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Speaking of Curves: Meet Curvy Fitness Instructor, Sarah Taylor!
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Oct 31, 2024
We're back with another Speaking of Curves series where we spotlight, celebrate, and support entrepreneurs and businesses in the Plus community! Join us every Thursday at 12pm, EST we will interview different businesses, designers, indies, and influencers in the community! Today's guest is Plus Size Fitness Instructor, Sarah Taylor!
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0:05
hello hello hello happy thursday welcome back um i'm marie janae the creator of the curvy
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fashionista and we're back for another speaking of curves um where each thursday we interview talk
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with a plus-sized business owner someone who caters to the plus-sized community whether they're
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influencers designers boutique owners creatives stylists like we're talking to different
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um creators and different business owners because especially now through rona it's more important to make sure we
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support these small businesses so that they can we can see them and support them on the other side of the road right
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on the other side of this pandemic and so especially for me like i have noticed that indie designers
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and the brands and the businesses in the plus space are the ones that literally help us move
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forward help us grow um and so um let's see this i'm getting a
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this is a community okay um so with this being said like it's
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important for i had a weird technical glitch so anyway so it's important that we support brands
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support give love and show love to those who are doing it so we have a new guest today and i'm really excited
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but before we do i have to give a major shout out and uber love to indie designer um zelly for
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she elon who is an um l.a based in the indie designer i would say boho lux
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um designer who just got into nordstrom i am wearing her uber soft
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ooh like i mean when i say these things are soft i've got these wide leg pants on this oversized top and i tied it
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i'm feeling very spicy like i'm loving it so as you are tuning in
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let us know where you're watching from say hello don't be shy and as you have questions
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don't hesitate to drop them in the comment box we're here to help you you know we're going to connect we're going to ask questions
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and today's guest i you know she has mastered the art of the pivot
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i've known her about like six years she started off as a blogger then um right after she won miss
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i want to say miss toronto miss plus we're gonna get the details from her in a second
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she won a title started her blog then she started modeling and then
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because of a personal situation and shows she's going to get into detail into it but because of a personal um
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situation she had she decided to start her business and since then she had opened two locations
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but then when rona stopped when rona came she had to pivot so we're going to list we're going to hear a little bit
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from miss sarah taylor and she's going to tell us a little bit about her business her brand
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so make sure you guys are saying hello like angela from charlotte new jersey so hello
2:55
miss sarah taylor thank you so much thank you so much for having me it's so
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nice to connect even though we're on in different countries i love it right right and so
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you're in canada you're in toronto and you are expecting
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i am i am almost 15 weeks pregnant so end of september congratulations
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and so for folks who don't know you let's like introduce yourself to the
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audience to those who are like um maybe not familiar and give them a little bit about what you do
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okay so um i'll start with a little bit of my story um so a big part of my story was i grew up
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bullied as a kid like most plus-sized women um which really affected my self-esteem
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and also all the decisions i made in life so i ended up at 21 my parents split and i
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um it was really really rough i grew up as a pastor's kid so it was a lot of change all at once and
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was in a really rough spot met a guy who was super abusive um we ended up getting married despite
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everybody else thinking we should and about two years in it just kept getting worse and i realized i couldn't
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live in that pain anymore and so i decided things had to end but for me what that was was the start
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of the journey to self-love and that's really where my entire life started to change and i really saw that value of learning to
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love yourself and i say that to because that leads into what i do now so a couple years into my healing
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journey um i had seen a plus-sized fashion show downtown toronto it was the first time i had seen
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curves in movement i was like what is this what is life and i then kind of was like oh maybe i
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could plus size model and so i had a couple opportunities really small ones and then i got are you the next miss
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plus canada i got an email and so i entered the pageant um i was covered in tattoos never done a
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photo shoot never done runway and i ended up winning queen people's choice and talent um much to my
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surprise and the next the next day i created sarah taylor's journey so that
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was my account on instagram i created a blog and i just started sharing my journey of all the
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things that i went through um and how i had gotten to where i was at that point and i just kind of wanted
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to document what was happening and it was all about not just pretty photos but sharing inspirational
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um quotes and parts of my life and then that kind of led into wanting
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to be able to work with women more and make a bigger impact and fitness was a really big part of my
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life and i was at a gym i had been there for two years but i was fat shamed quite a bit it was a boutique gym
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and i was known as the queen of modifications because i had been in a car accident and had injuries and one day i was at
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the gym i had been there two years as a saturday and a girl looks at me who is not tiny i will add and says
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are you sure you have medical clearance to be here i was like oh no you didn't simply because of my
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size and so it was in that moment for me yeah
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if you had medical clearance to be at the gym yep yep
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right so that evokes a lot of emotion when you hear that and when people hear that they're like oh my gosh but i knew that i wasn't the
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only plus-size woman that had experienced that at the gym because it wasn't my first time
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and so i ended up becoming um a personal trainer i took a extensive course and as soon as i
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graduated i opened my first studio with doing group fitness classes
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providing modifications teaching women how to strength train because i think a lot of women don't know how to move
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their bodies they don't know how to connect with their bodies and then i opened another studio about a year later in downtown toronto
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um and then i ended up going virtual because of covid which has been a really great gift to be
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able to work with women all around the world essentially um so that in a nutshell is serotonin dirty
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so far well okay so for those of you guys who are just tuning in and wondering what we're talking about miss sarah taylor
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based out of toronto is sharing her journey she started off as a blogger um shared her journey after just winning
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a pageant um started sharing her journey had an amazingly horrible experience
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at a gym and decided to do something about it and so what's interesting about you is
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that you said you went and you opened up two different locations sarah so if you guys are tuning in like
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don't hesitate to let us know where you're tuning in from we've got latonya from uh oklahoma hey girl um as you're tuning
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in like go ahead and ask questions so one of the things that i love about what you do sarah is that you're focusing on the
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self-love journey like there's no we're not talking about fitness from a space of trying to lose weight that's
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not what we're talking about like um and it's funny that we have you on because literally last week on twitter
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i was like yo i need some movement videos because i need to stretch again
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and like for me i want to be i need to learn how to be
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uh how do you say like comfortable in my my body as i have gained weight i want
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to become familiar i want to feel strong i want to like stretch and not wake up and be like oh my god i moved wrong and
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like my whole body is like right i'm getting older we all react
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right like and i still want like i'm trying 40 this year girl 40
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and you know i'm just certain things i want to feel like i can move and feel comfortable with it so
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this is where you come in yeah so we do a variety of things so everybody kind of
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has to find what they enjoy doing so what i've done is my i call it my magic is group fitness
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so now it's virtual so we've switched it to that um but really it's not everybody is at a
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high level in terms of fitness so in my classes i provide modifications for everything
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um we have strength classes cardio classes we do have a yoga class
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um but we do i don't teach it um i have somebody else who teaches it um and we stretch at the end of every
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class because it is important to be stretching and i also talk a lot about connecting with your body
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um rather than just ignoring it being in tune with your body focusing on breathing and focusing on
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proper form because i think a lot of women when they go to the gym as a plus-sized woman especially because
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there's so much discrimination we don't know what to do and if you don't know what to do you can injure
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yourself which would then have you not going to the gym and so it's really important that i teach proper form so
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we have classes that specifically focus on lower body upper body full body i have a core
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confidence and cardio class um because i like to it is a lot
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so but it's to give variety to people of ready to find what they like so let me ask you let me ask you having
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to go virtual like how did rona like because some people going through rona like it's you know
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negatively impacted positively burst something new like how did this
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pivot because you've made different life changes along the way so it seems like this if it was natural for you
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like how did you embrace like being on lockdown so for uh so in toronto we were shut
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down at the beginning of or the mid march of 2020 and within 12 hours i had a virtual
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solution 12 hours um so we had our first commute
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i did a community um chat was our first thing because i just wanted to check in with everybody
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how is everyone feeling are you okay do you need support um and then the following day was our
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first virtual class and it was definitely an adjustment um it is an entirely different energy being
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virtual and essentially when i was teaching in person i would coach and show like one or two reps
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and now it was i was doing the full workout with you so um pre the beginning of this year
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i was teaching nine classes a week through covid um which was a lot um but i have a
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couple other staff as well but it it was a very natural progression for me and then
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i had to make a decision a couple months into it because toronto gyms have basically been shut down for a year
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i had to decide that i was going to end my lease and just keep going virtual so i built a
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membership site um in four days by myself and launched the membership site
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but the great thing is like i had i've got a because i need folks to hear and
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understand what you just said so you didn't let so you were very
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solutions oriented coming into everything being hit like okay well where else can we go what else
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can we do how else can we navigate through what's happening so you took it as like i don't want to
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say a fun challenge but you took it on as a challenge to be like all right let's try something
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different and so with that pivot i imagine that you would need to have support around
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you like how did that like or or if you didn't like you know how did you
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like make that switch like did you have folks around you who are at least there to come encourage you did this all on your own i
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had like i have a support system i live with my boyfriend um and i have a really great really great family and friends and everybody
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is really encouraging they have been my entire journey but i didn't have anybody like hands on deck to actually help me i don't have
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any staff aside from i have a couple trainers who teach a couple classes but i teach the majority of our classes
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um i do have a tech background i worked for a software company in fundraising so
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very different and i'm not i'm not a coder i was client-facing and i learned our product really well
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and if it wasn't for that i wouldn't have been able to learn an entirely new platform build the membership site and do it it's
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because i have a bit of history in that um but i other opportunities like other resources
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that you had in your journey to help you here yeah that's right that's like another
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nugget like i i hope that you guys are watching this like like the whole like you're there's a whole
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kind of um theme or thread that kind of connects all these um um entrepreneurs
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that they're using what they have to get what they need and so they're like whether it's scrappy
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whether it's community whether it's innovation like they're making it work so if you are this uh if you have a
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business idea and you're watching and you're thinking like should i do it i have this idea i want
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to do something like you need to make it happen like you can do it and there are people here who are
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here to encourage help i will encourage y'all um so as you're starting your business
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like you've gone through you've done the pivoting um you went virtual you built this
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yourself so you just you and what you said 12 hours you had a new virtual idea
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and and see you also benefited from virtual already kind of starting to happen
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yeah there were examples around us like the dancing classes like the teaching you how to do this the dances
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and the moves and stuff so you have that was already happening so that just like clicked for you
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yeah and i think because so for me in building the two like physical spaces
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as well community was really really important and so they've become like family and so i
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would they were really supportive as well and i i was really in tune with what they wanted and needed during this time and i think
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because of the position that i'm in i do take it with a lot of pride because i am in a position of leadership and so
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i wanted to create something right away so that they felt supported they didn't feel alone and that they
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because everybody was scared especially when it first started right and so it was it was then talking also
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about like we can't go into the gym but we're in the safety of our own home and keeping moving during this time is
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going to benefit your mental health tremendously so let's figure out ways to do this together let's also have fun together
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um because it it really was a community and it still is and that's important for me as we continue to grow
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and things i have to pivot again and in the next few months being pregnant um it's important to be able to still
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have that community because i think as plus-sized women um oftentimes we're the only plus-sized
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woman in a room and so to have a community is important and so what would you say to like i
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want to kind of like um hone in a little bit like you seem very like we don't make this happen
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like there is no stopping this sarah right yeah no there's nobody say that entrepreneur that business
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owner who is struggling right like because not everyone has those thoughts like
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or struggling but kind of has an idea and they're unsure
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what would you say to that so there's a lot to that so in full transparency the week before
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covet hit i was contemplating claiming bankruptcy starting two physical gyms is a lot of
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money and i don't have any funding i took loans out under my personal credit i had maxed out two credit cards
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totaling almost 60 grand i thought like i if covid for me didn't
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happen i probably would have ended up in the hospital from so much stress it was horrible um and so for me covet
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allowed me to have a little bit of breath and breathe and space um and our government had some supports
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for businesses which has been helpful i still have a lot of debt but at least it's not on my credit card anymore
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um and so it really is you have to protect your own mental space um and be very
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clear on your why i don't do this i haven't had a salary in three years it's not like i make a lot of money doing this this
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is my life's work and it's what i'm passionate about so i have to stay connected to my why
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and the differences that i'm making in this world not just doing something for the sake of a paycheck because if that was the case i would
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have quit a long time ago i mean i mean like that's real like
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that's the realest thing it is we don't talk about like that underbelly of being an entrepreneur and kind of
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getting through we see the the pretty the highlight reels right like we see like those things but we don't see like okay
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how we gonna pay rent how we gonna take care of this person how we gonna take care of this what are we gonna
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do we don't see those things so for your business now you're virtual now you have a
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community so as i mentioned like i want to learn how to stretch
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like i want to learn how to do something that kind of just gets me moving gets myself familiar
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just so that i can you know i carry stress in my body especially up here and my back
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and so um and right now my hip is source i'm like oh my gosh like what
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is going on like i've just been like my body this is like stretch me and so
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you have classes so what can a person do like you know they've just come to you and
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they've just stumbled upon your site i just shared the url in the comments like what could someone do to become
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more familiar with you so what i offer is there's a few things so if you're like i just want to kind of
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see what you do without committing to anything i have free classes on youtube so uh
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youtube.com backslash the sarah taylor and i have samples of classes so i have 30 minute
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hit classes all body weight um no equipment required i also have a 10 minute stretching video for those who
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want to get a full body stretch you can also see like yes um you can see kind of like how i teach
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and and that i provide modifications for everything and i think the thing is when you are new to fitness or you're
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looking to get back into fitness you see the beach bodies you see insanity and as a plus-sized body it's
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not safe to just go from zero to not or zero to a hundred real quick so you gotta kind of
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build yourself into it safely in my opinion to avoid things like injury and so it's why i
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provide modifications so that somebody who's brand new can come do a class but somebody who's also advanced
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can do the same class and i teach you how to move your body in proper form for example squats is one of the things
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that people do the most incorrectly and that is where your form makes a huge difference
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and so like exactly right so that i showed modifications
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like some people they're like my knees sarah they're not going to do lunges so i have something that's not alone at all so that you can still
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participate in the class and still move your body because people have different injuries so i'm very
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mindful of that in the classes that i've that we do and all of our classes are unique so it's not boring
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it's not like the same thing every day um and it's why we teach things there's cardio
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also part of our classes are full classes there's a warm up to ease you in the workout and then at the end of every
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class we stretch and have a little bit of conversation and an affirmation because i really want to connect body and mind
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and it really is important to stretch and it's one of the things people don't we also have core in every class because
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most people who struggle with low back and hip issues it's related to a weakened core we're not talking six-pack abs
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we're talking about core and the strength of hearts like oh what is happening i feel like i
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i find myself doing like stretches that so for me like i used to be like in college
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like back in the day day day like i used to be a cheerleader used to be in gymnastics
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and like my body has like since all the way changed since then but i find myself like
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you know hella sore and tight and like wanting to just know but it's awkward for me
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to get in front of my tv and stream something like so like what is that conversation can
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you like explain because and i don't even know if you've had that objection from people like you do i just like move my take my
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coffee table out the way and just go to town like how does that work and for those of you guys who are just tuning in
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i'm here with miss sarah taylor um she's based in um in canada in toronto and she's
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um she has fitness by sarah taylor and we're talking about um her pivot how she pivoted from owning
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two um studio gyms and how she pivoted to all virtual how she's navigating this space
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i see you miss cher from north carolina and miss shelley from ohio as you guys are tuning in let us know um
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where you're tuning in from if you have questions for myself or sarah don't be shy
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and ask them um but i am curious um and then we got vanessa from brazil oh hey all right we're still in
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the house so i'm i'm just curious about um to that question so you can answer it yeah
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so there's a couple things i do so when you to start off with me i offer a free
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seven-day trial so you can kind of like poke around try live classes try on demand classes see what you like kind of thing if you
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don't like it you leave if you want to stay and join our community um but part of it i have a welcome video
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to talk about how to start a fitness journey um i also offer six week challenges throughout the year
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not like your typical fitness challenge there's no weighing there's no measuring the six week challenge is you get a prep
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session so we talk about a little bit more in detail how to start a fitness journey how to incorporate it
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into your life how to set up a space in your home um that is good for a gym how much size you need what equipment you
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need um and if you don't have access or finances to buy equipment what do you have around your house laundry detergent
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bottles fill a backpack worth of stuff like all those kinds of things because those are questions people have
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um also how do you schedule time to work out how do you make yourself a priority um all of this is part of what i talk
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about on a regular basis and in my group coaching calls twice a month as well we're constantly talking about how to
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continue to focus on yourself um self-care all of that kind of stuff because
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fitness is just part of the equation there's so much more to who we are there's so much more to the journey to self-love and i think it's important
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that you're aware and you have the ability to ask those kinds of questions so i provide that information in faqs i
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provided a video form um as also part of my six week challenge i offer uh weekly self-love and
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confidence coaching videos based on the 12 pillars of self-love and confidence i've walked through to get to where i am
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um so there's a lot of different resources beyond just like hey do do a class um because it can seem
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really awkward if you've never done it before and it's why every single class i describe and show
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every single move with a modification so that no matter where you are in your journey whatever class you join
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you're going to feel comfortable knowing oh this is how i do it and then you see me do it with modifications as well
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so that you can follow along i appreciate um all the modifications i i i have even
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seen yoga with modifications i was having some conversation with someone and they were talking about
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the getting familiar with your body like even yoga poses where you have to like literally move your foot over yeah or
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like listen you gotta move you gotta move her over a little bit so you can hit a spot you can hit a
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stretch and that is some for some people just hella radical and it's not about
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trying to lose or trying to fit into something fancy it's just about learning how to feel confident in that
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body of yours and to know how it moves and to become familiar with what she can do
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and for me like you know i've got a dog so i got a walker twice a week right so it's like twice a day i mean
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not twice a week but twice a day um and so while i'm out there walking like you know i want to make
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sure that i'm you know can do other things to just relax really and
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literally release so what is next for ms sarah well
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um i'm 15 weeks pregnant which means i'm gonna have to pivot again um so my current plan is live classes
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will will continue until the end of may uh 2021 and then i will be taking at least the
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rest of the year off from teaching live classes um i do have another trainer who's going to teach mondays
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um most people consume our um membership on demand anyway so um
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there's almost 300 classes in our library as well as all our workshops so all of our group coaching calls they're there as
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well and those will continue so that we can continue to have um community but in all honesty i'm kind
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of in this self-discovery place right now of what else how else can i help women how else can i empower
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women um like this is might be a little personal but last night i just really
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felt led to spend some time journaling at 11 30 at night and just kind of like journaling out
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like what are the things that i want what do i want life to look like what is the next step and and how else can i be of service to
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women to empower them so they feel better about themselves so i don't entirely know what's next but i'm also in this place of i've been
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really sick during this pregnancy but i'll figure it out yeah that is so real and i appreciate your honesty in
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that because oftentimes we're like oh i'm gonna have this and do this and i'm gonna do this
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or we're like oh no we're just going to keep on forging forward with what we have and sometimes it's just like okay what is
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the real right now like what's like you know so i appreciate you saying like who knows like you're gonna kind of
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follow where you're led and so that's really important um do you see yourself like adding like
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activewear like you know maybe like why do you laugh why do you laugh because everybody asks
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me um i would love to one day uh but i feel like there's so much that goes
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into that uh and i would like to at least be having a salary from what i do before i start to
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take on something that massive but um i mean i could see it i'd also like to write a book um
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i'd also like to continue to advocate with larger brands to include plus-sized bodies in the
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fitness world because it's something that is not seen so i've worked with some really big brands like in
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canada we have sport check which i think is really similar to like your guys dicks um i've done some really big campaigns
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with them uh nike also sponsored uh three runway shows i produced um and they gifted 30 of my girls all
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their gear head to toe so i'd like to continue to work with brands of that scale
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to move the conversation forward to bring that and advocate yeah
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that is amazing that is amazing so do me a favor and tell everyone where they can find you how they can
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follow you how they can contact you so fitnessbysarahtaylor.com you will
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find everything there we offer a free seven-day trial um for live classes and or on demand um
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on instagram i'm sarah taylor's journey um there might be a new account that comes up because instagram deleted my
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business account two weeks ago so i'm kind of in this like weird spot right now but fitness by sarah taylor
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you will find everything for sure um also you can find me on youtube as well the sarah taylor
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um and i've got lots of free content there and videos not just fitness but also self-love stuff
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product reviews a lot of fitness wear that kind of thing as well awesome awesome i cannot thank you
28:56
enough from for spending some time and chatting with us about your journey literally and and how like you know rona
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has kind of introduced a whole other venue for you and you like you said
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you're like you feel like you're thriving so that is really awesome i'm really excited to see what comes
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next again congrats on expecting um all the good luck to you and prayers
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and keeping you covered um and for those of you guys who are tuning in like i we just sat here with
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miss sarah taylor sarah taylor's journey of fitness by sarah um as a plus size fitness instructor who
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who doesn't create at all anything around weight loss more about movement body awareness and self-love i wanted to
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have her in especially as my body has been hella tight and as we all process stress differently
29:46
i wanted to know like what we could do and so she has a few solutions so i'm really excited
29:52
about that thank you so much for spending time with us sarah thank you guys for tuning in for
29:57
checking out um checking us out we will be back next week with another speaking of curves
30:03
i'm marie denae the creator of the privy fashionista and thank you guys for tuning in
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bye now
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