Sara Clarke

life would be easier if you lifted weights.

reason #1 - each time you pick up something heavy, you are literally proving yourself wrong. how long have we gone through life doubting ourselves? once we’re in that habit, a day doesn’t go by without the thought “nope, that’s not your opportunity - she’s better than you - it’s for her”. but every single time you pick up that weight/dumbell/kettlebell/barbell, you’re saying to your mind “nope, not today, this is my day, let me show you”. there aren’t many other opportunities for that to happen, DAILY.

reason #2 - having stronger muscles makes us functionally stronger. aka we avoid injuries. aka we avoid back pain. aka we have better posture. aka we can carry our own shopping bags, thank you very much. how much would you like to make it to the stop of the hill and not be dreading the walk back down because your legs are burning. lifting weights will mean you’re walking up mountains, not molehills.

reason #3 - you’re giving your body more things to feed - meaning you can eat more. I MEAN - COME ON!!! more food baby!! muscle weighs more than fat, but takes less space, so potentially your scales (if you weigh yourself) may not change, I can literally guarantee (if only I could spell it) that your body will change shape. those saggy bits under your arm - yep, a muscle is meant to be big there. your butt will fill those jeans and you’ll be able to squat down on the dance floor (or to pick up lego in my life).

reason #4 - there are so many more, so let me just list them. mental fitness, physical fitness, balance, co-ordination, helps to avoid cancers, reduces risk of heart disease, reduces risk of heart attacks, reduces risk of strokes, lowers your blood pressure, reduces risk of diabetes, arthritis and even depression.

lifting weights as part of your lifestyle can bring incredible change in almost any area of your life. and it is available to YOU, you beautiful thing.

Caption this 🤣🙌🏼

Teaching deadlift basics since 2012.

Strength training is a non negotiable for living a long, capable life. I’m talking about it next week on my podcast… the benefits, the basics & setting a challenge for you!
Head to the links in my bio to join the accountability community for

My client eats chocolate everyday as part of her breakfast, because it makes her happy. 🔥👏

She’s making leaps towards her goal shape and she’s booked a secret out of her comfort zone challenge.

End body shame. Find freedom. Experience new energy levels.

Know how to pursue health every single day, without pain, discomfort and limitations.

I don’t even like marshmallows.

Literally wrote a post today to prepare my members for the second half of the year, but all I could think was - but where is summer? 🤣

Forever hopeful. Forever full of faith. Forever not listening to the weatherman in the UK.

Peace and protein shakes.
When life has its ups and downs, mood swings galore, sad news, exciting news, my health is untouched because I have habits that are established in something greater than the outside world. ❤️☮️🥤

In my pursuit to help women find a sustainable pathway they can stick to consistently, using the things they love to do, I started an app that gave people set work to do daily.

It worked well, but it didn’t achieve the life changing results I wanted, simply because it relied on people already being motivated, self aware, and disciplined.

I don’t believe in fad diets, shouting shame over you or having to be obsessed with fitness.

But I do believe in the daily pursuit of health, and to get onto that pursuit, you need energy.

Start with the energy and you’ll be onto a cycle to success that’s actually quite hard to get off.

So I built a framework to get someone from overwhelmed to overflowing with energy. And to then use that energy to develop habits that feed your goals.

I’ve called it the energy method, and so that is why fitting in fitness is disappearing.

It’s so hard to fit in anything if you’re already at full. But the habits and method that I teach can turn that around.

Health that lasts a lifetime and not just a few weeks is now in your grasp.

Thanks for reading my little announcement.

If you can, please follow

Love you,
Sara

“I start everything and finish nothing…”
This week I tackle another reason why what you’re buying and subscribing to for your weight/health/life isn’t working, or you’re not actually doing the work…

You didn’t start with you.
You started with what worked for someone else.
Someone that doesn’t have your past, your joy, your life, your family, your workload, your trauma, your grief, your idea of fun, your experience with food, your sleep patterns.

It’s not you, it’s the system. And we’re here to break it.

Stop syn-ing. Start liv-ing.

When fitness is a habit rather than a hobby, you find yourself mindlessly doing pull ups just about anywhere 🤣

Picture this.

It’s a networking event and I’m introduced to someone. “This is Sara, she’s a health coach” they say.

Instant shame face. “Oh my goodness, you don’t wanna talk to me”, the other person says, “I need to lose weight”.

How did we get here?
Why is our need to fit into smaller clothes decide our worthwhile?

And if health, (a pursuit we are all on since we have temporary bodies), is only weight loss, then what is the actual point, since weight loss doesn’t equal life to the full?

Will I only experience “life” if I’m skinny?
Will I only be able to join in on adventure if I look like celebrities do?
Are relationships deeper than body size?
Will I one day be satisfied and completely confident if I achieve a size 6 dress size and no wrinkles?

Or is the pursuit of health something we’ve completely lost?
What’s the actual point in you pursuing health?

We’ve discussed it in my intensive coaching group this week and it’s brought some frustrating stuff to the surface which I’ll talk about on the podcast next week.

Did you listen to todays episode, start the week right & get your life in order. 12 minute episodes 🔥

Imagine a life where we didn’t use up energy worrying that we weren’t doing the things our body needs from us…

But rather using the energy from doing the tiny little daily things our body needs from us to have fun, adventures and LOADS of parties in our pyjamas?

Stop comparing, start living.

Back home 🇿🇦 I was told that calluses were a sign of being a good wife…

Think pull up calluses count?

I’m saying yes.

Working on me, so I can enjoy my marriage 😅❤️✌🏼

I’m away with my family and a pool is involved. And with pools come odd human habits.

The one that’s been playing on my mind is the semi naked confidence levels.

Certain body shapes have often meant that certain people have more confidence around the pool.

Bigger people seem to get glued to their beds.
Smaller people seem to stand poolside and have a laugh.

Why the freak are we like this?! I find this so sad.

Just because you get more material for your money when you shop fashion, does not mean you don’t have a place poolside.

Is confidence created by our thoughts? Yes.

Have we been thinking for decades that our self worth is dictated by our size? Yes.

This has got to end. There is no shame in body shapes.

It’s your joy to be alive that shines brightest and this has no relation to your dress size, thigh size, how hairy your legs are, how large your stretch marks.

It truly doesn’t affect anyone else what shape you are.

So stop living like you’ll offend.

Have the confidence because you’re a human, one that is capable of incredible things.

You have a place at the pool, you beautiful thing.

I talk about visualisation in my podcast this week and I took this picture for this very reason.
I was in my happy place in South Africa in January, and everything just felt so right, and I felt at peace, and at home, and close to my God, and my kids weren’t screaming.
So I wanted to remember the feeling in a photo. This was my best effort.

I’ve fallen prey before to thinking that a place will make me feel a certain way, but I’ve realised over the years, it’s intentional acts and habits that brings me to this place, and I can feel it anywhere. I was exercising daily, eating good food, praying, being part of a community often and taking time for my family.

I still crave being home, but I continue to use my weaponry of habits and tools to conquer the mood swings of my brain, and find peace and calm that we all crave in the loud and crazy.

You’ve got this.
What habits can you implement to bring yourself back to “being you”?

Fresh motivation for your ears today (even though it's Tuesday, you're still allowed to listen).

How do you get yourself out of bed/into the car/out the door/into the rain?

How do you motivate yourself.

This one tool has gotten me through daily workouts for the past 3 years.

Give it a listen (it's only 12 minutes) and see if it could do the same for you... for anything you're avoiding.

https://podfollow.com/1589084130

Causally found myself taking through the bleep test today for a TV ad.

One of the weirdest situations of my life… but don’t worry. I told every single one of the football team to ditch running and lift some weights instead.

Weights win games.
Resistance builds endurance.
Daily habits gets you places you never thought you’d go.

DO YOU NEED TO WAKE UP AT 5AM TO FEEL ENERGETIC?

I read the The 5am Club and whilst I didn't like the book, I was still intrigued to find out whether it was the magic key to being motivated, energetic and happy!

I found a few things out, for example,
you'll still feel groggy at 5am even when you're a seasoned pro...
kids don't adhere to the schedule...
winter is HARD...

But I did find the perfect way to adjust my sleep to wake up feeling great - and I outline this on the latest episode of the podcast!

Link is in my bio 🏋️‍♀️✌🏼

It’s not you, it’s your body.
It has a natural rhythm where you’ll feel tired, energised, slow, fast and groggy.
I’ve loved using .science this past year to track my sleep. It puts this in my diary too so that I can schedule life at the times I’ll feel best for it.

Not all of life can be designed perfectly, but I’m gonna take every opportunity I can to feel good so I can do good.

I’ve had the pleasure in watching my clients and members get uncomfortable for the past 3 weeks in the Worldwide Open.

No one really is doing it to win, but to better themselves.

Not today.

But next year.

Don’t move your body today for todays sake. Set your baseline today and do it for where you’ll be next year.

Able to run up the stairs.
Able to keep up with the kids on the bike.
Able to start couch to 5k.
Able to deadlift more than a Tesco shop.
Able to wake up without dread for life.
Able to see past negative thoughts and fight for hope, peace and bring joy to others.

Your workout today, whether it’s part of a worldwide league, or a personal inner-mind battle is ENOUGH.

2 minutes, 4 minutes, 40 minutes.

Doesn’t matter.
All that matters is your move past your comfort zone a little.

There’s not many better feelings than “smug” and YOU TOO could be feeling pretty smug with yourself if you had worked out consistently enough to get a rest day.

How can you achieve this feeling?
1. Set an alert on your phone for the next 4 days at 7am which reads “When will you work out today?”
2. Take it back to basics and write down 3-4 activities you could do that will get your heart rate up. Vacuuming included.
3. COMMIT TO A MINIMUM. “I will move my body for at least 4 minutes on my workout days”.
4. Set yourself a rest day reward if you hit your 4 days.

5. REST YOUR LITTLE HEART OUT AND WALK AROUND LOOKING SMUG AS HELL.

Repeat for life.

Anyones else lose the meaning of smug there too? Smug. Smuggg. Weird word.

This week on the podcast I’ve recorded something to help gear you up for the upcoming week, every Sunday.

Take a listen to bookmark for each Sunday.

I use my Sunday evenings to reset and plan the week ahead. Being intentional means I can do things I want to do and complain less about being overwhelmed in the week.

Be intentional and hit the things you need to do this week.

Podcast is available everywhere you can get podcasts - search for MOVE YOUR BODY

2021 was our year of adventure. We declared it, wrote it down, and it didn’t happen.
We had some pretty hard lessons to learn and as a result grew in mind, body & spirit.
Grateful that the answer wasn’t “no”, just “not yet”.
2022 - the year of adventure.

Are you waiting for something more complicated? Something that costs more so you have a better excuse?

This is what I find each time I’m invited to talk about the move your body movement.

All your new health requires today is that you move your body.

You don’t need new shoes.
You don’t need a membership.
You don’t need to get over covid.

Your body requires it of you that you do something with it today and in response it’ll:

Boost your mood
Give you more energy
Sleep better tonight
Crave nutritious food.

It’s not a trick
It’s science.

Move your body for 2 minutes today, and do the same tomorrow, and the next, and the next, and you will begin to see things happen in your body and mind what you thought you’d need to pay £1000s for.

Hey 👋🏼 I’m Sara. 30/Girl/Manchester.

I am an anti-fitness-fitness-coach. I’d rather be sat still, snuggled up, than be sweating, but if I do that I struggle to balance my happy thoughts and end up on a path of inner destruction.

Even after becoming an instructor after fitness changed my mental health, opening my own gym and buying all the leggings in the world… it still ends up being the last thing I would choose to do.

And yet… I have to!

So my gym and my app have become my own personal tools to combatting this.

Motivating the unmotivated through weird ass - anti fitness enthusiast- ways.

We’ve redefined fitness.
We’ve hacked it so you don’t even feel it.
We’ve formed an incredible community of people the same as you and me.

I like to use social media to bring you some REALITY into your life, a lot like this posed photo. 🤣 but hey, you deserve to see me without the sweat some times.

If you’ve appreciated any of my posts this year, please give me a share in your stories so that we can grow the ANTI revolution 🔥🙌🏼

It’s natural to feel motivated when the dates change to a new year, and it’s great to take action.

But whilst you are reading everyone else’s goals for the year, don’t allow yourself to be stuck in comparison for so long that you miss your chance for the real magic. TODAY.

Today is your opportunity to change 2022, 2023, 2034…

Today may not look like a perfect day, and it will have challenges that look like closed doors, no time and crappy circumstances.

But it’s those 2-3 minute windows between the hard spaces that change the future.

How do you choose to rest today?

How do you choose to move today?

How do you choose to speak today?

How do you choose to eat today?

How do you choose to see yourself today?

How do you choose which voice to listen to today?

These are the short term daily goals which are really just habits that will propel your life into awesome.