Jayne Hartley of Fierce Fitness on how she is coping with lockdown

A bit about me…

I am a Level 3 personal trainer with my own personal training business – Fierce Fitness

I love my work, I am very passionate about getting people to enjoy moving, to love their bodies and I believe fitness is for everyone.
In the last couple of years I have started competing in strong women competitions which I love. The events are so different from anything I had ever done before and the training gives me a massive sense of achievement. Everyone at Strong Woman competitions have been so friendly and supportive, its a fantastic community.
I trained as a dancer and still love to dance, most recently trained as a clubbercise instructor, which is brilliant fun.

How I am coping with being in lockdown…

I am struggling with lockdown. I feel out of control and scared. But we need to keep focusing on the positives, keep looking towards better times. And its really hard. When you feel low and want to hide, the last thing you feel like doing is being productive. And that’s ok. You don’t need to come out of lockdown speaking a new language or having redecorated your house. You just need to get through it. 

You do need to stay healthy though.

You need to keep active! Every hour stand up and move, dance, jump, anything that increases your heart rate 

Get outside – even just sitting on your own doorstep. For the first week of lockdown I was too nervous to leave my garden, I just sat by the door. But the fresh air can make you feel so much better. You can leave your house once a day for exercise…walk, jog, run…but get outside. 

My work has changed so much. I am a personal trainer. And my business changed overnight. I have had to adapt. Three weeks ago, I had never heard of zoom and now its my work lifeline. I am running classes and personal training online and having to redesign my sessions so they can be done in little space and with no equipment, but it’s so much fun. I still get to see my clients, I still get to make them do burpees, even if it’s over a screen it’s good to chat and workout.

Training. I love to train. It’s harder now at home with less equipment but I improvise and use what I have and still work at getting stronger, fitter and faster. My next competition was scheduled for June and has now been changed to August with talk of it being moved again to next year, but I still want to get stronger. Most days I train online again via zoom with my training partner and that keeps me motivated. I have converted a small part of my garden into an outdoor gym. Which is so cool. I want to add more bits to it…. I’m going to keep it even when I can get back to the gym. 

Everyone has days that are hard, and I don’t have any magic answers, just keep finding things that make your soul happy.  

On a day when you are feeling more positive and motivated, spend an afternoon getting some photos together, little bits of things that are important to you and writing down all your happy memories and experiences and put them in a box. When you are feeling sad and overwhelmed get out that box and sit and look through your happy times. I have used my box more than once.