I'm a bilingual yoga teacher who helps people who sit a lot gain mobility, move without pain and reduce their stress.
New year, same old me
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So here we are, over halfway through January. It's generally when we realise that "new year new me" didn't really come to be and that our lives aren't as transformed as we had wished. If that's your case, I want you to get rid of any guilt you might be carrying about this, and give you a few essential reminders you might need to hear right now. You don't need to go to the gym, run, or do anything you hate for your healthYou need to move to keep your body (and your mind) healthy, yes. But that can take many forms. You can walk, you can do yoga, you can lift weights, you can play padel. You can do it outside, in a gym or in your living room. My point is, you don't have to do something you dislike. Because if you don't like it, you're going to look for ANY excuse to stop doing it, and you WILL find it. Find something you are happy to do regularly. Inertia is what's killing your motivationOur bodies adapt to what they do most. So when you stay several days in a row without exercising, it takes a HUGE effort to start moving again. Find something you can do a little bit of, often. That's why I make short (5-15 minutes) routines for my clients. Easy to fit daily, to keep the momentum going. Make movement a part of your lifeTake the stairs, stretch in front of Netflix, do your steps while you're on the phone, take a walk at lunch to reset your mood and your body. Pro tip: If you start your day with the short routine from the point above, it'll be 10 times easier to keep the momentum going during the day (see my email last week about the sunk benefits). And most importantly... stop seeing your wellbeing as another task on your listIt is your maintenance, like brushing your teeth. You wouldn't stay in a house without fixing the leaky roof. I'm begging you to see your body as the only house you'll ever really own, and treat it with the kindness and care it deserves. Your physical wellbeing impacts your mental wellbeing and vice versa. And it impacts how you interact with the world around you. It's the table on which every other aspect of your life rests. So stop putting it last on your list of priorities. Nothing is more important. Love you, bye 🧡 Clem |
Clémence Dieryck
I'm a bilingual yoga teacher who helps people who sit a lot gain mobility, move without pain and reduce their stress.
Do you know the famous psychological bias called "the sunk cost fallacy"? It's when you've already invested so much time or energy in a project that you can't bring yourself to abandon it, even when you know it's going nowhere. Once we know it exists, we start seeing it everywhere: our friend who's staying in a relationship that emotionally ended years ago, the degree we're no longer interested in but we're "too far in" to quit... We keep pouring energy into something because we can't bear to...
Where does it hurt when your back aches? In the last few months, I've had a few new clients who all pointed to the same spot: on their lower back, just above the hips. They all told me they had a back problem, which is the logical thing to think. But most of the time, the issue doesn't come from the back... but a bit lower. I know, you know, we all know that we sit too much. And when we do, our hips become tight and weak. They gradually lose their ability to both move and stabilise our lower...
6.5 hours a day. It's the average amount of screen time for a woman my age. I've seen it in myself and in my clients: when we start wanting to take better care of ourselves, there always comes a moment when we realise we're going to have to reduce our screen time. And it's hard. It's hard because it's become automatic, and everything is designed to bring us back often, and especially to keep us there as long as possible. But this screen time also translates into neck tension, fatigue, rising...