I recently had the great pleasure of meeting with Health & Vitality Coach, Julie Ann Meyer. She’s the host of the TV show “Own Your Wellness“, where she interviews experts in different modalities of health & wellness for tips and tricks to improve quality of life.
Julie Ann helps women break through resistance to finally make lasting changes with their nutrition and exercise. By overcoming this resistance, women can solve health issues, chronic ailments, and addiction problems. She offers continued support with their diet and exercise, as well as help them begin to trust themselves to make their own health care choices.
JC: Hi Julie Ann. Please tell us about your company and describe the outcome that you help your clients achieve. What is the big problem that they usually have that come for to you for advice or help?
Julie Ann: Owning your wellness was built on the idea that you should have power over yourself, and most people give away their power to others instead of owning what’s theirs. So, with that comes responsibility and most people come to me because they’re finding some sort of resistance in making the changes that they definitely want to make. A lot of people that come to me have a diagnosis that they’re trying to get under control or some sort of physical ailment that’s bothering them. And also, addiction issues that have caused other issues in their life with their wellness. I help people overcome the resistance in making the decisions that they want to make, and I help them do it.
JC: What are the advantages and the benefits that they can get from coming to you?
Julie Ann: Well, there is a saying, for personal trainers, that is, I do your pushups for you. So ultimately, it is the client’s job to do the work but that being said, I hold the vision of who they want to be and mirror that back to them until they can see it in themselves. I guide them, I tell them how to do what they want to do and cheer them on while they’re doing it.
JC: So, you help them to stay on track?
Julie Ann: I help them stay on track. I help them come up with the game plan of how they’re going to implement the changes that they need to make in a realistic manner, set realistic, but lofty goals, and then stay on track to complete those. Because as soon as things start to come up and life gets crazy, all of a sudden, the health and wellness goes to the background again, and I’m there to be like, “Hey, let’s get back on track.”
JC: Besides you inspiring them, you hold them accountable. You keep them on track, and you keep that vision in front of them.
Julie Ann: Exactly. Because we lose sight. You can’t see the forest through the trees. So, when they’re in it, I’m there to show them where they’re going and remind them how far they’ve come because they can’t see their own progress either. So, to be able to show that to somebody, it keeps them inspired to keep moving forward.
JC: And you work more with men or women or both?
Julie Ann: I work with both, but I mostly tend to work with women. That’s who seems to be the most attracted to me.
JC: If there’s a difference between both sexes, working with men, working with women as far as, staying on track, following through, keep that vision in front of them. Are there challenges that you have to adjust to be able to deal with different genders?
Julie Ann: There absolutely is. With women, they tend to be a lot more negative and harder on themselves to the point that it stops them in their growth in their movement forward towards their goals. Men tend to go too hard, really fast and burnout.
Julie Ann: This causes injuries. And it’s, it’s the whole idea of if 1200 calories is good, I’m only going to have 900. It’s like the pendulum is swung too far.
JC: And how do you help them get past that?
Julie Ann: That’s a really good question. Typically, what I will start with is asking the client to trust the process and trust me and to go at the pace that I suggest, because ultimately, if they don’t introduce rest, if they don’t introduce play into the equation, then they’re going to slow down their results. And ultimately what they’re after are results. It’s sometimes counterintuitive, but it works better not to go extreme.
JC: Because rest and nutrition are branches of the fitness tree. And a lot of people think that just because they’re working out, they can’t eat donuts and anything that comes their way and that you have to work out every day without rest. Are those some of the misconceptions that you run into?
Julie Ann: Those are the two biggest ones. They think the workout has to be an hour a day and they have to hate what they’re doing in order for it to be working. And if something worked for someone else or they read it somewhere, they think it’ll work for them. without taking into consideration their own health needs and their own diagnosis. It’s completely misunderstood how important nutrition is. You can’t out work a bad diet. If your diet is not good, it doesn’t matter how much you work out. You will not be healthy. You will not reach your goals physically because about 80 to 90% of weight loss is what you eat. And then muscle growth.
