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Personal Trainer Michelle McIntyre is here to bring you the motivation, affirmation, and love you need to unleash your most powerful self. Always real and deeply personal, Michelle and her guests offer up experiences that will help you navigate the worlds of fitness, health, and wellness. Join her on this journey and discover that You Can Be A Fit Bitch Too!
00:13
Hey, you guys, it's Michelle and I'm back. Yep, that's right, I'm back. I'm back with a whole new season of You Can Be a Fit Bitch 2. I am so excited about this. It's gonna be a new season starting in September, going to November and the whole season is just gonna be incredible. I'm so excited to start this journey again with you guys. And this time we've got a little bit of a plot.
00:42
twist, just like life. Now, I guess I have to be a little honest and clear here. I know that I've been quiet for a while. And the reason that I've been quiet for a while in the past year or so is because I have been doing a lot of healing and I am actually ready to bring my story to you openly and honestly.
01:08
just to share what I've been through, what I've been going through, so that maybe I can help others. I always believe that we go through things in life and we all have a story and a story to share that can help others who may be going through something similar to give some light, some hope, some healing. I'm here this season to come back to tell you that we can rebuild our lives, we can reshape our lives, we can start a new chapter.
01:38
And we can begin again, even after loss, divorce, losing a home, going through mental health, depression. And all of that is linked to this one fundamental thing that I love and I am so immersed in, and that is the health and wellness field.
02:05
I just wanted to start by introducing myself for those of you who are just joining us in the second series of You Can Be a Fit Bitch 2, the rising series. My name is Michelle and I just wanted to give you a little bit of info on who I am and what I do. I have been in the fitness industry for over 30 years. I know, hard to believe I am 51. Going on 50.
02:35
Oh my God, I can't even believe I'm saying that, but I've been in the business of fitness and movement for a long time. And I love it. Love everything about it. I love what it does for people. I have done everything from personal training to group fitness classes, to running a gym, taught aerial fitness, pole, Pilates, you name it. I have dabbled in it and I love.
03:04
it so much. So this whole series of you can be a fit bitch too. The rising series is all about pivots, comebacks, restarts, regrouping, finding your voice, finding your path and finding your purpose with movement.
03:29
So that being said, I'm so excited to let you know that I am going to be having some amazing guests on here. Ones that are gonna inspire you with their pivots, with their plot twists, with their comebacks. You know, I think in this lifetime, we don't know what we're gonna be facing. And when we face adversity, we face challenging times. Sometimes we question everything and...
03:58
Not that this is anything new, but sometimes hearing it from other people's perspective, from other people's rebuilding, from other people's journeys, we gain strength, we gain wisdom, we realize that we're not alone in this life. And this podcast, I kinda wanna like revamp it, but we're just gonna put that little twist on it. It's gonna be Fit Bitch Rising. And it's all about
04:27
rising up, becoming who you're meant to be, being able to shift and change. And I'm so excited for some of the guests that I'm going to have on this season. em We're going to unpack the Ozempic journey, which is a big one right now. I know in the mainstream, um have a beautiful, wonderful client who is on that journey right now.
04:50
And I wanna debunk the myths. I want to dig into her personal journey with that and her decision on making that decision, because that is not a simple decision to make. I wanna kind of bring the mystery out of that and talk to her about her journey and how um she's doing right now and what she's gone through and how she got to the point where that was the decision that she wanted to make. I'm gonna talk to you about the menopause.
05:19
Oh no, the dreaded menopause and the menorrhage and all of the things that come along with menopause because I'm in that space right now. And I know many women that are going through that journey. Um, peri menopause, all of it. And the things that come with it that we don't talk about that, you know, sometimes you don't, you think you're the only one and you feel like you're going crazy. And there's so much information out there.
05:46
But I just want to share my journey on what it's been like to go through that and to be where I am at with it, how our bodies change, our body composition changes, how things aren't the same, but that it doesn't have to be the end. It is not some big crazy thing that like ends our lives at 50 or 52, 53, but how we can thrive through that and how we can.
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you know, create another version of ourselves and that we are still seen and that we are still an incredibly beautiful, amazing, absolutely honor our journey as women through that. I really want to help you guys through that because I feel like, well, to the men who are listening to this, it's okay.
06:40
but you may be dealing with a menopausal woman and wondering what the hell is happening right now. So I am gonna unpack a lot of that and dig into that with some humor and some grace because oh my God, it is a journey. And also we're gonna talk to some people who've just made some big changes and pivoted and started new careers in the health and wellness space.
07:06
And I want to talk to some other um people who are also in this industry and to bring some different perspective to you guys um from the way that they train and how they help their clients to, you know, manage stress and weight and get strong and what they do to do that. I'm so excited to share that um and to open up the platform to other.
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people in my industry who help people all the time, but in a different way than I do. I feel like that is such a tool for you guys and will be so empowering to know that there are different ways to train, that there are other trainers who take a whole different perspective. I believe that there is a great fit for everyone in this and you know, every individual is different.
08:03
And there are so many different trainers out there. And I'm so excited to be talking to a number of them for them to bring their expertise to this podcast, just to crack open some things a little bit more, to get some different perspectives, to dig in and banter a little bit. And also just to inform all of you of what is out there, what's accessible to you. Whoa, the world is full of.
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different types of movement and healing that, you know, I'm hoping that I'll be able to open that door up for you guys a little bit more on this episode. And I am gonna share a lot of tools on how to help with trauma, how to help with mental health, how to and heal and go through certain things in this life that we, you know, don't expect.
09:00
My journey's been quite the bumpy road um this last couple of years is I haven't shared a lot, but I am ready to share what I have been through. You know, the honesty and the clarity of that. feel like everyone deserves that. And you, as my listeners deserve that from me. And I am actually in a place where I feel
09:30
ready to share that and not so vulnerable around it. Dealing with, you know, grief, loss, depression that I had never been really hit with before gives me a whole new perspective on people who have dealt with it. You know, and the tools that I use to try to help get myself right and reset. And let me tell you, it's not easy when you're going through these life storms.
09:59
that get handed to us, whether we expect them or not, or whether we created them or they were brought on without our knowing, or we just had refused to see it. You know, going through that type of stuff, we sometimes see it and we deny it. We sometimes try to bury it. And I believe that strength isn't always loud. You know, strength is quiet sometimes, sometimes
10:28
strength is allowing yourself the grace just to be quiet and heal. Yeah, and I say that because you work with people all the time and your business is, you know, health and fitness. We are on all the time. Like, I don't mean that as in we're faking we're on, but we are there and we show up for other people so that they can
10:59
decompress and get healthy or release and talk about what they're going through. And, you know, the last year, uh, I couldn't put anything extra on my plate because I didn't realize that I would hit a wall and, um I couldn't add anything extra on. knew I could do what I had to do with my clients and my classes, you know, and it would take all of my energy to master up the courage to show up and.
11:27
be bright and energetic and positive, you know, but then I would close the door. And I, for the first time in my life, the last year, I felt like I didn't want to get out of bed in the mornings. I didn't have the energy to do that, but I did. And I was beating myself up about it. And I realized that, you know, strengths being strong and strength isn't
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always this big loud roar. Sometimes it's just being able to allow yourself the space and the grace to honor your feelings, to allow yourself to go through what maybe you haven't been able to look at. It's allowing yourself to say, okay, like I can only do so much right now and not beating yourself up for it.
12:28
Sometimes strength isn't loud. Sometimes strength is quiet. And that quiet strength can be the most powerful thing we have in this healing and transformational journey. In culture, it's believed that we need to power through everything. It's like a hustle, a bustle, a force, know, push, push, push through everything, push it down, keep going, keep hustling. And then we're celebrated for that.
12:58
And you know what we should be. We do need to hustle. We do need to push. We do need to grind it out. But sometimes we hit a wall and we need that quiet reserve. We need to stop. We need to slow down. In my experience over the years, I had prided myself on this hustle and bustle and push through and I couldn't get through anything. But sometimes the quiet, slowing down approach is really needed.
13:26
And that came to me with maturity in my fifties and coming through a lot of sort of life upheaval. You know, I tried to push through, I tried to push through a divorce. tried to push through trauma. tried to keep hustling and grinding until I couldn't. And when you hit that place that you feel like you've had a wall or you've slammed against, you know, you've slammed against the wall, you've
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You you've hit that ultimate point of, I don't think I can do this anymore. That's when we need to really reconnect with that silent, strong inner strength that we have and we know we need to be proud of that side of us as well. Burnout isn't pretty. We've all known it. We we've all experienced it.
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And in those moments in time when we're walking or being faced with a storm ahead, we need to find that calm inner strength that can guide us through the storm in a peaceful manner. Instead of trying to fight it, instead of trying to fight our ways through it, instead of trying to be angry and aggressive and trying to push, push, push through it. The best thing to do in that circumstance is to
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find that quiet, calm, reserved strength to allow ourselves the grace to move through it with compassion, with treating ourselves properly, you know, slowing down so that we can actually, you know, keep the pieces of ourself alive. And some of the ways that we have these quiet reserves and we can tap into them is through
15:20
somatic release, easy body movements, breath work, journaling, tapping into rituals and routines that really help to calm us and calm our nervous system, you know, so that we can then pick ourselves back up and move through whatever it is that we are going through. It doesn't have to be fancy. It doesn't have to be something completely off the mark.
15:48
Sometimes it's as simple as an evening routine where you unwind with your journal and you have a nice cup of tea and you take care of yourself and you put yourself to bed with grace and ease early because you want to get up and face the day that is coming for you the next day and you know that you have hard things to do. And in these times,
16:15
I have really learned over the last number of years, as I said, in maturing that we don't have to grind it out. We can find that quiet, beautiful strength and reserve within by slowing down, by not pushing down our emotions and feelings by sitting with them and really honoring where we're at and how we feel and being brave. takes bravery to look at
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what we're going through to feel our emotions, move through them, to accept them and to find acceptance for where we're at in life, no matter where that is, no matter what chapter you're in. And when we can do this for ourselves, we are able to heal, we're able to really, really get to know ourselves again. I think that what happens is in life, we go along,
17:09
We're just bumping along, we're going along, we're grinding it out, we're building a life, we're building jobs, we're building success, we're creating the lives that we want in this hectic, fast paced manner, because that's what society really portrays as that strong, independent human, that person who can just tackle anything. But they don't talk about internally what that does to us if we are doing that consistently.
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for years after years after year after year, there is a point where that doesn't work any longer and we need to couple it with self-care routines, with really honoring how we are feeling inside and looking at the things that we don't wanna look at sometimes. And that means slowing down. That means finding a better way to show up for ourselves.
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And it's okay to say no, we all don't want to miss out on things. We all, you know, want to be included and we all want to have an active social life and be out there. And this is not me saying not to do that, but in that quiet, resilient place, honoring where you're at, at that point in time, if you need, you know, to stay in because you're going through something and you feel like you need to show up for yourself.
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That's a quiet strength to have the ability to say, honestly, you know what I would love to come out tonight, but I really feeling that I need to rest. need to stay home. I just need a cozy night in is a really, really great place to be. If you can speak your truth and you can bring that forth honestly, with your friends, with your family, they're going to honor that.
19:06
And by you honoring you, you honor the place that you need to slow down, you need to heal, you need to have time to reconnect with who you are. You're only going to get better because of that. There's always going to be a hustle and a bustle and a grind that you can jump into. It's always going to be there. The thing that we don't make time for a lot of times is that quiet space for ourselves.
19:36
that place where we can really look at our lives and look back at what we've come through and also look at what we want to build for ourselves, what we want to change. And if we don't stop and take a moment to do that, we just keep doing and repeating the same things over and over and over again. That's like a Groundhog Day. That's going insane. That's insanity.
20:06
And you can't change that unless you take a moment to breathe, to stop and look at what you've been through, honestly, where you have come from, taking a moment to honor your successes, to honor the things that you're proud of, that you got through, the things that you maybe were scared to look at because you didn't want.
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to show that to yourselves. You know, we cannot lie to ourselves. I mean, we can, we tend to, you know, overlook or push down or ignore things that we are feeling that are uncomfortable. But it's in those like uncomfortable places when we slow down and we crack them open and we, we really look at who we are and why we are doing what we are doing. That's where the healing journey begins. And yes,
21:06
It can be scary, but it is so worth it. You are worth it. You are worth digging into that quiet strength, those reserves that are there for you to be kind and gentle to yourself. One of my favorite things to do is journal. I love journaling. Um, even if it's only just a quick little blip to write down, you know, what I
21:33
what I'm feeling and honestly and why, and how can I change my negative thinking to positive thinking? How can I be grateful today? What am I grateful for? What makes me happy? What do I find simple joys in? Another thing that I find really healing and I can't get enough of it and I encourage everyone I know to get out in nature.
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take a walk along the beach, sit by water, look at the ocean, breathe in the ocean air, get out in the woods, go for a hike, be in nature, surrounded by trees and birds and animals, and just to get a fresh perspective on life, it really does reset you. And if you can start to implement those
22:30
Simple things, they don't cost you anything. They're there, there's access to them all around us. And the way you feel after you have done something like that for yourself is incredible. It resets everything. And a lot of times we just want to power through difficult situations, difficult conversations even. And if you can take a breath and you can find
22:59
your peace, you are really able to approach it in a different manner, not aggressively, but open, honest with compassion, with space for yourself and your feelings. If it's a conversation with someone else, it's difficult finding space and grace for them to come to the table with you rather than battling it out. We've all been there when we had to battle out something with someone because we
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have a situation or a circumstance that is really negative and needs to be looked at and talked about. But if we can quiet it down, quiet our brains, quiet our bodies and be open and find a loving space to talk and to communicate, that is our quiet strength coming through. It allows for compassion, for caring.
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for deeper conversations, for more understanding, for more listening too. That's really important. It's not just about talking. It's about listening in this life to someone else. And it's also about listening to ourselves, listening honestly to what do we really need. And it's gonna be different for everyone. Everyone has different needs. But if you can tap into honestly,
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what you need and you can express that not only for yourself but to others so that they have a deeper understanding of your boundaries of what it is you truly need to thrive whether that be in a relationship or whether that be with work or whether that be in any situation whether that's with kids whether that's with yourself in the way that you want to show up in the world.
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Resilience is within all of us. We have the ability to get through this life, to get through anything. But I really believe that when we are able to tap into our quiet strength, tap in and reconnect with who we truly are and take off all of those masks that we put on as we go out in the world, you know, I'm a tough bitch. I'm strong. I can get through anything. I don't need help.
25:25
I don't need this. I don't need you. I can do it alone. I don't ask for help. I don't need anything. I'm okay. No, no, no, I'm okay. How many times have you said, oh, I'm okay when you really weren't okay? How many times have you in this life said, no, I can do it myself. No, I don't need anything. I'm fine. I know I have been that girl.
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for a long, long time, not asking for anything, not asking for help, saying I'm okay when I'm not. And you know what? We need to stop doing that. We need to stop just putting on that brave mask and that I'm like the superhero of the story, which you are, but you can be the superhero of the story that has that strength, but also has that softness that I know that is within all of us.
26:24
There's no shame in saying I need help. No, I'm actually not okay right now. I would love for you to support me in whatever way that is. Oh my goodness. You know what I mean? Like these are really difficult lessons sometimes and they're so simple. It feels really scary to say, you know, I, yeah, no, I'm not okay.
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Because to the outside world on Instagram and all of these platforms and in society, it's keep it together. Look the part, act the part. Don't show that there's any cracks. Be perfect. Keep hustling, keep moving, keep, keep, keep, keep grinding. That's portrayed as successful.
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Successful until it's not. Oh my God, successful until we hit that brick wall, go and mock speed and all of a sudden we're splatted and we don't even know which way is up. So just take the time to think about those moments that you've felt like that, that you've just grinded it out and you knew you needed help or you knew you needed to slow down. You knew you needed to take a weekend off from going out, from being social.
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Just think about those moments for yourself. Like I said, everybody's different, but everybody's got them. And just remember, you can have both. They both have an equal place in this life. They both have their purpose and they both actually work together. And when we can allow ourselves to be strong and fierce and yet soft and compassionate, we are
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better humans. We show up better for other people. We have more compassion for others who are going through things that are difficult. We can see it. We can support other people in saying, it's okay. It's okay to slow down. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you for showing up for yourself in a different way. I'm proud of you for saying no. I'm proud of you for having a boundary that allows you
28:46
to go heal, I support you in that. And the support will be there. The help will be there. You just have to be willing to trust it. You have to be brave enough to ask for it. I know you can do it. You've got that quiet reserve in there too. I'm so proud of you for being the beast mode that you are, but also flick that other switch, let yourself heal.
29:15
Let yourself be soft. Let yourself be vulnerable. Let yourself feel. You can do it. If I can do it, I know you can do it.
29:33
I'm going to get into that a little bit more as we get into the episodes here. I have a lot to share about my journey through that and how, you know, my community and my fitness and my somatic release and mobility class really helped me unpack some stored trauma that I was holding onto that I didn't even realize and how to regulate your nervous system when you're going through things like that. How to be vulnerable enough to share.
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And that was the biggest thing I found the more I shared with my clients. What I had been through the more open they became about their stories and their journeys and how much similarities we have as a fit family or as people that we know. We all hold on to so much in this life that we don't share because we feel like that we don't have the space or the voice to do it, but we do. And the more we share,
30:30
the more we become a light and a warrior for someone else who may be going through something so similar and feel like they just need to know that it's okay, that they're not the only one. Yeah, I am really excited to do that. And I'm really ready to allow that part of my life to have a voice.
30:58
that part of my life to be spoken about. And I want to share that with you because healing isn't linear. Life isn't linear. You know, we go through all of these like times and ups and downs and, sometimes we're on our fitness and sometimes we're not. And sometimes we're really good to ourselves. And sometimes we're just terrible shits to ourselves. Really. Like we beat ourselves up like
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someone would never do to us, but the way we talk to ourselves is ridiculous sometimes. Anyway, I just wanted to say that I'm really so excited to dive into this new season of growth, of expansion, of resets, of plot twists, of like...
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Realizing that you can change and pivot at any time in your life. If you decide to do that, you have the power to change your body, to change your mind, to change your lifestyle, to move forward. We're never stuck, even though sometimes we feel like we're treading water or we're spinning our wheels. It's okay. I've got some awesome inspirational stories coming to you. Some awesome insight on life.
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and love and fitness and so many more interesting, beautiful humans on, you know, self discovery, on health, on wellness, on how they hit points in their life, they needed to change and pivot. It's just going to be a really exciting season. And I'm so happy to be back with you. It's incredible.
32:52
I just realized I spent so much of my time and my life and my love and my passion for helping others become better versions of themselves. That this was just such a great platform for me to bring, you know, some of my quirky wisdom and some of the things that I bring to the table. But I'm excited to bring that even bigger and to a bigger umbrella with more people.
33:22
that wanna share some powerful stories with you. So if you're going through something right now, if you're trying to pivot, if life feels a little blah, or if you're on top of the world and you got there, I wanna hear from you too. I really mean that. I want to bring on, you know, episodes with me, but I also wanna bring on episodes with others who have a story to share.
33:51
And if that's the case, please DM me. I want to hear your story. I'd love to get you on here. I'm excited to share this new season with all of you. I got some juicy episodes coming your way. So that being said, I believe in you. I believe in the power of you. I believe in your ability to heal. I believe in.
34:18
your ability to pivot and change. I believe in your ability to become the best version of you. I believe in your ability to constantly be moving forward. We're going forward. We're not going backwards. So we're not going to look that way, but we're going to take the gems. We're going to take the storms. We're going to take the winds and we're going to bring it all together with love and light.
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acceptance, compassion, and realness. I pride myself on being really real and I pride myself on being one of those people who likes to see through the dark, who likes to bring out the light in people. And I can't wait to dig in to this season of You Can Be a Fit Bitch 2. Let's rise together.
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And if no one's told you today, I believe in you. I think you're incredible. And let's have the best kickoff September we can have. Can't wait for that first episode.
35:38
Thanks for listening. To connect with Michelle, you can email her at ignitefusionfitmichelle at gmail.com or visit her on Instagram at DivaDelight911. Support the show by subscribing or sharing it with friends or anyone you think would benefit from hearing it. You Can Be a Fit Bitch 2 is produced by Haunted Mouse Productions. This has been a Haunted Mouse Production. Cut that out.