WELCOME to my world...
I personally welcome you to my website. Here, you can book me for masterclasses, workshops and conventions; buy my books and videos/DVDs; employ me as a lifecoach and learn more about me. However, I want my website to offer you much more than that.
My aim is to inspire, empower and motivate you by sharing my passion, excitement and energy, my knowledge and expertise, my
thoughts and opinions and my love for life and my work.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘work’ as the ‘use of bodily or mental power in order to do or make something; especially
contrasted with play or recreation.’
In my former job as a solicitor, this was what work meant to me. Yet now I get to do work that includes play and recreation and, for me, it’s a hobby gone mad! The likes of footballers, golfers and racing car drivers must feel the same way. They are serious about what they do and they enjoy it, are passionate about it, love it and have fun with it. The only difference being that they get paid a little more for their work/play!
In the past I would have said that I started my career in health and fitness by coincidence. Now I know I was meant to be in this industry. When I returned home from law school in 1981, I looked for a local netball team so that I could continue playing as I had throughout university. I couldn’t find one I wanted to join. Maybe I did not look hard enough but there was something new and exciting just around the corner.
A friend suggested we go to an exercise class at a place called the Fitness Centre in Covent Garden. I went along to what turned out to be a dance class. I enjoyed it, even though I would never have said I was a dancer until recently - as a black person, I definitely missed out on that gene!. I have gotten over that one, having attended an Anthony Robbins Life Mastery course, where we had to ‘dance like JLo’, but that’s another story.
The following week something drew me back to the Fitness Centre. The timetable had changed and instead of the dance class there was ‘beginners aerobics’, taken by an instructor called Naomi, who I will never forget. She gave me my first experience of ‘aerobics’. I left an hour later and walked down the cobbled streets of Covent Garden with my legs shaking, on the most amazing high, thinking ‘that was fantastic’! I have been hooked ever since and it’s been the most amazing journey.
After nine years of practising law, I was very unhappy. I decided to leave the law and make health and fitness my career. Fortunately, I had already been teaching for seven years so had a second career to move to. However, as a single parent, I still had the responsibility of a mortgage and taking at least a 50% drop in salary wasn’t easy.
There are lots of unhappy people out there working at whatever they do. In the words of Gerry Sikorski: ‘Be absolutely
determined to enjoy what you do’. I am now a full-time student at St George’s Hospital, University of London studying
physiotherapy - something that I first applied to do 31 years ago, when I was 16! Financially it’s going to be tough
but I am excited, committed and determined. I’ll keep you updated...
So, welcome to my world.