Hello friends,

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it's been a while since I wrote to you. If you're in my WhatsApp group, I shared a little bit of an update there last week, but I thought I'd send out an email as well. I've been trying to set up a new domain and email before sending out a newsletter because I want to move on from Run with Tina, but I've had awful trouble with it so I thought I'd use this for a while longer.

For the past while I've felt the need to take some time to re-focus; I feel that this is something that is helpful to do regularly but for the last few years I've found it hard as I've felt a little lost and unsure what to do. Not only have I grown and changed a lot but at the same time the fitness and wellness industries have changed an awful lot and continue to change very fast and I'm not sure I like the way things are going...

Sometime ago I saw that Serena Williams, an athlete, is advertising weight loss injections (turns out her husband owns the company) and something snapped in me. I guess it was the straw that broke the camel's back. It's so disheartening to see diet culture coming back with a vengeance and women's insecurities being exploited more than ever - and by women - when for a few years it seemed like the tide was starting to turn. I've found it hard enough to convince people to try Feel Good Fitness or Weight Loss instead of diets or punishing fitness programmes and now this global superstar athlete who's always been proud of her curvy body is promoting diets and this idea that you cannot be happy or feel good about yourself unless you're skinny (she talked about this in some interviews). I cannot fight that nor do I want to. I'm not a fighter; I value my peace too much these days, so I decided to give up!

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However, I do want to do something because I did a poll recently on Instagram and around 90% of women said losing weight would make them happier. I have worked with hundreds of women and been through it myself so I know how it feels.

It’s okay to want to lose weight, by the way, it’s totally normal and it’s great that people are honest about it. Anti-diet movements like body positivity and even intuitive eating have shamed women for wanting to lose weight and that is as wrong as shaming women for being overweight/not losing weight. Ironically, many anti-diet movements still conform to diet mentality because they are telling women what to do with their bodies e.g. you should love your body the way it is, you shouldn't want to lose weight, etc. I have had so many clients come to me who now feel like they're failing because they cannot love their body as it is and because they cannot stop wanting to lose weight.

And let's be honest, the fact is that life can be easier if you’re a little slimmer. For example, I’ve had clients who couldn’t take part in activities like kayaking with their kids because of their weight and it does feel nice to know you can go to any shop and put anything on and look good, right? Let’s stop lying to ourselves - honesty with yourself about how you feel is the prerequisite to change. Of course, it's also okay if you're happy with a bigger body and don't want to lose weight. More power to you. You can also be perfectly healthy and fit even if you're overweight - there's so much more to health than just your weight but I feel like that's an discussion for another day!

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That said, I want to take the focus completely off weight loss and go straight to the root - no more skirting around the issue. The fact is that all body issues are caused by your disconnection from yourself. Regardless of your issue, whether you're unhappy because you're overweight or underweight or just do not like your body (I think most women fall into this category), this is the root of it. This is why you feel insecure, uncertain, stuck, anxious, you self-sabotage, over eat, under eat, binge, restrict, treat your body badly…. Because you’re disconnected from yourself - your body, emotions and spirit.

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​This is why you feel bad and when you feel bad you make bad choices because like attracts like. I know many of you are into manifesting - this is how it works. If you want to be slim because it would make you feel good, then you need to first feel good and it’ll happen. Being connected with yourself feels good - this is what eg Abraham Hicks calls being in the vortex and many others call being in alignment. This is the power of now that Eckhart Tolle talks about. It’s very simple, no woo woo tricks and rituals required.

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Your body is not the problem. The way you treat your body (diet, exercise, motivation etc) is not the problem - it's a symptom. With diet mentality we only treat the symptoms so of course any fix is only temporary. With my Feel Good approach we treat the cause and when we do that, the symptoms will disappear without much effort.

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​This is what my coaching will focus on from now on. Connecting with yourself so that you can learn to trust your own body and your heart and mind. It’ll lead to increased self-respect, self-worth, feeling good, self-love, confidence, freedom, reduced stress, anxiety, confusion…. It’ll lead to improvements in all areas of your life.

You can follow any diet, any fitness programme, you can have weight loss surgery or injections during this coaching - I have nothing against these I totally understand why people choose to have them, but unless you do the inner-work the results are only temporary and, more importantly, the happiness & self-worth they bring you won’t last very long. So if you use any weight loss aids, please work on your inner self at the same time.

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NOTE: this email might make it sounds very simple 'just connect with yourself and all will be well' almost like another quick fix diet, right? In reality, of course, there's so much more to it. Once you start connecting with yourself things will come up and y0u'll have to work through them one at a time. Things like emotional eating, food (or other) addictions, old bad habits, stress, hormonal or other health issues, other lifestyle issues, setting boundaries, self-talk, self-sabotage.... it's a process that's different for everyone and that's the beauty of it - you can make it yours and the process alone teaches you to trust yourself to know what's best for you. It's not an easy process but it's an exciting one that is guaranteed to make your life better in many different ways and the best thing is that you will start feeling better from day one - you don't have to wait until you reach your goal.

I'm going to share more over the coming weeks here and in my WhatsApp group, maybe on Instagram as well, so please stay tuned. In the meantime, if you want to try coaching with me or want to know more, please email me.

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I look forward to connecting with you soon

Tina x