THE INTERVIEW
Nikita Curins has been working in the training industry for over 10 years, and it shows! He walks us through how he has developed such a keen eye for movement, and the best way to train with him now. Nikita shares about the moment he learned he had a disorder that shattered his pro basketball career, but how it taught him about mental and physical resiliency. We talk about group fitness, and how in their popularity have left a lot of people at risk for injury (SO important to listen to if you're a big group class participants).
CONNECT WITH NIKITA
- Post editing there have been exciting new changes to the BGW schedule. You can now find them on MindBody/Class Pass (Toronto) under 'BGWorkout- The K.I.C.K.A.S.S Class'
- April 12th 2020 begins the newest edition of the BGW Transformation Challenge
** The goal is to help challengers build their confidence, help them change their body composition, lose body fat and learn more about movement and healthy habits
Check out the BGW instagram page to sign up!
RESOURCES
- Becoming A Supple Leopard; Kelly Starrett
- Agatsu Joint Mobility Course
- Functional Range Conditioning
- Glute Guy; Bret Contreras
- Darby Training Systems
- Foot Collective
- Anatomy Trains; Thomas Myers
- Man up; Bedros Keuilian
- Breaking The Habit of Being Yourself; Dr.Joe Dispenza
- @bg_workout
- @nikita_pntgn
- @embodiedalchemy.pod
- @domchesh
SPONSORS/PROMOS
- Pure Balanxed;
* ALCHEMY20 for 20% off https://www.purebalanxed.com
* @purebalanxed
- Carli Paintings;
* ALCHEMY15 for 15% off products, experiences, & creative services
* @carlipaintings
- Foli;
* FOLIPOD for 20% off your purchase https://shopfoli.ca
* @shop_foli
Feel free to give us a shout, hello@embodiedalchemy.ca
THE INTERVIEW
Nikita Curins has been working in the training industry for over 10 years, and it shows! He walks us through how he has developed such a keen eye for movement, and the best way to train with him now. Nikita shares about the moment he learned he had a disorder that shattered his pro basketball career, but how it taught him about mental and physical resiliency. We talk about group fitness, and how in their popularity have left a lot of people at risk for injury (SO important to listen to if you're a big group class participants).
CONNECT WITH NIKITA
- Post editing there have been exciting new changes to the BGW schedule. You can now find them on MindBody/Class Pass (Toronto) under 'BGWorkout- The K.I.C.K.A.S.S Class'
- April 12th 2020 begins the newest edition of the BGW Transformation Challenge
** The goal is to help challengers build their confidence, help them change their body composition, lose body fat and learn more about movement and healthy habits
Check out the BGW instagram page to sign up!
RESOURCES
- Becoming A Supple Leopard; Kelly Starrett
- Agatsu Joint Mobility Course
- Functional Range Conditioning
- Glute Guy; Bret Contreras
- Darby Training Systems
- Foot Collective
- Anatomy Trains; Thomas Myers
- Man up; Bedros Keuilian
- Breaking The Habit of Being Yourself; Dr.Joe Dispenza
- @bg_workout
- @nikita_pntgn
- @embodiedalchemy.pod
- @domchesh
SPONSORS/PROMOS
- Pure Balanxed;
* ALCHEMY20 for 20% off https://www.purebalanxed.com
* @purebalanxed
- Carli Paintings;
* ALCHEMY15 for 15% off products, experiences, & creative services
* @carlipaintings
- Foli;
* FOLIPOD for 20% off your purchase https://shopfoli.ca
* @shop_foli
Feel free to give us a shout, hello@embodiedalchemy.ca
Welcome to the embodied alchemy podcast. I'm your host Dominique Cheshire.
Speaker 2:Embodied alchemy started as a way to describe finding empowerment and has quickly grown into so much more. Embodied alchemy is about feeling the tough stuff and working through it. It's about sharing our stories, speaking our truths, and hoping that there's someone out there who feels it too. We are here together to celebrate our ups and our downs because the tough stuff is where the magic happens. I am so excited to be here with you today. Are you ready? Let's go. I am so grateful to be supported by Carmen Darley of Carly D paintings. She is a resin based artist and Toronto entrepreneur who was excited to offer offer
Speaker 1:podcast listeners an exclusive discount on all products, services, and experiences. Go to Carly paintings.com to see all the gorgeousness and use code alchemy 15 for 15% off anything under$100 make sure to tune in to episode four of the pod where Carmen shares the journey behind her amazing art, pure balanced, balanced with an X instead of a C is a brand I have personally loved for a little while. Now I have a shirt and a crew sweater and I love rocking them. Both. Pure balanced is an empowering apparel brand out of Toronto, creating luxurious everyday pieces. All their clothing include a sewn and empowering statement. Simply flip the X to read the affirmation. They're a brand committed to community with 5% of sales donated going to netic and 5% of sales going to friends first. You can check everything out about them on Instagram at pure balanced as well as their blog and online store, which is pure balanced.com. We want you to be able to experience their incredible stuff yourself. So for our listeners, use code alchemy 20 for 20% off your purchase and be sure to listen to founder Alli's story on episode two of this season. We are supported by fully shipping houseplants and cool pots to doorsteps across Ontario students. To be nationwide fully makes welcoming plants into your home or office, easy and convenient. Choose your plant and pot of choice and within two to three days your fully will arrive to your doorstep. Plus 95% of all packaging is recyclable. That is important. Fully provides happy, healthy Hardy plants that are easy to care for. Many are locally grown in Ontario. Use code fully pod for 20% off your purchase at shop fully. Dot CA and join the plant obsession. I know I have. Hello friends. Welcome back to the embodied alchemy pod. Today's guest has been known to describe himself and this is a direct quote as I may look tough on the outside, but I'm full of unicorn colors on the inside. While I might be only just getting to know Nikita. Karen's, I can definitely attest to the sweet interior he has as I've been continuing my own education in the world of movement, rehabilitation and accessible, safe teaching. There are a few people I've come to know who I feel are really making waves in this work. Nikita, who is a personal trainer, lifestyle coach, community builder, and overall lovely human being is one of them. He really knows his stuff and is someone I love learning from. He has known his fair share of struggles in the world of professional athletics and rehabilitation. So before I give too much away, please get cozy. Get your pens out because you're definitely going to want to take notes. Nikita. Karen. Okay. When you're ready, if you'd like to close your eyes, you can in a close lane too. And so yeah, they're just taking a nice big breath in through your nose and exhaling however you feel comfortable. Well, let's do that again. Nice. Inhale in gentle, beautiful X. hello.
Speaker 3:Ah,
Speaker 1:and one more time. As you inhale. Can you inhale anything that you feel like may bother you or tickle you while we're chatting today? Hold onto it for a second. Say thank you and nice and slow. Exhale. Let it go. Take a second. Stay here. Just pause. Resume your regular breath feeling where your feet are, your legs are, your pelvis, your breath moving through your body. There's any extra little bits of tension in your shoulders and your jaw and your eyebrows. Please feel free to let them soften. You can open your eyes whenever you're ready. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day, Nikita.
Speaker 4:I really like my mom. I really love your mom. Well, it's one of my favorites. So I have a, I have a unicorn monk. I kind of want to buy it from me. I won't lie.
Speaker 2:I got it for free. So I will, I would be up money if we did that. I, so we met, uh, like January or February, March, somewhere in there at an event in the city. We were both that, yeah, to come in as teachers. You were teaching the sweat fitness component. I was co-teaching the yoga stretchy calmed down component.
Speaker 4:Yes. I really enjoyed the music. You guys pick. Remember that?
Speaker 2:Yes. I wish I could say that was me. It was totally Melissa and I still steal her music cause it's so good. Um, and we all had a really lovely chat after a hello and we had all been given each other's Instagrams and so it's kinda nice to be able to see a little bit more about what we were all doing. And I very, very quickly came to learn that like, you know your shit, you are so you're welcome. I think in the world of movement, whether it's fitness, whether it's yoga, whether it's Pilati, is that it's really easy as a facilitator to get so excited about, okay, I'm going to teach classes and I'm going to move and change people's lives. But there's a lot of information to learn about bodies, especially multiple bodies. And those are healthy bodies. And a lot of time when people are our movers in the room who like started to live their lives a little bit in the city. We're talking about lots of people who work desk jobs, high stress, there's a lot of injuries that happen. And because I come from a background of a lot of injuries, that's something I'm really passionate about, making sure I've been educated in and I wasn't sure what that looked like in more like fitness training world. And so as I started following you, I was blown away by how you talk about the body, how you talk about movement, how generous you are with the information that you share. And then I got to know a little bit more about your story and how you got to that place. And so I just feel very grateful that you're here and that we get to learn more about you today.
Speaker 4:Thank you. Thank you for having me. I have a big smile on my face.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And the unicorn mug. So if you would like to introduce yourself a little bit and a little bit about what you do, that would be really lovely.
Speaker 4:Um, my name is Nikita currents. I am, uh, ex professional basketball player and, uh, I'm currently a strength and conditioning coach, a performance coach, high performance coach, and I guess movement coach. I help people to improve their movement, uh, specifically understanding body awareness, what they need to do, help them overcome their injuries, created their workouts around the way that they can actually get better results. And at the same time, I concentrate on a mindfulness and kind of taking that to the next level to make sure that the movement is not the only thing they concentrate, but they can level up their quality of their life altogether by taking mindfulness and pairing up together with a aspect of the movement so they can actually live a healthier lifestyle. In a nutshell, in a nutshell, that's pretty much what I do. Yes. But I started as a specialize in the movement first, uh, because when I played basketball, uh, at a young age, uh, I kept getting injured all the time and because it kept getting injured, I was just interested about, uh, like what can I do to make sure that I do not get injured or understand why I'm getting injured. And, uh, I went to kinesiology at York university and I, but the reason I chose it as strictly it was my plan B, I was going to play professional sports. So the only thing I chose it for, it's like, okay, let me understand how the body works better so maybe I can benefit myself. And uh, that's how I got into it. But I didn't really starts again, really, really like knowledgeable and passionate about the movement until I got my career. I had an injury where I had to put a metal rod in my head. Uh, I have a condition called a avascular necrosis. It was basically a vascular, a vascular stents, full blood and necrosis stands for cell death. So at age of 21, I had to put a, I was diagnosed with a bilateral condition, meaning on both sides of my hips at the, and the femur bone where you, a femur head is, uh, there was a pinched artery and, uh, my cartilage was deteriorating around my femur bones. So they were told if you continue playing sports, you'll probably need a hip replacement. But for now what we're going to do is we're going to put a metal rod into your left hip because on the left hip you have greater deterioration. Plus, uh, you have a torn rec fam muscle partially, uh, from like, I used to play like four or five hours a day practicing. Right. So, and I had probably poor biomechanics and certain levels, certain muscular imbalances that I, I didn't know much about and I didn't train properly. And, uh, so that was like devastating. It's actually, I went to see a doctor down the street right here at the sports medicine clinic. Uh, and, uh, I got lucky with my operation and other stuff from a perspective of, I actually, the doctor was dr Clara field. And, uh, he was a sports physician from April lifts and uh, and Canada, the national team, but I trained his son basketball so I had some connections. So when I did my MRI and I kind of had to, he sped up the process. If you don't guys don't know, like to get on my ride takes three to six months, they can put you on the wait list. And then sometimes like if you tell them you can come at anytime at night, that will get you much faster. Like I got my MRI within two days because I knew because I knew the person. So she did something, she did something, we'll do stuff. But uh, when I came back and they told me that, uh, what I had and went like, I remember he wasn't the one, I got to come back into the office and I talked to them and I was like, okay, hopefully it's a decent, and they told me like, this is what you have. Like you have your hips to deteriorating. Basically you have arthritis as a young person. Zoe, if you continue doing pounding, running, jumping, you will need a hip replacement by age of 30. And I broke down crying. I didn't like I walked away and didn't know what to do. I never had a plan B and next four years probably worried the toughest years of my life. Um, thank you for just jumping right in and sharing that because so I was
Speaker 2:about the same 21 ish for my 22nd birthday and I really, I know for myself, I was really felt, I really felt invincible, especially when you feel like you're so close to that moment where all of your dreams are about to come true. And I think, I think it's fair to say as a female, people would expect me to be really emotional about it. And I do think it's important. And one of another reason why I'm so excited to have you on is because when we're looking at how this affects everybody, not just me as a female, as a dancer, but like a man and on a basketball trajectory, that's a huge, that's a huge loss to feel too. And to share your vulnerability with that. I really appreciate that.
Speaker 4:Um, thank you. Uh, the thing is now I'm way more, like I tell it, I was just like, it's who, who I am, what happened. It's part of me. It, uh, I rarely ever cry about it now, but I was bawling my eyes out cause like, and I'm like, I didn't know if I would ever make it to NBA, but everywhere that I played in Canada, I would walk in and within the first five minutes people would know like, this is the guy who was better than anybody else on that. And I genuinely believed it. And even if they thought I wasn't, then I had to prove myself I would be able to do it. And I just had such an immense amount of confidence is like, you know, if you put like the best dress you have wear and you walk in until I can use think like everybody thinks you the hottest shit in the room. Like I walk everywhere. I would walk in, I would feel like this, but just knowing that how good I was and it just like I didn't think that I would do anything else. I truly knew that I was good. I wouldn't be able to make money this way. And uh, it's just what it did to my mental state. Like the amount of confidence, even like, yes, I didn't know maybe would I have any other skills or whatever else, but it's just the amount of confidence you go from like 300% to all of a sudden dropping to like zero and you really don't know. I was identifying myself with an athlete in my whole life, so I couldn't, and this was the hardest change to make until actually maybe like three, four years ago, maybe five years ago, to where I didn't know who I am without being an athlete. So if I'm an athlete and you and I cannot train and then, then who am I like, what am I capable of doing? And when it was taken away, I'm like, well I'm nobody that. And then learned the process of learning off of that. I'm so much more than an athlete and I'm a human being and an I, I can deliver on these different things and I have these different skills and talents. That's something that was very hard to learn. And it was very painful for me. And then I went through about two to three year depression where I almost walked out at a university because I was silly enough, I decided to take a class called a psychology of an injuries. Why do we do this to ourselves? And I thought, and I thought by taking that class, I'll be able to learn how to overcome my own injury. Right? So it's like psychology of injuries or something along those lines. And instead there we kept talking about how every athlete would have make it back and what happened to them and what they had to deal with. So I became, uh, became my worst class. I ended up getting an half in a class because I stopped coming and I just was too late to drop it. And that was a very difficult year for me and I really didn't know how to deal with it. And the, one of the biggest mistakes that I made is that I kept going to physiotherapy and uh, I was started to get better, but then I got T-boned in a car accident and when I got T-boned, uh, my body just got stressed out so my injury got even worse. So I kinda bounce back. And so that initial state and I had to, my physio was fully paid off, so I kept going two, three times per week, uh, in the beginning. But, uh, what ended up happening, I wasn't getting any better. And then my physio ran out and then I have to start paying out of my pocket and I wasn't getting bad and I was spending$1,000 a month out of my pocket and I only realized that for me to get better, I had to learn how to move better. So I basically what I did, and that was my biggest mistake. I took my responsibility and put it on somebody else. I said, I'm going to go to physio, physio is going to fix me. I'm going to go to massage therapist, massage therapist is going to be fixing me, but I didn't do what I didn't do. And what we all should do in any single situation is like what can I do to get better? And until I learned that, I only learned it when I ran out of money, I learned that when I ran out of money because I had no money to spend and I was like, I can't afford physio anymore, so what am I going to do? Like be miserable or am I going to, so I started learning more about but I was already a strength and conditioning coach but, and, and I was able to fix others but I wasn't applying some of the things that I knew on myself nor I was going into depth. And I started taking courses from different people. Uh, joined mobility and flexibility, lower body offer, body fashionable, stretch training, grade stuff like using the fashion, how to understand it using functional range conditioning, what you can do at the joint level and just starting to understand how the body works together. The joint level at the global level, at the fashion level and then implementing those things in and day out, day in and day out. And literally I did my ability training and like I'm a huge uh, advocate for telling people. Like I know I lift some heavy weights as well and I love lifting hag and I like training as an athlete and doing explosive stuff. But if you don't have a prerequisite of the range of motion and the strength at the joint level, the small things, you will never be able to do the cool things that you always want to do or you will, but you will compensate and it will cost pain. And literally by working three months in a row, three, two, I started feeling so much better and I didn't have to go and I started paying only for once a week for the therapy and I was able to so forth. Not six months later I was able to do things that I was never able, like almost never was able to do. And I started dead lifting without touching any weights for six months. I went back and within two weeks I was dead lifting almost 400 pounds. Uh, and at that weight I was like one 75. Right? Then I was able, because there were no restrictions in my body and everything was moving so smooth. So the energy transfer between the muscles and the fashion were so smooth that I never had to worry about how smoothed away way is gonna move. So I was able to recruit more muscles. I was able to recruit a fashion more efficiently. Right? I was able to use that for us and it just felt amazing. And then I just kind of continued learning more and more and more and I got really passionate about it cause I figured out if I can make sure that I'm not in pain then and I know a lot of other people probably experienced the same thing. So you fight, teach that to them. You give them a tool to learn what they can do for themselves and not be in pain. And because a lot of people, especially in the culture of nine to five and the sitting and laptops and phones wound up spending too little time moving into much time slouching and being in the[inaudible] and I have flex position, so we complain about pain and some people don't even know that they're in pain until you tell them to do something and they're like, Oh my God, I didn't even know I couldn't do it because they're just so used to being non-active. So when you start showing some people and you're like, open them up and give them something to do an as something smaller, they could change their life completely because they fashion carries feelings, fascia carries energy and fascia carries pain as well, right? So when you decrease the restriction in fashion and then you also open up the muscles and fascia together, all of a sudden people feel like, Holy cow, like I feel a hundred percent better, right? Like you're, you know, headaches. If you have migraines and you have a nine to five job, a lot of times it comes from a tied neck muscles, tight trap muscles, right? Potentially chest muscles, right? So if you do certain movement, all of a sudden you don't have headache, you don't have headache, you might have, uh, you have better performance at work, you have better performance of work. You also might have better relationship because you've, we've become more attentive when another person is talking, right? So treating your body with respect and actually investing time into not just lifting weights, which is an old conventional way, but actually learning how to improve your body and like learn about your body and master your body. It's something that becomes incredible. That's why if you take a gymnast, right? The gymnast is pretty much a Yogi on steroids, right? Because they all have to be flexible, right? But at the same time, they train a little bit different because there's just more progressive overload, but it's just the way of training, right? So it's a different way of understanding your body and being aware. And I think not enough, it was invest time and we just go to a typical like, Oh bro, let's go live to weights in the gym or like four girls. The same thing. I just want to have a nice butt and a narrow waist. Right. And a lot of times when you go do that, people don't understand that if you don't have good ankle mobility, like you're not going to, you're probably going to get knee pain when you do some of the exercises and if you don't have a good hip mobility, you're going to end up getting some kind of pain as well. So,
Speaker 1:and I just wanted to clarify for anyone who just heard that and it was a little bit, so you have an intake form when people want to work with you. And so these things that people are asking for when you're looking at like physique, it's not just like your opinion of it that's literally like that came from what you get most frequently on an intake form is like those are the things people are looking for. Right. I just wanted to make that clear that that wasn't like this is the way everyone has to look. No, no, no. You have a process. And of all the things that people say that they're looking for, those are the most, the most common. Yeah,
Speaker 4:it is, is the typical S is a stereotypical thing that everybody will ask based on the propaganda that they hear. Right? So like I will kind of look this way, like what her name, Kylie Jenner or whatever her name is. Right? So it was like make me look like this or I wanna I like a guy's like, can I have big shoulders and big chest? Right? But that might have a lower back pain. Right. And a lot of times I tell people, okay, the looks will follow, but let's fix the underlying issue of what's going on in your head. What's going on in your movement. I you talking properly to yourself. Do like, is it a positive or negative self talk? Do you have good relationships? Do you breathe properly? Right? Like people don't even pay attention if they know how to breathe and that could cause pain in your neck and costs tie traps, right? So it becomes so much more than that. People just don't want to put in time. They want like through a quick three months fixes, uh, which, and you can get really good results in three months, especially if you follow the nutritional protocols and what not. But if you want to create a long lasting change, it's like changing any habit and changing a habit does not take 21 days. It's a complete lie marketing, uh, to get your attention. Exactly right. That's actually, there's a study that shows, uh, how that whole thing came about. There was a, um, a surgeon, plastic surgeon, and he noticed that all his clients started to get accustomed to their new nose within 21 days. So the marketing girls took this and ran with it and just started saying, it takes 21 days to build a new habit because your body, your brain starts to adapt. But when they did an actual study and extrapolated the data, it took between like 21 and 286 days or something like that. I don't, don't quote me on the numbers, but it's like, until it's not 21 right then. So usually when I work with somebody in creating long lasting results and actually changing that for Rever, uh, anywhere from four to eight months, depending on how much weight they need to lose, uh, what issues are, how much pain they're in is usually the process where they build the habit and they can sustain the habit. Now, it depends whether they have a push in accountability, but it's way more than what people believe. And I just don't think that we treat ourselves with enough respect because then we claim it. We have a busy life. And it's unfortunate because in the end, if you cannot show up to work, you can provide for your family, right? But if you don't have your health, that's the reason you cannot show up to work. And if you like in pain, usually people go like, I don't have money, or I don't have time to take care of my body until it's in paid. Right? And when you cannot get out of bed and you're like, Oh, all of a sudden you have$1,000 out of nowhere to spend on yourself. But before that you bought a Gucci belt or a Gucci purse or whatever else was important.
Speaker 2:I um, one of my favorite quotes I actually, I actually heard this year, um, was that if you think wellness is expensive, try illness. And, and also to be clear too, before we started recording, you and I were both saying, you know, it's tricky when we're in this field and we're, we're really excited about encouraging other people to take care of themselves, that sometimes we have to be mindful that we don't slip as well. So there's nothing about, about this world that makes us better or lead us. We're still susceptible to the same things. I think that it's just we have so much more information and we see this play out over and over again. I know that I see it in clients myself, especially the ones that I'm seeing regularly, that they come in and they've been spending thousands of dollars on physio treatments, on massage treatments, on pain, and then
Speaker 1:that pain medication makes them like mentally feel really not totally there and they decide to instead spend less than what they're spending on that. On coming in and working on their mobility and it ends up being a lot less expensive over time with a much better quality of life.
Speaker 5:Um, in my opinion, and I, and I've seen it work all the time, is that I believe people need to invest into their, invest their time first into executing on daily basis and to something small. So my advice would be if you can find 20 minutes every day is better than and now three times per week because you will build a habit. Building a habit is more important than being in the gym for three times per week. So 20 minutes every day is going to build a long lasting change and you can perform the same five exercises as long as these exercises smartly developed for you to make sure that you feel better, whether you have a low back pain or hip pain or a shoulder pain, it doesn't really matter, right? Because the consistency is one of the most important factors in making a change. Uh, if we talk about long lasting difference in the health besides like 20 minutes our stuff and people spending money on let's say on um, pills or anything else like that, it's actually creating mindfulness and taking time to themselves to actually think properly and then plan out their workouts. Whenever I talked to a lot of different clients is an I train like from athletes to cos to models, right? It's managing the stress level. I probably would be one of the biggest thing. You manage the stress level and you will be able to lose some weight and you will be able to decrease your inflammation right away. But to manage the stress level, you need to look at your sleep, right? Because if you don't, the Straub stress level is a cortisol just release on the phone. And if we talk about women, when you release more cortisol, you also release more estrogen than if you do that, then women start feeling puffy and bloated, right? But you can decrease that by decreasing the stress level. Two ways to decrease stress level, get better sleep and at the same time go into a deep sleep. And at the same time you want to make sure that you increase them mindfulness, which is simple breathing or if you can meditation practices. Uh, and I believe the fitness industry altogether is now at more of a gray area to what actually works and what doesn't. And I believe if you follow like the cool, um, pages where it's like very, everything is very intense and it's very shiny and you know, girls show, let's say mostly like get their clients with a butts and like stomachs and the six backs and the guys always topless. That's not always the sustainable way. It's like what we're all, it's like looking at the Ferrari and like, Oh, I want to fit right here so I'm going to go like, it's a shiny object but it's never will deliver longevity. It's rare where a person talks about longevity and combines looks, there are some really good people and, but it's like maybe 20% of an industry. Everybody else is mostly concentrates on making money and providing you like this a cookie cutter stuff or like they advise that everybody followed for a long period of time and you need some kind of sword and ask the right questions because you want to create a lifestyle. You don't want to create a quick fix.
Speaker 2:So one of the things that I think, well I shouldn't say I think that I have seen you do so, so well, is you do this really fabulous job of knowing that you care so much clearly about, I'm like literally seeing your eyes light up. It's spirit. I love watching people talk about what they're passionate about. It's really cool. Um, but you obviously know what you're talking about and care deeply about education for yourself and your clients, but you make it fun and you make it feel like, okay, this is your goal. You know, your goal could be to grow your butt or it could be to lose fat or it could be, have to have a better quality of life. Whatever the like broader goal is that you can see all those little deep steps along the way. You do a great job of making it feel accessible and fun. And I know you were in different fields, which we can totally get into later online and individually, but I know you do group classes as well. And so I'm wondering knowing, uh, how you feel about body mechanics and seeing some of the stuff that you do. How do you feel about group fitness? And if people are like, okay, look, I would love to be able, I would love to be at a place where I can afford someone to do all of this, you know, money can be, I understand. So maybe group fitness right now is the only thing they can do. Do you have any recommendations on what people should look for in the instructors that they're going to see or the types of classes that they're taking and just generally how you feel about that overall?
Speaker 5:Um, so this is a no way to tell that some of these facilities are not good facilities. So it's a disclaimer. But yeah,
Speaker 2:I'm so excited for what's about to come.
Speaker 5:Um, so I'm going to use like, and I like them like I liked it, but I went on to people understand that there's a different level of fitness, right? And you need to understand and you need to check your ego, uh, before you think you're an intermediate and advanced or a beginning, right? Because a lot of beginners thing, they're intermediate and a lot of intermediate things, they're advents. Then when you really look on their mechanics, uh, the advanced could be they know a lot, but that doesn't make them advance. If you don't know how to move in there. One thing that I want you to concentrate on, if you have two left feet when it comes to movement, and if you, if you cannot dance, right, most likely, you probably don't move that well because you don't have that ability to spatial ability. And you need to understand that everything that like, if you've not never played sports, you're also most likely a beginner when it comes to working out because you don't know. You don't, you're not aware of your body in space. You don't have kinesthetic, uh, properties. So if you are a beginning, you know that you're a beginner. You want to stay away from any kind of berries, uh, treadmill, orange factories, uh, have 40 fives for good reason because you're going to probably over time getting injured, you will lose a lot of weight. Walking and tracking you amount of steps you do per day will also help you to lose weight. But so if it comes to the classes, if you would begin a stay away from any super, super high intensity, more than 20 people per class type of thing, because you're not going to get a feedback one-on-one feedback, you need to be working where there is at least some kind of form correction touch. And when you go say like, Oh, go to the classes, if somebody's standing 15 meters away from you and says, push your bud back, it's not a form correction. If there's no hands involved is probably no, it's, you're not getting farmed corrected because you not understanding on at that high pace to understand what actually happens is very good.
Speaker 2:And wait, can I side note? Yes. But if someone's touching you, they should always ask permission first.
Speaker 5:Uh, according to you. Yes, absolutely. Uh, I personally, I'm bad at that. Uh, and I, and I'll be honest, I don't ask permission in a class. I tell them in the beginning of the class, that's, that's what I do. If anybody feels uncomfortable, they have to tell me.
Speaker 2:That's fair though. That's still asking permission
Speaker 5:because I don't have time in June the class, cause I want to make sure that you get though the results that you want. But
Speaker 2:though like, cause I just think as we were talking about this and I think it's a good conversation to have because they know, so safety, trauma, awareness, all that stuff. This is why I think group class conversations are so fascinating because depending where you go, I totally on the same page with you with F 45 an orange theory. Again, like, I'm so sorry. I know a lot of people that I care about love these classes and it's by no means to put it aside. But with the conversation we're specifically having about body mechanics and correction and awareness, I'd literally been, um, myself in an orange theory class. I had a friend who was teaching and I went to support her and there was someone doing an exercise. We both very clearly, it was very clear she was going to destroy her back the way she was doing it. And I got up and I went to my friend, which is like, in hindsight, was really very egotistical of me, but I was like hyperventilating. And I was like, did you, I just, she's going to really hurt herself. And this lady who I knew who was teaching class was like, I know, but that's just how they're going to do it. And I was like, this is fucked. So I think it's important to know, right? And like, and like you said at the beginning touches important too. And you say at the beginning of your classes, look, and it's true when you have a group of people, sometimes you're like, I just need to move you so that you're working in a safe way. And I'm, I'm also talking and giving instructions and I can't say two things at the same time, but you still give that notice at the beginning of process. Look, this is, there's probably going to be some hands on corrections. You have to let me know because otherwise I'm going to go in versus just being like, I'm going to put my hands on your hips from behind and not tell you.
Speaker 5:Okay.
Speaker 2:Done. I'm off my soapbox now,
Speaker 5:but let's summarize. So the easiest way to know. So first of all, there's a two tie. There's the three types of trainers and coaches, right? And I'll break it down. So first one is super knowledgeable who doesn't care. The second one is a person who really, really cares and there are a lot of them but just doesn't have enough knowledge. And a third one is the person who cares and is knowledgeable. So wherever you are, there's maybe about 10% of people who cares and not and is knowledgeable and majority of people in the other two. And that's the biggest issue with the fitness industry altogether because the marketing is what gets people clients. So a lot of people just market whatever they're good at and people just get the false understanding of where do you need to be. That's one thing that you need to understand. So when you go to these classes you need to figure out does this person actually care because the person who and are they knowledgeable. The next thing is when you take a class in my class, I always ask to be questions right is what is your intention of getting from this workout? If your intention is to come break a sweat, you can go to any classes like soul cycles on whatever cause you're going to be breaking sweat. If your intention is to get better at certain things at cardio, you can also go to spin co soul cycle, quad cycle, whatever else. But if your intention is to get better from our perspective, build muscle, lose body weight, create a healthier lifestyle and not to have tight hip flexors and quads, and then probably soul cycle quad cycles. Being an every other cycle is not the best for you because your hips are going to be fucking tight and then you need to understand it. So the first thing would have before you started your journey, you need to ask, what is my intention? Then the next time when you show up to a class, doesn't matter what class it is, you need to know what is the objective of the class. If you don't know what is the objective of the class and if your objective is just to sweat, you once again need to learn what actually has happened because there's so many other ways to sweat, right? If your objective is to be part of a community, you need to realize that your objective, it is part of a community, but it subconsciously might be like, but I also want to get results. So in the end you're going to have to decide whether community is more important or results are more important because a lot of classes out there that build amazing communities, which are absolutely incredible and we need social aspect, just don't deliver results. And the third question you need to ask is that, am I feeling it? Where am I supposed to be feeling it while I'm performing a fucking exercise? Because if your coach is not, or fitness instructor leading it and you don't like you, you don't know what exercise you're doing and you don't know what exactly you're performing and where you're supposed to be feeling it. And then you're supposed to be feeling it in your but you, but you feel it in your neck or in your left ear, then you're doing something wrong. And you should probably ask you so of, well, should I voice myself? And if you feel like you too intimidated because it's too big of a room where it's a dark room or the structure is too far, then you're in the wrong group. Those are the three things that you need to consider. So what is my intention to get out of workout, right? What am I actually doing and am I feeling in the area where I supposed to be feeling? And the book an instructor has to communicate that which, because a lot of people, the way of classes, that's what people choose. Now the next thing and which is the most frustrating thing that comes in my opinion is that I have a lot of people come in who are bloggers specifically and bloggers like to advertise for an other different classes because they have a very favorite teacher who's maybe really, really good and they jumped from one class to another class and another class. And I'm pretty sure a lot of people do that. Uh, and the problem with that comes in if you have a specific goal and you put the goal, you wrote it in a journal, you put it on a wall or whatever you did and you go as I want to make sure that my low back doesn't hurt and I want to lose body weight. And you go into the classes that are not aligning with your goals. Like I'm going to go do boxing. Boxing is not going to help you with your lower back, but it's good for my mental health. Then you've got to check yourself again and see like what did you write on the paper? Was it actually true? Is that your goal? So you need to figure out what your journey is and then make sure that you're aligned. Classes if you go into berries, which is, I would say if you're an intermediate to advanced is amazing. Like I hate running, so I go to bury. Then I have friends, uh, who are teaching the classes. I'll go take their classes, but I don't consider bears a real workout. I consider it so my cardio workout, because I'll go after berries, I'll go do another workout because it's more of a cardiovascular and I never, and I concentrated on muscle, my connection. So, but I don't lift heavy enough weights. But the point I'm trying to make is that if you are a class person, decide what facility you go in. And then in this facility talk to them, what classes should I be taking if I have this issue? Like a lot of people take animal flow and I like kind of a flow and I know people who teach animal flow, but if you have a hip flexor issue then you need to make sure that the teacher who teaches you an animal flow creates the whole flow around opening up your hips and majority of the times is not going to be the case. 80% is going to be spending in a hip flection, which is going to tighten up your hip even more. So it's what questions do you ask when you go into the fitness and are you actually getting benefit from the classes that you've taken and if you taking four or five different classes or three different classes, are they aligning with what you want to achieve? Because in the end you're going to get frustrated if you're not seeing results of a certain period of time where you end up, okay, I've been going for three months, I've been taking classes and yes, I'm noticed some results, but all of a sudden I pull out a toad and my knees are hurting, my elbows are hurting, and all of a sudden you're like, why the fuck am I doing this? And it becomes frustrating and like, what am I doing wrong? And then you start doubting yourself and then it becomes a mental battle, which is way worse. I'd rather you not lose five pounds and then have healthy mental state, then lose that weight and then be mentally unhealthy because it's going to be so much worse for you. So when you go to fitness classes, you have to figure out what is my goal, what am I intentions, how would work? And ask as many questions as possible and then decide. But if you would begin it, high intensity shouldn't be the way to start. If you can do something with high testing maybe once per week, but if it's like three, four times per week, high intensity, you're definitely gonna end up getting injured or over time feeling certain type of things.
Speaker 2:I really appreciate your conviction and passion explaining that cause I feel the same way too. And I think especially in Toronto with things like class pass and competing studios, there's sort of this culture especially I feel like because uh, attendees can leave reviews. I feel like I've had this from studios before where they're like, just make sure everybody's happy. Make sure like suddenly one person, you at the front, it's your job to make sure everybody is doing everything well and you cannot physically give 100% of your energy to a class because chances are you have to teach another class that day and another class. And so I, I believe it has to be at least 50 50 where I'm offering something. And as an attendee you have to be willing to at least listen, maybe not take it. Maybe you're like, you know what? I don't want to do that today. And that's fine. But like that exchange of as a person showing up, you have to be accountable as well for the choices that you're making. It's not, it's not somebody else's responsibility. And that's such a reflection as well as what you were saying about your recovery process, that it wasn't until you were like, I've been going to someone else to get better, but I have to do it for me, that that change happens. And so I think it's really interesting, these little decisions that we can make in what seems to be different compartments of our life actually are all completely connected and are completely related. And I appreciate how much you talk about mindfulness because mindful movement is so important for our body's safety. And I'm wondering if that's something that you innately had in you because you were an, is that something that you were taught through your basketball career or is that something that came through recovery or is that something that came
Speaker 5:well, I believe I have a little bit of a, like a innate ability slash talent. I concentrate on the details. Like I see things like even let's say in my clients, and this is point example, but uh, my client will get a haircut and I will notice her that she got a haircut. I will compliment it. She'll like my boyfriend didn't notice it then you did. Right. So because for me to be good at the coaching and the movement, I have to see things to pay attention to details. So I'll know that what shoes you wear yesterday are like how complements a girl in the shoes as well. Because I know like, Hey, like also beautiful shoes and I know people take pride. So paying attention now always says details matter. Like that's super important. I don't think I was as detail oriented until I got further into like studying movement and understanding it more. But I always had that innate ability to see it. And, and I believe like whenever I teach my class barefoot and because I want to make sure that, and it's not a yoga class, it's a lifting class, but what you should bear for it because people have issues with their feet. So I want to strengthen their, uh, dexterity of their toes and the arch because a lot of people have flat arches and people really, they cannot fix their feet when you can with a proper movement. It's just not people. People don't want to spend time because it's not sexy fixing their feet. It's not like,
Speaker 2:honestly if people are like, but my toes and I'm like, yeah, let's work your toes.
Speaker 5:Exactly right. So, and I'm not saying that's what you should be doing all the time, but you can incorporate into your training for like 10 minutes every day or what we do in the class, we just do the whole class barefoot. Right. Which allows you to create a better balance and whatnot. And I love yoga or when it's done properly with the proper teachers cause they will know how to load. Not every teacher is the same obviously. Um, but I just kind of fell into like I understood how important the details are because when you train professional athletes and when you play professional sports is that small detail is the difference between common first and second versus scoring and go and not scoring Nicole. Right? Would that form bride recruiting certain muscles like locking out your elbow versus not locking out the elbow that really, really matters. And when you want to lift heavier or be faster or do certain things, you really gotta pay attention to the details. And I believe in the industry is just completely overseen. And, uh, I tried to bring in it so my class, and I don't know many trainers that do even like it's just, there's no intention before every single class. Like people don't tell the same stuff that I was setting up. Like you got to bring and tell people the responsibility aspect of what we're talking about. Similar to until I started to taking responsibility for my actions and everything that is, there's a quote, everything. The reason where you are is just some of all your choices.
Speaker 4:As simple as that, everything that happens to you is your own responsibility. Don't blame your ex boyfriend, ex boy, girlfriend, the money you lost, you fucked up. You take the responsibility to not your boss. You could have, it's not the reason because DTC was like there are certain things that are happening, but it's always your responsibility. As soon as you start understanding that everything that happens is your responsibility and you have nobody but yourself to blame, it literally will change your life. And I believed that people need just to take more responsibility for everything that happens and it's super hard. I've been there, I'm out of there and I talk to people and I constantly push people and it's very uncomfortable conversation and people cry and that's okay. And because if you stay in a comfort zone, you never going to grow. Right? So, and as cliche as that sounds, sometimes we need to cry. Sometimes we need to get into arguments. I'll tell you this much. So, and this is where was a breaking point for me. So I had an ex girlfriend, uh, and part of my story is I was dating somebody who was sexually abused by a stepfather and through her teens, right? So I was not only carrying my weight and uh, when I was going through my depression, but I was also carrying her weight and I was completely broke down. And this is where it was a complete meltdown. I was one of two classes. We, when both, where'd your university and she called me out. So she's lagged this five, five cute curly hair. Light-skin girl me at that time, one 85, a whatever it is, like tried to live, still kind of not feeling the greatest. And she called me out, she said, well, got into big argument and she said, you using your injury as a crutch, you get you gave up. And she just like, she let me have it. Like she screamed at me. She's the only girl who I have a cut to let me have it. By the way, at the time, I would never let anybody speak in the way she spoke to me. Like she literally leveled me with the ground. I was so upset. I took off my shoe and threw it at her head.
Speaker 6:And this is like in campus
Speaker 4:on campus like nobody, like I really, and this is like, and I realized how low of a moan, cause like I would never raise a, a a not like my arm on, on a girl and never done anything like that. Right. But I was so, but I took off and I try and I aimed at her head. I missed, but I was so upset. I remember that day till that moment, because that was the day I started to train again. I started to play basketball again. Whatever I could do. It wasn't pain, but I was going through it every single day. I was stretching more. I was doing my exercises, I was started studying more. I started, I started my Mark starting to go back up and university. And I still remember that moment. But the thing is, if she never challenged me, I would have been still miserable. I still would be in that space. How low it had been blaming everybody else because I was blaming everybody else because like, Oh, why did it happen to me? Why didn't happen to somebody else? And that's why it's super important. And recently I traveled to, so Lulu lemon, uh, have this thing they have, it's called sweat grow connect and it's called the huddle. And they took influential people from all over North America and they flew down to New York and I got lucky enough to be one of them. Uh, thank you very much for that experience. And was a three day. There were excellent VA players. There were rappers, mottoes trainers, people who do incredible things in the community. And uh, we worked out together. And then we shared our stories and we talked about certain things. And I can disclose some of the stuff that we were actually, because it's a private information, it was very vulnerable. But I'll tell you this much, that grown ass men who are 200 plus pounds, six, eight, six, five women, everybody cried sharing their story. And when you heard what these people went through and what they ended up doing with their lives, I looked in my shit and I was like, wait up. Why am I complaining? Like these people doing way more with way less or they achieved way more with way less. So whatever you think you're going through, as long as you take responsibility. And there's always two ways. There's always a choice. There's a choice to bail and there's a choice to take it to the next level. And if you choose to surround yourself with the people who support you and you want to be a lot like that, you'll be, you'll end up getting to where you want to go. Because these people went through some serious thing and, and grown men. And I'm not saying women didn't cry, but I want to make a statement because we're talking about the whole mantra thing. But the grown men broke down and cried about a circumstances, but they would talk about how they creating a charities and funds and all this stuff. And you go like, wow, rarely and I'm complaining about broken foot or broken hip or when person went through like five concussions and could have walked, right? So it just puts things into perspective and you start becoming grateful for what you have and what you can do. And I think we just don't do enough that, uh, and that's the, and that's the bottom line. And I think we just need to put ourselves in a room with more people that you want to be like, if you want to be raised, put yourself in the rooms with the rich people. If you want to be healthy, hung out with healthy people. If you want to be happy, hang out with happy people and you'll start noticing that it's rubs off. And everybody on the list create a list. Two people to two columns, one column, people who inspire you, people who you should feel happy around, people who really you can't wait to see and then create another list. Honestly, another site created a list of people who drain your energy and I don't care if it's your mom, brother, sister, if it's your boyfriend or girlfriend, if they end
Speaker 5:up being on a blood sucking energy, sucking side, you have to figure out either how to have a conversation or kind of slutty slowly eliminate them out of your life and hang out with people that you really, really enjoy and you really look up to. And you'll notice that if you man up and you did that step, it doesn't matter what circumstances you have, there's always a solution. You might not know it, you might not, it might take you a time to figure it out. But if you put yourself in your, truly be in a position where you have, Hey, I believe I can change, it will change.
Speaker 1:I just first wanted to apologize for laughing. I'm sitting here and, and knowing you like in this little bubble that I know you and it's so hard for me to imagine you being so angry to do that. So made me giggle. But
Speaker 5:it's fine because listen, I was so angry that I was like, it's not like me. Like I, I would never do that then. Uh, but it just got me so mad because she was so right. I knew she was so right and it was just a scream for help. And when I did it, I was like, as I walked out, first of all, I said, I can't believe that I threw at somebody, uh, Mushu and somebody that I love, uh, and that time and I apologize the same night. And then like I just started a new chain reaction of things. And like, there's certain elements that happen in our lives where we don't know what actually happens, but it just elevates us to the next level.
Speaker 1:I, um, once I was like out of the hospital, able to like function around pupil. My uh, so I was raised in a household where it was very like we follow the rules, we do the rules, the rules exist to make us all happy, keep us all in place. Even though like now as an adult I can see that my parents are complete hooligans in the best possible way. They like really wanted to instill that in us. And maybe three weeks, maybe a month. And after all of my, like major stuff had happened and it was really settling in. I was very angry as we all do. And so I had a friend that was like, I have a carton of eggs. We're going to wheel you into the car. We're going to go throw exit shit. And I remember telling my mom, cause at that point I was like, literally my whole life has disappeared. Like no one, I can't get grounded. I can't even walk. Like what are they going to do? And so I remember telling my mom like, so-and-so is pulling up with their van. We have a curtain of bags, we're just gonna go throw eggs at shit. And my mom was like, have a good time. Not on people, but like we did and we just like, Oh such rule against until she got, she went to throw up, my friend ended up driving and she was like, you guys are having so much fun. I'm missing out. And so she went to throw an egg and it hit the top of the car on the inside and then the fun was over. But so there there's sometimes value in throwing things just not at people. Um, I really wanted to, to share something that you had shared with me before we started recording. So a lot of what you're doing right now is very focused around women and the community women. And I think that that's really cool. I've said to you before, I have an issue with male people telling me what to do movement wise with my body, but you are a person who I would take that from for sure. Um, but you have a very cool future thing that you would like to create. And I was wondering if you wanted to share about that yet.
Speaker 7:Um, so yes, I do work a lot with women and I have the community that created a colder PGW workout. So to BG workout, better glutes workout, then I kind of, uh, work with a lot of women and I love working with women and I believe, uh, like women are more receptive to feedback, which is absolutely amazing. Um, men are not. And uh, so actually because of that in the future, I'm not doing it yet. It's cause I want it. I'm still building BG. Uh, but I believe the vulnerability aspect when it comes to men is lacking significantly. And, um, I will be creating this community called the gentleman's collective, um, the God idea while ago, because I felt like maybe sometimes you see in the movies that do, you know, these guys hang out every single Friday and it's so realistic and they play hoops and then they have no problems. And I wanted to grade something for men to become better human beings, become better men for their wives, girlfriends or whatever, and also feel supported. Similar women build an incredible community for each other where they support and push themselves and I guess it came a lot from inequality over time, but men usually do not have an outlet to open up and be vulnerable and share their experiences and sometimes they don't want to talk about issues that come into their household so they don't want to bring stress and talk to their girlfriends or wives and spouses and they just kind of hold it in and over time it might become an anger, resentment. Not every men, not every guy has a solid group of friends because they fell into a relationship and kind of drifted. And I know when we get older and we kind of take a path of being in relationship and our partner becomes our best friend, sometimes we drift off a lot and just creating a support and I believe it needs to be done for both women and men and in all dynamics of partnership and they'll all dynamics of partnership. I completely agree with you, but I decided to do something closer to the summer or like may April potentially to where be concentrating specifically on guys meeting up, like doing some sports stuff and then like around talk where man could actually be vulnerable. Learn how to be a real gentleman, learn about how to be a better human being. Learn how to be a better man and a friend and a spouse, right? To make sure that it just continues. Education and personal development. You know, I'm wearing this hoodie, so do more V better and it's kind of something that I live by. So everything is in that learning opportunity and I feel like man could really step up and get rid of their ego. Learn how to be vulnerable and the real strength comes in a vulnerability because you become so much more emotionally intelligent and emotional intelligence is where it's actually add because it's allows you to communicate and build tribes way more efficient.
Speaker 1:When you were going through your rehab process, you're 21, I think you sat in all of this came crushing down into you and then you had to go through your recovery journey. Did you feel like you had that support?
Speaker 7:No, I had, I had no support. I mean, I had some friends show now I'm like, but that's what I realized. And over time you realize even now when you were, I can talk to your body, you probably have a couple of close friends, but they are on a different path. And because they're in a different path, they don't understand what you going through. So they cannot relate. So sometimes you meet a stranger who understands you better. You become so much closer because you're on the same path. Like I have right now, we're really close friends. She's a female and her name is Ashley and she's actually, she is my client. But we became such close friends because she is on that spiritual journey. She did Iowasca and uh, she's just, I just want to level up so, and whenever I tell her let's do something, we just do things together and it's random. And when she asked me to do something, I'm like, yeah, cool. Because we just feel that compatibility and energy where like we just as friends want to do things that other people don't want to do. And it's rare when you find somebody and I didn't feel supported whatsoever. I mean my parents didn't understand what I was going through. My friends didn't understand what I was going through. So that's why I was a lonely space. And like people will come in and be like, how are you doing when you called K? Right. But unless you like their needs, there are definitely a need for groups and calming out. And that's why maybe like AA is so successful and others, the groups for posttraumatic stress disorders who was so successful because you share in your understand that you're not alone on that path. That's why thank you very much for having this podcast because whoever will reach in to know, hear the stories though, understand that Hey, there are multiple people who actually got their shit together and ended up doing very successful things after going through an injury or whatever.
Speaker 1:That's truly why this came to be. It was for me that are, I mean, very similar. I was lucky that I do feel lucky in a way that my experience also happens so gang because it really very quickly became clear who were friends that were deep like soul bone friends and who were friends that were just superficial surface friends. And I feel very grateful, a lot of the deep, true, best friends that I had before then. Were those people during that or, and are those people now as well? Yeah, and I feel that with, I feel very lucky that I, that I had that because I know that a lot of don't
Speaker 2:or even without having had something traumatic happen, right. Just in day to day life. Um, and that community is so important and I appreciate that. It's something, it's trickier for me as a female because I do feel that sense of community immensely. I know there's sometimes still the stigma of girls can be catty with each other and and bring each other down. I don't either. I honestly, no I,
Speaker 7:I think it's the best time to be a female is right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I feel I feel uplifted by all the people and inspired by all my female friends and that's something that I have chatted about with my boyfriend and I have that curiosity about him and his friends cause they feel like that doesn't as organically as exists maybe. And I don't necessarily feel like it's fair for me to comment on that cause I don't know. But so for you to talk about it is really is really cool.
Speaker 7:I witnessed it on both sides because I worked so much with females. I actually don't have too many male friends from that perspective because I worked so many with females. But the guys that I do with were they all pretty much taking the same path of personal development. So it's easy to be supported even from the distance because like, uh, two of my closest friends, a PhD in education for the maltreat and they create an enough for profit organization for marginalized communities, right? So to be at that level and making a change, you have to be emotionally involved and, uh, you know, put in work and you understand what support means and go through certain traumatic experiences. So I'm lucky enough to have, even though they might not be so close with me, uh, is the people who are willing to make a leap is just, people don't prioritize it enough yet. And I feel women are just way better at prioritizing that. Let's call it a girl time, right? Or girl, girl social time. Right? Um, we like guys don't like, yeah. Like, cause a lot of people have a stigma. Like, let's go to a bar, get some drinks, right. When it's sometimes having a healthy conversation is, that's all that you really need to feel support and be able to overcome. Uh, but I think, so the thing is in the, in the back in the day and, um, uh, cave men, uh, times, right when, whenever woke evolving, right? We weren't building tribes. Now tribes were about the capacity of a tribe is about 150 people because after that it becomes a non[inaudible] manageable to know every single person. So based on the research and the books that I read, like that's what we, and we all seeking the social interaction and we all know that people who even smoke and drink, if they have really good social life, they live longer than the people who access has and feel excluded. Uh, right. So the idea is to create the support system and that's why the tribes lived for longer and they hunted and gathered whatever they did. Uh, because of the communication, because of the community, because of, uh, you know, being so involved in each other's lives and being supported and because it releases a different hormone. So there's a different hormones that were released based on, uh, whether we are a part of a community or we do things on our own. And in the end when you really serotonin, right, is being a part of the community. Right? And we don't always release, release that hormone if we're not, and that we feel shitty on the inside. That's why I drink it. It explains why during Christmas, a lot of people feel lonely even though it's all happy. But even they feel like their relationship with their families and not, not the greatest or their friends or they're like, you know, they recently got out in a breakup. I'm happy for you, but I'm suffering right here in silence. And that's why I bring in something together. It's super important. That's why I did like this. Tomorrow on Friday we're going, I invited, I felt like some of the girls from my classes, they were going through some stuff and I said, why don't we all just go to a Christmas Mark and I hang out and drink mob wine and hot chocolate and just be like together. And so you understand that other people cared because other people do care and other people do. Uh, how love for you is just sometimes you don't see it because you don't interact enough or you don't feel supported, but other people really do think highly and sends you the love on daily basis and they think very, very well about you. You just need to make sure you put yourself out there or you speak up or create something. So I decided to be a leader in that space where I'm like, Hey, why don't I do something? Because I know if I feel it, either people feel it too.
Speaker 2:I feel like I could talk to you forever and I feel like you have so many amazing things coming up in the future, so I'm hoping we can sit down and get some of that stuff is happening. I have two questions for you. So if someone has been listening to this and whether they are injured or not, but they're like, I want to do what Nikita's doing, I want to start getting into training. Do you have any recommendations for people about like, okay, you've decided you want to be a personal trainer or a fitness, whoever programs, the training programs that you've either used and loved or that exist now that you recommend with everything that you know, if someone is like, yes, I want to take this path, I'm curious, where would you start them off?
Speaker 7:That's a little bit of a tougher question because I learn everything from being in the physiotherapy for like 12 years. So every single time I was in physiotherapy I would ask questions. So everything that we're doing, I'm asking, I'm already have the same background so I'm just like, I've got this vast amount of knowledge. Like some of the physiotherapist basically say I'm a hybrid between physiotherapists and the train I because I know so much and I implement the stuff that they teach,
Speaker 4:uh,
Speaker 2:your own training program for people because I would love to learn from you.
Speaker 4:There is something that we were going to be working this year where I will be creating something like an online course from the, some of the basic things. And it's like I work with some trainers and I currently teach some trainers as well, like I'll be doing more seminars, but if you want to like really look and learn certain things on the book. So Kelly start, uh, becoming a supple leopard. That's a great book to read about mobility, like starting and stuff up. Um, uh, I've taken a course by a Godsu joy. Mobility of flexibility is a great course to take, uh, taken a course for from uh, FRC functional range conditioning. Just don't understand what is a full body tension and the kind of how to implement it. So I would say FRC. Uh, I got Sue joined mobility, um, and Kelly started books and then you can also look up glute guy. Uh, he's has a book by Glu, his name is breath Contrares so like you would understand, but my biggest advice would be take everything with a grain of salt and don't develop your own system and understanding of stuff. You also can go to a Darby a school of like there's a power lifting or some of the basic courses that they teach. And a one more course would be a thing that they called the foot collective. They talk about feet, right? So like if you do any combination of these things, that would be really, really good. It will make you understand more what the body's about. And then later on you can get into like anatomy trains, which is a myofascial lines and stuff like that, which you do need to understand. But I would not jump in into it right away.
Speaker 2:Totally. It can be, if you don't already have an understanding of the system, it can feel like too much, like too much. Um, so we know where we're, where you're potentially going in the future. People who are like, yes, let's do it now. BG w what is it? We're going to take it, but it is happening.
Speaker 4:So you can follow BG underscore workout. It's an Instagram page. Uh, we currently rebranding, but there's a lot of content on it already. And we'll be releasing more content. Uh, actually have a trainer who's coming in from Alberta to work with me for the next three months to provide you guys with more value. Um, besides that, I teach classes at little lemon. They attic spit Dinah and queen. Uh, in Toronto. Yes, in Toronto. Uh, I teach it twice per week, Monday nights and Saturday mornings. And on Saturday mornings I actually do something really cool where it's an hour and a half class and I teach mobility and I teach the CLA the typical class. Plus once per week I bring a guest where we do like either meditation or we talk about, uh, we did a safe circle before and I'm actually gonna bring a shuffle dancer to teach people how to dance. So it's kind of like just building, but I
Speaker 7:do specialize, uh, on like if a typical class is concentrating more on how to wake up your glutes, how to understand that if you squat, you want to feel it in the glutes, quads and hamstrings, not only in quads, if you have certain issues, should you be squatting or deadlifting or should I be sticking? So unilateral movements and there's a lot of feedback. So that would be like the my main class. And uh, I also do a coaching one on one and a online coaching and the programs. And if you follow either BG underscore workout or my personal Instagram, Nikita underscore B, N, T, G. N, you'll be able to see the links, click on the links and you can sign up to whether you want to get it free assessment or audit of your health or you just want to come into the classes.
Speaker 2:Do you have anything final you want to leave people with? There's a little nugget of Nikita that they, they take home with them.
Speaker 7:As I said before, I would say the first thing that she need and the most important thing you need to concentrate on as everything is uh, everything comes from you. So you got to take responsibility for everything that happens. There's a great book, two books that I give to all my clients to read. One is called men up by bedrest. Cool. Coolin is just very real. It's like a CEO of a fitness, a franchise, and the company who almost had a heart attack or, or I remember heart attack or anxiety attack and he changed his whole life. And another book is by dr Joe Dispenza called breaking a habit of being yourself. So those two books are really good one and they completely polar opposites, but they will literally start a new journey on the right path. And another one I would say be very mindful of how you approach your fitness journey. Ask right questions for what you want to accomplish, who you're working with, and are those people, are those classes that are right for you? And don't just rush in and just do your investigation because we spend more time figuring out what cards and by then who, what class to go or who to invest. Just because somebody said somebody is good. Even if somebody says I am good, don't believe them. Go try it out. Then only then make a decision on your own test drive the fucking car.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for all that you shared now all that you share all the time. Anyway, check out Nikita's Instagram if you haven't already. There's so much that you shared just on there. That's unbelievable and I really appreciate you being here. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 7:Thank you very much. It was my pleasure
Speaker 2:unicorn mugs forever. Thank you so much, Nikita, for being a part of the podcast and for sharing your story. If you haven't been to a B GW workout in Toronto, make sure you check out the Lulu lemon attic studio at Spadina and queen and follow at Nikita underscore, P N T G N on Instagram for all the awesome events he has coming up. I love being able to interview different perspectives, so I really appreciate his willingness to share some of the struggle as well as the success. If you want to keep hearing stories of resilience, please make sure to subscribe and leave a five stars so we can keep this community growing. If you know someone who would really benefit from hearing the[inaudible] story, please feel free to share this episode with them. And if you want to stay in touch between episodes, you can follow the podcast on Instagram at embodied alchemy dot pod and me your host, Dominique on Instagram at Dom Chesh. Thank you so much for being here. I will see you next week.
Speaker 3:[inaudible].