by Golda Poretsky, HHC
www.bodylovewellness.com

Now that we’ve tackled how to move past resistance to exercising and we’ve come up with some suggestions for building your fitness level no matter what your size. Now let’s get an extra boost of motivation from a fat competitive dancing champion, founder of the Body Positive Dance School, and all around awesome woman, Ragen Chastain (shown at right).

Golda: Tell me a little about what you do.

Ragen: I am a competitive dancer who founded Body Positive Dance School and Company in order to make sure that dance is accessible to people of all sizes, to forward the principles of Health at Every Size, and to challenge stereotypes about dancers of size.

Golda: How long have you been involved in dancing? What about competitive dancing?

Ragen: I’ve danced and choreographed my whole life: jazz, cheer-leading, drill team, figure skating, swing choir, etc. I started competing in Country Western dance in 2004.

Golda: I think a lot of us assume that you have to be very thin to be accepted in competitive dance. How did you get past that assumption?

Ragen: It isn’t always easy to be accepted as a dancer when you have a non-traditional body. I’m lucky to have a lot of natural talent at dance and as an athlete. I also work very hard, and I love to perform. I never use my size as an excuse, and I have a continuing goal to be stronger, faster and more flexible than the traditionally sized dancer with whom I compete. While it may not be fair, people my size are judged by a different standard – anytime something goes wrong there is a tendency to just blame my weight, which, while seemingly obvious, has never been the actual problem. I’ve never found an issue in my dancing that better technique couldn’t fix!

Even so, when I first started there were judges who told me that they wouldn’t raise my scores until I lost weight, and a judge once told me that she couldn’t stand to look at me because my arms were too fat. Conversely I have had plenty of people who watched from the crowd tell me that I am an inspiration to them. I might even go so far as to say that I’ve been a crowd favorite. In my favorite incident a little girl came up to me with her Dad trailing behind. She told me that her Dad wouldn’t let her sign up for dance because she was too fat. While I was standing there he apologized to her, told me that I was amazing, and agreed to sign her up for dance class the next day. While I’ve had competitive success – including three National Championships – I find that by concentrating on being an artist and entertainer rather than concentrating on getting anyone’s approval, dancing has more meaning for me, and I am happier doing it.

Golda: What are your dance classes like?

Ragen: The classes are choreography based rather than technique based. That means that we focus on having fun moving our bodies rather than on having perfect technique. We always start with a reminder of the main rule – that there is absolutely no talking about weight loss in the class. We create a space in which we are more interested in what our bodies do than what they look like. We always start with a warm-up and end with a cool-down. In between we might do musical theater, modern, jazz, Latin or other styles of dance. The most important thing is that we have a blast.

Golda: What would you recommend to someone who wants to be more active but isn’t sure where to start?

Ragen: The people I have seen be the most successful at becoming more active have done so with a goal to enjoy activity and appreciate their bodies, rather than just focusing on trying to change their size or shape. Before you even try to become more active, start by appreciating your body for everything it does right now – whatever that might be. Just the simple things: your heart is beating, you are breathing etc. Keep the focus on appreciating all of the things that your amazing body does for you, and try a bunch of things to find out what you like to do – whether it’s yoga, dancing, kayaking or something else.

Golda: Please tell me more about the Body Positive Movement.

Ragen: My understanding of the Body Positive Movement is a journey to a place where we don’t make judgments about ourselves or others based on their size, whether they weigh 80 pounds or 500 pounds. A place where people’s self-esteem is not linked to their body size.

Golda: Where can people find you and your classes?

Ragen: All of the information about the classes (including videos of the Performing Company and the ability to sign up for our Body Positive Newsletter) is at www.bodypositive.org. My personal blog is at www.danceswithfat.org

Thanks, Ragen, for sharing your inspiring story with us!
Remember, we have lots of new and exciting offers at Body Love Wellness! Starting October 7, I’m teaching a 3 week teleclass to support you in your intuitive eating and body love journey. Register now to secure your spot! And for the New Yorkers, I now have office hours in Manhattan on Wednesdays! Email me or leave a comment below to set up your consultation.

And as always, let’s stay connected. Please stop by my Facebook group and become a member of the Body Love Wellness Group! You can also follow me on Twitter.

Last week, we talked about how to move through resistance to exercise. This week, let’s get physical!

Before we get started, I want to talk about why we’re doing this. Though it may be difficult, I don’t want you to go into this with the motivation of weight loss. Some people do lose a bit of weight via exercise, and others don’t. But I don’t want you to think that exercising is “not working” if you’re not losing weight. I want exercise to be about health, feeling good, and loving your body – not weight loss. These are the questions I want you to ask yourself about your workouts:

—Do I like this workout? Is it fun?

—Does my body feel better and/or stronger when I do this workout?

—Do I have more energy?

—Do I feel less stressed?

—Do I have more mobility?

—Do I have more endurance?

If you’re answering “yes” to at least one of these questions, I believe that your workout is working. You may start to answer yes to more of these questions the more you exercise. And if you find that you’re not getting these benefits, it may be time to change what you’re doing.

So where do you start?

First, I would be remiss if I didn’t point you to a great blog from my co-writer at More of Me To Love. Each week, Andrew’s Fitness for All blog gives great fitness tips, from exercises you can do while sitting at your desk to stretches to strength training techniques. And if you’re in the San Francisco area, you may just want to make an appointment.

Personally, as someone who used to join gyms only to religiously attend for approximately 3 weeks, I’m now a big fan of working out at home. I mainly use an assortment of fitness DVD’s. Some of my favorites are Megan Garcia’s Megayoga DVD (she’s a plus sized model who developed this yoga series for bigger bodies), Rochelle Rice’s workout DVDs (very empowering and also for bigger people), and Kelly Bliss’s workout DVDs (empowering, size positive, and includes workouts for people with mobility issues, including sitting workouts). Fitness DVDs are great because they’re relatively cheap or even free if you get them from the library, and you don’t have to add travel time to your workout schedule.

If you’re looking for size positive exercise classes, Ms. Garcia and Ms. Rice both teach their classes weekly in New York and Ms. Bliss teaches classes in Philadelphia. Ragen Chastain, a plus sized competitive dancer and dance teacher, teaches dance classes in Austin, Texas where students are specifically forbidden to engage in diet talk.

Whether or not you can find size positive classes in your area, if you want to take a class, just go. Decide that feeling good is worth the risk of being the fattest or newest or whatever. Connect with the way the movement feels in your body, rather than your perception of people’s perception of you. Do it for your body, even if you’re mind is coming up with reasons not to go. And remember, it’s all research. If one class isn’t for you, try another until you find one that you like.

And if you do nothing else, put on some music and get your body moving. To help you along, here’s one from the Gossip.

Comment below and let us know what you like to do to move that gorgeous body of yours!

By the way, we have lots of new and exciting offers at Body Love Wellness! Starting October 7, I’m teaching a 3 week teleclass to support you in your intuitive eating and body love journey. Sign up by September 25th to join the class for only $100! And for the New Yorkers, I will now have office hours in Manhattan on Wednesdays! Email me or leave a comment below to set up your consultation.

And as always, let’s stay connected. Please stop by my Facebook group and become a member of the Body Love Wellness Group! You can also follow me on Twitter.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

In this two part series, I want to address an important part of Health At Every Size—exercise, or as Linda Bacon so eloquently puts it, “finding the joy in moving one’s body and becoming more physically vital.” We all know that exercise, when done in a way that is appropriate, has many wonderful properties, including mood elevation, improved cardiovascular health, and increased strength and endurance, just to name a few.

Finding the exercise that’s right for you and that feels good to you can often be more complicated than just getting to the gym or popping in a DVD. For many of us, we have to get through loads of guilt (like guilt over our barely utilized gym memberships or languishing exercise DVD collections) or shame (like feeling like the fattest person at a gym or track, or third grade gym class, or being picked last, or feeling ridiculed for our athletic ability as children) or overly high expectations (like, in order to be worth it, I have to exercise every day for at least 2 hours and keep my heart rate at x and get really good sneakers and join the best gym, etc. etc. etc.). With all these thoughts swimming (yes, exercising!) around our minds, we often psych ourselves out of exercising long before we even begin.

To be honest, some of my clients don’t even like the word exercise. To them, it connotes all of the above guilt, shame, expectations and more.

So, in the first part of this two part series, I’m going to address how to move through some of the gunk that will make exercising just what it should be: moving your body in a way that feels good.

First, take some time to free write about what “exercise” means to you. (If “exercise” doesn’t have strong connotations for you, try other words, like “working out” or “body movement.”) Just write freely and let the words flow.

What negative experiences did that exercise bring up? Spend some time acknowledging those negative experiences, even taking a moment to feel the pain of those experiences. And then, let them go. Acknowledge the pain and then let it go, knowing that those experiences were in the past and that they do not control your present reality.

Next, take some more time to free write on exercise, remembering some positive experiences. Maybe you enjoyed riding your bike, swinging on the swings, dancing to the radio, or certain sports. Spend some time acknowledging those good times with movement and feeling the fun of those experiences. Take a special note on any of these things that you might want to try again. Also mark any activities that you haven’t tried yet and might want to try. Let the words flow, without judging yourself or stopping yourself.

Lastly, spend some time free writing on your assumptions about exercise. Do you assume that exercise is boring, hard, only for certain people, only for weight loss, etc.? Bringing your assumptions about exercise to light will assist you in determining and moving through your negative associations with exercise and will allow exercise to become what it should be: fun, healing and enjoyable.

Doing the free writes above will allow you to exorcise your negative feelings and assumptions about exercise. Then, next week here at the Body Love Wellness Blog, we’ll get down to the nitty gritty about how to find body movement practices that are right for you.

As always, please become a member of the Body Love Wellness Facebook Group and follow me on Twitter!

We all know that exercising and moving our bodies is important, right? But sometimes I find that the word, “exercise,” induces a lot of negative feelings in my clients. It brings up endless school gym classes, fitness club memberships that were paid for and rarely used, and sometimes, even pain.

If exercise feels like a dirty word, then toss the word. Let’s just call it something else: playtime, funtime, movin-and-groovin time, or whatever strikes your fancy! I don’t care what you call it as long as you take some time to move your gorgeous body and shake what your momma gave ya!

Are you feeling it already? That sense of fun and play? Body movement is a fantastic way to bring it all back!

Before we get started, I’d like to say that if you enjoy going to the gym, then keep on doing it and having a blast. This article may help you infuse just a bit more fun into your workout.

And if you dislike going to the gym, that’s also great. That is a brilliant piece of information! You don’t like going to the gym. Fantastic! So now… what do you like to do?

You can think back to when you were a child. What games did you like to play? What movement did you enjoy? Did you like tag, or badminton, or tapdance, or dance parties in your room? Did you like swimming, or running as fast as you could, or doing yoga with your big sister? What movements gave you pleasure? What activities made you bound out of bed?

Looking back, are there any activities that you could do now? Is there a class you’d like to sign up for, a pool you’d like to jump into, or a playlist you’d like to create for your next living room dance party? There is still time to do all of these things. By reconnecting with your sense of play, you will not only move your body in a way that benefits you physically. You will also be reconnecting with your inner sense of youth and vibrancy.

And before your mind takes over, try this. Try asking your body what it would like. Take some deep breaths and ask your body, “Would you like to go for a swim? Would you like to have a dance party?” Feel the sensations in your body. If an idea gives you pleasure, then try it then and there or make plans to do so in the next few days. Leave a comment below and let us know how it went!

And don’t forget to check out my blog at More Of Me To Love!

Also, please stop by my Facebook group and become a member of the Body Love Wellness Group!