem to have done a huge swing backwards uh in the last little bit. But yeah, it's it's uh it's heartbreaking. Um in the semi-recent stages of my career. Uh I was working in a um in a medical environment and was able to have conversation with folks who were uh the the specialty of the clinic was folks living in larger bodies. Um and the first time I heard stories from uh cis men about them choosing to operate a larger body because of assault and abuse they'd received as kids because they felt that they would be less attractive and less likely to be resulted. Um stories like the first time I heard that was that reaction, the second time, the third time, the fourth time, the fifth time. Um yeah, the the the number of ways that um folks' relationships with their bodies were impacted by others was it's it's still terrible. Um but every time it was kind of a new version of terrible.

Building Everybody Stronger

Bill 17:00

Yeah. So uh everybody stronger um is uh uh hyper-inclusive. Uh any any body type, uh, any orientation. Uh um can would you be willing to share a bit about how you came to found this space? Because I'll be honest. Um, not my experience of the fitness industry. Uh and we've we've talked about religious messaging. Um part of me would say I've experienced the fitness industry's messaging as well as being quite damaging on occasion as well. And then out of the blue, everybody's stronger. It's like, wait a second, where that where the hell was all of this, right?

Geoff 17:35

So yeah, and again, sort of for better or worse, like uh I'm I'm so grateful that we exist. Um I I hate that we're headline news. We have, you know, we're we're invited to podcasts, we're we're on CBC, we're on global, you know, where we get invited to stuff because we're such an anomaly. Oh my goodness, you look after people in all kinds of body sizes? Yes. In all orientations, yes, in all kinds of identities, yes. Wow, that's amazing. Like this should just be the normal.

Ricardo 18:00

Yeah.

Geoff 18:00

This is just what how how fitness and health in this space should exist. Um but uh so I'm glad that at least we are here. Um and and I'm on a mission to make more and more of us and more versions of us available to more and more folks. Um so why me? I'm an unlikely kind of uh figurehead for this operation. Um I am you know I've I've operated a fairly um kind of uh typically sized body. I'm tall, I'm lean, I come from a family of taller, leaner folks. Um body shaming and uh and size diversity was not part of my experience growing up. Um in fact, with my sport, it's been a challenge for me in reverse to kind of um gain and maintain weight. Um I'm a six foot-one strength athlete. I need leverage uh to be to perform well in my sport, and leverage requires mass, and mass for me is challenging. Um but along the way, I kind of did the typical fitness thing. I went to the gym, I would do the circuit. Um, and then an older guy kind of spotted me one day. I was like 14, 15, tucked me under his wing and said, let's let's get you doing this sort of properly. Um and he taught me how to do bodybuilding, and that was my original experience with fitness was arms day and legs day and upper lower splits and kind of all that very traditional three sets of ten and reps and hypertrophy and kind of like the magazines and Schwarzenegger and all that. Um and then um I did a bodybuilding show, um, like an actual competition. And that was wild. Like that is like you're shaving your entire body, you're wearing a sparkly black speedo, you're doing like base layers of of uh of tan, and then you're building layers on top of layers, and it was weird. But an amazing experience. Um, I had about 10 weeks from when I decided to do it to when I was on stage and learning the pose routine and all that. But then you get on stage and you are literally being objectified by a panel of judges who aren't necessarily looking for one thing in particular. Sometimes they're just looking for what they're looking for, and you don't know what that is. Um, but it is you and four other people, um, depending on the grouping. That's and that's it. Um so I went from that to like, okay, that was a great experience, but I'll never do that again. That was that was that was gross. Um and then shifted from that into uh powerlifting. Along the way, um, I started to um find a career in fitness. Um I actually have two business degrees, um, one in HR, one in marketing. Um I spent one year in the field and went, oh, is this what this is gonna be like? No, thank you. Um but then I moved to uh to New York City to kind of start my life from scratch. I was in Australia at the time, um, and started working out at a gym, and I just done my bodybuilding show. And anyway, the the owner of the gym on my second time in um offered me a job, gave me a shirt and a name tag, and was like, all right, go get clients. Yeah. Um, no qualifications, no experience. Uh, but I guess I looked at the part. Other than probably the look, right? I had the look. And this was the New York hustle. I would like genuinely go stand out in the street in my too-tight shirt and my rugby shorts, and I would attract people off the street. Um, and I had the Aussie accent and the tan.

Vicki 21:33

I was going to say that. Yeah.

Geoff 21:37

So, you know, so uh eventually I put those seven years of postsecondary education to work as a business owner. Um But yeah, this was this was a grind, this was a hustle. And when you're first starting out in personal training, you kind of train anyone who pay you. Um but then over time, you figure out who you connect with the most, um, who you can serve most effectively. With your personality, with your skill set, just kind of the kind of person that you are. And I found over and over again the folks who I would connect with the most, and the folks I could serve the best, were ones who were not comfortable doing exercise in a gym environment. And this is a thread that really starts to carry through. We uh moved from New York back to Australia. Um, and I started a small personal training business there. And this is Australia. So we're parks, beaches, playgrounds, we're outside, we're throwing stuff around, we're like cool off after workout by jumping in the surf. Yeah. Life is pretty good.

Bill 22:38

It's not Calgary. You ended up here, yeah.

Geoff 22:42

Uh but over and over again, um, this the same kind of effectiveness would work with um would land with folks who who really just were hesitant to rent movement. They wanted to move their bodies, they wanted to do it safely. Uh, they were kind of 30s, 40s, 50s plus. Um, just you know, kind of mom and pop folks off the street. And yeah, this is kind of what became the cornerstone of my personal training operation. Um fast forward uh moved to Canada. Um and just get more and more honed into this as a population that I could serve effectively. Um and then I took on a practicum student in 2021 uh when I was operating out of my garage because of COVID, um, which is another story which we can get into later. Um and this was the first non-binary person that I'd met and person. Like I had had friends growing up who were gay and lesbian and and and whatnot, but this was the first uh non-binary person. And this was not only learning a new language um around uh identity. Um this was also kind of learning a new being exposed to another population that were underserved in fitness. Um and this is a thing that keeps coming up: a population who is underserved, either unserved utterly or underserved grossly. Um and the mission of Ace getting into this was to um create a space where where queer and trans folk could feel comfortable uh moving their bodies with a sense of freedom and safety. Uh so this was added on to our kind of existing inclusivity practices. Um and we've just kind of kept going from there. Um so we expanded from the garage into a larger space now. We're in Inglewood, uh, we're about 3,000 square feet. And yeah, this idea of hyper-inclusivity um is all folks in all bodies, all sizes, all identities, all abilities. Uh we're working on our accessibility. Uh, there are some stairs we're trying to overcome now so we can serve folks in wheelchairs. Um, but really it is it is a right um to access um knowledgeable and and trained and educated services um for for serving your body. Yeah, and being able to move it in a space where you feel safe and protected.

Queer Standards And Gym Safety

Bill 24:57

Thank you. Yeah. So how does that land with you, Ricardo? Because uh you talked at the end of at the end of the last podcast about the fact that even within the queer community, which is already underserved in this, um that you also experience a great deal of um judgment and and unsafety um in the in the process, right?

Perfectionism From Media And Metrics

Ricardo 25:16

And that's part of the attraction of why I messaged your organization in the first place was the fact that there is a an organization out there that does serve the queer community for people who not only I would say, like you said, are afraid to go to a conventional or typical gym because as a non-binary person, you don't know the kind of or a trans person, you don't know what the kind of um um reaction you'll get to people, right? From in in a change room. Yep. Um, but you also find that like people are motivated to exercise in our community because of the hatred they receive. Um as a a a fat person of color, I could probably say I'm probably in the bottom rungs of the ladder in our community, right? Um and and my motivation to go to the gym cannot be for someone else's eye pleasure, otherwise I will fail. And that's what I've learned for the past 25 years being in this community. That the countless times I've tried to lose weight, just to have a smile on someone's face when they look at me rather than a scowl becomes a catastrophic nightmare for my mental health. So it was only in the past years since COVID that I've worked on my health and my obesity at my own pace and for me and for my own mental health. Whether so if I'd go five or six months without losing a pound or even gaining some weight or losing some weight, at least I know what the pathway has been and what the struggle has been, and not doing it for anybody else. And so to have a gym like that, and couple that with um with trainers that may not um understand bigger bodies or understand the uncomfortable levels that that queer folk go through. It's it's you're a very unique and uplifting experience just from your website. Like, I don't even know. I met you outside, right? Like I don't know you from Adam. Well, you're coming over after this, yeah. Yeah, for sure. Um, so I can tell you, like, I um I have I I had a good life membership. Let me tell you, I have a gym membership, I just have the membership. Whether I go to that gym, you're donating a membership. It's a completely separate, yeah, it's a completely separate issue. Um, and then like you go to Good Life, and then like all of a sudden, this like super hot guy is like, Hey, how's it going? And they're like, Oh, good. I'm like, this is weird. Some random person is talking to me. We should work out together one day. And I was like, Am I being awesome on a date? And is this like a is this the dating world in the gym community where we go and work out together? Because that's not like no. And then you walk by the board, it's a personal trainer trying to like you know get you to join them, right? And then I joined the why. And uh the why over here in Quarry Park is really unique, it's got a gender-neutral open change room for for people like uh like you know, for any for any gender, uh, and it's really cool. But like the why is so busy with like all different things in the world that you're almost afraid to like use some of the equipment in case like you absolutely you hurt yourself, but then they gotta put you know, and so it's it's an interesting experience, but like you know, to focus on your question more more specifically, um Bill, it's it's also what we see in the media and mainstream culture uh on how gay and queer people are are perceived and and and viewed. And I think it was um uh it was a couple of TV shows of recent. Oh no, I can just use modern family, everybody knows modern family with Cam and um Yeah you know, and it was the first time a bigger person was portrayed in a gay relationship because mostly it's been like, oh, we went to the gym, we went, you know, we we had kale smoothies and whatever the fuck, right? And now you have these these two like sorry we have this this two like you know, a a bigger person and a skinnier person together, and they've they have a child and and and they raise it up. So society's moving closer, and what distresses me the most about what I said last podcast episode is that society is moving forward with acceptance and with education, but internally in the queer community itself, it's staying the same. Uh in many ways, it's regressing with with the the loss of like gay villages and gay safe spaces and everything moving onto your apps and your and to online, it's not a safe space to me, right?

Bill 29:28

So I wonder though, because again, like you also said, like there was up until a few years ago, you thought that we were kind of actually you know moving past some of the stuff and then advancing in some, and you're seeing the regression as well, right? And I think we I think we all kind of have a collective sense that you know across a number of different metrics around just like general kind of good social, justice, relational diversity, inclusion kind of things, we are seeing uh a substantial scale back across a lot of the rhetoric just in the past few years because of whatever the reason is. And if Joanne were here, she'd give you the name of the guy.

Vicki 30:03

But also there isn't there's a big movement, particularly in conservative young men who seem to be doing more and more uh what's it called, manscaping and spending more time and energy perfecting their look. In fact, they're putting energy into how they look as opposed to developing relationships. And so there's this level of perfection they're trying to achieve while they are still young. And I I was just watching a reality, you know, I'm not gonna name names, but I was watching a reality TV show, and I don't think the women on that show were older than 30 and they all obviously had work done on their faces. And it's now that's not going to the gym, but that's this level of this need for a level of perfection that's impossible to get without a money and b inter like intervention. And there seems to be more of that being available and and public. Like before, it used to be you kept it very on the down low if you had plastic surgery on your face. And now it's they're they're going to such extremes that you can't help but notice that they've had work done.

Karen 31:20

And I wonder about the psychological relationship between our bodies, like what this does to our psychological relationships and our social relationships. Because as we are as I'm listening, I'm thinking about this kind of sense that we're we're fighting in some ways our body, our we're actually fighting our bodies to be something that, as Vicky says, this perfection that is actually unobtainable. So what psychological damage are we doing to ourselves? And as we do internal as we do individual internal psychological damage, what then damage are we doing beyond ourselves? Like in our interactions with others and in our sense of how we're abusing others and and and how we treat others who are not perfect. Like pre-COVID, I was five mornings a week, three nights a week, gym person. I was a gym rat. And, you know, and I was lifting weights and I was cycling for miles and I was swimming for miles, you know, and then COVID hit. I got two horrible bouts of COVID, scarred the living daylights up my lungs, made my asthma like almost uncontrollable to the extent I could barely walk the stairs. And all I could think about was, oh, look the damage I've done to myself. Because you know, I really went out there and tried to catch COVID. You know, I was blaming myself because I could no longer kind of achieve this fitness perfection that I was, you know, felt like I had to chase. And and the psychological struggles kind of post that have been harder than the physical. Like I can live with the fact that because I couldn't do what I was doing, I can't look like how I looked. But it's you know, I it was the psychological stuff of feeling completely inadequate, feeling like society now hated me because I look the way I look. You know. But I'm like, you know, three years ago I could barely get up the stairs, you know, because I was because I was in so much pain and agony. You know, and so I just I really struggle with so I'm you know, the the fact that you know there's folks out there in the fitness world who are actually thinking about our psycho the psychological impact of the of the work that they're doing does give me a sense of hope because I've also seen folks who have been deeply damaged by the sense that they are not worthy because they could not achieve a perfection that is actually not real, because each of us is perfect in the eyes of God. Absolutely. Regardless of our shape, regardless of where what things we think are damaged in our being, every single one of us is perfect in the eyes of our Creator, whether you name it as God, Allah, whatever, each of us is perfect. I I say whatever you're making model.

Vicki 34:19

Yeah, exactly. Whatever you're making model. Yeah. Do you remember that story of a husband that sued his wife because they had an quote-unquote ugly child because she hadn't disclosed to him all the work she had had done, her dental work and facial work. And then the child came out. Yeah, the child came out looking like her original self. And he sued her. So it's crazy.

Bill 34:45

I mean, I so I remember I remember when I was in seminary, there was a presentation that was done about somebody that had done some longitudinal research back at the start, starting with the start of Facebook. Um and they were really clear that like talking about because I think social media um social media carries a lot of the brunt of the ills of our current world, whether or not it's fair to lay them all on the altar of social media. But at the start, from the start of uh of Facebook, when it was first becoming popular in normal cultural use, um for about 15 or 20 years, they studied young people and their habits and their um their posting habits and their content over that time. Um what they said would happen is that over time, um you would post a picture of yourself and you would garner likes or comments or whatever the case may be. And they could actually track that over time uh you'd turn your head to the certain, you know, the certain way that you get more likes and positive comments, right? And and that by the time, you know, 10 or 15 years down the road, there's only one monotonous, you know, uniform photo of you repeated over and over and over again in different settings of the exact same angle. Like you hone your entire image based on the response of your peers. Um and at the same time, anyone that says, wow, that's not a good look for you, or whatever the case may be, disappears from your network altogether, right? Um and like ceases to even be a source of feedback. Um so you you you generate this echo chamber of positive messaging, but only one aspect of yourself. So if you have a birthmark on the right side of your face, um, over time you learn to hate anyone looking at the right side of your face um rather than accepting who you are, right? So the idea of um fighting your body, I mean, like that that's me every day right now. I'm the I'm the I'm the guy who's in the middle of the gonna run a marathon before I'm 50. Um and and quit smoking three years ago and ran my first half marathon last year, or two years ago, and my second one last year. And this year I have to run two of them. But I got slower last year more than anything else. I ran a worse half marathon and injured myself. Um and like all of this. And I dropped um, I remember when I started, I dropped 70 pounds in nine months. Wow. Um, and I looked skeletal, in all honesty, right? And I have now gained a whole bunch of it back, and now I'm doing the you know, a pound a week kind of kind of loss in the hopes that maybe um maybe I won't do it. Like the the graph on my fitness app is maybe the worst thing ever, in all honesty, because they remember everything, right? Um but uh um like just the again, like all of the all of the the like the pushing against myself, the fighting, like like it hurts, and I'm gonna keep on going anyway, right? Like it became this whole um like the drive was just so intense when I have such a huge runway. Like the long I don't need to run the marathon tomorrow. I got years before I have to run this thing, right? So um it's just such a fascinating uh our relationship with our bodies is so complex because um the metrics I think come from external sources more than anything. Um and there is no um well, like you said, right? You're on you're on a stage with four people, you don't actually know what anyone's looking for. Um and someone's gonna give you a score based on a like a nebulous set of you know metrics that you have no control over, right? And and uh not that I would ever equate my life with a fitness TV show, um, but uh um I think I think that's the same experience for a lot of people, right? There is so much data and so much information uh that tells us about who we are and how we are less than. Um and and in the middle of it all, um like hearing that there are spaces that might actually reinforce the idea that that may not be what you need to listen to, um, and that you can be you can be comfortable in your own body and you can you can own your own um ability, whatever whatever that may be, right? Um and and and that is such a you're a unicorn to me, in all honesty, because that was that was never my experience. Um and and hasn't been. I mean, I fired my last trainer because we were so philosophically different. Um and and it started off so like I was sure he was the guy, right? And then in fairness, he also then went full mega afterwards. So there might have been some other uh things that we could look for, right? But it wasn't full mega when he was training me.

Ricardo 39:24

The red flag was there, the wind just wasn't blowing.

Discipline Without Punishment

Bill 39:30

Um so I think maybe now would be a good time for us to take the intermission because when we come back, I want to actually uh spin it a bit and talk about how we can maybe redeem some of the uh the ideas about both religious messages about our body and fitness messages about our body. Because I think um, and we'll we'll talk about it after the break, I think we might find that there are some commonalities around things like commitment and discipline and caring communities that support us that exist across both of those conversations as well that are important um to lift up as being perhaps the voices we need to listen to more in this conversation. So we are going to take an intermission and we will be right back. And welcome back, everybody. Before the break, we were talking a bit about how our bodies are shaped and some of the theology and culture and systems that shape them, and about how much of that we may need to unlearn. So, this half I'd like us to actually uh turn slightly and maybe assume that not everything is uh doom and gloom in both fitness and religion as it relates to our bodies, because I think that faith traditions and fitness culture uh don't just shape harm. They also have the great potential to uh help people find discipline and commitment and community and even healing in the process, right? So I'd like to spend our second half ending in hope. How about that?

Vicki 40:55

Uh we are a people of hope.

Bill 40:57

We are a people of hope, or so I'm told repeatedly in my staff meetings. Uh so I want to start with discipline, if we could start there. And Jeff, I'm gonna throw it to you first. Uh, as the fitness expert in the room, uh, what does discipline look like in fitness when it is life-giving rather than punishing?

Geoff 41:15

Oof. And it's funny, the the one note I have on here is to talk about language, and you're straight into it, because the language you've used for discipline is already fairly loaded. Um to answer that question, I would say it is commitment to the practice, uh, which sounds like familiar language at this table. Um, and that is different for everybody. Um, for a lot of folks, that is committing an hour to themselves um once a week, in the you know, either uh on their own or in the care of of somebody knowledgeable who can kind of guide them through that. It's the accountability of that. Um the um the the discipline is to I yeah, I'm gonna say back to commitment to the practice. It is um honoring movement in a way that serves you, um in a in a time and in a way that serves you as well. So um a lot of the work that we do is finding that right kind of combination, um, time of day, day of the week, number of times. Um, and then kind of once we find that that block and that the kind of the wave uh when to do it, then we can work on the how. And the how and the why and the when are always kind of different for everybody. Um I don't think I'm answering the question correctly, but no, I think you're doing think you're doing all right.

Bill 42:38

Yeah.

Geoff 42:38

A little uh a little uh way uh way laid there with the language portion, but yeah.

Bill 42:42

So when you talk about loaded language, do you want to say more about that?

Geoff 42:46

Um I so we've used that a lot at the table already. Um uh like I said, when um when uh part of my education and working with folks in uh who live in larger bodies was using language like that. Um Ricardo, I've heard you've you've referred to yourself as fat, and and you've heard the use the word obesity. Um these are words that it's I imagine there's a journey to you sort of claiming or reclaiming that language uh for yourself. Um when I met Ace, my my first uh interaction with a non-binary person, that was a whole lot of new language to learn. Um and and language around fitness, around bodies in particular is is it's very complicated. Uh the way we describe ourselves uh in language, the way that we are described by others is uh is significant. Um and within different communities, different populations, that's different as well. Um Ricardo, you said you kind of found us on the website. If you go through the website, the language on our website is very uh intentional. Um and intentional to signal to folks who are affected. Um by language that we understand. It's a very interesting kind of signal, a signaling mechanism. Um to show that simply by using certain descriptors, using some language, not using other language, can say like we understand, we get it.

Vicki 44:14

Well, I noticed that you use the word operate. I operate a body.

Geoff 44:19

Yes.

Vicki 44:19

As opposed to you are your body.

Geoff 44:22

Correct.

Vicki 44:23

Okay. Can you say more about that?

Geoff 44:25

Maybe as an athlete. Um food and food has always kind of been like a vehicle for nutrition for me, uh, which served me well when uh when I lost my stomach, uh, and I kind of had to rebuild my relationship with food around that. Um my my body serves a function as an athletic vehicle. Um, I I put inputs into it and it produces outputs for me. Um and uh in some ways that serves me well, in other ways it's a bit of a disassociation mechanism.

Ricardo 45:00

Yeah.

Geoff 45:01

Um, but yeah. Um just want to ask me more questions about that so I can answer more effectively.

Vicki 45:08

No, no, I just I find that interesting. And in the use of the word discipline, it there's a a long period of my life where if I didn't hit the metrics, that meant that I didn't succeed in that day. And they say this about being older as well, right? But I think particularly as a woman who um has given childbirth and has had things happen to her body that is like, what the hell is going on now? What's happening, you know, in any given time. And now things have settled down. And being older and having more life experience, I I recognize where the expectation was the tail wagging the dog. And the discipline wasn't serving me. So I can imagine a prayer or spiritual practice. Um, I'm thinking of Karen Armstrong again kneeling at the altar. Like, what does that do for a relationship with God or a deepening of faith if it's intentionally causing distraction and pain to your body? But if going out and walking that day as opposed to going out and running that day is what's going to help you calm your mind, have your body feel that it's moved and allowed your whole sense of your body to settle in, and that was enough for today. And so the discipline of what is discipline versus what is um abuse isn't the right word, but over-determination and focusing on the achievement rather than as my dear spouse says, the uh the the destination isn't the point, the journey, right? Like like what does the journey mean? And so if the discipline is consternation and failure, and that if that's what is the result, then what good are you really doing versus trying to create wholeness in our beings, right? When we talk about the miracles of the Bible, it's often phrased around physical healing, but really those of us in progressive theology understand it to be a spiritual healing that Jesus was doing. And so this wholeness that can only come when you understand that you're that discipline requires there to be a an understanding of what is serving you and helping you be who you are, as opposed to pounding out um and holding you down.

Karen 47:48

I want to pick up on on the use of language and metrics. Uh in my work as the pastoral relations minister, I look at a lot of job descriptions. Um, I assess all the job descriptions that congregations submit for ministry personnel to apply for. And we have as one of our metrics self-care. And and it's a percentage of their work week.

Bill 48:13

You're only allowed one hour a week.

Karen 48:14

You're allowed to five percent of your 40 hours is self-care. And I and it drives me crazy that we have that metric in there. But what also really gets me is the language, the use of the word self-care. Because actually I think that puts onus on people to do another checkbox list of things in their week at work, rather than, as I think about it, this kind of sense of the holistic approach to the well-being of our bodies. And when I think about it in the terms of the gospels, Jesus did some very particular things to look after himself. He ate good food with his friends and they took their time. They didn't go to McDonald's and drive through and grab the nearest thing. You know, not that there's anything wrong with doing that if you're in a contextual thing.

Bill 49:07

Yeah, it might be contextual.

Karen 49:11

But every time you hear about him eating, he sits down, he gathers a community around them and they eat together. And if you look at when people eat together in a communal setting, the food is there's a relationship to the food that is very different than when we look at food as just something I have to do because it's on the list of things that has to happen today. And he also spends time in prayer and reflection and stepping away from the hustle and bustle of of his life and his ministry. And he walks everywhere. Again, that's contextual. But he walks everywhere. But I just think about that whole sense of in some way that is a holistic approach to his being, his body, his soul, his mind. Sitting together, community, eating together, having conversation, looking after the soul by spending time in prayer, and then moving the body in in ways that are not about I've got to make this metric of well, maybe he did have to get make the metric of getting from you know point A to point B. But it wasn't about if I don't do it, I fail. It's just uh this is how I'm gonna move myself. And I think we punish ourselves by not doing like we we give ourselves kind of you know a check, you know, a cross instead of a check mark because we don't kind of achieve certain things. But I think if we approach it in a more holistic sense of food is good for me especially in my eating community, caring for my soul is good for me and moving my body is good for me, and they all work together to create the being that God has called me to be.

Ricardo 51:05

It's interesting how you talk about that holistic lifestyle, but in not to dive too deep into the union part of my life. You know, the world we live in requires us to work and work and earn more money and and focus on just being able to pay the bills and stuff like that. So we lose touch with that piece of holisticness where um family time is important and because you have to work or you have to, and you know, I I'm the first to say I own a house and I hate it simply because I hate mowing the lawn and and shoveling, but it becomes a system in place. And and so, like lunch breaks are such an odd thing because you say eat, eat and go back to work, right? And then come home and you're running around with the kids and all these sports and stuff like that. The world we live in now has um and it's unique to North America. Um uh the the the bootstrap mentality of work, work, work, work, work, and and eventually you'll succeed because when you're 65, you'll retire. I want to travel now. Right? So I want to travel now and enjoy my life now, and that's that opportunity isn't present for most people, but I think um what I value in in what you're saying is that um there are still 24 hours in the day, and how you use those 24 hours instead of checking a box, um uh you um sort of blend in from what what you're doing to what you're doing and prioritizing um things in a more holistic way, it makes a lot of sense, right? And um I think that also boils down to how we perceive ourselves and our strengths and our weaknesses rather than how we um rather than focusing on what others expect of us to do and be, right? Because I think once if you live a life a certain way and somebody comes to you and says you should do this, and in some way, shape, or form makes a lot of sense, you then incorporate that in addition to what you're already doing when you know you're already tapped out, right? So I was just thinking what Jen said outside. She's like, where do you have time to make fudge? And I was like, you know, you're right, because it was like 10 45 at night, and I was like, let's make a block of fudge.

Karen 53:09

And it's good fudge, it's excellent.

Ricardo 53:12

It was very healing for me. My my my problem with myself is that I love to bake and cook and then I bake all this shit. And I was like, I need to get this out of my house now.

Vicki 53:19

Yeah. You need to eat with friends. Yeah, eat with friends, we'll all come over.

Ricardo 53:24

But regardless of the time of the day, like you said, I it brought me great joy to know that I was bringing a plate of fudge to to podcast tonight, right? Yeah, um, so whether or not that was the best thing, I'm sure you appreciated the chalk to fudge more than if I brought sliced cucumbers and carrots, right?

Bill 53:39

So um as a guy who didn't get his run in today, I'm carrying some guilt with me into this podcast. Um but so so Vicky, I I wanted to, because again, like this idea of holistic kind of living, you you had said, you know, that in in scripture we hear a lot of stories about Jesus healing. Um and these are these tend to be very you know kind of physical stories that we're hearing of, like a physical healing, but that we understand kind of in the progressive tradition that um that there's also a spiritual component to this, um that this is a spiritual healing. And I think I think what we what we would actually um um kind of think would or understand would be that both are actually true, right? That there's a there's a whole there's a wholeheartedness to this, that as as the physical is healed, so too is the is the the spiritual. But more importantly than that is the um the restoration of yourself um into a community of care. Like you are restored to your your place that you belong in in doing it, right? And and more often than not, um we hear throughout history, certainly in our scriptural tradition, but throughout history, that that more often than not people are um separated from the place they belong, not by anything they have done, um, but by the um the the messaging that has come from outside of them, or um somebody saying, you are not enough as you are, you are not clean enough, pure enough, thin enough, strong enough, committed enough, pious enough, or making assumptions that you are not capable. Right. Um and so um like the idea of living fully and wholeheartedly um in in every aspect really does seem to um require that we we pay attention to all of it, right? We pay attention we cannot be simply spiritual creatures and live wholeheartedly. We cannot simply be physical creatures and live wholeheartedly. We need to we need to practice self-care, but in a way that is um still restoring us in some way, not uh um like I I I would agree I get an hour I in fact, let's be honest, in my job description right now, there is zero percent for self-care. Um but uh you know I don't think I have that in mind.

Vicki 55:45

Should be in my call. Thank you for that.

Joyful Movement And Adult Play

Bill 55:46

But on the one hand, I I appreciate um what I what I have certainly seen is at least a movement to recognize that it's important, right? That we are not just um commodities to grind down um and and and use up and then throw out when um that the there might actually be a need for us to be well in order to bring wellness to our work, right? So um baby steps, credit where it's due. Um, but uh but at the same time, uh this idea that you somehow section that off to the the work outside of the work or you know, in an ideal in an ideal scenario, we're wholehearted in every task, whether it be you know, going to the gym, showing up for work, sitting down for dinner with friends, sitting down, you know, to work on homework with our kids. The the wholeheartedness is, I think, meant to be at its core all-encompassing, right? And I like I can I can think of any number of times. I took up biking um a couple of years ago as well because I wanted to minimize the the impact on my joints as I was training for running. And I live in Saddle Ridge, which people online may not know, is on the opposite end of the city from where we are currently sitting right now. Um, and it is a 30-kilometer bike ride from my house to the doors of this church. And so I would commit to do it at least once a week and I would aspire to do it twice a week. And there is a particular hill at the bottom of Heritage Drive, right next to the Costco, that you need to go up in order to get to this church. And it is a bloodsucker. Um, and I have yet to manage to get up that hill on my bike. Um, and I have been doing this now for two years. And I can I can make it halfway, maybe 60% on a good day, and then you have to do what I still equate as the walk of shame. Um, and it has made it so much worse with the advent of the e-bike. Um, because they're going past I am constantly doing the walk of shame in my pedal like a sucker bike. Um, and somebody will inevitably just burn by on their e-bike. And I even catch myself doing like like the string of curses, the the judgment, the condemnation of this guy, right? This bike that's e-biking by me or whatever. And it's like, like, why am I actually doing this? Right? Like, this is supposed to be a life-giving, um you know, meaningful, transformative thing for me. It's meant to, it's it's supposed to be for me, not to impress some random stranger. And Jeff's already raising his hand, so I'll I'll turn it over to you right now. Yeah.

Geoff 58:17

When you're right as you went. So yeah, and I think it touches on, you know, we're kind of heading into this kind of part two about the the joy of movement and that celebration of the body and what it can do and how we can make it do these really amazing things. Um, you know, you're you're enjoying biking and running. My body is you know, sort of physically more um uh aligned with say mid-distance running. No, thank you. Tried it, don't like it. I really enjoy moving heavy objects short distances. And I am not built for that, but it brings me so much joy that I will find a way to make that happen. Um and and it sounds like you have um distance running in in your past as well, and you're you're committing to engaging in that, and and you found things you were talking about at the gym as well before. And like um I think it's important that regardless of the metrics and regardless of the the messaging and regardless of the different influences we have, that if we can find a way for movement to create a sense of joy for us in a way that's just fulfilling just for us, then that's very important.

Vicki 59:27

I think about my our granddaughters, right? They're four and two. And if given an opportunity to be outside, well, frankly, it happens in the house too, but when given the opportunity to be outside, they don't walk. They run, they run for the joy of just being out and about. They're not running to get actually anywhere faster or to uh race each other yet. But I'm also thinking of recess. Like, why do we lose the concept of recess when we're out of grade five or grade six, right? Like that whole to me, that's the wholeness or that's the um that's the wholeness of our lives is doing the hard mental work, going outside for recess, coming in, doing some more hard mental work, having lunch, and then going to a music class. Like this whole the wholeness of our bodies and our brains and our senses. But you know, you ever like if you're ever out with little kids and you're not distracted by your to-do list, like I'll be in the field with our dog and I'll just start running because we're outside together, and that's fun.

Ricardo 1:00:37

When I try to notify my dog, she thinks something's wrong. Who's chasing us? What danger are we in? 911. What is going on?

Bill 1:00:46

Yes, but again, this like this idea of of sort of recess or play or just kind of like like for the fun of it, right? And and we were talking during the break, Jeff, and you're like even the way you were talking about like uh like equipment intimidation, right? Um and and uh you you know you said like we don't have equipment, right? We've we got we got stuff that you can use, right? Or like whatever whatever the exact language is that used, it was the it was like and then you but you you went off and rattled off everything that I would normally say, well, yeah, that's the equipment I have at home, right? The kettlebells and the right, but it's not equipment, right? It's uh like the the the reframing of the mindset around it almost, right? Is to to kind of invite it to be something other than the um the I guess the traditional understanding of like you're gonna go there, you're gonna like pound out some reps and you're gonna, you know, dude bro your way to a a new body or whatever, right?

Geoff 1:01:32

So um and we got hammers, we got stones, we got tires, we got stuff you can move, stuff you can throw, stuff you can throw your body at, stuff that can be thrown at your body, like so it's it's like people's body.

Ricardo 1:01:44

Yeah. No, you're all money.

Geoff 1:01:47

But but it's but it's play, right? And and and sometimes uh especially with with gyms, we get sort of caught up in this idea of well, I I wear this and I look like this, and then I go to this place, and I go for my hour, and I do this machine, then this machine, and I go through my list and I do my sets and I do my reps, and then that is my block of exercise completed. I check that box. Yeah.

Bill 1:02:08

There's an arm day, there's a leg day, there's a full body day, there's uh yeah, core.

Geoff 1:02:13

Let's let's let's let's kind of reframe that instead of I go to a place where there's things to do that are that that bring me joy, and sometimes they're heavy, and sometimes they're fast, and sometimes they're slow, and sometimes they're dirty, and sometimes they're wet. And I don't know if anyone's tried one of those, um, like an obstacle course race or like been to one of the like the offset ninja places, and like it's play, man. It's it's it's using your body for play, and there's there's privilege in and being able to engage in some of that and and not in others. Um there's I think this is part of the part of the fun, is finding ways for this to it's so refreshing to hear someone like yourself with a business that you own saying stuff like that.

Ricardo 1:02:52

Let's just have fun and play. Because usually you go to gym and it's always like the fitter, faster, stronger, tougher. And like that's I mean, great, but that that sets a goal for you that maybe you don't want to achieve, right? Like I can remember being at the gym and I was on that rowing machine, and somebody physically stopped me and said, Good for you. And I was like, For what? They're like, for taking the steps to lose weight. And I was like, I'm actually not here to do that. I was just here to do it. And so, I mean, God love her. She must have been 105 years old, but like she knows she it's that generation where they just can't keep their opinions to themselves in many ways, and their assumptions, uh, and so did she ask you that in your life.

Bill 1:03:33

Also a beloved child of God.

Ricardo 1:03:34

Also a beloved child of God. Being bigger my whole life, that's not a new experience for me. Um, especially being bigger in a child of the 90s was not a new experience for me. And under normal circumstances, I would say 80% of the time you can let these things roll off your back and move on with life because it's just people's biases, but like sometimes it stings, and sometimes it becomes the point where you never want to go back to that place because you look at that machine and that bad experience has now defined you, right? And so when you use things like play, just have fun, do what you can do, right? Um, and there's another one where, like, for some reason, when I was looking at fitness stuff, this is a funny thing about the algorithm thing we had about when we were talking about open relationships, but I I was looking up like fitness and body positivity and all that kind of stuff. Of course, now my algorithm on Instagram is all like personal trainer and like blah blah blah blah. And some guy was like a South Asian guy, and he's like, eat the South Asian foods that you like and still train. And I was I messaged him and I was like, that's really cool that you do that because like I don't want to give up butter chicken and all that kind of stuff, right? And he's like, Well, what are your goals? I'm like, honestly, for me, it would be like to become more active by increasing my flexibility and my my my my supportive muscles and stuff like that. He's like, Well, I'm not sure I can help you with that. And I was like, So you want me to just go straight into strongman? Is that what we're doing here? Like, am I going straight into lifting dumbbells? Because I'm asking you to help me with the baseline so I can grow from there. And he's like, he's literally like, I don't think I'm the guy for you. I'm like, cool, right? I'm happy he was honest and didn't charge me a million dollars to do it at the time, but like it's it's more people would enjoy exercising if it was in a judgment-free way, and um, and it has to not just be judgment-free, it has to go even further to be like um motivational in in for the right reasons. Like um, when I exercise, I put it in the group chat and I was like, I don't know why I have to do this to be thin and healthy. Like, I just want to eat cake and then lose weight, right? And my friend's like, I promise you, Ricky or Ricardo, the more you do it, the more you'll enjoy it.

Geoff 1:05:42

And I was like, Not with everything.

Ricardo 1:05:47

Exactly. I was like, Do you say that about legal opinions? Like, um, so i I think it is very important for all people and all organizations to frame um Fitness as um something that can be as joyous as eating. Um my sister is a great example. She she lost a bunch of weight and she's maintained it for the past 15 or 20 years, and she says, I work out so I can eat chocolate cake, right?

Geoff 1:06:16

Okay, so yes. Okay, yes. All right. So so we have we have Candy Corner in our gym. We genuinely have rice cuspie squares and we have gummies and we have MMs and Skittles and candy bars and I told you I would come, okay?

Ricardo 1:06:29

Just like chill.

Geoff 1:06:31

But like the number of times I have been asked this question by by folks who are you know still kind of indoctrinated in traditional fitness and diet culture messaging is but it's a gym, how do you have candy? I'm like, because candy is awesome and movement is awesome. I don't get the disparity here. The two can mutually coexist. They don't compliment each other, they don't cancel each other out. There's no earning your candy. Like the this this language and this this messaging, it's it's so instilled in us. Um but you can move your body and eat cake, and those two things can mutually coexist.

Bill 1:07:10

So again, let's try to let's try to spin it a bit here. I'm gonna put it to you um to start with, because even as Ricardo was talking about, you know, I think more people would uh would enjoy fitness if it could be done in a judgment-free way. All I could think was, yeah, and I feel like that's the same could be said about the church. Um so let's talk a bit about what a supportive community actually looks like, um, whether it be for fitness or for the church, right? Um and I'll I'll ask you to do the church, we'll let the resident expert eventually you know kind of weigh in on where it aligns with with the fitness community. But uh what if we were to look at the hopeful side, right, at the the positive messaging side, because like we've used words like accountability, um, discipline, commitment, right, as as hopefully things that can be life-giving, right? And around all of that tends to be a need for there to be a supportive community to help us, to carry us, right? We're better when we're together. So what would that look like from a church perspective if we were going to build a supportive community of care to help us with all those things? Um commitment, discipline, accountability in a supportive way?

Vicki 1:08:13

Well, first and foremost, we would recognize the diversity, the joyous diversity of who we are, not limited to our shapes, our colors, our accents, our culture, but also in our uh worldviews and approach to problem solving, or uh and our approach to our creativity. Um there within religious institutions, there's this can be this limiting set of factors that you must believe this or you must behave this way, or if you're a person of faith, you can do this, but you can't do that. And particularly within our denomination, uh, we're not alone, but within the United Church of Canada, we encourage doubt and questions just as we encourage um compassion and love. And I would be suspicious of somebody who was lived a life of certainty in their belief. And and also then that means we need to create environments in which doubts can be expressed and questions can be asked. And the response isn't, why would you say that? It the response is, oh, that's interesting. Tell me more. And uh a dear friend of mine says her faith is deepened or her understanding of God is deepened when she hears other people speak in a different way about theology. It's not that one is right and one is wrong, it's allowing for me to hear what you believe and whether or not I am aligned with that, it'll it gives me the questions or openings into the what I understand about the divine or what I understand about how God is creating in our world today. So uh there is one would hope that there's not judgment within our communities of faith. If somebody I was interviewing somebody for a piece that we're doing at in our congregation, and the fellow said, I just need to tell you, um, I don't think I believe in God. And I said, Yeah, same. And he just, you should have seen him, he had this massive physical reaction. He's like, What are you talking about? You have to believe in God. I said, Well, I believe in some sort of God, and I and I think I believe in this, this, and this. And he was just absolutely blown away. He didn't think he could, he thought he was being extra by um expressing that thought, not realizing that probably what he was referring to, I don't believe in that. I I doubt my belief in that as well. I believe this over here. And so the if we can hear one another's opinions and thoughts and expressions with as little judgment as possible, then that's how we would hopefully enter into a discussion about body image or sexuality or um orientation or identity. Um trying to remember that we are all made in the image of God, and none of us require surgery to be made more perfect in the eyes of God. God loves us exactly how we are, and um, and God wishes nothing more than for us to feel so loved that we do not need to strive to change who we are for another to love us. That's my sermon for today.

Geoff 1:12:10

Um, Ricardo, I don't know if his name. Um, so you and I were having this conversation about me coming in today, and and one of my hesitations was I'm not a person of faith, and I have a complicated relationship with organized religion, I would say on the side of not so much. Um, and you said um, like actually, that's that's perfect because these are the conversations we invite in these spaces, and that was wonderful. Um, because as we see in fitness and as we see in I imagine in faith communities also, lip service can be dangerous. If you say you're inclusive and you're not, that is much more dangerous than not saying it at all. Because if you uh sort of attract someone towards your your messaging or your operation under the kind of the guise of being inclusive and and then they arrive and then find out you're not, that it's so much more damaging. Um, we've had folks come into our gym and spend a good 15, 20 minutes in the space being like, okay, I know you say no scales, no mirrors, and welcome for all and all that stuff, but I'm so used to being let down by other spaces. We had a couple who came in, a queer couple. They had been to five other fitness facilities within Calgary who all promoted being inclusive. And the closest they found was one gender neutral washroom. Um, so they came into our space and they saw the website, they saw on the social, they did all their vetting and still had to spend time walking around and going, okay, I see this and I see this, I see the flags, I see the like I hear the language. They were so prepared to be let down. Um and yeah, so I I I really thank you for having me today and and and welcoming me into this conversation um with that alternative uh yeah kind of perspective.

Bill 1:14:02

Yeah, I mean, as the as the affirming lead here at McDougall, um, one of the things that I try remind people all the time, right, is that um saying you're inclusive, like like language matters, right? As you said, right? Language matters. Um inclusive doesn't mean friendly, right? It actually means more than that, right? We all think we're friendly all the time, right? Uh to be inclusive, to to truly be um, you know, invitational and and invite diversity and and uh expansive kind of uh practices of love, uh like you you've got to mean more than just like, I'll say hi to you when you walk in the door, right? Because there's a whole lot more um that is actually required. So like it makes I can remember, I can remember gym shopping. And again, the like the it actually surprised me at first when I when I first started about the again, the no mirrors, right? Because for me, um I hadn't really hit that point yet in the like looking at myself kind of as a as a fitness uh or part of my fitness practice. And uh I really wish I never started, in all honesty. Uh but but you you you do become very aware of it, right? And I I can remember by the fourth one, actually, like it's not even just a mirror, any reflective surface, right? Like uh if your spoons are stainless steel, I've got a problem, right? Like you put your shoes for some like so so yeah, I mean like like like being clear about like if you're if you're gonna say it, you've gotta be able to really authentically live it. Um and and not just your your leaders, like your leadership, not just the the founder, right? Like your your entire like kind of front-facing uh relationship needs to be that.

Vicki 1:15:37

It has to be embodied.

Bill 1:15:38

Yeah, it has to be embodied, right? Um thanks for giving away the ending.

Geoff 1:15:44

And you know, and this is and it has to be consistent. It has to be consistent across the practitioners, it has to be consistent across the membership base. Yeah. Um we have a code of conduct that you must subscribe to to enter the space. Um it is no hate speech, it is no like there's you know, it's a lot of yes this, but a lot of no this also. Um and zero tolerance. Yeah. Like if if you in in our space in particular, you don't usually make it through the doors without doing that on purpose and coming to us because we are who we are. Um but yeah, I imagine uh and your locations also that that's you try.

Bill 1:16:17

It's you do your best. It's complex, right? Because again, like the struggle. Be welcoming, but also being the struggle is also with grace. Yes, right? Yes. Um and and so uh recognizing and and recognizing that like my kids now are growing up inherently knowing things that my parents struggle their lifetime to try to understand, right? Um and uh and that like all of this, again, all of this movement towards again expansive inclusivity is fantastic work. And we've already kind of alluded to in this podcast as well, that we can even see right now that it may not be as solid a foundation as we thought it was four years ago, right? We can see that it's maybe a bit more tenuous than we figured. And and so um I always appreciate people who are um very demonstrably committed to learning, right? And to recognize that sometimes in the process of learning, there needs to be grace for when you screw it up. Um there's a difference between um intentional hate, um, intentional bigotry, intentional like closed-mindedness, and like I'm struggling to figure this out and I'm just not quite there yet, right? Um and and if there can be grace in that, um we're all better for it, right?

Geoff 1:17:33

Um perfect example. So and I've I've referred to Ace in this several times. Um, but what I I I really uh am grateful to Ace for was they said, all right, listen, old sis white dude. You got six months to ask all the weird questions and get all the language we're gonna do all this. But after six months, I'm holding you to it.

Bill 1:17:54

Yep.

Geoff 1:17:54

You better like I'm giving you this period to figure it out, but then after that, it's on you.

Bill 1:17:59

Yeah. Ricardo's giving me longer. Um I had to text him this week actually because Microsoft was not his friend. Um yeah. So um because he couldn't put in. We had a whole debate around what are his actual pronouns, right? Because I know they're not he him. Um, but uh he had been wearing a pen. Sorry, I'm gonna share this story anyway. I don't even uh that it said he they. Um, but his signature on his work email was they them. Um and it was like, I know one of these are right, um, but I don't know which one, right? And so I had to actually just text him and say, like, I I have no idea. And then got to hear all about how Bill Gates is not as benevolent as I thought.

Ricardo 1:18:31

You could either do he, him, or they them. And I was like, what about he they? And it's like which does not compete.

Vicki 1:18:39

Um You're the reason Microsoft went out this week, then.

Ricardo 1:18:42

Yeah, yeah.

Vicki 1:18:43

So again, just trying to put people in like trying to put boxes or trying to put parameters on things that do they need parameters?

Bill 1:18:50

I'm so much more appreciative, appreciative of someone who'll say, you know what, I just don't want to be the one that screws this up, so I'm gonna ask the like ask the dumb question, right? Um and I think there's a hell of a lot more integrity in that and relational commitment in that, right, than the we're gonna like find all these really weird circuitous ways to never actually have to like just get to that point. Right. So uh but it does mean that every once in a while I have to send the stupid text message and I rely very heavily on grace on the other end when I do it, right?

Geoff 1:19:17

So and I think the the kind of the the the permission to to stumble a little bit and the grace of the person who you're kind of stumbling in front of um is is a wonderful mutual investment in the relationship.

Bill 1:19:31

Yeah. Yeah.

Geoff 1:19:32

So as far as um It's not your responsibility, no. But when you can afford build that privilege um that allows him to learn and grow.

Bill 1:19:40

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So so um building I imagine, maybe I'm wrong. I imagine not everybody succeeds well with your code of conduct. Uh so um but but again, you you start again, you encountered your first non-binary person after you moved here to Canada, right? Yes and uh and there was that learning process for you as well of being able to have your six months to ask all the weird questions and to to start to build a community of care and support. Correct. Um out of out of that kind of found I mean with experience before that, but out of that foundational kind of connection to then you know expand on this.

Geoff 1:20:17

And intentional. And intentional. And you mentioned intention before, and I think intention is very important.

Bill 1:20:21

Yeah. Um so again, um how what does what does a supportive community look like that carries each other in the fitness industry in a meaningful way? Like what would you add to you know the list of kind of what we have here on the church side of things? Oh fantastic.

Geoff 1:20:40

Um I think it's a lot of listening. Um there is there's just so much. We're uh I think we get so caught up in I have this thought I have to say this thing that's in my brain versus like just shut up and listen. Um and and not only just listen, but actually hear the answer as well. Um not kind of hear what you want to hear, but hear the actual answer. And sometimes hear the answers that aren't the answer, uh the things that aren't being said. And uh, you know, it's we're all here in person tonight, which is wonderful. Uh, we're sitting around a table, we can read each other's language, we can kind of feel each other's kind of warmth and such, but you know, where we're doing more virtual working from home. Um I have two teenage kids and almost their entire social network is is online. It's text, it's voice calls and stuff. They don't get this this interaction, this humanness. Um so I think that that humanity side is is really important. Just uh I I say we're a space where humans can human. Um and um it hasn't quite caught on. Uh takes some some uh more description sometimes. But I think that is the important part is be open to new ideas, um, to new experiences and um and and hear it in the way it's being told to you, not the way you want to hear it.

Bill 1:21:57

Where's this landing for you, Karen? Anything you would add to this conversation? Anything you would add to our list that we're forming here of good supportive community?

Karen 1:22:04

Well, I think in the terms of um in the terms of like a good supportive community, for me, what I want to when I walk, I visit a lot of churches my job, right? Um and one of the the pieces and this kind of human-to-human piece that you're talking about is is that sense of walking in and actually feeling like they're incarnating Christ. Like I can feel that in congregations. I can also not feel it in some places. And I think a lot of it is is around the ability to be able to wrestle with the language and the questions that we have in a place where grace has allowed doubt to exist. Um and that and it was a phrase I often used when I worked with students uh and and helping them work in communities, that our communities that are most uh most ex are the best example of crisis-based communities have an ability to allow one another to safely fail. You know, so fail in my incapacity to get my head around my first encounter with someone who is non-binary while I struggle as I kind of try and find the language that will will work, that will make that person feel in wanted and included in our community. But that and that the recognition is that I'm struggling to do that and I'm working at it. And and I think that when I walk into communities that have that ability to fail safely because they've decided to be vulnerable with one another, grace-filled with one another, then we start to see true community. Then we really get to see what I think Jesus was actually trying to get us all to find. Like what he was really talking about was that vulnerable communities that allow people to work at being human to human is all we're all we're really trying to do. Like if we can't if we feel if we feel at everything else, if we can actually be in communities where we can make space to be humans to human with one another, then I think I actually think that the the community has succeeded.

Bill 1:24:41

Anything you'd add, Ricardo?

Ricardo 1:24:45

Oh, it's been good. My god, how do we follow that up? I I think that um uh building a community is um part of leaving your biases at the door uh or dispel of them completely regarding um what anybody, what do you think of anybody, um, especially when it comes to propriety. I mean, look at me now, I'm six foot four, um I haven't weighed myself in a little while, but I'm wearing a skirt. And it's it hasn't really impacted anybody in this room. But there are people that would walk by and be like, what the hell? Right? And so uh to to give you an example of what a safe community would be like, is when I wore this skirt one time at one of our conventions um where at work, uh people had said, Why are you wearing that? I was like, Well, they're really comfortable. They're like, Well, men don't wear skirts. And I said, Well, then why do women wear pants? Right? If there's some gender norm to a propriety for clothing, if there's some gender, if there's some certain size that needs to be if it uh that needs to be uh viewed, um, then you exclude a bunch of people. If your language and your actions are exclusionary in any way, um even if you're not directly talking to the person, uh it creates an atmosphere of unwelcomeness that that doesn't need to exist. I mean, it just takes so much more energy to have these opinions when you can just accept a person for who they are, and that's um and that's where it comes in, and that's where fitness culture sometimes fails, is that um when I said earlier about like the stronger, faster, whatever, um uh it's just it's not meeting people where they're at, it's pushing them to get to somewhere, which they may not be able to get to. Or um it may take them longer. I remember when I first signed up for a personal training when I joined um um the giant fitness conglomerate that exists all over Canada. Um I I I wanted to stop the personal training not because I didn't like the person or didn't value the experience or the it's I just couldn't afford it, right? It was like a hundred extra dollars a month. And and for those of you that know me, know my travel schedule is obscene. So sometimes I would go a whole month without even seeing the personal trainer. Um and the first thing that personal trainer said to me was like, Well, think about the possibility of diabetes and heart attacks. And I was like, Cool. Okay, I think about that daily when I look in the mirror because people tell me I should do that everywhere I go.

Bill 1:27:16

I feel like we are reaffirming Jeff's entire business model of it.

Geoff 1:27:21

It's fantastic how I can see your health though. Yeah. Like, or we can we we we assume we can see someone's health in their outward expression.

Ricardo 1:27:29

And so I'll couple that with what you just said. Um I said to him, I said, that's that's nice. Thank you for thinking about me. And you know, like you're just concerned, you don't even know me, right? Um, but this is not about the work you've done, this is about finances. And if you can't help me with that, then there's no way you can help me. It's just a a brick wall. But I I also recently got a new doctor, and um by recently, it was like two or three years ago. Um, and my biggest fear about the medical profession is that like I could go in for an ear and Infection and they'll always talk about the need to lose weight uh in some in some doctor in some medical. And I said I said this in the last episode. Me and a a friend could have be seeing exactly the same doctor with exactly the same illness, and we'll get vastly different outcomes in medical treatment. So I went to my doctor, and he, you know, of course, he wants to do a physical and go through all my history and stuff. I said, Look, you can see me. Okay, you're not blind, because if you were blind, you wouldn't be a doctor. Um I exercise regularly, as as regularly as I can. I I try and eat healthy, I count my macros, I do all these things, I get my blood work done every three or four months for for whatever reason. I'm trying my best. And I'm trying to lose weight. And but I I need to find a doctor that is just going to look at me as a human being and treat my flu or treat my knee and not say that weight loss is my answer. And he looks at me and says, Well, it looks like you've been doing everything right. So let's look at your knee. And I was in a state of shock. All right. I was in a state of shock. He's like, your knee is not because of your weight. He's like, looking at your blood work, you're perfectly healthy. He's like, you are fat. And he's like, you know, the fat deposits around your organs is not safe. But if you're exercising, then I don't have a problem with you the way you are. Let's look at your knee. And it, you know, it's it ends up being a tall problem when you're banging your knee against chair legs and one too many times. But it's just uh a welcoming environment is one where like you you you you hear people and you see past what you what your biases are and and and you accept someone for what it is. So like that's why I like the church community um that we've sorry, the podcast community that we've built here. Because we can have frank and open discussions about anything. And um I don't feel religious guilt when I'm in this room or in this church. I don't um uh and it's been really cool to build a community like this. So yeah.

Disability, Privilege, And Access

Bill 1:29:56

So we are coming close to time, but there's one thing that I do want to cover because I will feel like I have not done service to the topic if we don't talk about one thing before we go. So I'm gonna put this question out to the entire podcast because we have been talking tonight a lot about bodies and a lot about movement and fitness and all that kind of stuff. And I I want to at least be um open and honest that uh I think if we're gonna talk about things like discipline and fitness and commitment and movement and all those kinds of things, we need to acknowledge and not ignore the realities that for some people, disability, chronic illness, um accessibility, injury, systemic barriers, these are very real things. Um so I put it out to the group, whoever wants to jump in on it first. How do we how do we hold these conversations in a way that um honors and makes makes space and holds space for that reality for people as well. I can jump in. Sure.

Geoff 1:30:47

Uh and actually the the I was kind of hoping we would have a conversation around privilege. Um and we've kind of landed on that. So thanks for picking it up. Um, I I would say the I could use operate, the the the five of us around this table are operating visually different vehicles. Um and I imagine our experience in the world is um uh is shaped by by our outward expression um in in different, some some uh more subtle ways and some more overt ways. Um you know, I can walk into kind of almost any room anywhere and be taken seriously. I'm I'm assumed to know what I'm talking about, and I'm outwardly confident and I'm you know kind of tall and English speaking and um you know and and operate a fairly lean body vehicle. I'm gonna use it now. Um but I imagine that that experience is not the same for others around this table for for some subtle and some overt reasons. Um I have learned to um appreciate that that privilege exists. Uh there was a phase where I would sort of apologize for that privilege, and and I was kind of taught around that to say, you don't need to apologize. You need to be aware of it. You can't not be aware of this in the way you operate in the world because it does affect the way that I'm the the you're treated.

Ricardo 1:32:17

Um my favorite author, and I mentioned her in the podcast before, is Aubrey Gordon. Uh she writes a lot of books about um uh about anti-fat bias um and the world that we live in um when it comes to fitness culture. She recently wrote a lar an article about body positivity and the body positivity movement and how it can actually be sometimes more harmful than good because it's now been hijacked by you know corporations like Weight Watchers and Dove. And I'll just read two pe two paragraphs from her article, and then that'll be my my piece. Uh myths about fatness follow fat people around everywhere. Stubborn as a shadow we can't shake. Our imagined reputations precede us. We are assumed presumed to be unloved and unlovable, dead people walking liabilities to movements for social justice, often social justice movements that we even founded. Even in spaces that advertise themselves as body positive, we still face exclusion, albeit a softer side. A kind that insists on happiness and health, all while defining both things by fat people's omission. We can't be healthy, just look at us. And who could possibly be happy looking at that? Though countless of new supporters have flocked to the body positivity movement in the last two decades, few are aware of its considerably more radical roots in fat activism. Few seem to have any commitment to justice that work, justice work that extends beyond their personal relationship with their own body. So, what she's saying is that body positivity does a whole lot of good work for people accepting and loving their own bodies, but doesn't do a whole lot of teaching on how to love somebody else's body, the people you come across, right? Even body positivity's newer substitute, body neutrality, is designed to right individuals' relationships with their bodies, but not to change the cultural context that has created such widespread discrimination against fat people and such negative body image for all imagery in people of all sizes. There is a more just, more kinder world that we can build together. One that ends our wars with our own bodies and one that blunts our biases against others and starts by making room for those of us who don't appear happy and healthy and just learn to love. So it it's it's possible for us to have all these movements and to embrace fitness culture as long as fitness culture is willing to meet us where we are as well, right? Um, and yeah, that's wonderful.

Vicki 1:34:46

Um our son's girlfriend is an occupational therapist, and I've learned a lot from her as she has finished her training last fall and is now practicing of her passion to help people move, to regain movement, to move uh however possible in the space that they have. And so I I think I have a lot of learning to do personally about disability, um uh disabled space and how people move with like how to use the language, what language don't I know yet, and how not to make assumptions but to ask questions and be curious in a way that's respectful and not um not imposing. However, uh my son's girlfriend, our occupational therapist in the family, has also opened a window to me of um of the joy of helping other people um work with what they have and to work within uh the parameters that they have. See, I was gonna use limits, but that's not the word, that's not the right word. It's the parameters. It's happening in real time. Yeah. Language change. Yeah. And so within the parameters that they have, right? And and and that what they might not get to 100% of possibility of what a body could possibly do, but they can make incremental changes to make their lives more comfortable or themselves more independent or themselves more secure in how they move. And so I've been learning a lot about uh what disability is and the range of disability. And to some capacity, like at some point, we're all going to our bodies just naturally become less capable. And so having grace or having um searching for understanding now, well, I feel my knees are still okay, my ankles are still okay, but having curiosity now might allow me then when I'm less capable of being able to know how to ask for things that or help or assistance.

Karen 1:37:17

I was thinking about this in the terms of our bodies are very personal to us. That doesn't seem a strange statement, but they're you know, because we're all very it's the one thing it makes us differentiate, like it that visual differential that we have with one another immediately. And what I've as I'm thinking this through, in the terms of kind of uh certainly in the fitness world, and I also think in the church world, there is there are a lot of stereotypes and assumptions made about people on that first impact look. So if you're overweight, you're probably poorer. You're you're assumed to be economically less productive. Um there's there's assumptions around gender and size that it's okay in some circles to be a big guy or a big man, because that's because you're muscular, but a big woman is seen as someone who's let themselves go. And so there's these social, economic, even political pieces around what our bodies look like. And and they become divisive and destructive in communities because we no longer see one another as the embodied well, and certainly in faith communities as the embodiment of Christ or as beloved children of the Creator. And so two years ago, I broke my wrist. And I'm not owning this as a disability or anything, but I broke my wrist and I broke my dominant handrest and I had surgery on it. I flailed around my house for eight weeks, luckily not killing myself with the knife in my left hand, trying to do basic things. Now I have a good friend who actually has uh was born without uh the bottom half, like so below elbow of their arm. And I phoned them up and I went, okay, I know this is not the same, but how do you survive in the world? Like I could not get you walk into the washrooms and those dispensers that say pull with both hands. I'm standing there with one hand, losing the paper towel every time I went to pull the paper towel dispenser. And I'm like, I'm talking to her, and I'm like, how do you survive? I said, I know this is limited, that it's eight weeks in in a cast, and I'll be fine. How do you live like this? Like it was and and we had this really great conversation about you know the the the way that the world is just not geared for for that person because they have a disability. And for me, I think that as we think about what is what does it mean for us to care for our bodies, what does it mean for us to be in communities that support us as we have both a spiritual and physical relationship with our bodies? I think it's important to remember that there are these things political, social, economic, physical, that actually are barriers to people entering in fully into those communities, even if they're not intentional.

Bill 1:41:10

All right. Well, we are just about done. We have a tradition here at uh Prepare to Drown that's at the end of the evening. We go down the table. We are gonna start with Ricardo. You get one final thought. So if you uh if you wanted people to take one thing away from our time tonight, one message you want them to leave remembering, what would you want that to be? Your final word on the evening. We're gonna start at Ricardo, and we're gonna work our way this way, and we will end with me. So, Ricardo, you are up.

Ricardo 1:41:38

What was that term that they used to use in the night? Beauty is only skin deep or something like that, right? And it was just horrible. But uh beauty is um all around us, it's diverse, it's big, it's small, it's tall, it's short, it's white, it's brown, and um if we just embrace people for who they are, then then uh we have a much happier and safer world. Uh as long as we dispel our assumptions about people's lives. Um if someone's bigger or someone's smaller, um, if someone's really, really skinny, they're not it's not that they're not eating enough. If someone's bigger, it's not that they're not exercising enough. If someone's disabled, it doesn't mean that they're a drain. It's just all we need to do is kind of operate out of love and and and just acceptance and the world will be an easier place to be and kill capitalism.

Bill 1:42:28

The Marxist crept out at the end. Socialism will worry. All right, Vicky.

Vicki 1:42:35

It is from love that we are created, and it is to love that we return. And in that love from which we were created, we were created in the image of the one that created us. And so each of us, no matter how we look, no matter how we present, no matter how we identify, uh, are loved by the creator. Whatever name you give to that creator, that um masterpiece, that mystery that is so unimaginable, it cannot be described. And when we need re and we need reminding that when we look at one another, we can see the beauty of that creator and um and that in in that imagery the la that love is reflected if we have the eyes to see, the ears to hear.

Geoff 1:43:35

Jeff um Wow, that's a hard act to follow. I would say um more of a maybe a a message than a thought is um we've talked about play, we've talked about joy, we've talked about um just experiencing life in in the ways that you can. I would say try to find a way to move your body with joy, um, regardless of what other people say or think that should look like. Try to try to find that way that works for you. You may not find it straight away, try a few different things. Um and if you find it, fantastic, and if not, that's okay too. But give it a shot.

Karen 1:44:23

We're not defined by our bodies, because we are not only our bodies. We are the complete being. And that means that we are also love, and we are also the complexities of our brains, and we are the complexities of our souls, and all of it is beautiful, even in its imperfection, because imperfection is what actually makes it beautiful, because we get to kind of have that reflection back. Uh I think the imperfection reflects back the perfection of who we are in so many ways. So we're not we're not defined by our bodies ever. Thanks.

Bill 1:45:11

So I always get the last word, which is fantastic. Um and uh I will end by saying again, first off, thank you to everybody tonight for this conversation. This has been life-giving. Uh it certainly has transformed Ricardo's entire perspective on the um on the on the fitness industry. Um, but but more importantly, um uh it has presented a different narrative than I think a lot of uh folks hear in the day-to-day, which is certainly what we strive to do uh here on this podcast. So um I will end by saying uh that you are whoever you are, and uh whatever your uh relationship to movement or to your body, um that relationship in its current form uh hopefully is never going to uh lead to you believing that you are broken, um, because you are not broken uh no matter no matter who you are and no matter what your story. Uh you're not broken, you are human, and that is a beautiful thing uh in in that humanity. Uh if you are struggling, know that you are not alone and that there are really good people doing fantastic work trying to build safe places uh that you can be yourself in all of its wonder and all of its beauty. And uh we don't always get it right all the time, but uh the commitment to learning and the commitment to continuing until there is a place for everybody at the family table is is the dream. And so we continue to work for that, knowing that uh that you are loved and that you are um deserving of that kind of place in the world. So you are not broken, you are human, it is beautiful, and you are not alone. And so with that, I am going to say again thank you to all of you for being here, to Vicky, to Jeff, to Karen especially, uh, for for jumping in and joining us in this conversation. And uh we will see you next month. And that is where we are going to leave it for tonight, friends, even though there is much more to say. Thank you for being a part of the conversation. As you head out from here tonight, just a small reminder that your body is not a problem to be solved. It is the space in which your life is happening right now, so you need to be gentle with it and with yourself. Prepare to Drown is recorded live each month in front of an audience here at McDougall United Church in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. So if you are ever in the Calgary area, we would love to have you join us in the room for a live recording. You can find all of our past episodes wherever you get your podcasts, or by checking out prepareddrown.com. We also have a Patreon that is free to join if you would like to keep the conversation going. I'm Bill Weaver, and this has been Prepared to Drown. We'll see you next month.