A healthy body cannot be bought or sold and all the money in the world cannot buy you health. Money can buy you healthcare and drugs to treat symptoms, but neither of those can make you well. You will never wake up in the morning fitter and healthier than you were the night before – unless you DO something to make that happen. And you can. You hold ALL the power!
Did you know that only about 12% of adults are metabolically healthy? By the time we get to 60 – most people have at least one chronic lifestyle condition. The good news is though – by making dietary and lifestyle changes – you can make sure that you’re not one of them!
Personal Health & Nutrition Coaching is quite different from normal ‘Personal Training’ that you would be offered if you go to a gym. PH&NC takes a much broader and holistic look at your health markers.
I offer a programme tailored to fit YOU and YOUR health goals. My main emphasis has always been diet, but over the last couple of years, many of my clients are now also interested in other areas such as strength and resistance training, exercise, yoga and stress/sleep hacks – so I offer coaching on those too.
When your body works like it is designed to do – when you feel fit, healthy, strong, flexible, nourished and less stressed – EVERYTHING is better. If you are in chronic pain, overweight, sleep deprived, stiff and stressed – EVERYTHING is much harder to cope with.
Give yourself the gift of health. I promise you that when you FEEL healthy, when your body feels happy, you sleep better, you laugh more, clothes fit like they used to, your skin glows and your hair shines and life is full of joy. Who wouldn’t want that?
See below to find out more about my health coaching or if you would like to chat or have questions – call: 07811 823467
HOW IT WORKS:
First of all – I always suggest we have a chat over the phone and if you would like to sign up – you can choose a six or eight weeks programme – you get a weekly 1:1 coaching session with me.
If you’re local (I’m just outside Dartford, Kent) I’ll come to you – or you can come to me, or we can meet at Everyone Fitness at White Oaks in Swanley or I offer an online option via Zoom.
Your programme is tailored just for YOU.
TOGETHER we take a look at your current diet, your fitness levels, how you sleep and how you manage stress – and together we discuss your health goals/aims – whether it be weight management/loss or just general overall fitness and TOGETHER we work to achieve these.
My main focus is diet, strength/resistance training and flexibility/stability.
DIET is the most important -even if you think exercise is the key to weight loss – it gives a very poor return for all your efforts.
Exercise is good – and I encourage everyone to get moving – but what you’re eating and fueling your body with will have the biggest impact on your health.
Basically – if you are fueling you body with junk – no amount of exercise will really help!
I normally start with an analysis of your current diet. I will share with you all my knowledge about diet and nutrition and especially how our modern diets are not supporting our health at all, but in fact are making us sick. I will make easy swaps and suggestions for you to try to make healthier food choices and I can also tailor make an eating/nutritional plan for you – which you try to follow as best you can.
As a private client you also benefit from a FULL BODY COMPOSITION WEIGHT SCAN showing your bone density, muscle mass, subcutaneous and visceral fat percentages and other health markers, I will also take your blood pressure, your height and waist measurement – as this is a better indication of your health than BMI (I can explain more when we meet). I will also ask you to keep a FOOD DIARY and just jot down how well you slept and for how long etc, and how stressed you feel.
I am available for support and all you have to do – is actually follow my advice as it only works if you actually do it!
With a more holistic approach to fitness and health – I can show you how you can transform your health, your body and your life in such a way that you will NEVER feel hungry again, you’ll maintain a healthy weight, you’ll sleep better, be less stressed and you’ll enjoy exercising and looking after your body – everyday!
Coaching packages are a minimum of SIX weeks – that’s six hours of one to one coaching with me – plus you get SIX FREE CLASS PASSES (dance or yoga – worth up to £60). Or you can book a single one off session for £60.
COSTS
Six Week Programme £300
Eight Week Programme £380
Over the course of your programme you’ll also learn about how diet/lifestyle and exercise supports your body and helps you to remain as fit, healthy and free from chronic diseases and hopefully you’ll also become more metabolically healthy, more flexible, more mentally balanced as well as physically stronger and fitter. You’ll even sleep better!
Changes take time – you can’t expect to get slim, fit and flexible in a couple of weeks, but you can start on that journey. Making changes over a longer period of time are much more powerful ways to change the way you think, your habits and ultimately your health, rather than trying to do everything at once.
I am available for support at any time – just contact me and ask as many questions as you want!
FREE DANCE & YOGA CLASSES
As part of the Health Coaching package, you also get to come to any one of the classes I teach per week for FREE (dance or yoga) although this is not compulsory.
IT’S UP TO YOU! I know we all wish there was a magic button we could press to transform our bodies, minds and habits overnight and wake up slimmer, fitter and not craving chocolate – but – I know you know there isn’t one. It takes self respect, time and effort to make the changes, but once you have – the rewards are even greater than you can imagine!
Once your initial progamme has finished – I offer a regular heavily discounted rate if you want to do further sessions. Email me for details.
I want everyone to be educated, inspired and excited about embarking on their own personal health journey which is why I am passionate about empowering people to look after their health, so I am delighted to be able to offer personal health coaching in addition to running the dance, fitness and yoga classes..
email: maria@dancegeneration.co.uk or message/phone 07811 823467
DISCLAIMER: I am not a medical doctor. If you are on medication or already have a metabolic health condition – such as T2 Diabetes, CVD or high blood pressure – please talk to your GP or HCP. Any changes to your diet if you do have any metabolic issues needs to be done with your GP’s knowledge.
QUALIFICATIONS: I am a fully qualified Nutrition Network Advisor (https://nutrition-network.org/), an Approved Practitioner for Health Results (www.healthresults.com) and a Public Health Collaboration (phc.org) Ambassador. I also hold a Level 3 in Diet & Nutrition. I’m a fully qualified IDTA (International Dance Teacher’s Association) dance teacher, a RYT200 (Yoga Alliance Registered Yoga Teacher), a qualified Science of Stretching Teacher (https://www.yogabody.com/stretching/) and a fully qualified Zumba/Dance Fitness ZIN member (Zumba Instructor Network). I also hold a 1st Dan in Shotokan Karate.
THE BIGGEST TIP I can offer you is this:
DIET – First of all – you can’t out exercise a bad diet – that’s the first place I look at with private clients. The rules for this are simple too:
Eat BETTER – make better food choices and try to eat fresh, single ingredient, wholesome foods. Avoid anything processed. Especially UPF (Ultra Processed Food) this is not even really food. It’s industrial processed chemical manufactured and processed to ‘look’ like food. If it looks like it’s been interfered with by humans too much – you don’t want it – as it’s likely to be high in trans fat, sugar and salt – sometimes called an HFSS food. I also recommend you cut down on starchy carbohydrates, as these ‘spike’ your blood sugar levels. This is called hyperglycemia. Cutting down on carbohydrates can help guard against this. Aim to eat LESS than approx. 130g of carbs daily. Think replacing anything WHITE (such as rice, potatoes or pasta) with GREEN. Avoid ALL seed oils – sunflower, rapeseed and other ‘vegetable oils’. How much oil do you think you can squeeze out of a sunflower seed? Exactly! All seed and vegetable oils are industrially processed and basically TOXIC to the human body. Cook with olive oil, coconut oil, butter or ghee.
Eat LESS – of the refined empty nutrient lacking fake foods found in packets (these are ALL UPF). They are actually designed to make you feel hungrier as they do not satisfy you like REAL foods do. You really are better off eating a plate of bacon and eggs than a bowl of cereal for breakfast. There is lots of confusing information out there about what foods to eat. The outdated NHS ‘Eatwell Plate’ encourages us to base our meals on carbohydrates – but the latest science says we need to rethink this and base our meals around proteins, not starches. I follow a LCHF diet – so basically I eat less than 70-100g of net carbs per day – which is super easy to do if you’re not eating the white, sugary, refined foods or drinking pop or soda. And I eat LOADS of food. I practically live on cheese!
For more information on metabolic health see my LLVLC page.
MIND TRICKS – I can also teach you some mind tricks on how to overcome the cravings for sugar that we are ALL addicted to (yes, even the diet gurus!). Choosing a healthier lifestyle doesn’t mean you’ll NEVER be able to eat chips or ‘enjoy’ a slice of chocolate cake again – although once you see the benefits of cutting out the sugars and carbs, you won’t see these foods as treats anymore – but if you really want that slice of cake – you can have it.
CALORIES – The emerging science has also recently debunked the myth of ‘calories in versus calories out’ as a weight loss tool. Calorie counting is so last century! If you follow a low carb diet – you don’t have to count or weigh anything. It’s super simple! Again – see LLVLC
DRINK WATER – lots of it. Water helps flush out toxins, it supports your kidneys and it’s really good for your skin. And you don’t need me to tell you – it’s FAR better than alcohol!
MOVE – ANY movement is better than no movement. Exercising doesn’t have to be a full on Sweat-Fest to be effective. In fact, if you go in too hard, you’re likely to injure yourself – which is counter-productive. Even a ten minute walk every day can make a huge difference if you’re not already doing much exercise. Swimming is a good choice if you suffer from joint pain, as it’s non-weight bearing, and both yoga and dance are brilliant choices as they use lots of different muscles, they help increase your strength and stamina and can also help with balance and pro-prioception (body awareness). Movement not only benefits your PHYSICAL BODY – not exercising or moving is hugely detrimental to your MENTAL HEALTH too.
Our lifestyles have steadily become more sedentary over the last fifty years or so. The increase in car ownership, desk and office jobs and TV channels have all contributed to our unhealthy lifestyles! Adding more movement into your everyday life is one of the easiest ways to get more active – such as walk instead of taking the car, use the stairs and get up and boogie if you hear a favourite song on the radio. Moving more each day AND following a more structured exercise routine is more beneficial than just hitting the gym once a week or going to the odd yoga class. Movement needs to be part of your daily life.
Dance Fitness is especially good as it uses both fast and slow movements (see also OTHER AMAZING STUFF) and as well as improving your cardio fitness, my classes also use toning movements to target the major muscle groups. Music has been proven to lift the mood and exercise and moving your body in general, releases Serotonin – which is one of the ‘happy hormones’. A good sweaty dance session is practically guaranteed to lift your mood and make you feel happier.
However – often, doing too much exercise and starving yourself is actually counter productive – it can cause inflammation and high cortisol levels in the body – both of which can slow down weight loss, but worse -if you move more – you’ll be hungrier – but if you eat less you won’t feel very energetic (as food IS fuel) so trying to eat less and exercise more is a hiding to nowhere! Pretty soon you’ll give up… and I don’t blame you – I mean who wants to be tired and hungry all the time?
YOGA is good for increasing flexibility, building up strength, improving your balance AND as the style of Yoga I teach (called Vinyasa Flow) is a conscious blend of movement and breath – the skills learnt on the mat in class can also help with stress relief in everyday life – which can also lead to sleeping better. And talking of sleep….
SLEEP – absolutely essential to well-being, but oh, so difficult for many people. We generally don’t get enough sleep either, so learning how to relax and unwind and tune into your parasympathetic nervous system is a skill worth learning. This is not ‘meditation’ in the way that people think of it – which is sitting in ‘Lotus’ hands in prayer with incense and candles – it’s just spending quiet time with just your breath and I can teach you some really simple breathing techniques that you can do for just five – ten minutes a day that can lower your blood pressure, make you feel relaxed and help you sleep. I can also help you understand why the eight hours sleep goal is actually counter productive, and show you what you can do to move towards getting your best sleep ever.
ABOUT ME When I was 37 – I gave up a career in publishing and retrained and qualified as a dance teacher. I started Dance Generation in 2003 and I taught all ages (hence the name) until I decided to retire from teaching children in 2020. I’m now 64 and I’ve been teaching dance, fitness and doing yoga for over 30 years and I’ve always been super interested in healthy living and eating the right foods ever since my little sister (www.barbarajhunt.com) landed her first Saturday job at the Health Food shop in our local town. In 2010 I decided to study for a Level 3 in Diet & Nutrition and that sparked my interest even more. But, although I thought I had it all under control – I was trying to follow the best lifestyle I could and I was doing everything that the NHS says we should to keep healthy – I didn’t FEEL healthy – so when I hit my menopause (around 50) I put on weight, felt horrible and I even got spots! I just didn’t like my body anymore and I absolutely hated getting old.
So I made a promise to find out all I could about how I could support myself mentally & physically and to grow older, but in a healthy and active way. After all, there’s no point in living to be 100 years old – if your last 25 years are spent sitting in a chair being spoon fed. I did tons of research into how our diets have changed over the last 50 years. I looked beyond what the mainstream media and Big Pharma and Big Food have been telling us about sugar, processed foods and carbohydrates. I began to discover that so many things that I had believed to be ‘healthy’ were in fact, detrimental to our health and well-being and in some instances are actually killing us (slowly).
In 2011 I qualified to teach Zumba/Dance Fitness and I took up Karate (that’s another story!). In 2017, after practising Yoga on and off for many years, I decided to do my Yoga teacher training and in 2018 – after a year of teacher training, I also qualified as a Yoga teacher. I love learning – so with my passion now moving towards diet, lifestyle and well-being as well as dance – I did my Nutrition Network Advisor training (https://nutrition-network.org/) and I’m now also an Approved Health Results Practitioner for Health Results – see healthresults.com
Using all these skills and many other things I’ve learnt over the years, I’m now passionate about helping others live better for longer – so basically healthy ageing, being strong, flexible and balanced and being the best you can be at whatever age you are and working WITH your body and not against it.
If you think I can help you – contact me to find out more. I promise you that NOTHING tastes as good as fit & healthy feels!
For more information – 07811 823467 or email: maria@dancegeneration.co.uk or 07811 823467
International Dance Teachers' Association