So, this is something some of you have been waiting for (another post exposing my personal thoughts). I recently came by someone who asked me what I write about after I mentioned I was a blogger ( I told them I am fitness/health blogger) and that my topics range from exercises, mental health, nutrition, etc. Well they proceeded with “what are your credentials and how do you go about teaching people about fitness/health – when there are other people in your field who may or may not agree with anything or everything you are saying.. how do you compete against them for followers and what are people supposed to believe if you have differing opinions than someone else in your field?” . At first I was thinking, ” wow… seriously”, but then I said “.. it goes a little like this, I have my degree in exercise science, I interned for many different places within this field, I have worked with many professionals in the field, and I also keep all my college materials (books) and I research and read magazines, in the process of being certified in personal training and don’t come off like an arrogant piece of shit when I write” – this is how I manage to keep readers and followers and gain respect within my field (among many other things that go unnoticed). 

Lets just say, he was delighted by my answer and didn’t further question me but instead gave me a high five and told me “works for me”.

I decided after having to answer his question, I would write about this particular topic because honestly, it is true – I am “competing against other fitness/health bloggers who have differing opinions than mine and may not always agree with my tactics, information, and have more expertise than myself”.  I am not so stubborn to realize this, I am not so arrogant to ignore it, and I don’t think I know everything, which is why I spend hours on my laptop and hours teaching myself and studying. Sure, I may never know everything and there are fitness professionals without their degrees who are more knowledgeable than some of us with one – surprising huh?! But honestly, I never write to compete against others in my field, I don’t write to prove I know it all, I don’t write to make myself seem better. I write about fitness/health because this is my life, my everyday life and whether I agree with other professionals or athletes is not important because everyone has their own way of doing things. Now does this mean, when someone is using poor form/technique when squatting; I promote it? NO! what this means is, if that person is not able to demonstrate the exercise properly, either I make it known or I don’t. I don’t feel compelled to analyze everyone’s blogs and check to see how right they are or wrong they are. If I am following another fitness/health blog, best believe I read their content, and if I don’t agree with something, I normally comment with my take on things./sometimes I research it, and if I feel like the blogger is writing about something totally in left field that I know is NOT right or encouraging something that I know is unsafe, etc then I don’t follow them because I don’t have time for shenangins. It is the same with YouTube fitness videos, I swear these are sometimes the worse because they will do some circus trick to encourage others to do it too but have no real purpose and can’t identify how the movement is even constructive to a persons well-being. 

Personally I have had people disagree with topics  I have written about, such as: “Child obesity” was one of them because so many people have different thoughts, experiences; Did I go off on people who didn’t like what I had to say about it? – no. Why would I? I don’t care if you disagree with me, because hey, we all have a right to an opinion and all my readers are allowed to be honest and forthright as long as it is tasteful in nature and not something to arouse people’s anger. I feel like this, if you don’t like what I write about, then come forth and let me know,  you don’t have to agree with everything I say; that is the truth. If something I write about offends you (hopefully not) then say something but don’t expect me to back down & kiss ass either, because I won’t. For the most part, I think my topics have proven to be well written and I have yet come by a fitness professional who talked negatively about anything I have written thus far (thankfully) and I hope it stays this way because I live to learn, teach and grow. Hell, I have had many fitness professionals who have been in my field for 10+ years and have given me advice on workouts, shared their insight and added their own recommendations and I LOVED IT! because they didn’t belittle me, they actually only complimented my writing and confirmed the information; letting me know my topic wasn’t  full of bullshit and lies because trust me if they ever were: I would expect those same people to let me know. 

So how does one like myself handle agreeing-disagreeing with other fitness people? We talk like adults, exchange thoughts, I learn from them, I ask them questions, I gain insight and I respect their knowledge, because more than likely they have been in the game WAYY longer than myself and I only want to be as successful as they are now in their careers. My motto is “who cares whether the lunge or back squat is a better exercise – the more important thing is we both know they are functional exercises” LOL. 

I make mistakes, I may be biased sometimes & I am young.- but I won’t lead you over a cliff;  Thank you everyone for reading and I appreciate everyone’s support on my blog. 

Your Fitness Blogger,

Shay-lon xxx