Sticky Notes
Ever wondered what it's actually like to build a fitness business from the ground up? Meet Rosie and Leila, two Pilates instructors who crossed paths at a London studio and discovered a shared vision that was too powerful to ignore.
This podcast—Sticky Notes—is our real-time chronicle of building something from nothing. We're relatively new teachers stepping into entrepreneurship, balancing Rosie's big-picture dreaming with Leila's pragmatic planning. We're challenging fitness industry norms, particularly the narrow concept of a "Pilates body," and creating spaces where everyone feels welcome regardless of how they look.
Join us weekly as we document every decision, meeting, and milestone. Whether you're interested in Pilates, entrepreneurship, or simply enjoy witnessing the unfiltered journey of two women betting on themselves and their vision—we're glad you're here for the ride.
Sticky Notes
Beyond the Scale: Our Personal Fitness Evolutions (Ep. 7)
What if our biggest limitations are the stories we tell ourselves? "If I say I'm not a runner, I'm not a runner. But if I say I'm a runner, I damn well am a runner." This transformative mindset shift lies at the heart of Rosie and Leila's deeply personal conversation about their fitness journeys.
From drastically different starting points – Rosie as a competitive coxswain who was always athletic, and Leila who actively avoided PE class whenever possible – they trace their evolving relationships with movement, body image, and self-perception. Their stories reveal how cultural pressures, family dynamics, and social environments profoundly shape our relationships with our bodies, often in ways we don't fully recognise until years later.
Leila candidly shares her experience with disordered eating patterns that were unfortunately reinforced by well-intentioned compliments, while Rosie reflects on the unique pressures of being weighed regularly as a teenage athlete. Yet both have arrived at a place where they celebrate what their bodies can do rather than obsessing over how they look – a journey that required consciously reframing their approach to fitness.
The conversation takes surprising turns as they discuss how F45 training transformed Leila's relationship with exercise by removing decision fatigue, how running has opened up new ways to explore London, and why the "body trust" philosophy has been revolutionary for both of them. "Your body will tell you what you need," Rosie shares, quoting advice from her mother. "Sometimes that means you need a cookie and sometimes it means you need a salad – and both of those things are equal."
Ready to challenge your own self-limiting beliefs about fitness? Listen now and discover how shifting your perspective might open doors you never thought possible. What story are you telling yourself that might be holding you back?
Welcome back, episode 7.
Speaker 2:Woo, very exciting Wondering why we look so similar to Episode 6? We did one long filming Movie, magic baby.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which was not planned, but we just were talking and it was interesting. We don't want to just have hours and hours of going out into one episode, so we're splitting it up and so this is episode seven and no business talks about.
Speaker 2:So you're waiting for that hopefully we'll have some cool updates next week, but a cool chat nonetheless, yeah hey, okay, thanks guys.
Speaker 1:Fine, our topic and I this kind of ties into the whole reason I brought up the paywall thing anyway, which is that now, as a result, sticky notes will be evolving a little bit which we've touched on, but there's kind of a little more. We have so much freedom with what we want to talk about here and I think.
Speaker 1:You know, we don't necessarily want it to become about our personal lives, but there's some specific topics that we both think would be really interesting to touch on. From a personal perspective, you could say and a lot of that will still be the building of our business, but hopefully eventually there's only so much to report on that front.
Speaker 2:I think it's also relevant to us as coaches. If we're going to be people who you know you spend a lot. You'll hopefully be spending quite a bit of time with us virtually, you know, maybe it might be pre-recorded, may not be live, but you will be hopefully hearing us in your ears. And I think fitness is something that can be quite vulnerable for people and it can be quite an intense for some, maybe an intense, you know subject, and I think the more authentic we can be and maybe the more people can be comfortable and get to know us hopefully it only helps and aids their experience with our businesses that's a very good point leila, yeah, thanks.
Speaker 1:So with that, we wanted to talk about our fitness journeys. Is that the best way to say it?
Speaker 2:yeah, I guess. So yeah, do you want to kick us? I feel like I touched on it quite a bit last time. I don't know if it.
Speaker 1:I know I kind of don't. I was thinking about it from the perspective of how I even got into Pilates, but it's when you I don't know if you feel this way when you are in the fitness world, especially teaching. It's when you I don't know if you feel this way when you are in the fitness world, especially teaching it's hard to imagine a life where it's not a part of your routine. So I'm just trying to think of where it all kind of began.
Speaker 2:Where you are. Why don't, why don't we interview each other? So instead of I'll ask you the questions, cause I feel like obviously I don't know what I don't know, yeah, and you don't know what I don't know, um, have you tell me about like 13 year old Rosie? Was she always sporty? What were you like in PE class? What was the vibe? Were you a competitive gal? I'm very competitive, very was going to say I kind of get it.
Speaker 1:Very heavily competitive, but I have sort of picked. Remember was it last week or the week before. It was the week before when you said that coxing, you didn't know what to expect. But then you saw the picture of me and it was not at all what you expected.
Speaker 2:Laid down in the boat, like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like a little shrimp.
Speaker 1:I have found the sport where the least is required of me physically, which isn't. If a coxswain ever listened to that, they'd be like hold on a minute, and I would too. It's not entirely true, because you do have to. You're expected to be a certain size, which actually is relevant, because 13 year old me was just I guess I wasn't coxing yet, I was at 14. I started coxing in high school and I had to be aware of my weight. So that's relevant for a 14 year old teenager. But I was also always on the smaller side so I didn't ever feel stressed about it. But there was value assigned to me being a smaller person, which I don't think is the healthiest and I think Coxon's also because and I'll just speak for myself I think because I'm a competitive person and was drawn to this athletic world. I also was fit anyway, but coxswains themselves don't actually need to be.
Speaker 2:What drew you to being a coxswain? Were you interested in rowing and then ended up as a coxswain? Were you interested in any other sports?
Speaker 1:I not really I did when I, when I was a kid, I did gymnastics and ballet and dance and all the things that kids do. And then, when I was in elementary school, all of my friends played football and I-.
Speaker 2:Wait, football like your football or football like my football?
Speaker 1:Okay, my father's British, so I will always call it the proper way.
Speaker 2:I respect you for that. That's a green flag in our business.
Speaker 1:UK football and I we did call it soccer, to be fair, I just had absolutely no interest in that and all of my friends did it. So it's kind of weird to think about now that I I don't know what I was doing during recess when they were bringing that know what I was doing during recess when they were that. But I I was more of an artsy person. That was really important to me. Not really artsy in my personality, but I enjoyed being creative more.
Speaker 1:And then I was briefly on the dive team my freshman year of high school, because we just we went to a pool in our neighborhood and that was just kind of what I did over the summers was on the dive team. And then in the spring all of the divers and swimmers went to do water polo and I did that for about two weeks and it was very scary for a smaller person, not to say that small people can't play water polo, but for me it felt very it's a very intense, aggressive sport. And then I had a friend who was joining the rowing team and I said, great, I'll join as well. And then I tried to be a rower and our coach basically said no, you're far too little to try to be a rower, so I did boxing and that was kind of the end of that.
Speaker 1:It is the ultimate competitive experience because, you're just racing side by side with someone and you're telling these people what to do, and I kind of compare it to a jockey. I think I've never actually done that, but that's sort of what I would imagine it to be like Is rowing a big thing?
Speaker 2:You grew up in Michigan. Was it a big thing there?
Speaker 1:Not really. It was it happened to have popularity in the area in which I grew up?
Speaker 2:So interesting. It's so interesting to me how something so as small as that can shape so much of your life, because obviously you know you that is a large part of what your life here in London has been. I don't know if you want this publicly shared.
Speaker 1:You met your current husband through rowing, I met everyone I've ever dated. I have met. That's not true. My very first high school boyfriend was not a rower, but other than that, everyone I've ever even been remotely involved with has been on rowing teams and I don't think that's great necessarily, but it has informed a big part of my life and I did meet my husband.
Speaker 2:I I think it makes a lot. I've been, I've been having this shout out tristan, we, we, so lots of love for tristan, um, but uh, I think that's so true because it goes not to completely derail us. It goes to like a conversation I've been having this week with a lot of people, and my mom included, about, you know, priorities in life, interests in life, and obviously, whilst I'm sure maybe some of those relationships were maybe not ideal to have been with other rowers and in that situation, but clearly I can only begin to imagine, but clearly that is something that was so important to you and rowing, or the sort of sport and lifestyle of, like that fitness lifestyle, was something that was a priority to you and so it would make sense for you to align and match with someone who also views that as a priority to them. Yeah, it goes along with a lot of things such as, you know, being able to all right, the sort of discipline that it has, but maybe also the prioritization of fitness and I don't think it's necessary.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't think it's necessarily wrong for that to have been a priority and it's not ideal, but yeah, going back to me as a 13 year old, I grew up with very active parents in their own unique ways, but but super active fit that was a priority and they never pushed that onto us. Like I said, I didn't really want to play sports and they didn't really care about that at all, which I appreciate, but I always had an example of that being a part of someone's lifestyle and I think I was attracted to that in the rowing world and really enjoy being around athletes who care. Maybe you feel this with the place that you go and do your fitness stuff because it's not it's not like a team, but in some ways it probably kind of feels like a team because you go there frequently and spend time with people and you do train for something and I like being around those people.
Speaker 1:I think it's nice to be around people who have goals that are physical goals. I just think that's fun. So that has always informed a lot of my life. And then, in terms of my own fitness, I just started kind of working out with my mom and actually Sarah, who you've met and who helped us find Riverside my best friend, she and I. It's just funny. I don't know if you have experiences like this as well which we can talk about. When we were in high school, we had a period of time where we started going to the gym at 5 am.
Speaker 1:Oh, my God, and we would go on the elliptical for a good 45 minutes and then we would go and lift some weights for another 45 minutes and then we'd go to school and that seemed totally normal to us. And now we look back on that thinking, why is no one? It wasn't the best way to take care of our bodies, but we were like we're working out, we're fit, and so I've always tried to sort of figure it out. And then I started going to workout classes a bit with my mom and I always that and it's just been a it's. It's never not been a part of my life. I think also I'm very grateful that it has almost entirely been a very positive part of my life.
Speaker 1:I have always had very high body self-esteem which I attribute to a lot of things, but also my mom, because she was so like body neutral, never negative, never overly positive, just letting me be me and I think that has helped a lot. So even now actually doing more Pilates, it's been interesting because I went through a little phase where I sort of panicked because I was doing less of other stuff and then lifting weights and running and things like that, and so it's.
Speaker 1:It's interesting how every few years at least for me anyway the, the, the schedule kind of evolves a bit and I'll be more interested in doing one type of workout.
Speaker 2:How did you find Pilates then? What was your segue to that?
Speaker 1:My mom again so much to thank Ellen for Shout out Ellen.
Speaker 1:Shout out Ellen, she did not know really. I think that she was doing Pilates. She would just go to this class and they did, like I've mentioned to you before, 25 minutes of spinning, 25 minutes of mat Pilates. But I don't think it was even really advertised heavily as Pilates. Now I look back and realize, oh, that was classical mat Pilates. Now I look back and realize, oh, that was classical mat Pilates and I just started going to it with her and I think I talked about this, maybe episode one. That was all through high school and college. I was doing that in my hometown and then I moved here and I thought, oh, I've been doing Pilates, Let me find other Pilates studios. Couldn't find anything that resembled what I had been doing.
Speaker 1:Learned that the reason for that was because it wasn't classical which everything I was doing that was advertised as Pilates and was not was clearly just bar, which is fine, but it was not at all what I was looking for. And then I started going to exhale, started going to pie. That was five years ago and it's just gotten to be more and more a part of my life ever since then. I don't know what prompted me to want to become a teacher.
Speaker 2:I was about to ask how come you started the teaching training program. I think for a lot of people it does become like a natural segue. If it's something you do a lot, it's almost because it's right. I mean, even for people who never want to teach with it. There was a lot of women on my course who were just doing it to advance their own knowledge of the system and their expertise and they never really wanted to teach it full time, let alone part time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I, yeah, that's. That's a good question. I don't know, I think it was just and maybe this is probably true for a lot of teachers it was just curiosity.
Speaker 2:I was doing it a lot and I really liked it and I think it also helps because you were training at pie, and pie has its in-house teacher training program, so it might have felt just like a natural sort of segue over and I've been super lucky you have this too with your mentors and things.
Speaker 1:I had a few mentors, especially in Michigan, who kind of subtly pushed me in that direction and then, before you know it, you're starting a pilates business here we are eat, sleep, breathe pilates yeah, but my, I think for women, young women especially learning to have a healthy relationship with fitness can be so challenging and up and down and it has been overall pretty positive for me, which I'm very lucky for.
Speaker 2:That is great to hear. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to think if there's any other.
Speaker 2:Major standouts.
Speaker 1:Do you have any other questions about it?
Speaker 2:I'm trying to think, not necessarily.
Speaker 1:I think I have a great One thing that's really weird is that I'm done coxing for the time being?
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, I was going to say we talked about this. Personally, we haven't talked about it here, that is, I remember asking you how that would feel, to sort of take a break from something that has been.
Speaker 1:Well, it's going to be interesting moving to Salt Lake City to be interesting moving to Salt Lake City and I'm not moving there for very long, but I still will be away from the rowing world for a little bit and it's going to push me to actually be a bit more athletic in groups because it's a lot of being active in the mountains and outdoors.
Speaker 2:it'll be a very different kind of routine than you know running along the thames, I think it'll be interesting to see how not that I mean actually I think coxon is probably being a constant is probably a large part of your identity, understandably, so, oh, okay, london now you're fine.
Speaker 1:We're very upset in Hyde Park today.
Speaker 2:Sounds of the city. It has been such a large part of your identity for so long, so I imagine it would be a cool opportunity to really explore other parts and other ways of being active that you maybe have not had the time to do just yet. Yeah, I'm very curious where my competitive energy is going to go yeah, oh that would be cool actually yeah, I'm not quite sure what are you going to pick up these next few months?
Speaker 1:I don't know, tristan has dreams of me picking up some sports that I'm not particularly drawn to, but I don't. Maybe just getting older makes you less inclined to be that way and I won't have the itch to go race someone, but I definitely have it now. I mean, I've not been coxing for you know two weeks and I'm like get me out there side by side. I don't know, we'll see where it goes. I'm going to try to channel it into the business yeah I mean that's funny.
Speaker 2:To that, no, I mean I think I was. I'm competitive with some things. My mom would say I'm very stubborn, and I can agree that I'm very stubborn and with some I mean I'm very competitive with the card games or board games. I was never particularly competitive growing up, but that actually I think my mom would disagree. I have that spirit. But to what you're saying of sort of where do you channel that energy?
Speaker 2:Now, some weeks where I'm having, where I may be sort of overly hormonal or I get quite I might, I may get more agitated with my friends um, maybe especially guy friends than usual, I remember a specific workout that I did on a Friday night where I finished the workout and I was just like I almost floated out of the studio. I was like that's why I've been in a bit of a cranky mood beyond everything hormonally. I hadn't worked out in a few days and it was that hit post hit workout, release of endorphins and I was like like I should probably go reach out to some of my friends and say hi be a person again yeah.
Speaker 1:I find it with, actually with the rowing world people I've dated, and now Tristan, obviously, when we've been in different boats or I think I'm a pretty good teammate, but I really have to check myself if I'm in a different boat than someone who I'm really close with and I didn't even think about like you racing against, even like.
Speaker 1:Tristan for example if you, there's been times where I've had experiences where I'm racing someone with whom I'm very close and afterwards I kind of have to say I don't yet have the maturity to speak about the fact that I lost that. So we need to just move on from it. It's better now. It should just be fun.
Speaker 2:but I think that's mature and I mean that a lot of people don't even have that self-awareness to know that that's the last few years, so it's I mean, I know people in their 40s and 50s who don't have levels of self-awareness. So I think coming to that in your late 20s is it should be fun.
Speaker 1:I feel like people who are very competitive are always reminding each other that hopefully it's fun. It should be fun, especially with rowing here. What I was doing I was on a club. You know I was paying to be there, so if you're not having fun with it, then what's the point? Fair yeah, what about Layla at 13? What was 13-year-old Layla doing?
Speaker 2:Layla at 13 would send current Layla to a psych ward to be evaluated. She would say that girl needs help. You wouldn't recognize her. No, no, no, she would actually think that I. She would think someone is holding a gun to head, um, and that I need to be checked because someone is lacing my food. Uh, leila at 13? Yeah, I was, I mean young. At a younger age I was never, ever, never really sporty. I grew up in a beach town so I was always sort of swimming or at the beach, but when it came to sort of school athletics I was the first one to ditch PE for whatever reason I could.
Speaker 1:I did that too. My friend Tasia and I would pretend that we had to tie our shoe for probably 20 minutes love that mostly doing things like dodgeball. Oh, you could just get hit.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Really hated and I remember we had a teacher who really allowed that and then suddenly the PE teacher switched and it was a different teacher who didn't care for any of that and I just was mortified that I would have to actually do it, so I can relate to that feeling.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I me, and the running I didn't like I was talking to a friend about it. I have a visceral feeling in my stomach till this day when I think of like the start of our 400 meter track. I will say I did love netball for a long time. I was on the netball team and we had a great group of girls. I think it helped that a lot of my friends were on the team. But, similar to you, with Coxen, I was the goalkeeper in netball which, if you know, I mean similar to most other sports, the goalkeeper has to move around the least and it was ideal for me because there was less running. But it worked when I was, when I had hit, because I grew to my very tall height of 160 centimeters quite young, but then I just stopped growing. So I was the tallest on the team for a while, second only to the goal shooter, but then, as everyone else in our ages, started to grow taller and I became shorter.
Speaker 2:I was going to have to either run more or get out, and and I said my time is done, I'm done here. It's been a good one. I got to go. So that was the netball, because if I were to ever go play now, I would probably be given one of the wing positions where I would have to run laps around the entire thing. So you know.
Speaker 1:I know I feel like I, since I've known you you have been I think of you as an active, fit person.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is so I I mean in my last few years I was almost forced to do PE Some of the I mean because it was a part of our like high school diploma or whatever. But if I read back my report cards which I do want to pull out for one of the things I'm doing I barely scraped by. I was I'm just about past things because I was kind to my PE teachers. I was not getting the times or the results necessarily needed, um, and I think we didn't have the best and I doubt a great, healthy school PE environment exists everywhere in the world. It didn't, I think, in my experience at our school, but I probably have a very biased experience.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I wasn't the sportiest growing up, didn't have the best relationship with food or body image, which I think is natural for a lot of girls. I think that is maybe the more normal experience to have. So I don't think mine is particularly unique. It came from maybe less than insecure and I credit a lot to my mom. A lot of it didn't come from her and she was never whilst I remember her, maybe now and again watching what she was eating. It was never done in terms of I should watch what I eat or that it was done with any other reason than to just like sort of be eating healthier she had. And I can't even imagine, because I think the generation above us, as in sort of our parents generation, went through even worse. It was like a diet culture. I see tabloids and I can't even imagine so I I must have been so hard to try and set that example.
Speaker 2:But I had a very positive in-house with my mom and dad, I think some of the extended family, not the best, but a lot of the. I don't think it was unique to me. I think what I experienced was a very typical Arab, middle Eastern discourse and actually I think also a lot of the western world, so not the best body image or relationship with food and fitness. And I think when it starts that way it is hard to get pulled out of it, because there was a point when I was 16 where I leaned out a lot, um, and I was very complimented along that process and I didn't lean out in the healthiest way I was. I it caused sort of like a disordered eating pattern, um, and so it almost I can't remember what is the word I'm looking for it's something this day.
Speaker 2:It like a not approved, oh my god it's reinforced reinforced, yes, what I was think like um negative thought pattern and so when you are losing weight and people and it's why I'm very careful not to compliment anyone on weight loss specifically, um, or even weight gain I think you should know. I think it's a slippery slope, but I'm very cautious to not necessarily compliment someone on weight loss if I don't know sort of their intention behind losing weight or how they are losing the weight, because mine probably wasn't the healthiest at the time, but I think it was. I understand that it wasn't bad intention from anyone who had been complimenting it, but it just unfortunately reinforced negative patterns that we are luckily out of and on the other side of um, but yeah, like kind of the baseline for most girls.
Speaker 1:It's so hard to avoid that. I don't do you remember the first time, like what age you were, the first time you because I you know I talked about how I have always had a very positive sort of like body image and self-talk, but I could probably identify the age I was when I first thought, oh, maybe I should be a little thinner or getting a little fat.
Speaker 2:I tell you what mine never made sense. Yes, I can pinpoint, maybe not an age, but I know what I was. I think he's probably been mentioned before, but my cousin, Saeed, is about four months older than me and we are very close Is this?
Speaker 1:who bought you the?
Speaker 2:Yes, the little tripod that we used. Yes, he is also who I ran High Rocks with in May. So he has been like almost a partner in crime for me for a lot of my whole life and we had a phase when we were teens where we obviously hated each other Maybe not obviously, but where we both went through our separate teenage tantrum years.
Speaker 2:But he's about four months older than me and I'm an only child, so he has been a brother to me more than even a cousin, um. But so we did everything together from because we were in the same year group, a lot of the same friends as we were older, but we would eat the same things, do the same things. But as we entered teenage-dom and our different genetics because he takes a lot from his mom's side, I take from our dad's side yeah my body was not reacting the same way his body was.
Speaker 2:He could inhale four big macs and to his credit, I mean, he had his separate issues. He struggled to put on weight. He had a very fast metabolism and that caused issues for him later on, um which I you know is its own struggle and that's where I think also people who are very lean and or skinny um is not necessarily a positive thing and I think you know both sides of the spectrum exist. But yeah, he struggled to put on weight and muscle, whereas I had the exact opposite issue my, my metabolism is not as fast as his. So I just remember being confused why he could eat glazed donuts and I couldn't, and we would have different reactions.
Speaker 1:Isn't it also weird? That was a start, even though he's basically a brother figure. I guess maybe he wouldn't have gone through this if he struggled to put on weight. But I have two brothers and I've spent a lot of time on men's rowing teams and we have a different. I'm not an expert on it, so and then up and they turned out healthy weights for them.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And girls go through a very different kind of experience. That is very so. I mean men too. I didn't grow up as a boy, so I don't know. But everyone looks different in seventh grade. There's a whole range of body shapes and sizes and it's very potentially confusing.
Speaker 2:I would not want to redo being a teenager. That was one and done for me personally couldn't pay me no, and I can't even not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a wild, the wild wild west, and I think it from, but I do think beyond. I think there was outside influence and I think the our world. But also, like media, it just starts to plant seeds into your brain and just makes you question things, but so, for the most part, not the most ideal relationship with food or fitness. Leaned out, then put that weight back on because obviously I had leaned out just through, uh, dieting unhealthily, um, so there was never real, not like a lifestyle change, but I fitness hadn't then become a big deal to me. We hit COVID.
Speaker 2:I moved to London, was traumatized by my, my personal experience with fitness and sport growing up, and so I just almost labeled myself as not sporty or fit, because that was just my experience with it Started lifting and a little bit because I wanted to. I here he comes again. I wanted to say I needed a gym membership because I was going on walks and that was like my therapy. But it was getting really cold in london and I was like I need a treadmill or a gym membership so I can use a treadmill and just go on my walks, um, and so my cousin was signed up to this gym near us like a hotel gym that was like 35 pounds a month. It was in a basement. It was very poor, but all I wanted was like to get on a treadmill. And I still remember.
Speaker 1:That's so sweet that you guys did it together.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, he was there for his like weights and then I was like, well, I need to go somewhere. And I still do to an extent, but it was much worse. Worse, I had really bad social anxiety and I was like, if you're going, I'm going like I'm not gonna go be a new, because gyms are still, I mean, intimidating to me and I I sort of know what I'm doing now. So I think back to that leila who and I just want to give her a hug and I don't know how I did it I went, went on the treadmill and then saeed was like, why don't you try weightlifting?
Speaker 2:And just like, planted that seed in my head and I was like, um, maybe fell down that sort of rabbit hole, um, in terms of like learning what I needed to do through tiktok, and then a little bit from him, like whenever I needed a bit of advice, I would go to him, um, just for like form or things like that. And it's not that with respect to him, it's not that he's accredited pt or anything, but he had done PE at an IGCSE level which is like our, the sort of our first two years of high school would be the equivalent of that and so and he was just like, had been lifting weights for a couple of years at that point, so he had, like, the general knowledge that most men do, or people who would lift for a certain amount of time.
Speaker 2:So I went to him for a lot of things um, and then, as the world opened up, that's really nice yeah, we love we.
Speaker 2:We have love for him. Um, as the world opened up, lifting, I I enjoyed lifting for a lot of the time but I still, whilst I was uh gaining a relation or starting to enjoy a bit more, still hadn't necessarily uh dealt with the mental or like food aspect of things. As the world sort of opened up as I graduated or as I went into my third year of university and wasn't sure I wanted to, what I wanted to do with my life, I had started up pilates because reformer pilates was starting to. It was the whispers of it had made their way onto social media, yeah, and it seemed like, you know, a safe space or, I think, a lot of what I was seeing.
Speaker 2:Also, it did seem very female dominated and whilst I gyms can be intimidating because of the, for a lot, a lot of them were always like male dominated. I think think I'm not sure that that is exactly why I was intimidated by them. I think I was just intimidated in general and I'm not sure what about reformer Pilates made me less intimidated, whether it was the fact that it was. It seemed a bit more targeted towards women, weirdly enough. Weirdly, just knowing its history. But I started it and then I think I've mentioned this before the only way I could get myself to campus in my third year to write my dissertation was by booking a reformer class either before or after. At the time I had to be on campus, and so I would almost force myself into it, and so that got me into Pilates.
Speaker 1:It's funny that you say that about Pilates being female dominated because actually now that I think about it, in college especially, I was on a men's team and we were very separate from the women's team and I had a lot of social anxiety in that space. I was kind of a leader on the team so I feel like I had faux presence of not having social anxiety. But internally I felt very socially anxious in that space and I found so much appreciation for going into this studio, which I now know to be a classical Pilates studio, where it was female run there were women behind the desk.
Speaker 1:Pretty much all of the coaches and teachers were women.
Speaker 2:I had not ever really pieced that together, and doing it with my mom yeah, I don't know if it was something conscious at the time, and it's why I would love to get more men doing Pilates and I would love to emphasize more men doing Pilates and I would love to emphasize the importance of it for men, especially to cross train with HIIT or with weightlifting. But I completely understand as well for women who want their especially sort of their dynamic reformer classes to be, you know, maybe women's only spaces. You know, you see the memes of what's a man doing here and I understand the humor in it. I also understand the importance of making sure know men are moving and feel comfortable. But I do think for me at the time it seeming like almost a softer workout style is probably what made me feel maybe not welcome but made it feel more achievable or attainable. So that's how I found pilates, started the teacher training, and even when I started the teacher training I still wasn't doing anything but pilates. I was eat, sleep, breathe pilates. Uh, what at what at that point had been contemporary and then had turned into classical through, um, my teacher training.
Speaker 2:And then I think this sort of more intense physical fitness that I'm currently in now only started, if I'm being honest with myself, in like April last year went through something in my personal life that sort of set me spiraling and I needed an outlet. And I had lost sort of a lot of people that were very close to me, not through death, just through not being great people. Just their life felt down, bad for and I just needed a shake up. And I was in gyms a lot because I was training at Equinox for my Pilates course, so I used it as like a physical outlet to be lifting weights again. And so in April I started to pick up weight training a little bit more, maybe still not seriously, but just as a way to sort of get out of my head and get into physical movement. And then in the summer of last year I started teaching. And then because of that okay, I know you're fine, I was teaching, yes, and I was teaching I think we've said this before I was teaching crazy hours, so I just wasn't able to eat the best just because I was exhausted from everything that goes into teaching, which we've touched on before, so I'm not going to repeat myself. So by the end of last summer I sort of dealt with some of the things I had gone through mentally a little bit more, but just was so busy with work that I didn't really have time to use it as a physical out yet beyond a little bit of the weightlifting. Have time to like use it as a physical outlet yet beyond a little bit of the weightlifting. So I decided in september of last year it's not even a full year ago now, um, to go to f45 because shout out, f45, I love you all so much.
Speaker 2:I was had decision fatigue every time I was going into the gym. So even when I went into lift I didn't and I knew what to do. I had a program but I didn't want to almost come up with it or decide what the next station or like next um workout I wanted, like exercise I wanted to do, was because I just spent my day deciding for everyone else. It also meant that if I had just spent six hours at third space or equinox, I didn't really want to spend another hour there or hour and a half on my own to lift weights, because when I'm on my own lifting weights I could get chatty with other people, I might just be lazy in between my reps and I'm sure I could be a bit more diligent with it, but I just wasn't.
Speaker 2:So I was not putting that time. So I was like you know what? I need to find somewhere where I can do group training and they can tell me what to do, I don't have to come up with anything. And I found F45, which had both strength training days, some hybrid days, cardio days. It sort of seemed like the perfect cure-all for me because it was only 45 minutes, I could be in and out and I had no like agency really. I mean, in the best way possible, that's what I wanted, was I?
Speaker 2:and of course, you could yes, and of course, if you don't want to do something, you don't. They're not actually holding a gun to your head, but I like the idea of being told what to do and guided through a workout. Um. So I found f45 and that kind of changed everything for me.
Speaker 1:It was really when was that that?
Speaker 2:was. That was I started september 2024, so not even like 10, almost a year. Yeah, I've got the date of the very first class and I have a photo of me after that very first class and it was on a monday night, cardio. And had I not signed up for the two week trial, I wouldn't have gone back because it was so hard, but the coaches were great and the environment was great.
Speaker 1:Do you know why you were drawn to that? Specifically Because I've done F45 before and I'm trying to think why I feel like I might have. I had looked on ClassPass and I feel like I had heard you talking about it before, which is why I ended up sort of cluing into it, but I don't know why you.
Speaker 2:I mean it was. So there was two things I mean. The first is it, location wise, is very convenient for me, in its proximity to me, and I also just knew if I'm not, if I have to put in distance to go somewhere, I'm not going to do it. I mean, maybe now it would be a different story because of how important it is to me, but at that point I just knew it had to be the easiest thing and that was how I was going to do it.
Speaker 2:But also, my aunt used to go to F45 in Canada when she's there over the summer and she would post it onto her Instagram. Her entire Instagram story every day would just be like her at the like stations and just like documenting that entire workout. And so I saw it and it was. She was just posting it on her own private account for her own sake. There was no ultimate like, no, I think she was doing it for fun, she enjoyed it, she liked the workout, the community there in canada. So when it was september and I was like looking into her wanted rush hour, yeah, when I was, when I had seen that there was that f45 close to me, it was more so that, oh, I knew what it was because I had heard and seen it from her. I'd almost seen what the workouts looked like in a, to an extent from her instagram, yeah. So it felt it wasn't something foreign. And then also it had they had that two-week trial which was like 10 classes or so for like 39 pounds, which for london pricing is obviously great.
Speaker 2:And I mean most studios have a really good trial period because the whole aim is to get you hooked. And I've spent a lot more than £30,000. Yeah, I'm hooked. I drank the Kool-Aid, I'm sold. So, yeah, I had heard of it. I saw the trial. I was like you know what, we'll try it. If I don't like it, that's fine and I'll just go on to a different studio. But it I got hooked from that very first one. The coaches were great, the vibe, I mean the community seemed nice enough. I wasn't really chatty until 2025, but those sort of first few months I was just like in and out, but everyone was really great and it felt like a very supportive community.
Speaker 1:Also does this look so cute.
Speaker 2:No, you look cozy.
Speaker 1:I feel like that is kind of your um mo with like in pie. I feel like it took you a few months to get comfortable, sort of like being chatty oh yeah, oh, I was never the chat, so quiet. I am so quiet until you know me, and then, once you know me, I will not shut up preschool or like a preschool teacher, I was like a year and a half.
Speaker 2:So, like whatever that, however old you are little, yeah, a little baby, um, and uh, she was my very first teacher ever, really, um, and I'm the reason, my, my mom, but her best friend, because she was my teacher.
Speaker 1:So it all goes back down to me. Sarah and I are the same Our mom when I moved to America. Sarah went home one day and said to her mom there's a girl at school and she has a British accent and she's going to be my best friend. And now our moms are best friends.
Speaker 2:That's so cute. Oh my God, that is so cool.
Speaker 2:I love that, yeah, so I. They met at the school door purely because my mom was just asking about something to do with it, you know when the school term would start. And then Miss Maria, who I call her Miss Maria, even though you know she's not my teacher. She was my teacher and they always tell the story and even you can see in the school photo I'm just hidden in the shadow and I was absolutely mute.
Speaker 2:I spent that whole first year with her and I didn't say a word in class. But I would go home to my mom and I could not shut up. I was like just the constant stream of thought and I apparently I would say everything you know, like oh, miss Maria said her toe is hurting because you know there's a rock in her, like tiny things. That she was just like saying in passing. It was like robotic memory and I just would not speak at all during school and I would go home to my mom, who was obviously, you know, my mom, and I would just say it all back to her and so sweet and so I used to always score very well in sort of reading and comprehension tests and writing, but I was just not very outspoken.
Speaker 2:And then I had a lot of social anxiety growing up, and I mean through being a political anxiety growing up and I mean through being a Pilates instructor. I've had to, you know, get through that a little bit and I feel a lot more comfortable obviously now in gyms and the fitness world. Just because of how you know it is in my life. I kind of have to be comfortable with it. But yeah, so I took it. It took me a while to get really sort of chatty with the community at 45. But the sort of first few months was just like me getting into the routine of it. And I think in January of this year it's really taken off even more as I focused a little bit more on my nutrition and like just cleaning up a little bit what I ate in a very healthy way for the first time ever. My goal has been to get strong rather than to lean out.
Speaker 2:So it was the eating healthy thing, um not really active. I mean I, I decided to delete deliveroo. That was my big thing because I was just yeah, and it was just body stuff Financially.
Speaker 2:More than anything financially. I was running those numbers and I was abhorred and I was like, right, I'm spending so much. At that point I was very active, working out September through December, and I was like, okay, if I'm putting so much time and I'm doing the hard part of showing up for the workout, I was like I know, if I clean up my diet, the slightest bit, there's going to be a large change. But I was so conscious to do it in a way that was healthy and that wasn't, you know, disordered, and I'd spent quite a few years trying to get rid of all that disordered mindset and trying to allow or allowing myself to eat whatever I wanted. It doesn't help that I am gluten intolerant, like actually, health wise, I just I ignore that right now. It's not a priority for me.
Speaker 1:Um, so that's like a one day you ever, my god, whoa, did you ever consciously do anything to deal with the mental piece of it, or I mean just sort of working on it on your own?
Speaker 2:on my own. I was in therapy a while ago, um, but that was more um. Sorry, I just saw a message from my father. Uh, I was in therapy, but that was less to deal with the food stuff, it was more to deal with the mental but obviously the mental impacts. The food is all connected, or at least for me it was. Um, but and I'm a big journaler and a very introspective and very self-aware, so I was sort of very conscious of everything all this time, um, so it was a lot of that work, more than anything, and my mom even asked me you know what, what is, what was it that really clicked for you this time? And I think it was finding that In terms of what?
Speaker 1:In terms of fitness? Or in terms of food.
Speaker 2:I think more the food, because the fitness sort of came naturally, sort of I was just feeling good working out, but I don't think there was much of a physical change. September through December it was just like a lifestyle change and then, because I was committing a lot of my time to it and my effort in the workout, I and because I was committing a lot of my time to it and my effort in the workout, I was curious. I almost viewed myself as a science experiment. I was like if I change one thing and just cleaned up the diet a little bit, what would happen and what change would I see? Lo and behold, it has been quite a big change. But it's because I think there are also friendships and people in my life who are no longer there that maybe used to drain me more than I think they or more than I was aware of. And I have a very small circle now, but one that I'm very happy to be with and I think all of that does impact, like just that sort of mentally and who you're around.
Speaker 1:Would you say that now you feel like you're, can you tell mentally that you're in?
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm in completely, yeah, yeah, so much. I mean, even now, I don't necessarily watch what I eat. I just I think because I'm so active, I obviously need to be eating quite a bit. Um, my main thing was just, it was just that initial jump of eating a little bit more protein and eating out maybe three times less a week than I had been or you know whatever.
Speaker 1:Amazing, because I feel like some people and it's such a hard thing to get out of like it's.
Speaker 2:You've done the work and now you can enjoy that, which is very yes, I think it was a lot of trial and error, years as well. You know, this is not the first time since being 16 that I had tried to lose weight. It is the first time I had tried to do it in a healthy way, that's for sure. In terms of you know, I didn't cut out any major food group. I didn't. I was conscious to not track or count calories. It's something I still can't do. I don't like to know how many calories are in a certain thing.
Speaker 1:I did do that at one point, you know, and again I can say, oh, I had such a healthy. But I remember so many girls I knew were tracking their calories on an app and I did it and I remember putting in my I don't even remember what the app was called my fitness bow yes that's ingrained in my brain, don't you?
Speaker 1:worry, I remember putting in like my height, my weight, my, age and then it was telling me you know I would eat the amount of calories that it was telling me to eat. I'd be like no way, dude. Oh my god, fucking way, I am still. So I was and I am feel very grateful that I don't have the whatever the brain effect is that made me like really spiral into something like that. But I remember just being like what in the fuck?
Speaker 2:this is not accurate uh to when you were asking what my first negative experience was and I know I'm not the only one who experienced this, because I saw it go viral on tiktok and I was like, wow, I really have not had a unique experience ever and it was, um, I don't know if you ever had like the we. So I had like the we fit, which was like a different app that came with it and it had like the board that you would stand on and I vividly remember standing on the board and it calling like 10 year old Layla, obese on the screen, which at that time I wasn't even and I wasn't, but it was just whatever the BMI had calculated it to. But this is also a not not a unique experience no, no, I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2:No, it's so fun, but it's not even a unique experience, because everyone on TikTok was like why was the we fit, calling us all fat and obese and it was.
Speaker 1:That is way worse than what I ever thought you could have said no, it was but it's actually I'm able to look at that in like a funny way now.
Speaker 2:Oh my god, that is so funny. It just came back to me. I need to send you the TikTok. It is like millions of comments though. That is so funny. It just came back to me. I need to send you the tiktok.
Speaker 1:It is like millions of comments though that is kind of the era that we were in during that time, because it was we, we fit which I had. But I don't have any memory. I don't think we had that board thing or whatever it was. Maybe we didn't have we fit, but and then my fitness pal and people should not, maybe that's not fair Me myself, my experience and then a lot of my friends we certainly should not have been tracking. Yes, and I remember with my fitness pal you would put in like, oh, I ate some yogurt today and you would look up yogurt and there'd be a few options and you'd kind of like eyeball the bowl of yogurt that you just ate and be like, oh, I guess it was about this much and I threw some berries on there and it would be totally arbitrary yeah, I also was having to try to figure out like ethnic food which I don't even know what is it?
Speaker 2:yeah, no, because I also would ask my mom how much of x, y and z is in there. She didn't know. She was just eyeballing what she's cooking. Yeah, um, and she was also trying not to promote it, I'm sure, so it was just like a as part I would love to go back and, like you said, give your old, give your younger self a hug, and I feel like a lot of my friends younger selves to hug oh
Speaker 1:100%. By the way, being age 16 until I don't know, puberty is a very confusing time and your body just changes so much it is the worst time to have any kind of tracking. Yes, I mean actually I tell you about all the positive like having this really positive body image and stuff. I do remember in high school this other coxswain and I were similar sizes and we were just small, smaller people, and one day we weighed in together because they weighed us pretty consistently and we both weighed the exact same amount and it was like ha-ha, like yay, we both weighed the exact same amount. It was just a funny thing. Yeah, you know to the tenth, like exactly the same. And then I remember I do remember after that, every time we got weighed together, thinking, is one of us going to be heavier? Oh my.
Speaker 2:God, yeah, I can't even, and it never actually affected my actions in a major way, but what a waste of mental energy that I was spending from ages 14 to however old I mean, worried about that that was my biggest thing was, before reaching what I now have of like a body positivity, I had to go through years of like a body neutrality and I think between like 17, 18 to like 22 23, where I was just like you know what I need to just eat comfortably and just sort of get over that restriction. I think it was just viewing my body as literally like a vessel that I exist in and just like day to day life and like getting through academics and also just like your body does so much for you. Yes, like because fitness was not a big deal to me. My body was almost not a big deal to me what it could do, because I was just like well, it's getting me to class, it's getting me to the parties at night, like that was kind of it really. Um, and then, as now, fitness has become a bigger deal to me. It's still, or it's more so in terms of I have strength, goals and things I want to achieve, and it's in a very healthy way. I'm not like intensely focused, but it's nice to have like a general guide of what you're working towards and my fitness goal will now forever sort of be like strengthen, like long-term mobility and health.
Speaker 2:And so in the new year, as I sort of decided, I wanted to retry tackling my nutrition. I was just like, right, we'll just maybe be conscious to eating a little bit more protein, a little bit less fried food and just eating out a little bit less, which I knew would translate to numbers. Wise eating less. Whether or not I tracked it, like I still couldn't tell you how many calories I'm eating a day I just am eating more protein until I'm full and calling it that, and it has caused me to lean out in a healthy way. But now I look at my body more as what it's able to do in terms of, you know, competing in the high rocks, competing in that challenge, and that is what I see fitness to be as, rather than, oh, I go to the gym to lose weight, get skinny. That was like the big reframing that's maybe my frontal lobe developing.
Speaker 1:I remember my mom when I went to college. I remember calling my mom and saying don't really know what to eat. I was very lucky which sounds like you had to where my mom was cooking a lot for me growing up and that's the association I had with food just my mom's cooking. And she told me and I will never forget it because it's such good advice, I think which is your body will tell you what you need and if you just let that guide it, then and sometimes that means that you need a cookie and sometimes it means that you need a salad yeah, and both of those things are equal.
Speaker 1:Like you know, you feel very different at certain times of the month than you do at other times of the month and you feel, you know, just depending on what phase you are in in life, and I feel like now I'm quite good at my body's telling me something. I gotta go with it. There's a reason for it Body trust.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah, that seems like a good place to sort of yeah, and that I was going to ask you one other thing, which is your training for your um.
Speaker 1:What is it? Is it a full marathon, half?
Speaker 2:half, I don't, I'm. So I'm terrified that I'm gonna finish the half and like look to someone and say, should I do a full? I'm, I don't even want to think. Let's do it, let's turn around and do it again.
Speaker 1:I want to know how that has been and I'm curious partially selfishly because now that I'm not going to be doing coxing for a little bit, I'm sort of vaguely curious about doing something physical for myself and I don't really know what that means. So I'm just wondering, yeah, where you're at, because you you mentioned that you have hated running previously.
Speaker 2:Yes, so what it was. I did the high rocks, like we said in May, which obviously it's sort of a joke that anyone who does a high rocks doesn't shut up about it. So I did that, which you loved right, I loved, I think it was. It was sort of I had really at that point, leaned out quite a bit. I could see it and feel it in my body, um, and I was able to do something, and I was. So I felt such a sense of accomplishment about completing that race and I was able to look at my body and be proud of what it had done, like just as a physical challenge, rather than, oh, I didn't look at a single photo and be like, oh, I look like this here, oh, I wish I could just like you know you in all the photos thanks.
Speaker 2:We were in our matching you know, family name talks and I was just felt very content and I was on my period that day. So I was like so, um, I was so, I felt so content with just you know. I was so like, if my body can do this, I really don't care what it looks like, because I've just accomplished such a difficult physical challenge that it just sort of wiped the stage clean or wiped the floor clean, like you know, in terms of body image stuff necessarily. Um, that's amazing, that's really cool. And I mean, at that point I didn't run a single kilometer ahead of our high rocks race because saeed and also saeed and I were also doing it for fun. We, our time goal was get under two hours, make it to the finish line.
Speaker 1:You know, it was just a fun way for us to do something that people do, where they're trying to get yes, first place or yes.
Speaker 2:So there's like places and there's also like time goals like people will try for. Like a sub 60 is like a very elite time to get okay or like under whatever it may be. Um, we were sort of to me it was fun because he was always very sporty, growing up, super lean and athletic and quite quick, and I wasn't and I was like, oh my God, this is just, like, you know, a fun way for us to do something together where I now have the strength that we can, you know, compete at the same level basically. So I didn't run a single kilometer. He did a little bit, but I hadn't.
Speaker 2:So it was the first time in my life I had ran 8k. It was broken up into single kilometers, you know, interspaced with the stations. But I sort of looked at him and I was like whoa, like after I would never forget after our first kilometer, I looked at him and I was like I don't know if I can do that again, not in terms of it was so hard or easy, just like physically. I've never done it before.
Speaker 2:So like, and he was like, well, we'll see, no, yeah um, and then afterwards I so I finished the high rocks, felt great, still didn't necessarily think, oh, I, I want to start running, um, but training for that high rocks gave me a very good almost not tunnel vision, but it was like a guide line or to help my training, and it also meant on days where I didn't really want to train for no reason other than just like a little bit of laziness. I never forced myself to train on days where I actually didn't want to train, but on some of those days where it's just like, eh, would I like to sit on the couch for another few hours? Yes, would it be better if I got up and I did a bit of movement? Also, yes, so it gave me that extra motivation to be a little bit more disciplined on some days where I maybe wouldn't have been, and so I just liked having something to train for. And so when that hierarchy was done, the next one in London I'm unsure if I'm going to be in the city for so I, and it's also not until the end of the year. So there was just nothing really to train for and I was like well, I want to train for something.
Speaker 2:And I've always said I'm not a runner, because that is just a thing that I've said and I know that it's just if I say it, it'll, I'm making it true and so, and I know it's a mental game. I mean, obviously you train for it physically, but it's a mental game more than anything. And I said I would like to rewrite how I am identifying myself as, and if I say I'm not a runner, I'm not a runner. But if I say I'm a runner, I damn well I'm a runner. So I have signed up for a half marathon in October.
Speaker 2:I think it's also less intimidating to say I'm a runner versus I'm training for a race. It feels a bit easier to sort of focus on the race part, so it is more so. I mean I still don't love every run, but I'm actually starting to experience what some have called runner's high. I can say I know what it feels like and it is a real thing. That's amazing. Yeah, so that has changed the game for me completely and I mean I don't even know where the fitness stuff is going to continue to go, um, which is exciting. So it's cause it's still all very new for me. So it will be cool to see sort of where I land and settle with it.
Speaker 1:It's cool that you're like doing all of the Pilates, you're doing some weightlifting, you're doing some functional training, you're doing some running. You're just moving your body in the way that feels right. Yeah, this time, that's awesome. How cool. I'm excited. Wait so, when is the half marathon? Because we think you're getting updates on it October, unless we, randomly, are like absolutely not.
Speaker 2:No, let me double check. It's October 12th or 19th. I believe it's the 12th. That is so exciting. Yeah, 12th of October. I've just signed up for a 10K as well, at the end of August. I will admit I signed up for it because I saw an ad when I was on the way to work on Tuesday and it was the track that they were running for the 10K, and one part of it I'm going to show you on the screen. It's called the Swift Sprint with a guitar, and I understood that to refer to Taylor Swift and that guitar to refer to her.
Speaker 1:I did, is it?
Speaker 2:not. I'm hoping it is. It's somewhere near Wembley Stadium, it's got to be. I mean it says Swift Sprint. It has to be hoping it is it's somewhere near wembley stadium. That's specific, it's. I mean it's. That's what I mean. It says swift sprint.
Speaker 1:It has to be it's like you're running by wembley stadium.
Speaker 2:It's like near where the bobby moore stat. So I'm like I really think it is and I said, taylor, swift, call me up and I booked a 10k.
Speaker 1:So I think that that is the cool thing about running too, is that you can.
Speaker 2:I'm not a huge runner just because I get bored, but when I'm in a new place, if I can, I like to go on a run because you can see a lot yes, I would love to also, as I haven't talked about it much, but as my time in london potentially comes to a close, I would love to be able to explore the city through running, and a lot of my running right now has been done indoor, on a treadmill, just because it's been quite hot in london. Um, yeah, so I mean, I did my my first 10k the other day, but it was funny because I was on the treadmill and I was like how am I gonna get myself, like not distracted, and I put on the eras tour movie documentary oh, my god, I just ran to that in equinox I was on the treadmill like singing, having the time of my life, um.
Speaker 2:So I'll be running that in august, end of august, and I'm hoping that sort of. I think it'll be a good way to just like get used to sort of like pacing myself, you know, running in outside and in person. I mean, obviously I'll be running outside before that. But yeah, like you're saying, it's such a cool way to discover cities and I I'm excited to. I've always sort of wanted to be around. I think in my dream world I would have always been a runner. It's just I think I'm not gonna.
Speaker 2:I mean, this may be a bit controversial. I'm not going to say that you need to be leaner to run, but I think obviously being leaner has made it easier to run, and I don't, and that's. I've seen a lot of wonderful influencers and people who are on that sort of running talk side, showing that you don't need to be lean to run and they enjoy running at whatever size they are. I was actually training for a 10K about this time last year and it got canceled, so I never ran it and my training just went out the window, which is funny to like actually look back on, but I will say I think it has been a little bit easier to get into running this time around, unfortunately, as I've been leaner, um, so I and I think I would have always wanted to be able to run.
Speaker 2:I just couldn't. And I think even then, had I been disciplined enough, not necessarily to lose the weight but to stick to running, I would have ran at whatever. You know. You don't have to be, you don't have to be fast to be a runner. You can run at whatever pace you want. No one should ever tell you, oh, you're not a runner because you're not running at a certain pace, um, and I think that's something I've been able to learn. So I almost wish I had been running even at slower paces, to have been able to run through some really cool cities. But you can't change the past. You can only change the future. So I'm excited to run in some cool cities in the future.
Speaker 1:It's funny because when I first started running in london, sarah and I would run together because we were living together and we would run through. We lived near raven's court park, which I don't know if I've ever been there. It's a very sweet park, it's one of my favorites, but it's not. It's a park, it's not anything wild and we would run in there and then we'd go home and then one day our other flatmate we were living with, she was.
Speaker 1:She was much more of a runner and she was training for a marathon, and so she had us and we were all happy. We happened to all be leaving to run at the same time and we're like we'll just follow you and then, when you need to go off, you go off and we'll just, you know, circle back. And it was the first time which, now that I've been in London for so long, I'm like how was I missing this? We ran and it was just a straight shot from where we lived right out to the Thames path along the river, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:And I remember it so clearly, getting out there, turning the corner and seeing the Thames and Sarah and I looking at each other like oh, wow, okay, this is so fun. And then that started to be kind of a loop that we did Like there's just so much you can.
Speaker 2:Same with walking, but you can just see, you can cover a lot if you're able to run, of course, and I think it's such a beautiful city that I would love to be able to explore on foot, especially as I may be, you know, living in cities where running outside is not as feasible longer term about this with utah.
Speaker 1:I know I have to wrap it up in a minute, but no, you're fine. One very confusing thing about salt lake city is that so in london, right, if somewhere is, if you look it up and it's a 30 minute walk, that might or sorry, a 30 minute drive, that might translate to like a 90 minute walk or something, because there's traffic and things. Salt lake city is very much designed for cars and it's very efficient for cars. So I've been looking at um, I was looking at like therapist's office and how close they were to me and it was a seven minute drive. So I was like, oh my gosh, I can probably walk there, yeah wait and then I looked up the walking and it was 90 minutes.
Speaker 1:Oh my god, oh my god. And it's also, and it's probably through like wild intersections and like highways or whatever it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it was 90 minutes. Oh my god, oh my god, and it's probably through like wild intersections and like highways or whatever it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah and it's really, really hot there in the summer so yeah it's just yeah I think we are so fortunate in london and there are so few cities as walkable as london worldwide. I think europe obviously has quite a lot of very walkable cities, but for the most part, a lot of where you and I may end up. Whilst they have a lot of stuff you can do outdoors, especially for you, they're not very walkable. I mean, I grew up in Saudi, in the Middle East, so we drove everywhere. I was not walking on the streets In Lebanon a little bit, but even then, yeah, like you're saying, it's so hot in the summers. You're not, you're not. You're not really walking the way you would in london, and it's something I love about my life here and I think would be quite an adjustment longer unless something goes really crazy, I do not hope to end up in salt lake city, so hopefully, walkability is very important to me so hopefully, that is yeah, um, all right about it yeah, we covered a lot.
Speaker 2:Thank you for listening to episode seven. It was a very raw, honest chat, I think, for both of us I hope to have more of those, because I think that's fun yeah, and I think there are probably a lot of stories, um, maybe similar or not too dissimilar, like us.
Speaker 2:That would be cool. There's a few people that I think it would be cool to have on sticky notes. I know we've mentioned her before. She was getting a shout out. Pina has done quite a lot of cool work on, like holistic, uh, medicine and health, and I think that would be a cool interview to have on sticky notes, as opposed to honeycomb studios. So I think you can expect more conversations like that. Yes, see you next week.