Maya Marian Bryant

If you’re ready to be consistent forever with your exercise routine, then keep swiping!

It’s so wonderful to set bold health goals for the new year. But, if you want to make sure you can stick with them long term then you’ll want to ensure that they’re practical.

If it’s too intense or too far away from your current lifestyle, then it won’t last.

Instead, start small and build a little more on each month!

If you’re looking for somewhere to get started then comment “power” below! 👇🏽

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Can you tell the difference? They’re way too close for comfort. Instead of focusing on going from 0-100 and how fast you can strive to change your body. Instead, focus on health promoting behaviors like water intake, eating in color, sleep, exercise, etc. things you might focus on during a weight loss program even. Except, focus on building the behavior long term. Not for a 90 day sprint. So maybe instead of starting with hour workouts, you start with 10 min because you know you can succeed with that. Instead of going from eating out everyday to kale salads everyday, you start cooking at home 1-2 times per week.

It’s a marathon, not a sprint, you got this! Don’t forget to like and share this post!

Let’s kick these to the curb in 2024 and work on building healthy, realistic, and sustainable fitness routines!

Be sure to like this and share to your story!

If 10,000 steps has always sounded unrealistic and unsustainable for you then I have good news! Getting around 7,500 is where you’ll see the maximum health benefits from and there’s still wonderful benefits even at the 4,400 mark too!

If you’d looking to improve your health, start with small improvements that’ll add up over time like:
Standing up once per hour
Parking further away
Taking mini walks/laps around the office or home a couple times per day
Stretch breaks
Quick 5 minute movement breaks

You got this!

It’s all about what’s realistic and sustainable for you! Wishing you much success in your health and wellness this year.

If you build it fast, it won’t last! But if you build it slow, it’ll grow! With Barre Empowered, I’m all about realistic and sustainable. If you haven’t worked out ever, let’s not set a goal to workout for an hour everyday. That’s not realistic for you yet. Start with 10-20 minutes a couple times per week, add in a couple more, and build over 90 days. You’ll have fun, enjoy a sustainable routine, and see incredible results along the way.

If you’re ready to never start next Monday again then we have to change your mindset around fitness!

The goal isn’t to go from not working out at all to everyday, that’s called a recipe to fail. The goal is however to build a realistic and sustainable routine that works for you and you only! It doesn’t have to work for your friends, mom, etc. make it specific to you!

Start small, it’ll grow - aim to be just 1% better each day ❤️.

If you’re looking to develop a consistent exercise routine, enjoy exercise, and develop fierce body confidence then I’m not sure what you’re waiting on - join the party!

We start on January 8th with a brand spanking new program - Power Barre! It’s just 20 minutes per day for 4 days per week so you can cater the schedule to what will work best for you!

Want to join us? Comment “power” below 👇🏽

Wanting to be healthier is wonderful! But let’s focus on behaviors instead of just following a plan that says what, how much, and when to eat.

What are some examples of health-promoting behaviors?
Getting adequate sleep
Reducing/ Eliminating substance use
Exercising 150 min/wk
Including more fruits and veggies
More daily activity (ex. Standing up at work, taking walking breaks, etc.)
Reducing stress
Eating in more variety
Improving your mental health

There are SO many things you can do to improve your health that DON’T include a diet ❤️.

The pursuit of thinness over health has damaged our society significantly. I realized I wanted much more bolder and beautiful things in life and I hope you do too - join me for a Power Barre challenge to you can see just how strong and powerful you really are! Comment “power” to learn more!

I learned these things the hard way, so you don’t have to!

I truly with fitness was showcased to me in the early stages as fun, empowering, and a joyful experience. That’s why I focus so heavily on that for you. Fitness is supposed to enhance your life, not become it.

This means your life shouldn’t revolve around your diet, your intense workout schedule, of how much you weigh.

Although mainstream fitness culture will tell you the opposite and to reign in your nutrition and that I want you to remember what’s true to you. Fitness doesn’t have to become your whole life for you to get incredible results with it.

Don’t comment on peoples bodies!

Even if it’s well-intended.

Even if you think they look better.

Even if you want to comment on how long, lean, and more toned they look.

Why? They could silently be fighting a battle to just get out of bed. Some people turn dark and gloomy when it gets dark outside.

Do they look more lean and are super proud of it showing before and after pictures? You don’t know what they did to accomplish that. It could be incredibly disordered, rooted in hate for their bodies, they may have even developed an eating disorder along the way as 25% of dieters do. If someone is on no carbs, sugar, and tracks everything they eat, that’s not behavior to encourage. Praising their weight loss does exactly that.

From someone who used to be the “healthy one” and even proud of the weight loss I accomplished, I promise you didn’t want to encourage my behaviors. Eating the caloric intake of a toddler and exercising for hours per day is nothing to praise.

Is everyone that extreme? No! Some people might just be increasing their step count and eating more fruits and veggies and their body naturally wanted to lose a couple pounds.

But when they walk in and it’s the first thing you comment on - they aren’t getting the message that they’re more than a body.

And what’s the message that people gain when you post your “before”in a shameful way when their body looks like that? That you’d rather be less like them.

In the last 40 years, Americans have undergone over 2 million weight loss attempts. Yet, o*esity prevalence has tripled! Why is that? Swipe through this post to find out and share to spread the information!

But it’s not a diet… yes the efff it is. It has a start and end date, requires you follow a diet, doesn’t allow for cheat meals, requires you to exercise two times per day. The program was created by an entrepreneur of a supplement company and a motivational speaker. It’s all talk, no science. Most people don’t need to drink a gallon of water per day, it far exceeds the exercise recommendations and although it says it’s not a fitness program, the entire site is full of before and after pictures.

Could parts of this be beneficial in isolation? Yes! But the intent and intensity matter. You’ll likely be much more successful on a longer, less restrictive baby step approach. That’s exactly what I offer with Barre Empowered. Comment below if you’re ready to make some healthy changes in an empowering way ❤️.

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You don’t need to start a diet on Jan 1!

You don’t need to start an extreme exercise routine on Jan 1!

I’m a weight neutral coach. That means I treat my smaller body client that has a lot of “junk” but doesn’t put on any weight, the same way I’d treat someone on a larger body doing the same.

Size isn’t predictive of health at a population basis. Healthy looks different on every body - I coach the person in front of me, not their size.

We ALL have to focus on health promoting behaviors regardless of our body size and regardless of if our body size changes. It’s time we look beyond weight to determine health and work towards considering one’s overall lifestyle, behaviors, and health.

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At my thinnest, my nails were falling off, my hair was straight and breaking off, and my doctor told me “way to go” for my weight loss and asked me what I did.

Listen, if your life revolves around food and exercise then that’s not the right weight for you.

If the only way you can maintain your body is by restricting, that’s not the right weight for you.

If you have to count and monitor everything you eat and drink, that’s not the right weight for you.

We should ALL be focusing on health promoting behaviors. But never to the point of obsession or restriction.

Exercise is supposed to enhance your life, not become it ❤️.

The night before our anniversary, I told that 5 years ago, I was waiting to pick him up from the airport after he went down to Atlanta for a couple months for work. He proceeded to tell me every special detail from that moment until he asked me to be his girlfriend making me fall even more in love with him 😭.

❤️Thank you for being my travel buddy
❤️Encouraging me to start my business and all the help along the way
❤️Supporting me through school + starting a year long Pilates training program just after 1 year of finishing school (Someone make sure I don’t start not another program 😂)
❤️Sasha Mae’s favorite playmate
❤️ The many adventures and dates

Life is full of growth, love, laughter, and balance with you and for that I am grateful ❤️.

P.S. be sure to swipe to the first picture to see the first picture we ever took together

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10 minuets of exercise while watching your shows counts
Side steps on your way to grab water counts
Lunges during meetings count
Pacing while on the phone counts
Doing some arm exercises while on a call counts

Start where you can and grow!

Fitness is so focused on your results being how you look by any means necessary. Let’s begin to rewrite the script and focus on the many things we gain from exercise that don’t have to do with body change and take pride in our ability to move, celebrate, and respect our bodies in doing so.

If you’re looking to improve your health - great! Let’s focus on that by engaging in health promoting behaviors. Instead of going to the gym to lose weight, go to the gym to celebrate what your body can do, build muscle, strengthen your bones, and lead a healthy lifestyle.

If you engage in health promoting behaviors and your body really wants to lose weight, then it will. There’s no need for you to engage in restrictive measures to do so. Be kind to your body and learn to respect it at its size and trust that it will navigate down, up, or stay the same and grow stronger - either way doing so in its own time.

I’m so sorry you were lied to thinking that you are so much in control of your body size. There are so many other factors that are involved which is why it’s not as simple as “eat a little less, move a little more”.

People don’t often think about air quality, employment, and your environment contributing to the size of your body, but it’s important to recognize it comes from a wide array of different factors.

Take it from someone who has been there and done it twice - will not help you reach your

Instead, work on building a strong, healthy, and powerful body regardless of what size that happens to be.

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Starting your Monday off with some spooky truths about the fitness industry. There has been a lot of progress made, but also much more that needs to continue to change to be a healthy and empowering space.

Diet culture really pulled a fast one here.
If your health is 100% in your control, then diets can work and you’re the problem.

Except, while we can engage in great health promoting behaviors, our health is not 100% in our control, our environment, genetics, and access to many things greatly affects it. So, being mindful that there are in fact other things at play here is very important.

Do the best you can with what you have ❤️.

And this is why I will never recommend body checking again. The only result of your fitness routine you see shouldn’t be how much weight you lost and how much thinner you can get. Then there’s the fun game with restriction. Like if I just cut out x more calories, I bet I could get a 6 pack in a couple of weeks before the trip. No!

Exercise for your mental health
Longevity
Strong and healthy bones
Powerful muscles
Reduce the risk of chronic disease
Or to build better body image!

There are so many reasons to exercise but sticking with only the highlights of “did my body change this week?” Is a recipe for disaster.

Make it make sense…

Deciding to start a health and wellness routine is no easy task! What makes it more challenging is huge lofty in the sky goals where failure a lot of times is inevitable. Instead of trying to do a 360 in 2 seconds, I want you to focus on small adjustments that you can make in your life that are realistic and sustainable.

So if you can’t do a full Barre class, maybe some calf raises while you’re cleaning dishes. Instead of sitting on the phone while talking to your girlfriends, can you walk around? Can we add veggies to the curry, nacho mix, or lasagna? It’s those initial small changes that will help you have long-term success!

Looking for somewhere to get started? Comment below, I’d love to welcome you into our non-diet and empowering fitness community ❤️.

Are you aware of all the glorious reasons to strength train? If not, read about them here!

If you’re looking to start a fitness routine and get into strength training specifically, then Barre Empowered will be a great place for you! We keep the grace from Barre with weights to help strengthen our bones, muscles, and boost our body image confidence- join us!

Take up space! You aren’t meant to look like you’re 15 for the rest of your life ❤️.