About the episode
Topics discussed in episode #7
Transcription:
Melanie (00:01):
Hey friends. Welcome to episode number seven of Entrepreneurial Outlaws. As promised today, we have our very first outlaw guest and I am really excited for you to listen into our conversation, for you to meet Stacy Hobson, and for you to hear her story and experiences. She, as she puts it, is a plus size girl turned certified personal trainer, a nutrition coach, ruffling feathers in the health and fitness world by creating plus size workouts for bigger bodies and helping women see what’s strong and healthy looks like for their bodies. This conversation was so, so inspiring. She had so many insightful stories to tell about her own personal experience as a plus sized trainer in an industry that for the most part is dedicated and built upon us, in particular women, taking up less space and being smaller. She talks about her experience in gyms with other clients, with straight sized clients, with other coaches, and then also her experience in the online business space. It’s a really, really great conversation and I’m so excited for you to meet Stacy and for you to listen in to this conversation.
Melanie (01:23):
You’re listening to Entrepreneurial Outlaws, a podcast for creatives, introverts, and paths and spiritual folks who want to grow a sustainable and impactful business on their own terms together. We are paving the way for a new normal in online marketing and business. When that allows you to lean into what makes you and your business unique. And I’m your host, Melanie Knights storyteller, Pinterest strategist visibility, coach and CEO of content are, can be marketing or non-traditional marketing agency for creative business owners who don’t want to compromise their creative integrity to make money, get ready because each week we’re having the messy, honest, and transparent conversations about entrepreneurship, the kind that’s missing from the highlight rails of our social media feeds. And you’ll learn how to create intention and connection behind your content marketing so that you can sell without selling out.
Melanie (02:30):
We’re uncovering the real stories behind what it takes to run a sustainable online business, the highs, the lows and everything in between, ready to break the rules and become an entrepreneurial outlaw. Let’s do this, couldn’t do the show. Stacy. It’s great to have you. I’m so excited for everybody to listen into one of our conversations, especially as we’ve been having these off of air and I’ve had to kind of, I was like, well, we have to save something for the podcast. So can you start by just taking a moment and introducing yourself and letting everybody know what it is that you do and how it is that you help other people?
Stacy (03:18):
Yes, of course. So thank you Melanie, for having me on I am actually really excited to have this conversation with you today. Especially cause we’ve been having so many conversations about this lately outside of this episode. So my name is Stacy Hobson. I am the owner and founder of S L H fitness. I am a plus size personal trainer, so I’m a certified personal trainer and a certified nutrition coach. And what I do is I do help women, specifically women and bigger bodies learn how to actually eat, to nourish their bodies and to get stronger in their actual body. So I help them see what healthy and strong actually looks like for their body and not necessarily trying to look like the women in the magazines or their best friend or whoever.
Melanie (04:23):
Amazing. And I feel like that’s, I feel like that’s such a, a rule-breaking concept because you and I both know that so much of the health and fitness space is focused on being smaller, being tiny, taking up less space, losing weight. And you and I, we both connected a number of years ago through our own coaching businesses. And I think one of the reasons we connected was that we are and why, well, I was a plus sized coach and you are a plus size coach and we both connected based on that and have been in touch ever since. And so I’m really curious to, I really want to talk about your experience as a plus sized coach in an industry that is so focused on us being smaller because I think what you’re doing and the way you approach a walk is not only size inclusive, but I feel like it’s inclusive of all people. And I think that’s so important. The kids, it’s not just bigger bodies who feel uncomfortable in their fitness journey, but I would love to know your experience. When you first started your business, will you stay in your business as a plus size trainer? Was that your goal to use use plus size as kind of a marketing point? No, definitely.
Stacy (05:58):
So it actually, wasn’t when I started, I just wanted to be a part of the crew. Like I wanted to be I’m the personal trainer that helps inspire others to live a healthy life. Just like my personal trainer helped me to do so I did not intend on being a plus sized trainer in my own mind. I felt like I was just one of the trainers. I didn’t feel as though being in this industry, I guess I could say I was naive. I just thought that, you know, I’m just going to start this business. I’m going to do my thing and I’m going to be a trainer. I didn’t actually label myself at all. I definitely started out with just marketing as a personal trainer who is going to help with weight loss, fat loss, whatever their personal goals were. But I learned real quick that if your body does not look a certain way, it’s not going to be, it’s just not an easy set sell for lack of a better word.
Stacy (07:25):
It’s not just a matter of, you know, somebody comes to talk to you and you’re having your consultation and you are, you know, explaining your services and everything, but you know, the person not you, when you’re sitting across from that person while you’re explaining yourself and everything you have to do, you know that they’re looking at you, like it’s just a feeling that you got. I knew that they were not looking at me as someone that could help them because I don’t have the body type, like a lot of personal trainers do. I’m not really lean. I don’t do fitness competitions. I just, my body type is just different from everyone else’s. So that said, I, because I learned real quick, I found myself having to actually show proof of my services that I indeed knew what I was doing, knew how to get them their results.
Stacy (08:34):
I had to start sharing examples of clients that I have. I was currently working with that I had worked with. I had to demonstrate my certifications, that I indeed had this knowledge to help them. So it wasn’t as though someone just walked in to meet the trainer, let’s talk prices. I’m I was spending a lot of time to sell myself more. So my brain, if that makes sense. So it wasn’t, I feel like I had to put a case study together in order to present to my services as being legitimate, just because I mean, I, I had people that would come and meet me and they wouldn’t hire me because they saw the way that I looked and they decided I couldn’t help them based on the way my, if I, if my body looked like this, then I clearly could not help them.
Stacy (09:37):
So I actually got that a lot. So I personally feel like I had to work 10 times harder to get one client compared to the typical personal trainer who has the typical body, you know, I would get one client to their five for examples, just kind of how it felt, how it was. So I feel, and then once I got into with the client, then it always felt like I had to constantly prove myself. I always had to explain my programming if they weren’t getting results. All of a sudden I was feeling a ton of pressure because I felt like I only had so much time to show them that I could help them. Because it’s almost like I had to prove my worth as being able to do my job.
Melanie (10:38):
That is so interesting. And I feel like I have tenfold of questions off the back of that. Okay. So first of all, my first question is like, did you, so you said that you, you felt like maybe you were naive going into the industry and then found yourself in this position where you had to prove yourself. So did you end up choosing to label yourself as a plus size coach or did somebody else label you that way?
Stacy (11:07):
So honestly let’s see. I have, so I’ve been a trainer since 2016. This year 2020 is the first time I actually put a label on it more so for my own comfort level, because I felt as though, if I label myself as this is what I am, then there is no question about it for those that might, you know, do their research ahead of time before hiring me. It’s so that was actually more of my comfort level I have in the past, this has been said, and this has been presented. Sometimes it would be said, isn’t it great that there’s a PA plus there’s a personal trainer that has a, a body type like that. So people are actually when they mean the very best, like the best of intentions when they’re saying this, you know, a lot of times they still, they don’t want to say the word fat.
Stacy (12:23):
They don’t want to say plus size. They don’t want to say bigger body because to be honest in our society, there’s a lot of negative connotation that runs around those words. When honestly, if they’re just descriptive words, they’re just adjectives. But we, as human beings have put such moral value on to those words that if we say it and we’re talking about someone, even though we’re being descriptive, we automatically will feel like, Oh, I’m going to hurt their feelings because they think I’m going to say something bad about their body, because that’s kind of how the words have been generated. Right? So I, it, it has been sent, but not a hundred percent labeled. It’s just, you know, you can do you know that this is how you are seen, but it’s not like it’s actually something that is physically said to you.
Stacy (13:20):
It’s almost like, you know, when there just becomes an understanding, like that’s the plus size personal trainer or that’s the bigger trainer or that’s the fat trainer, like, however someone wanted to describe me because it’s not just, she’s a personal trainer. There has to be more of a descriptive. I mean, there’s not people that are saying that’s a thin personal trainer because that’s just an understood thing, right? That’s what society believes is a personal trainer, is that they’re thin and they’re straight sized. So whenever there is a trainer who does not have the ideal body type, the society has placed on this type of career that all of a sudden you have to describe it. You have to put a label on it. So people fully understand which seems it’s, it’s a very interesting thought and it’s a very interesting thing to see happen and to be the person in that place.
Stacy (14:28):
I will not lie. It has been very uncomfortable and there’s always been that struggle of me even feeling worthy enough to do this job. I truly can say there has been a handful of times. I have almost quit because I felt like the pressure was just too much. It’s started to feel too much. I started to feel like, did I even make the right decision? Is this even right for me? And I would, I would talk to my husband. I would tell him, I’m not sure I want to do this anymore. I don’t know if this is even worth it. Like this is starting to be really heartful on my heart when you are constantly trying to hustle for your worthiness is exactly what Bernie Brown always says. And I really have felt like for the past four and a half years, that that’s exactly what I have had to do. Because clearly my career path did not go the way I had envisioned it to go. Which I mean, that’s kind of life in general. I don’t, I’ve never actually had a discussion with other personal trainers as far as how their careers have gone. But that’s just also, because I don’t know if I really want to have that conversation. It’s kind of a scary one for me.
Melanie (15:56):
I mean, okay. I do want to go back to something you said you were talking about, and then I want to bring us forward into something else that I want to try not to forget to ask you. So you were mentioning about the fact that you felt like you had to prove your web Venus to be able to teach, like put a case study together and that you had clients or sorry, potential clients who almost wanted proof. I have a question and this might be a controversial question. I’m going to fucking ask it anyway. I want to know what these straight sized people, cause I feel like if somebody who looks like us came to us, I feel like there’s no doubt. I feel like, and this, and this might be my own bias, but I feel like there would be a safety. There would be a feeling of safeness and being seen and HUD, and I’m so intrigued to know whether the bias is coming from people who Osceola peop straight sized people. And I don’t know, I’m just really curious about that because I feel as though in my experience, when I was in the health and fitness industry, a lot of people who very naturally navigated towards me was older. Usually perimenopausal and kind of at buddies like mine or what bigger.
Stacy (17:20):
Yes, that’s exactly right. The clients that I got they always had body types, very similar to mine. I did have straight sized clientele, but it wasn’t a ton. I very much had older clients. I had a lot of older clients. I also had clients who were either in menopause or were peri menopausal. So the ones where I had, so those were the clients I truly did not have to work as, I don’t want to say convince them, but it was just a very natural conversation. They, I could instantly tell they were comfortable around me. It was straight sized clients that when I would meet them, it, a lot of them would end up. You could just, you can feel it in the air. You can feel the energy, you can feel how nervous all of a sudden they feel.
Stacy (18:35):
You can tell that you were not what they expected anticipated. Because a lot of times, you know, they would talk to me over the phone or we would talk via text. So they didn’t really see me and see who I was. So you know, I would see it on their face as soon as I would meet them at the front. At the time when I would meet them for their consultation, you could see it. So a lot of times I knew going in, I had a 50 50 shot. I was either going to convince them that regardless of how my body is looking, I really could help them with whatever they needed or that they were, they already made their mind up right now. And they’re just going to go through the motions of this. So it was always like a 50 50 shot at that point.
Stacy (19:32):
So you are absolutely right. That it really was. I got a lot of flack from straight sized people and they were the ones that, you know, said they couldn’t take me seriously because of the way my body looked. Obviously the way my body looked was a pure representation of my knowledge, my education, my skillset, because if I could not get my body to be a certain way, then I clearly could not have helped them with their goals. Like obviously that wasn’t a thing I could do for them. So and I mean, I ran into it all the time. I even taught a fitness class every time. Not every time, but sometimes a new person when they would enter. I would see them look at me sometimes they would leave because I had people tell me, wow. Yes, there were people that said, I cannot go take her fitness class because I CA I’m not, I have to be motivated by someone who was actually fit and she’s not fit.
Stacy (20:41):
So I have to go to someone else’s class. Also what’s always is that when your body type looks different, every time there would be an, if a new person would come in, they would always go to the fitness person in the room. And they thought that person was the teacher for the class. And every time they would be like, no, I’m sorry. Stacy is the instructor of the class. And after like, of course, like it crushed me in the beginning, but then I got to the point where I was like, you know what, when this class starts, I’m just going to prove it to you. I’m going to show it to you if you stay at, I mean, clearly, you know, I’m not saying this out loud, but it just got to the point in my own head. I just started to giggle about it because I knew my athletic ability.
Stacy (21:38):
And of course, as you already know, when you are teaching a fitness class I mean, when you’re training someone, you are, you can still show some of your strengths because you have to show them how to perform the exercises so they can see some of that. But then it’s really when you’re working out with them and the fitness class. So they get to see your full ability at that time. So it was, it always ended up being like a game, almost like, well, here we go. I’m just going to show you, I’m going to show you what a bigger body can actually do in this fitness class. I mean, people, it, it, it has been said, there are people have said in the past, like I actually had someone asked me if another instructors class was harder than mine, because she is thinner and fitter than me.
Stacy (22:35):
So they automatically presume that. And when you teach body pump, body pump is the same. We all teach the same class. So regarding of how it feels hard or not it’s all based on your fitness level. It’s also based on the weights that you are using in your class, and it’s not based on your body type, it’s just based on your fitness level. So I would get that question a lot and I would have to explain, again, that’s not how this class is taught. We all teach the same release, it’s all the same stuff. It’s just a different time slot with a different instructor who happens to have a different body and a different personality. So you’re going to get the difference in that aspect, but the workout itself is the same.
Melanie (23:29):
Wow. I mean, so there’s elements of that. The, I didn’t know, there were parts of that story that I had not had previously. I didn’t know that people walked out and things like that. And I think, well, I mean, fuck that. Right. But like, seriously, I mean, it’s just done it. Yeah. And it just stuns me the bias and it’s, it feels like to some extent it’s not even unconscious, like it is conscious bias towards bigger bodies. And yeah, I get there as a level of ignorance or lack of just not knowing because you know, the reality is thinness is normalized. It is popularized and it is normalized. And so therefore the concept of a bigger body in movement, the concept of a Vivek, a bigger body training or exercising, being healthy is just completely lost because of this popularization and normalization of what’s a bigger body means.
Melanie (24:40):
And in so many ways, these people are losing out because, you know, I, I would say the same. I know that in, when I worked in the gym, one of my classes where I was basically told when I fast died, like, well, we don’t really know what this is, so you can do what you want. And I was like, amazing. So I basically made it what I wanted and it was the hottest class because everything else was formatted. And I mean, there was rules, obviously I didn’t break rules around health and fitness, but it was, it was difficult. And so if people didn’t come back, it was usually because it was too hot. It wasn’t because of me. But the thing is, you know, I, I’m sitting here listening to you and I’m thinking to myself, did I actually experience this as well? Like, and I don’t know that anybody ever walked in the room and went and asked somebody else, but I definitely think people would walk in the room and I would be standing at the front and be like saying, hello.
Melanie (25:38):
And that’d be this kind of pause and this confusion on their face. And then we’d get started. And it would be like, you know, here we go. And I was saying to somebody, it may have even been you. But I was saying to somebody the other day that, you know, being able to teach a spinning class, spinning and remembering what the hell you’re supposed to be doing, which song, and also shouting at the class and, you know, above the music, like that requires a certain level of athletic ability. And again, like this idea that it can’t be done by a big, a buddy is just not true. Right. And I’m so intrigued by these labels, you know, this idea of people labeling you labeling us labeling. And I mean, us, not just you and I, but labeling. Yeah, of course. Because like, isn’t that just where we’re at in society. Like, we can’t just accept that someone is who they are. We have to label them. We have to label them as the plus size trainer. You know, we don’t, as you said, we don’t label somebody as the, as the thin trainer, but we have to find a way of describing that person. It’s almost like this need to connect, but we don’t know how to do it or that, you know, people don’t know how to do it. So they end up labeling us. And oftentimes that label is designed to make them feel more comfortable buses.
Stacy (27:07):
That’s exactly right. And so and that’s the thing that, and I will say, what I do want to say is that, like, you know, anyone who would ever not hire a personal trainer because of the way their body looked, it always is a hundred percent, the bias of that person. They have fatphobia, they, they, there is this fear within themselves. You know, there are people who are afraid of getting fat shit. I had that fear and sometimes it still creeps up. In regards to, if there is some weight gain that I might notice, or maybe clothes are not fitting properly in a season of my life, because I have spent my entire life since I was 11 years old, trying to be smaller because I have always lived in a bigger body, no matter what age I was, it that’s just always how it is.
Stacy (28:13):
You know, I couldn’t always like, you know, your girlfriends, you want to be able to swap your shirts. You want to wear their cute top. And there was a lot of times I couldn’t or wear their pants because we, we didn’t wear the same size. I was typically a little bigger than my friends. So I, there has always been like this own awareness and my own self. And then of course, as that’s the part, like I was saying when I was naive, when I first started as a trainer, because I thought I’m just going to walk in here and do my thing. You know, I had that fire in my stomach and my soul, like I was, I was ready to do this and contrary to popular belief, you know, when I did, I had already lost 80 pounds at that point. So this is the other scenario is that you look at someone and you don’t, you don’t even know.
Stacy (29:13):
And while I do not coach weight loss anymore, I was on my own journey before I became a trainer. So I had, you know, for me that that was an achievement in itself. I was wearing a certain size, you know, I had all of those thoughts of trying to fit into certain size clothes. I wanted my body to be a certain way. And so here I am, have, have looking so much different than I did, and I was still being called fat. And I was, so it was one of those things that made me realize that whatever it is I try to do in regards to my body, it is just never going to be enough to be viewed as whatever is acceptable in society as a whole, the way that they are promoting body types. So that also was like a huge turning point when it’s like, you know what, at some point I have to, I’m going to have to just work, to heal myself and to let all of that go because it doesn’t matter.
Stacy (30:32):
Like I spent a good amount of time up until last year I got injured. But up until that point, I still, like, I was doing things to my body to still try to make myself small, because I wanted to be taken seriously in this career that I chose to just change up. I mean, I changed our life as a family so that I could pursue this dream of mine to build a business and to do this. If that makes sense, what I just, I, it was, it, it was a very huge awakening to know that no matter what you do, this is always how you’re going to be looked at. You know, some people are going to say that you’re not going to be as successful as the thinner trainer because their body is representative of the career of being a trainer. So that’s just how this is, and you’re just going to have to accept it.
Stacy (31:39):
That’s also the biggest thing someone could not say to me is just to tell me to get over it and just accept it, because that will put a fire under my ass, bigger than anything, because to you that your ass is wrong and that your belief is not the true reality of the situation. And my body will never dictate how good I am at my job, because I don’t go as a receptionist. I mean, maybe someone could, but I mean, I had was a receptionist prior to this and my boss did not treat me as though I couldn’t answer the phone and do that work because I was a bigger body.
Melanie (32:21):
Yeah. I mean, that’s so interesting. The, I think the idea that it’s almost like we wouldn’t be taken seriously because of the size of our body. And there’s always this need to prove ourselves. It’s so interesting because it’s like, there’s an element of me that believes that this is partly because if someone is going to, and I’m generalizing here, but if someone is going to the gym with the goal of, let’s say weight loss, and they’re like, you, you gave the example earlier, someone who needed to be motivated by that person’s body. Like I call bullshit. Like, I’m sorry, but that motivation of looking at someone else is gonna within real quick, because you are not going to achieve the results, whatever your results make, whatever your goal is, you’re not going to achieve something by going to the gym and looking at someone else whilst they teach you how to exercise in a class a few times a week, like then not that isn’t going to rub off and suddenly help you control your eating habits.
Melanie (33:35):
So you’ll sleep habits. You’ll stress habits, the 21 hours a day that you’re not at the gym or, sorry, the, I don’t know how many hours are in a week, but whatever, but not going to help you the rest of the week, you know, that that person or that image that we see is not going to help you do those other things. And so it’s almost as if like the empathy and humility as a person in a bigger body. The fact that there is this need to prove the worth of the skill and the worth of the job that you’re doing. It almost like leads you to this place. And I’m going to say possibly getting people better results because there is this connection and you’re building a relationship versus it being surface level and fantasy, or, Hey, this person looks, then they can teach me something it’s very similar to, you know, I just recorded an episode and said that likability is no longer a Bible marketing tool in the online business space.
Melanie (34:37):
Well, it’s the same thing, like ability as bullshit, but also looking at someone’s body type and saying, Oh, because they don’t have that particular body type. I cannot be taught by them is the same. It’s not gonna, it’s not buyable. And it’s not motive motivated. Oh, a hundred percent. I wonder in relation to kind of now that you are kind of in this different place in your own career and you’re not teaching, you know, teaching weight loss as such, and you’ve recently opened up a program, which I am a part of bad-ass is in bigger bodies. And I, yes. And I am wondering like, what does that shift feel like for you professionally? Because I’m, so what I’m hearing is so much of this, this kind of Johnny of coming into this space with this fire and this passion to help people. And then somewhere along the way, it just kind of got pissed on basic. And it was the same for both of us. I think it was just like, wow, okay, this isn’t what I was expecting. And now having to kind of find your new and like evolved pathway. And I feel like you’ve really found that. I mean, I was saying this to you earlier, and I feel like you’ve really, really found that. And I’m just so intrigued to know what that looks like for you personally and professionally, as you kind of lean into this this conversation around bigger bodies.
Stacy (36:10):
So there’s a lot of different things that come to mind, but the thing that keeps coming to me the most is just feeling empowered. I know that this can be a word that is thrown around so much, but that is just how I feel it almost, it, it honestly feels like I have shed my skin and I have emerged as an entirely brand new person. I am, while it felt so hard and I almost, and it almost broke me. And in fact, I will admit even just when I took a break from in-person training, back in October, I was broken. At that point, I was broken. It broke me, me pushing so hard in my business to try to prove myself to other people and me not take care of myself, my own opinion, what I wanted my business to be. It broke me.
Stacy (37:16):
So now I just feel so empowered that I honestly feel like I have finally stepped in to the place that I was supposed to be in. And so it feels like I was supposed to go through what I went through. I was exposed. I was supposed to experience it because there was something, there was something better that I was actually, there was a reason I felt this fire in the first place to be a personal trainer. And now I finally see it because I had so many opinions being thrown at me. You know, I was even when I hired a business coach, I was told specifically what I should be teaching because I couldn’t really be teaching this kind of thing for reasons because of my bigger body. So I was constantly being told who I shouldn’t be in order to be successful in a business when all along, I should have just been myself in the first place.
Stacy (38:24):
I should’ve just shown up as who I was and done that. So that’s it. So that said, I, it honestly just feels good. I, I have noticed first of all, I love not being, not talking about weight loss and fat loss because healthy doesn’t have a size. You cannot tell anything based on this. Could we argue that people need to lose weight for their health? Of course there are different instances and there are, but that is not, that is not the general viewpoint of health itself. It’s not looked at as an individual basis. It’s looked at as though if you weigh a certain amount, if you fit into this graph chart of the BMI and you fit into those columns that we have decided all human beings need to fit into in order to be healthy. Like this is, that’s not individual health. That is just, that’s just like putting, it’s just like covering it with something and saying, everyone needs to do this.
Stacy (39:37):
Like, everyone needs to love the color paint because we, as a society have chosen the color pink as being our color. You see what I mean? So I definitely even this last time when I launched my program, it just felt effortless as an entrepreneur is the first time. Well, this is the second time, because when I did rebel fitness program this summer, it still felt that way just to show up and just to be like, look, we’re going to exercise. We’re going to move our bodies. Our bodies are bigger, but we can still exercise regardless of what anyone else is saying. And we don’t have to have the goal to lose weight. We can just move this body and feel good in it. It it’s just a completely different switch. Gosh, I hope I answered. I feel like I went in a big
Melanie (40:34):
I like big Saccos, you know, us, we like to make a short story long. I always say this. Yeah, so, so guys, this is the thing, right? So Stacy and I have known each other for a very long time. Her birthday is like, I dunno, maybe a week or so before my, I think maybe, I don’t know. It’s like the middle of January. So she is technically I say, technically, same star sign as me, but there’s like this commonality that Aquarians a very thorough and it’s a very Aquarian personality to basically have to make sure that you fully understand the answer. So I’m a freaking nightmare because like, I can’t make a short story short or long story short. No, it’s a short story long. So yeah. So I, I tell Stacy all the time that you are, I tell you all the time that your tech you born at the wrong day, like you’re actually in Aquarius,
Stacy (41:28):
According to the change and the horoscope here recently. I, yes,
Melanie (41:37):
Let’s see. Well, there we go. There we go. No, you did answer my question. You definitely answered the question and you gave him a more value that I think is entirely irrelevant because I mean, you, you said like your most recent launch fall effortless. And I mean, isn’t that how we all want our launches to fail. I mean, if you’re listening to this and your launches don’t feel effortless, like this is a huge thing, right? I’ve talked about this before, already on the show. And it is often an alignment issue. We don’t need more stuff. We don’t need most strategy or more fluff in our businesses. What we need is to get into alignment with ourselves because the rules, the noise, that is what is holding us back. And and I think I, yeah, and I think it’s a Rite of passage though. Right?
Melanie (42:30):
I do. I do feel that age. I say all the time, people tend to come to me and my business when they kind of, they’ve tried everything else and they’re fed up. And I mean that in the nicest possible way, because it’s what, it’s the conversations I have. Like it’s because there is so much regurgitated noise out there. And so it kind of filters down and then this is what happens. We end up in these businesses that we can’t even recognize. And you know, this has been a conversation you and I have had for a while. And it’s been really great to see you these past few months, past year, I guess, really lean into that, that buyer that you had when you first started. I think we all know what we all remember that, you know, when everything feels shiny and exciting and there’s no like self doubt and then all of a sudden it changes and it’s been really, it’s been really great to see that happen in your business. And I’m so excited and I love being a part already. We’re going to just start it, but I love being a part of bad asses in bigger bodies. So before we wrap, before we wrap up today I would love it if you could just share. So Stacy also has a membership called the freedom fitness membership. And I was wondering if you could share a little bit about what this membership is and what it looks like.
Stacy (43:49):
Yeah. So, so the freedom fitness membership, it is, it is just a membership, a monthly membership where I offer a group. So there’s a membership group for where I share. I call them teachable moments just because, I mean, every moment that you’re reading something new in regards to information, that you didn’t have a belief on that as a teachable moment, because you are learning every time you’ve taken in. So I share a couple of times a week teachable moments. There are workouts there’s three workouts that I provide every single month. The thing with freedom fitness, I called it that because you have the freedom to do whatever feels good for you. So for example, I usually schedule the workouts and the app just because in order for it to go live, I do have to schedule it in the calendar.
Stacy (44:52):
I do it Monday, Wednesday, Friday, but you are, you are the one that is actually the expert of your life. I am not. So if you know that there is a better day in time for you to fit a workout in, then you have the freedom to do that. I am not the trainer that says, just follow the program exactly as it’s written, because that’s just not feasible for real everyday life shit happens. Life comes up. So basically the membership is just giving someone workouts, providing the support and the guidance that they need teaching them about. It’s okay for you to squat in a different way. That feels good for you, mobility wise and not how everyone says you are supposed to squat because we have to move our bodies and the way that they’re meant to move and not how someone else’s moves. So I definitely teach that and I teach how to eat, to nourish your body, which is really just reminding you that it is important to eat your vegetables and your fruits and drink some water and things like that.
Stacy (46:08):
But like, you’re not going to get fat eating bananas, and you’re not going to get fat when you have Friday night, tonight’s with your fam. And it’s just, it’s just, I don’t know. I don’t know how else to explain it. And except it just feels, I want it to feel effortless. I don’t want eating healthy and workouts to feel hard, to feel like you have to change your life and flip it around so you can fit all this healthy stuff in. I think that your life should stay how it is and the hell eating healthy and working out should just be integrated in there. I don’t think it should be the other way around. So anyway, that’s just basically what the freedom fitness is. It’s just the freedom to be yourself, to live your life, how you want to live it, and just seeing what strong and healthy looks like for your body.
Melanie (47:02):
Yeah. I love that. I you’ve said this lot a couple of times, but FLS has come up both in relation to your business launches. And also I like fitness and food, and I think, I think that’s so important, right? So much of life, not just this year, because so much of, you know, as entrepreneurs so much about lives does not feel effortless. There are, you know, things that just feel frustrating or out of our control. And it feels like we’re in this constant cycle of trying to figure those things out, that if we can allow things to feel effortless, and if we can create, you know, a way of a pathway of being effortless, that’s so powerful for ourselves as business owners, as humans, as, as parents, as, as people, right? It’s so important. I have loved having you on the show.
Stacy (48:01):
Thank you. And you know, I’ve loved being on here, even though if I felt kind of nervous,
Melanie (48:06):
There’s no need to be nervous. Everybody’s amazing. So I do have one specific question that I want to ask you before we wrap up. And that is what does being an entrepreneurial outlaw look like in your business? What does it mean to you?
Stacy (48:27):
To me, it means showing up a hundred percent unapologetically in this bigger body, standing tall as a personal trainer, calling myself a plus size personal trainer that is educated to talk about health and exercise and teaching women, that there is a much better way to do these things. It is being a rebel in the health and fitness industry. I definitely feel like a rebel. I feel like I am breaking all the rules and it feels damn good. I’ve always been an outsider in the first place. I’ve never followed the pack. So I’m very much showing up in my true unapologetic, big ass body that I actually am beginning to feel very proud of, to be honest.
Melanie (49:33):
Yeah. That’s so thank you. That’s, that’s just so powerful. On all levels, right? The unapologetic pot is, you know, I think we all need to be able to leverage that and feel that harness that power because when we do that, it feels so good. So thank you so much for coming on for gang, super vulnerable, having these conversations. I know that everyone is going to so appreciate hearing them. You know we’ve been talking about plus size bodies and entrepreneurship, and this seems to be a big topic of conversation. So I know we’re going to have you on again at some point to keep diving into this. Okay. So before you disappear, I would love for you to just let everybody know where they can find you, how they can get more of you like it stuff. Yes, of course. So you can find me on Instagram at mrs. Stacy Hobson. That is my preferred social platform. And then also you can find me on my website, it’s http://www.stacyhobson.com. Perfect. And we’ll make sure everything that Stacy has linked to today is over in the show notes. So you’ll be able to visit the freedom fitness membership page. Make sure you go follow her on Instagram. You’ll be able to find her blog and find, just follow her and, you know, just consume more of her content around fitness and bigger bodies and, and just really embracing that. Thank you so much, Stacy. Thanks lady.
Speaker 3 (51:18):
[Inaudible].
Melanie (51:19):
Thank you so much for tuning in to today’s episode of entrepreneurial Outlaws. If you see yourself as an entrepreneurial outlaw and enjoyed this episode, but you do me a favor, it would mean the absolute world to me. If you could take a moment to subscribe to the show and leave a rating and review by leaving your review, you are helping me to grow out we’ll community and together we can show other entrepreneurs that breaking the rules can actually be good for business. Don’t forget. You can find the show notes for today’s episode, along with any of the links that I mentioned on my website@melanienights.com forward slash podcast. And if we’re not already virtual busters, you can come and hang out with me on Instagram. I am the one with the country music playing the lukewarm coffee in my hand, and I’m dishing the doubt on how we can make entrepreneurship more inclusive and transparent. Plus I’ll probably send you some fun gifts. So until next time Outlaws.
