My Background in BodyFlow

So now that you are a little more familiar with BodyFlow in general, here’s my (rather lengthy) personal BodyFlow story…

During the 08-09 school year, we lived here in North Carolina for my husband’s fellowship. I had taken a leave of absence from teaching 5th grade, and just worked part time jobs at a church and a gym.

Knowing that we would be returning to central Illinois, I contacted our gym back home and inquired about the possibility of adding BodyFlow classes. The fitness manager said she was indeed considering that, but needed a few more people interested in becoming instructors before committing. Hello, perfect!

The training process is a little different now, but those three days in Charlotte with a bunch of strangers were intense (especially for an introvert all by herself!) We were each assigned a track the first day that we had to teach the next morning.

Might I mention that memorizing choreography is not a natural skill for me. Some people say they just play the DVD in the background while doing dishes and then they’ve got it. Me… not so much.
I have to watch the DVD. Rewatch it while reading the chorey notes. Watch it again with the presenter voices off. Then listen to just the music with the notes. Then practice it several times. Then figure out what to say while I’m doing the moves.

Just writing that all out makes me wonder why I do this! (But then I remember the list I finished last post with and it all comes back to me! The time invested learning the release is so worth it!)

Now imagine this process happening FOR THE FIRST TIME and only given 16 HOURS to prepare – and sleep somewhere in there as well, so that your body can workout ALL DAY LONG FOR THE NEXT TWO DAYS!

AND – AND – then try to wrap your brain around the fact that they digitally reverse the videos so that you, as an instructor, can mirror their actions as you look at the screen, but still say the words that they say. Confused? Tell me about it!

On stage, we say right, but it’s really our left. This totally messed me up for the longest time. I even put my contacts in the wrong eyes one day because of it!

Of course, I had gotten the Sun Salutation track, which involves multiple rounds with several right and left cues. I was a disaster! Practicing over and over and over, alone in that hotel room, I thought my brain was going to explode.

The tears began to fall. What was I doing? Why in the world had I thought this was a good idea? I had ZERO dance experience (not that this was dance), but I had never even heard of an 8-count before this!

Fortunately, after a shower, a reassuring phone call from my husband, and a (decent) night’s sleep, it all came together. However, I will never hear “Desert Rose” by Sting in quite the same way.

(Update in case I’ve scared anyone from ever considering becoming an instructor: Nowadays, you know your tracks well before training starts. Maybe they heard me crying…)

I passed that April weekend’s certification and then had three months to submit a video of me teaching a whole class. We were moving back to Illinois at the end of June, but the gym I worked at here in NC didn’t have any Les Mills classes (because you have to pay a significant license fee in order to offer their programs).

Luckily, the Gold’s Gym nearby allowed me to teach with one of their Flow instructors as my mentor. And wouldn’t you know it? She was from Jacksonville, IL. WHAT?! Small world! Her husband had worked at Illinois College, a school in the same athletic conference as our alma mater.

Lisa Marie was such a blessing in those first few months, helping me with timing and technique, and even manning the camera for my video submission. Amidst changing Les Mills company regions from Southeast to Midwest and a “lost in the mail” debacle, I was finally official.

Soon after moving back to Illinois, I started teaching the Monday/Wednesday night classes at Five Points, and couldn’t have loved it more! It was a perfect way to decompress after teaching fifth graders all day!

Even after finding out I was pregnant just a few months in, I was able to continue to teach up until about 30 weeks. By then, it just got to the point where I wasn’t a good visual example with a giant belly knocking me off balance! (But Flow is a great class for pregnant mommas!)

A couple months after Hayden was born, I was able to resume teaching, and continued Flowing for the next two years.

When we decided to move back to North Carolina, I desperately wanted to continue teaching Flow. A connection through my husband’s work left me hopeful. The fellowship director’s wife happened to teach BodyFlow at a couple of the YMCAs in the area. Surely, she could help a girl out, right?

Well, during our house-hunting trip that spring, we stopped in the new YMCA to check out the facilities, and I picked up a group fitness schedule. Scanning down the list of classes, I saw, “BodyFlow … Lisa Marie” WHAT?!

There surely can’t be that many people with that name! I mean, I know it’s a city of over 200,000 people, and I know it’s the South where two names are common and all, but it couldn’t be just coincidence, right?

Nope! Sure enough, my Illinois-born, former mentor from Gold’s Gym now worked at the YMCA (near where we thought our house would be)!

Through a series of emails and a performance interview, I was all set to teach again. Hallelujah!

After Josiah was born, I ended up switching my home branch location to the YMCA that’s closer to our house, but I’m still in awe at how everything fell in place.

It was totally God at work there.

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11

I can’t even tell you how happy I am that God’s plans involved BodyFlow for me!

 

 

***Let me know: Do you like the personal stories or prefer more informational based pieces?