Episode 251: Sweat Equity with Natalia Petrzela
“In terms of body standards and beauty standards, there's no question that fitness history is also the history of elevating and enshrining certain physical ideals as desirable, and other ones, not only as undesirable but as immoral.”
- Natalia Petrzela
Kate shares a hair serum that has changed her life and Doree organizes her dresser to great success. Then, historian and author Natalia Petrzela joins them to discuss her new book FIT NATION: The Gains and Pains of America’s Exercise Obsession, the history of Americans’ relationship to fitness, why fitness has become class-based in this country, and why the pandemic has possibly led to more fitness joy.
Photo Credit: Sylvie Rosokoff
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Transcript
Kate: Hello and welcome to Forever35. This is a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves. I'm Kate Spencer.
Doree: And I am Doree Shafrir.
Kate: And we are not experts.
Doree: No. But we are two friends who like to talk a lot about serums.
Kate: You can always visit our website forever35podcast.com for links to everything we mention on the show. You can find us on Instagram @Forever35podcast and you can join the Forever35 Facebook group where the password is serums.
Doree: And I also just wanna put in a plug for our shelves on shopmy.us/forever35, where you can find our favorite products, including Kate's Butt Care Shelf. You can sign up for a newsletter at forever35podcast.com/newsletter. We have a new newsletter going out tomorrow, so if you wanna get in on that, sign up. And if you want to reach us, we have a voicemail and text number at (781) 591-0390, and our email is forever35podcast@gmail.com.
Kate: That's all the stuff
Doree: That is all the stuff. Kate, you know how I'm always complaining about how cluttered my house is and how I have too much stuff and I need to get organized.
Kate: I wanna honor you and say yes, but I don't actually feel like you complain. I don't think when you say complain, it's not like you're just nagging. I think it is a heavy thing that weighs on you and stresses you out.
Doree: It is a heavy thing that weighs on me and stresses me out. I think I'm just feeling self-conscious because I've been talking about this for years and every time I try to improve things, I feel like I just get overwhelmed and things go back to the way they were. So that's my baseline and I guess I'm about sounding a broken record. People are probably just get it together.
Kate: I actually think it's pretty relatable to kind of exist in that the broken record space when it comes to home clutter. I don't think it would actually be relatable if you're like, I got it together, I solved it, I got rid of all my clutter and now everything's organized. No, I think most of us are in this cycle of we clean up one pile and then the other pile doubles. And I actually think your experience is very human and I hope you don't feel like there's something wrong with you or there's anything to be ashamed about. Cuz I connect with what you're saying and I bet other people do too.
Doree: Well, I have taken a stab at some organization in the last few days. I have reorganized my dresser drawers, which I like to periodically go through my clothes and sell or give away clothes that no longer serve me. But I find that I usually do that in my closet and that I just sort of ignore what's in my drawers.
Kate: Fascinating, fascinating. The drawers just never get unpacked.
Doree: The drawers never get unpacked. And there were a few drawers that were especially chaotic. And the other thing that I was realizing is that there were certain things that were just in five different drawers.
Kate: What do you mean, like socks?
Doree: I had sweatshirts. No sweatshirts. I had a sock drawer, but there was no dedicated sweatshirt drawer. So they would show up in various drawers because I would just shove them in. You know what I mean? Be like, oh, there's a little room in the T-shirt drawer, I'm going to put a sweatshirt in here. So I never
Kate: It has shirt in the name
Doree: That meant that I never really had a handle on how much stuff I had because it was all dispersed. So I was like, okay, we need to do something about this. So I took everything out of the drawers and went through it and I gave a bunch of stuff away in my Buy Nothing group, which if you're not familiar with Buy Nothing. It's really an amazing it's amazing. It's amazing thing. I think it started on Facebook and it's all very, it's hyper local, and you have to join the Buy nothing group where you live. You can't be in more than one buy nothing group. And it's all, they set geographic boundaries. And I remember when I first tried to join my local by Nothing group, the one from my neighborhood had gone dormant because no one was willing to admin it. And then someone took it over and it got revived which is great obviously, but they also have an app which I have not used, but
Kate: Oh really? I did not know that.
Doree: Yeah, they do. They have an app which the admin of our group periodically reminds people of. And I think it's also, if you're not on Facebook, you could conceivably use the app. I don't know how active the app is it, the Facebook group is very active, so I don't how much actually gets done on the app, but if you're on Facebook, it's worth looking for your local buy nothing group. And there's various rules that I won't get into, but the point is that people give away stuff. You can only give away stuff for free and you can only take stuff for free. You can't say, I'm looking to buy a blah blah blah. Anyway, so there was a bunch of stuff that I was like, even if I tried to sell this, I would get $3 for it. And why don't I just give it away? Because I also feel giving stuff away is good karma. I give away a lot of, he Henry's old clothes because it feels like I'm paying it forward. A lot of people with kids older than Henry have given me a lot of clothes and I kind of wanna keep that going. So I give a lot of clothes away to people who have kids just a little bit younger than Henry, even though they'll never be able to give me clothes. It's, I wanna just encourage that vibe, you know what I'm saying?
Kate: I like this vibe.
Doree: Wow. I have a lot of thoughts about this apparently. Anyway, so I did that and then,
Kate: no, this is great.
Doree: And then I revived this old Instagram account that I have Doree's Closet.
Kate: I love it.
Doree: Where I have sold stuff. And when I logged into it, I realized I hadn't posted anything on it since fall of 2021. So I went a whole year with more than a year without posting anything on it. And I posted some stuff, I sold a bunch of stuff, mailed it out. So that also felt good. The stuff that I was like, I could give this away, but it's, it's still pretty nice and I could use the money, so why don't I see if I can sell it? So that felt good. And the upside was that I totally reorganized all my dresser drawers and now I have a sweatshirt. I have a place for sweatshirts and my pants are organized. I have a soft pants drawer and a hard pants drawer, and a jeans drawer.
Kate: Oh my God,
Doree: My pajamas are all in one place. My pajamas had been dispersed, it was just chaotic. And I'm feeling so much better about the way my drawers are organized. So just wanted to share.
Kate: You know what, it's so interesting you mentioned this because I did a very kind of quick drawer reorganization a few weeks ago where I pulled everything out and I didn't do it, the whole dresser at once. I did one drawer, my workout closed drawer.
Doree: Yes, yes, yes, yes.
Kate: And I was also in a state of chaos and one thing that really helped in addition to doing that was getting some drawer dividers. So,
Doree: oh, I have drawer dividers.
Kate: It really makes a difference. And so my tshirt shirts, my shirt drawer, it has tank tops in one side, then in the middle and then on the right it's long sleeves. And the other thing that really helps that goes to shit, but I have to, I think it's important to pull everything out and redo it is folding it. I forget there's a name for it. It's not where you stack everything on top of each other, but you fold it. File folding I think is what it's called. Do you do this? Because this, I find so that helps me so much.
Doree: I do do this because I learned this from Marie Kondo.
Kate: Yes. This truly makes a difference in my drawers.
Doree: Yes. Cuz you can see everything.
Kate: Yes, yes. I'm trying to get my kids to do it because they put their clothes away, they do their own laundry and put their clothes away. But my youngest daughter, she calls it, she just does the stuffing method where she just doesn't fold in. She stuffs it in her drawers. Like that's her. And again, I'm kinda like, well, you're in charge of it so I don't do your laundry or put your clothes away, it's your thing. But then she can never find anything. And then she has the same kind of, hers is, hers is ultimate chaos. There's ultimate chaos happening in her drawer. Feels good. Talking about drawers, almost like I just cleaned out a drawer even though I didn't, but clean drawer.
Doree: Almost, yeah. And my next goal is my office.
Kate: I'm looking at it right now on the video screen,
Doree: Which will be a bigger thing. Recently I got rid of a lot of, I gave away a lot of books recently and that was good because I, I've historically found it hard to give away books.
Kate: Oh yeah. It's giving away bits of your soul.
Doree: But I'm trying to just be really practical.
Kate: Interesting. You're bringing this up because one realization I've had about myself post ADD diagnosis is that I function best in a world that's clutter free and very organized. But the world I create is cluttered and disorganized. And so I don't know how to reconcile those two things about myself.
Doree: Yeah, I feel the exact same.
Kate: Right?
Doree: Yeah,
Kate: I know what I need.
Doree: Its a problem.
Kate: Yeah, it's really challenging. I I create the opposite of what serves me.
Doree: Yes, yes, yes.
Kate: I don't know. This is some, I've been thinking about organizational a lot. One thing I wanna do, but then I don't know if this is just creating more stress, is I was thinking about writing a master list of all the spots in my house that need to be picked up and making it very specific. There's one kitchen counter that's like the dumping ground. I went over there today. There's an open Covid test box sitting on top of a box of tissues and a dog chew next to a ripped up kid's book next to a candy cane. It's that countertop. You know that countertop.
Doree: Yes, I do.
Kate: I need to clean that countertop. I need there's, and then there's the general, our bedroom, but then there's specific sections of the bedroom. So I had this vision where I create this master list and then every day I give myself 30 minutes and I tackle one thing and I would divide it with the old husband too But just the thought of making the list feels overwhelming. So I haven't gotten there.
Doree: Yes, I agree.
Kate: Well, I have a product that's come into my life that I wanna shout about from the rooftops and consider this podcast a rooftop. Okay, consider this me shouting. So my friend shared that her favorite hair serum is the Trader Joe's shea butter and coconut oil hair serum. And she shared this is the best hair, this is my favorite hair serum. I love it. And that just registered in the back of my rain, the back of my brain. I was like, great. The next time I go to Trader Joe's and I'm in that little toiletry section that they have, I'm going to look for it. So I was there, I'm in the old TJ's and I found this hair serum $4 and 99 cents. I also got their dry shampoo, but I haven't used it yet.And I took it home and used it on my hair and I also used it on my eldest daughter's hair. And I don't know if you recall, but the eldest daughter in the home here has extremely thick, fine wavy hair that we are constantly kind of looking for things to kind of help also because she's in charge of caring for her hair. I'm trying to find things that make it easier for her to do that help with keeping it untangled and blah blah blah. That. When I tell you that this hair serum came into our life like a miracle, I dont even, this shit is the best. It's great. Oh Doree, I have been using it on my hair. My hair's very long and the ends get dry. So I've been putting it when my hair is wet just at the ends. And it is just giving it a silkier vibe, not as it kind of gets dry and crusty and tangled at the end. Sometimes yes, I probably need a trim, but that's neither here nor there. But when I tell you that my kid's hair, it just makes her hair easier to brush, less tangly smoother. She can run her hands through it and doesn't get stuck. This shit is amazing. It's amazing.
Doree: Wow.
Kate: Yes this is, and I have to say, I know there are a lot of loyalists to certain Trader Joe's products and I have never had that moment where I really hit it off with a Trader Joe's product. Even a holiday scented candle that people I know that comes out around December that smells like a pine tree. Forget the exact name of it. And people are like, this candle sells out. You must, if you see it, you've gotta get it. So I went and I bought four of them cuz I saw them and I lit it and I was like, I don't need this can this candle's fine. So I haven't had a moment where I've been like, this Trader Joe's product is the thing. Let me tell you this hair serum Doree is the thing. One final comment I need to make. I have fine thinner hair. My child has thicker wavier hair. This stuff works on both our hair. You don't seem as blown away as I want you to be. I want you to be beside yourself.
Doree: No, I mean I am. I am blown away. Do you think it would work on my hair?
Kate: I would not put it on your scalp. I think a roots only. I think it's, for most of us, it's going to be kind of like you're working the ends of your hair for shorter hair. I'm not sure this is your item. maybe.
Doree: Okay.
It all depends on our hair texture and wave and all curl all of it, right? It's all our hair is so individual. But for $4.99, speaking of buy nothing, I do feel like you could buy it and try it and pass it on if it doesn't work for you. And I mentioned this because I have been trying to find a hair serum. This is now something I want to own. And I tried to find one at Target and they were sold out. So I came across this one and I was just like shrug. Okay.
This is interesting because I feel like I am constantly on this quest to get sort of smoother hair. I feel like I have a lot of flyaways
Kate: This would help.
Doree: And I don't know how to tame them. So I'm curious. The antistatic spray that I have does help and I'll sometimes spray it on my brush and brush my hair and then my hair does look smoother but I've been wanting to get something that makes my hair just look smoother. So I don't know. This is intriguing. I'm sorry that I didn't seem as excited as you were hoping for.
Kate: It's because I've had a coffee, a tea, and a flat white. So I'm a little bit like,
Doree: wow, okay.
Kate: I'm riding a wave of caffeine this morning that I'm, and as I told you recently, I'm trying to cut back on caffeine, but Anthony was up at 3:30 in the morning to catch a flight. So I have kind of been up since 3:30 in the morning, so I'm self medicating.
Doree: Gotcha.
Kate: Hey, before we take a break, can I ask you a question?
Doree: Of course.
Kate: I'm going to throw this out from left field for you. Should I get a flip phone? Here's where this is coming from. Can I tell you?
Doree: Yeah.
Kate: I got influenced by a college student's TikTok, where she revealed, this is a viral TikTok. She and all her BFFs got flip phones because they determined that their smartphones are what make going out hell. It's what causes drunken text fights or bad hookups or photos that they wish they hadn't taken and posted to social media. And so they decided that if they got flip phones, they wouldn't do any of those things. They would just call each other and take photos with them. And apparently these flip phones have changed their lives. They still have their smartphones, which they use, but they have these flip phones for going out. Now you might be asking Kate, are you in college and do you go out a lot? And the answer to both those questions is no.
Doree: This is what I'm wondering.
Kate: Yeah, you were wondering if secretly I've been at the University of Illinois with these girls. No.
Doree: Yeah, I was. I was kind of like, is this an actual issue for you, Kate? Are you drunk texting people you shouldn't be?
Kate: No, but it made me think, I wonder if it can be applied into a 43 year old's life. This is just kind of a food for thought thing that I was thinking about right before we started recording. And I just wanted to pose, just wanna pose it.
Doree: What I'm hearing is that you want the old, did you have the Nokia bullet looking phone? Did you have that phone?
Kate: I never did, like the kind of original cell phone. That was cool. And everybody had the da-da-da ring on it
Doree: Thats really specific.
Kate: The weird looking
Doree: Here. I'm going to text you a picture of something that is on eBay as original Nokia 33-10 unlocked retro cell phone chief.
Kate: I see this phone and I did not have this phone, but I wish I did. This was such a chic, cool fucking cell phone.
Doree: I had this phone.
Kate: It's like an iconic phone.
Doree: It was an iconic phone. I like, It was like the phone.
Kate: Oh my god, you can buy it. I'm on Nokia's website and it says the icon is back.
Doree: So maybe this is what you should get.
Kate: Wait a second. This is fascinating. I wonder what would I do if I did an experiment where I lived off of my iPhone for a month? I wouldn't be able to text.
Doree: No, you would. You can text with these phones,
Kate: But Doree, it's the time. You have to scroll through the numbers. Remember that nightmare? You just sit there and pound the numbers to get to the letter you wanted.
Doree: Yes, I do remember that. So you would only send very short texts.
Kate: I you know what? Honestly, I am truly kind of intrigued by this. This could be an absolutely stupid idea, but I find it intriguing.
Doree: Yeah, I mean, why not?
Kate: I mean they have flip phones. Oh God, I love a flip phone. God, this brings me back. Okay listen listeners, what do you think? Are we all going to start using flip phones in 2023 to get our mental health in check? Or am I just having a hyper fixation that's going to disappear in a day? You let me know.
Doree: I mean, I don't know. Kate, this is interesting too. They have a modern flip phone.
Kate: This one. I see this. Yeah. If I could text regularly, I would almost consider one of these things. One of these.
Doree: So you want a blackberry?
Kate: Ugh, what I wouldn't give. Yeah. Honestly, yes. Maybe that's what I want. Maybe I want a blackberry. Maybe. But I think blackberries are Didn't Blackberry dissolve? Isn't that company dead?
Doree: I thought they came back, but maybe they don't work on any network.
Kate: I am looking, Blackberry looks to me like they are a cybersecurity company now. Oh, smartphone.
Doree: Oh, okay. All right. Nevermind.
Kate: Blackberries had such a run there too. That was such a chic ass phone. People with Blackberries. Paris Hilton. Remember her walking around with her Blackberry in like 2000.
Doree: Yes. Like Kim Kardashian.
Kate: Yes.
Doree: Well listen, this has been a fun walk down memory lane, but we are going to take a short break and before we do that, we are going to introduce our guest.
Kate: We are talking to Natalia Mehlman Petrzela. She's a historian of contemporary American politics and culture. The author of Classroom Wars, Language, Sex and the Making of a Modern Political Culture. And most recently Fit Nation, the Gains and Pains of America's Exercise Obsession. She's also the co-producer and host of the acclaimed podcast Welcome to Your Fantasy, and the co-host of Past Present Podcast. She's a columnist at the Observer and a frequent media guest, expert speaker, and contributor to outletslike the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN and The Atlantic. And she's also, as if that wasn't enough, she is the associate, excuse me, She's an associate professor of history at The New School, co-founder of the Wellness Education Program Health Class 2.0 and a premier leader of the Mind Body Practice IntenSati, which I have had the pleasure of taking her InterSati classes in New York City many years ago. And she is an inspiring teacher and an inspiring podcast guest.
Doree: Yes, she was amazing. So we're going to take a short break and then we'll come back with our interview with Natalia
Kate: Natalia, welcome to Forever35. We're thrilled to have you here. We have many questions for you but we always begin each interview asking a guest to share a self-care practice. So we like to just put you on the spot immediately.
Natalia: Okay.
Kate: So I know the world is crazy, everything is nuts, but do you have something that brings you a calm in your life that you consider a self-care practice?
Natalia: Yes. I go for walks with my husband. It is just, I wish we didn't need to be in motion to put our phones away, but it helps and we just make time. We put it in the calendar. We just did this today in the middle of the day. It's just a really lovely way to get some fresh air, spend time together, not be looking at our phones or responding to the kids. And yeah, it was a pandemic thing and now it's just a life thing.
Doree: So cool
Kate: I like that its with another person. I feel like so often I go, I've been going on a lot of walks, but they're very kind of timed by myself. But there is that the walk and talk. And you're, are you in New York City?
Natalia: I am in New York City. So we go on the west side. On the river.
Kate: Yeah. I mean there's also that just the New York City walking experience that's so delightful. But there's something about being with another person and using that time to connect, especially when it's your partner. That's really lovely.
Natalia: Well, I like to take the stakes down on date night kind of things. I think, I don't know if you guys have partners or kids, but there can be this like, oh my God, we have to go out and have dinner and have so much fun and spend all this money. And I'm like, sometimes I don't wanna get dressed and do this whole thing and just to go for a walk and you're like your sneakers in your parka and have that time is great. I will say though, that I do enjoy alone time too. And for me I am really into 305 fitness, which is a dance, cardio practice, practice dance, cardio class shouldn't be so, and that to me is just so fun to take that hour, go to the studio, dance, listen to music, sweat on my own or at least not with people I'm related to. It's really lovely. So yeah, love self-care.
Kate: Well that's kind of a great segue into just getting a quick recap and I mean probably we could talk about it for an hour, but a quick recap on your journey into fitness and throughout fitness as a participant, because you also study it, but what was it, when did you first come into fitness and how have you experienced it at different moments in your life?
Natalia: Yeah, so it started a long time ago though not as long ago as some people would assume. I was really unathletic as a kid. I was totally intimidated by sports PE, dance. I was just this girl really happy reading my books and taping songs off the radio. And what happened was at junior year of high school, so like 94, 95, I was so humiliated by PE class, I'm like, I just gotta get out of this. And I realized you could do an independent study in phys ed had to be supervised. And my parents were like, we're not getting you a personal trainer. Rich people do that. And they said, we do belong to the Jewish Community Center and they have group fitness classes there so you can go. I didn't even know what that was, but I'm like, this is better than PE. And I went to step aerobics and Natalia was born.
Kate: This is amazing.
Natalia: Yeah, and so ever since that moment, it's looked at different ways, at different times. But I, I discovered in that room, I who had been so intimidated by everything kind of athletic or physical, I'm like, oh my God, this is so fun. I love to move, I love being in my body. I just love it. And in college I worked the desk as a front desk girl in order to get a free gym membership at a place in New York City. And just then I started doing marathons when I moved to California for a while. And it's just always been this part of my life. And so I really was a participant first before certainly I started getting into it as a scholar.
Doree: Okay, wait Justin aside, because I know you're from Boston and we are also from Boston, and I know exactly which JCC you're talking about. In Newton.
Natalia: Yes! Exactly. The Newton JCC, a historic spot.
Doree: And we also belonged to the Newton JCC, I was on the swim team at the Newton JCC, spent a lot of time at the Newton JCC in that gym with the track.
Natalia: Yes! The track! That's so funny.
Doree: Yep.
Natalia: Historic site.
Doree: Historic site.
Kate: So then how did you begin taking a scholarly approach to looking at fitness with this kind of critical eye? And I'm wondering not just fitness culture in general, but your own participation.
Natalia: So I am just chronically always in my own head that is not a good thing. But occasionally it works for doing things like writing, a scholarly book about the gym. So I guess at that, no one's ever asked me that question in that way, but I guess it kind of started with this feminist ambivalence that I had about how much I loved going to these classes. Because on the one hand, and this started when I was in my twenties for sure, but on the one hand I just felt so good and strong and empowered and I could take on the world. On the other hand, I had enough of a kind of feminist consciousness about me that I'm like, why do I feel so good when these people are literally saying, work off those cottage cheese thighs, memorial days just around the corner. I'm supposed to hate this. This is patriarchy, but it feels not just so good, but it feels like empowering. What's going on there? So I went to college in New York City and then I worked for two very dizzying years and then I went out to get my PhD in California at Stanford and I was working under Estelle Freedman, who's just this feminist icon, founded feminist studies there. And it was really there where I started to work through some of those contradictions from an intellectual perspective, reading about women's consumer culture, reading about women's only spaces as feminist spaces and trying to square that circle a little bit. And then I guess I just never really take off that historian's hat. I'm always walking around the world being, how did we get here? Why do we do this? Where did this come from? And I really tend to apply those questions to everyday life things. Like, I'm looking at a sandwich, when did we start eating sandwiches? And it was sort of natural to do that. And I was actually, it's funny, walking on the 101, I feel like whenever I'm in LA I wrongly put in walking directions. I'm like, it's a mile away and I end up on some overpass or something. But I remember I was walking, I wish I remembered exactly where it was and there was a gym kind of over the highway, the freeway, and I saw all these treadmills, it was in the evening. And I looked at that and I was like, all of these people spending money working so hard running to go absolutely nowhere, what is that about? And so all of these kind of questions started to percolate to yes, look within and wonder why I was doing this and what I was getting out of it, but also to think why is a culture and how is a culture we got here?
Doree: Well I'm a PhD dropout, so
Natalia: Love you anyway.
Doree: I have a, I don't know, maybe a less refined historical eye. But I did really appreciate your kind, of the journey that you take us on in your new book, which well, Kate, I don't wanna speak for you, but I really enjoyed, and thought
Kate: Speak for me
Doree: Yeah. And thought it was such a wonderful kind of comprehensive overview of not just fitness culture, but also really placing everything in its historical context. And one thing that I'm wondering is, one thing that you talk about a lot, and this is kind of a through line throughout the book, is that the history of fitness and fitness itself seems so imbued with all this moral judgment and adherence to specific western beauty standards. And I'm wondering how you see those origins kind of continuing to influence fitness culture today?
Natalia: Yeah, that's such a big question and a really good one. So one thing I think that's worth thinking in about in terms of this moral question is that today and for a couple decades now we associate working out with positive moral virtue. There's a reason I always say, you'll apply for a job in accounting and you write runs marathons at the bottom. Why do you do that? Because it's supposed to show your disciplined and virtuous. That was not the case for most of American history. And I think that's something I really want people to grab, that if you were something, if you were somebody who spent a lot of time working out lifting weights, running, you were a health nut, you were a weirdo, you were weirdly preoccupied with the life of the body in a way that made you suspicious. And so that kind of moral calculus has changed over time. And so I think that that is really interesting. In terms of body standards and beauty standards, there's no question that fitness history is also the history of elevating and enshrining certain physical ideals as desirable in other ones, not only as undesirable but as immoral. It's inextricable from this history that I tell that fat bodies are not just seen as unattractive but seen as a sign of moral failure. And I think that as much of a booster as I am about fitness, I think we can't tell this story without telling that story. And I do think though, in terms of where we are today, there is a lot of good work going on right now in terms of deconstructing that less rejecting fitness culture as a whole. I'm always skeptical by people who are, this whole thing is so corrupt, I want nothing to do with it because I think right, kind of saying I'm not going to move as is not the radical act that it might seem to be. But if you see, I think one good thing about social media actually is that we have seen a real shift in terms of which bodies are considered fit. A real pushback on the notion that fatness is a sign of moral failure, or of ill health, or lack of fitness. I mean I've learned, in the latter chapters, I cite some folks who have done a lot of good awareness raising around the fact that there was this first stage, I think in terms of kind of fat acceptance or even a presence of fat people at the gym where it was like, oh, good for them. Theyre here trying to get fit. And almost like it's okay if you're here as long as you're trying to improve yourself to get thin. And one of the things like, I'm thinking in particular of Mirna Valerio, who is a self-described fat runner who's just, I've learned so much following her, she's in better shape than so many people and such an athlete. And she really pushes back on that notion that some people think about themselves as a form of acceptance or tolerance to use the word I don't love. And actually that's just another form of fat phobia. And so I do think that social media, we never would've gotten those perspectives in fitness magazines or the kind of glossies. And I do think social media has done a really good job in saying you can have fitness culture that is disconnected or that rejects this kind of, body shaming is a catch word, but this kind of celebration of a very particular body standard and condemnation of another. Does that answer the question? Sort of?
Doree: Yeah. I mean the moral judgment thing, I thought we did see some of that kind of early on even though, you know, talk about Muscle Beach, is the Santa Monica kinda wanting to shut it down and people thinking I'm as kind of nutty, but I guess I'm thinking of some of the government stuff that did seem to have this perspective of improving the populace.
Natalia: Yes, I can talk about that. So yeah, I think a really important piece of the transformation from fitness makes you this superficial weirdo who just cares about building muscles and looking pretty or hanging out at the gym with other unsavory characters, which is a big theme. A big shift in that is efforts by the federal government to connect physical fitness to civic virtue. Big theme, We don't have that as much anymore, but there are a few examples of that. I would say as early as the 1930s here, I draw on the work of an amazing scholar, Rachel Louise Moran, who looks at the Civilian Conservation Corps, which is part of the New Deal. Yeah, I know it's the history professor in me comes out, but
Kate: No, no. It's just so intense Civilian Conservation Corps.
Natalia: See this is in the New Deal, reminding everybody, yeah, this is a time when FDR, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, creates all of these agencies to put people to work and to work for the government, to get people moving and get the economy moving. And the Civilian Conservation Corps is so amazing because they're putting young men to work on all these public works projects outside. Okay fine, that's like many of these agencies. But what she uncovers, which is so fascinating, is that a big part of the cell is like, we'll put meat on your bones and muscle on your body and the advertising for this, I mean it looks like a Chippendales ad, it's these hot guys holding axes and whatever. And the way that they show it's this young man was this scrawny dude who went off and joined the CCC, he comes back a good citizen with muscle on his body. And so I think that's an important part of the chapter of this transformation. And then another piece which is probably more familiar but is super, super important is the Presidential Council on Youth Fitness. And that kind of kicks off in the Eisenhower era, if we wanna win the Cold War, we've gotta be militarily prepared. All these suburban kids are getting soft cuz they watch TV and they eat frozen food and that's the American good life, but it's making us vulnerable. And then JFK, original fit-fluencer I would say, really takes it up to the next level in one of the things he does is this Presidential Council on Youth Fitness. He drops the "Youth" and is like everybody needs to be exercising. And he also is always aware that this is a national security thing. And he talks about how soft Americans are a threat to American, America being a superpower. But he also is like, this is lifestyle, this is fun. Look at me in Hyannis in Palm Beach like swimming and throwing a football, "Hey Bobby, I challenge you to do a 50 mile hike" and then all these other people are doing that around the country. And so you're absolutely right Doree to ask about that. It's that government project to make being fit virtuous for civic purposes. It's so important. But then much of the story that I tell is that's sort of oppressive and terrible in this Cold War apparatus way. But the positive side is it held the seeds of this possibility that we'd actually invest in the infrastructure to make that possible. Imagine if we really did have phys ed that was amazing and got kids in shape. Imagine if we had parks and running trails and all of those things. The problem is they planted that seed and this very powerful idea about fitness' virtue, but never really followed through on the infrastructure. So then an industry really runs with it. And part of the virtuous project is, and if you can afford it, you deserve to be fit. And those who don't value this or can't afford it, well they're fatness or they're apparent lack of fitness reflects on the fact they don't care about health, they're a bad citizen, they're lazy, all the rest.
Kate: Yeah, I mean I feel like this is so pervasive now, this kind of including not just fitness but wellness as a measure of class, and of virtue.
Natalia: Yes.
Kate: And I struggle with this personally because we talk about self-care on this podcast and it's a bit of a trap. We're participants, but it's also kind of integrated on a systemic level that is really problematic.
Natalia: So I think there are at least two important points that you're making there. Well one is this started out as I wanna write the history of wellness and then that felt too diffuse. And I was like, well let me focus on physical fitness. But the reason it's so powerful in our culture today, this constant treaties to exercise is because it's no longer just a physical project. It's caught up with this broader wellness project. If you wanna be a fully actualized person, you've gotta work on your body, the gym being one of those things. And that's really, I think the story of, fitness in America and wellness more broadly, from the 1970s until today really. And you see more and more people buying into this idea that mind and body are connected and that it's up to you to take control of your health. And that idea is a really important shift.
People in the most part did not believe that early on. I cite all these sources of people criticizing these PE boosters saying if we spend time with kids working on their body, they're going to get stupider. There was this notion mind and body were disconnected actually, that really goes away. And one of the things that I write about that I explained why this became so powerful is even in a moment that was really politically divided, it's very appealing across the political spectrum. This idea that you should take control of your own health. You have feminist, you have black power activists who are like, this is self-determination, right? No more dudes in white coats telling me what to do. Or I'm frail or I don't understand my own body. I'm going out for a run, I'm taking up space. And it has this progressive cast. On the other hand, you have a whole conservative movement that's like, this is about personal responsibility, this is about self-discipline. You don't need to wait for some government handout. You should be taking care of your own body. And so I think that that is, that kind of expansion of these bodily products to being about being a good person and to taking control of your own health absolutely gets us to wellness today. And then the last, or not the last, but another super important piece to that I think comes in the '90s when you really have yoga and the gym world converge with one another. And most people who study this stuff, they look at the way that yoga was sort of corrupted by the gym and this spiritual thing just became about getting jacked and whatnot. Sure, that's interesting. But I'm actually interested to your question about the way that yoga really influenced the gym. And it's in the '90s that people aren't instructors anymore, they're gurus, they're talking about enlightenment, you have a practice and that really allowed, it introduced this more elevated idiom of what you get at the gym. And that can be great. And I think it allowed a lot of people to articulate and experience something really transcendent there. And I'm like one of those people. But on the other hand, it totally raises the stakes that like, oh, you know, don't work out. It's not, you don't work, you just don't work out. It's like you don't care about wellness, you don't care about health, you're kinda
Kate: Your soul.
Natalia: Yeah, yeah, totally. And that's really I think an important chapter to explain how we got to where we are today.
Doree: Well and of course and touch on this a bit too, is it, I don't wanna say completely excludes, but it doesn't do a good job including the disability community or many other communities for whom this idea of self-determination when it comes to fitness is just not possible. So yeah, I was hoping you could talk a little bit about that and I guess also talk about how fitness culture can or should become more accessible.
Natalia: Absolutely. So yes, the big problem with this breathless embrace of self-determination is that it tends to erase all of the structural factors or even in some individual factors, that prevent certain people from taking advantage of this. And I mean I often talk about this in terms of the running and jogging community cuz that language is so loud there. Do you mean all you need is sneakers and willpower? Just go outside. What's wrong with you? I mean, come on, what neighborhood do you live in? What body do you inhabit? Its so benighted I think in that regard. And so absolutely that story of exclusion and sort of willful ignorance of folks who are being excluded throughout fitness and wellness culture is so important. And I think it's so insidious because the kind of inspo is so individualistic and it's so ignores a lot of that context. what would, and I think just to bring in a kind of historical piece here that I think is really interesting, just from the primary sources that I've been steeped in for so long, I looked at a complaint that was brought against some gyms in the early 2000s about disability access. And it was interesting to me because the response of the professional or trade association of gyms was like, oh no, no, no, you gotta understand, it's not that these gyms were deliberately trying to exclude disabled people by being like non-compliant or being inaccessible. None of them ever assumed that people with disabilities would want to go work out. And to me that was like, whoa, that is a really different mindset because I feel like today, your question Doree, corresponds exactly to the kind of questions we should be asking, who's been left out, and the presumption we should be more inclusive because this is important enough that everybody should have access. So where are we now and where should we go? I mean I think one thing that we need to think about as you mentioned is access. But I like to push back on the access piece sometimes a little bit to think about access to what? You know, because there's so many aspects of fitness culture that are pretty disempowering and awful. Do I think the world would be a better place if everybody was going to classes where they're being told memorial days around the corner and you know need to lose weight? No, that's awful. Great. You know, should have right to whatever you want, but that's not what I'm talking about. And so I think that we've gotta create a world, it's a hard, a hard world to build, but the way I think of it is we've gotta create a world where people can exercise on their own terms. You know, that this isn't an oppressive thing where we're like, everybody must be fit and everybody must take PE and everybody must get this amount of exercise in this way per week. But where people have more access to opportunities for movement that in which they find joy and in which they find purpose and in which they find community and yes in which they can achieve physical health. But that's not it. And I mean this kind of goes back to where we started the conversation. If you had told me, oh you can go to PE and you have to go to every day for the rest of your life, I'd be miserable. It would be terrible. It was being able to have that opportunity even as a teenager, 30 years ago, to find exercise and movement on my own terms, that meant something to me that I think is so important. And so that's what I think we need to work towards. That is an industry question, but it's much more a policy question I think, and it's a policy question about safe spaces and I'm in safe spaces, like safe outdoor spaces, well-lit streets, but it's also much bigger. It's about poverty, it's about people having to travel miles to their shift labor, that job that changes every day and not having childcare. I mean there's so many pieces here, but you can't write about every piece in one book. So I try to focus on this but start to raise these questions that this fitness inequality issue is a social justice issue, not just a silly story about what housewives do after drop off. Because I think that is a piece of the story, but that's far from the only story.
Kate: I think we both wanna become your student and just
Doree: Yeah. Can we audit your classes?
Natalia: Come! Anytime! I'm teaching a lecture class about this book starting on January 23rd, so I'm super excited about that.
Doree: Oh, hello.
Natalia: I'll just sneak in my phone there so you guys can come on in. But do you have an open invitation if you ever wanna come to a class whenever you're in the city or. That's an honor.
Kate: Yeah, I so, I appreciate your point of view that you're offering that it is so interconnected with so many other aspects of justice. Is there a way that you see activism come out through fitness?
Natalia: Yes, absolutely. I mean, historically for sure I write about feminist collectives in the seventies who are doing self-defense workshops through martial arts classes. I write about black power groups who are also coming together and doing these collective empowerment sessions also through martial arts. I think today, I mean just right after Trump won, I ran this series called Exercise Your Power, where the new school gave me space where I teach and I got food donated and I brought together anybody free of charge who wanted to do an IntenSati workout, which is very cathartic, eat and discuss kind of a political strategy for the future. And to me in general, I think that exercise can both cultivate these communities for empowerment, to strengthen yourself and inspire that sense of optimism to do something out in the world. To me, the feeling that you have when you leave a great class, or a run, there's that sense of possibility and I think it's really a squandered opportunity not to apply that to more pressing problems than fitting into your genes, which is not a non-problem. But sometimes I think the industry language often stops at that. And fitness history is full of examples of people who have connected fitness to loftier pursuits.
Doree: So we're just going to take a short break and we will be right back. Okay, we're back.
Kate: Doree had a great question in our document about the pandemic and I was kind of curious where you think fitness and wellness stands coming out of the pandemic. And Doree had noted this kind of resurgence in an outdoor recreational fitness Doree's a tennis player.
Doree: Yeah. I have to admit I was thinking of you when I wrote this question,
Kate: Yes a pickleball player, but you also were playing tennis. We all had to, it was the only escape was to get outside. But then also I think so much of Covid has, it's changed fitness online, it's changed the conversation about wellness. There's a lot of really toxic, you know, the rise of the quote crunchy movement, all this stuff is kind of connected coming out of the major isolation that took place at the beginning of Covid. I know we are still in COVID, anyway, this is a very large question, but I'm just wondering what your kind of like take-aways are and where you see things going, in this pandemic space.
Natalia: And I'll say that as having written this book during the pandemic, I was so sad that it was delayed because I had my kids at home and everything. But then I'm like, thank God that I didn't put this out before I could write the last chapter on the pandemic because it kind of accelerated a lot of things already happening, but also changed a lot of things. So there's a lot in your question. But to start with where you started, I think one of the most interesting things about the pandemic is that it both kind of brought about this resurgence of super low tech recreation, hiking, running, walking, tennis. I mean the pickleball thing is totally comes out of people needing something to do in open air spaces. But then you also have this acceleration of the highest tech spaces like the Peloton boom in all of these other connected programs, which approximate a pretty decent in-person exercise experience and even the community aspect of it.
So I think that's really one interesting thing that's happened. And the pandemic has gone on for so long that people have created new routines, they've invested in new hardware. Some people have rebuilt their houses to accommodate new fitness and health routines. So I don't think either of those things are going away. One, I think pernicious thing that's really happened though is that every health indicator shows that health inequality has exacerbated throughout the pandemic, and people debate how you really measure this, but obesity is up among lower income people in particular. And I think it's no accident that as people were told, stay inside for some very good covid prevention reasons, stay inside in terms of health and wellness and everything, quite honestly means very different things. If you can rapid order a home fitness setup, or even if you have time to do a free YouTube workout or you have that kind of space inside to invest your time and your money to do that kind of workout, a lot of people don't have it. And we had honestly the side of the political spectrum, which is most often pro-public programs being close the beaches, close the parks take down the basketball hoop.
Kate: Yes.
Natalia: And that to me is heartbreaking. The fact that we had, we already have had this really precarious kind of public recreation network and the fact that public pools, parks, playgrounds, all of that, the places where people can actually get free and accessible recreation were the last to open, no urgency. While people with means are sitting at home and on their pelotons. To me that's so egregious and really a moral failure. So I think that's part of the pandemic story, pandemic health and fitness story. Sort of getting off my soapbox for a little bit and being more of an industry commentator. I do think it's also interesting to look at the way brick and mortar fitness is bouncing back and people are going back to the gym in person. And I think that's super interesting because, I think, what I saw is that a lot of people did almost like an elimination diet with fitness in the pandemic, because they had to, and you stripped away everything and people had to bring back different aspects of their routine and really reflect on why am I doing this, what do I get out of it and what's the purpose? And I see people who are like, I can't believe I walk to a gym every day. This is so convenient. I just get up from my computer and I get my workout in and it's done. I talk to other people who are, I realize what I like is the happenstance conversation in the locker room. We're seeing other people, or that instructor. And so I think within a certain social class, a lot of people were on autopilot with their workout routines beforehand and now we're kind of seeing a correction to that or the impact of that as people have had to be more reflective. And it is interesting that even though it's less convenient, a lot of people are going back to in-person fitness. So I think that that's kind of heartening and also kind of proves my point that fitness is about more than just purely physical exercise. When, just interesting, I don't know, an interesting point that I found in talking to some entrepreneurs and business people in the industry, is that they're confident that brick and mortar fitness will come back, is coming back, and if people have the cushion to make it through, a lot of them are going to be okay, but that people are not going to every day walk 20 minutes to go to a 45 minute class or something and then it'll be more a destination thing. So you'll see, oh, once or twice a week I go for an hour and a half to do this thing outside my house, but the other days I stay home and maybe work out with my yoga mat and my weights at home. So I think this is still shaking out, as you said, we're still in the pandemic, there's still lots of people who don't wanna go to a gym, even if they can afford it. So we're seeing a lot happening, lot happening there. Last thing I'll say about that, I did talk to one, a person who's a founder of a big wellness company and he said he's very bullish on the boom of the sector now because comorbidities related to lifestyle, things like exercise were so much higher around COVID. And so he's, I actually think once we're, if we get out of this, this is going to be a higher priority than ever for people across social classes. So we'll see. I'm a historian, not a forecaster, but I do think the pandemic has accelerated certain things but also shaken out in ways that were sort of unexpected.
Kate: It's made me reevaluate everything in so many different ways, including having COVID has changed how I, like my fitness and all that stuff. So it is, it's interesting to think about from that perspective.
Natalia: Oh yeah.
Doree: I think I have, I mean. It's interesting what you said about being forced to give up a lot of things and then kind of add things back. And I feel like that has at least led me to prioritize joy and the things that I actually want to do with less thought about how is this affecting my health or how do I look? It's more just I want to feel personally fulfilled by this. And that is a shift in mindset for me personally. And I don't know how common that is, but I would guess that it is somewhat common just in part because I think a lot of people are seeking community that they didn't have during the pandemic. And whether that looks like going back to a gym or playing pickleball or what have you, I think those are things that people are really seeking out.
Natalia: I totally agree. And I think during the pandemic there was so much of, let me just survive, let me just keep my head above water. Yes. Let me just not get covid. I mean that's mm-hmm a baseline survival perspective. And ideally we wanna do more than that. You say we wanna feel joy, we wanna feel connection. And it's heartening to think that we can get back to doing that rather than just getting through the day.
Doree: Yeah, totally. I'm also wondering, and I was thinking about this as I was reading your book about when I was in France a few years ago, and there are very few gyms there and it's just not a part of the culture in the same way that it is here. And so what I'm wondering is how all of this is so uniquely American and whether there are, and maybe this is outside the scope of your research, but I'm curious, are there other countries or other cultures that have a similar sort of perspective on fitness? Or is this truly a uniquely American kind of way of being when it comes to fitness?
Natalia: Oh my gosh, great question. And this is when I'm like, well, I'm an Americanist, but I think, I'm not going to cop out that way. But first it's funny you mentioned France, cuz I took my family, I taught in our study abroad program in Paris for a semester in 2018. And one of the things that I joked about, cause I obviously went to every gym in Paris to kind of test it out and see what it was. It's the only place in Paris where being an American makes you such a celebrity. They're like, oh, America Bootcamp, New York Body Californian because fitness. That's so funny. And they're all knockoffs of American gyms, which is really funny too. And so it was this rare thing where American fitness culture is an export, was so loved even by stereotypically snobby Parisians who don't maybe love Americans, but is it so American? Well, the first thing to note is that the beginning of fitness culture in this country is an import. I mean, these are pretty much all those strong men and women I write about early on are all coming from the German states basically. So that is really not inherently American. And there's stories of importation and appropriation throughout my whole book from yoga, which is obviously a huge one, to martial arts, to Zumba. I mean, these are all things that are bringing in very deliberately and sometimes not that deliberately. Aspects of movement and fitness cultures in other countries, I will say. And that's really important. My discipline's divided by country. But that's a really artificial and sometimes damaging distinction. I will say. I think it's not an accident that I'm writing this about the United States and that fitness culture has caught on so powerfully in the US because it cohears so perfectly with our mythology of self fashioning and our kind of bootstrapping rhetoric about being a self-made person. I mean, what better arena in which to be like, I did this myself. I'm a self-made man or woman, then your own body. Right? And it also coheres. So there's that individualism of Americans that is so connected to fitness. There's also that optimism of like, I can do it. This is the year. My health is in my hands. And then I also think we are very ambivalent about our connection to luxury and also conspicuous consumption. And we talked about virtue, but to me, one of the reasons why fitness is so performed in the US in which such, and with such gusto is because it's not just luxury and indulgence, it's work. And Americans love to conspicuously consume. If we can show that we deserve it or we worked for it. And I think that all of those things which are so much part of our American ethos, really converge in fitness culture and really across political divides or cultural divides. It's pretty compelling. And the last just data point I'll say, is that I think I wrote this book today, this was compelling today, for a lot of reasons, but post financial crisis 2008, and which also is when Instagram really takes off, it's kind of this perfect storm where all of a sudden we're encouraged to show our lives through this new social media platform. And at the same time, it's really unsavory if you're even sort of self-aware to be, look at my fancy shoes or my cocktails or my caviar, but to be look at my leggings that I'm wearing to go sweat at this class, I'm being disciplined and virtuous in working towards health. And so that's a modern example of why the performance of fitness is so public today. Because even as we've had fitness culture for a long time, that was not really the case in the 1980s. In the 1990s. Today this is something people show off about themselves.
Kate: Well, and you note too the white supremacist roots of fitness, which is obviously not just something that occurs in America, but certainly we really have our foothold in white supremacy here,
Natalia: For sure. So um,
Kate: That seems like it ties together with the American origin story.
Natalia: Oh, for sure. So one of the things that was really interesting to me to find in my research is that I'm studying these early fitness enthusiasts, these strong men and women. And I was reading Bernard McFadden, who was one of the early boosters, very influential in this subculture. And what he was writing about is he was saying there's this myth that women should be sort of resting and frail and fragile, but they've gotta get rid of their corsets and they've gotta start strength training. And I'm like, yeah, dude, this is awesome. And then you keep reading, and actually he's talking only about white women and he's talking about this as a way to ward off what they called race suicide, because there were so many minorities, immigrants and black people who'd been emancipated from slavery, who were reproducing at higher rates. And so it was part of a much bigger movement in that time. But I found that so interesting because on its face, it seems sort of like "you go, girl, let's lift weights", but you keep reading as we all should, whenever we're in doing this kind of work. And there was a very different, it was for a very different purpose. And the other piece, Kate, I think that's really important there is, I found it so fascinating that at this time in the early 20th century when lifting weight, strength training exercise was seen as unsavory, that one of the most powerful ways that these men tried to elevate it and show that this was civilized is they were constantly saying like, I am not a mere breaker of stones. I'm not a mere brute who just lifts heavy things. This is about self-discipline and this is about the cultivation of a higher order humanity. And there, there's, I won't go into the thing now, it's in the book, but there's a very evocative scene where Eugene Sandal, who's this very famous, strong man who's white, kind of overpowers this black bellhop and shows it that you see, I trained deliberately, he might be physically stronger, but this is civilization. And so I think that kind of white supremacy piece is really an important part of that early history that we can't look away from.
Kate: Your book is so good. I mean listen everybody, do yourself a favor, dig in here because you really have it. I mean, it's such a great embodiment of the way that this discourse covers. It connects so many things. And it's interesting to view it all through the lens of fitness and how it all really does connect and overlap.
Natalia: Thank you.
Kate: It's truly amazing. And it's not something you ever really think about when you step on the elliptical, the old New York Fitness.
Natalia: I know. I love that elliptical.
Kate: Yeah, we know that one.
Natalia: Thank you. This means so much to me. You know, labor kind of in obscurity for a long time to write these things and thank you so much.
Kate: Well, we should note that in addition to being a historian and a professor, you also teach one of my favorite fitness classes, IntenSati. Where can our listeners find all the things that you do? Where can they track you down, get more information about your work, events, anything you're offering?
Natalia: Yeah, so definitely NataliaPetrzela.com is pretty up to date. And then Instagram, I'm @NataliaPetrzela and also Twitter. I have the same handle. LinkedIn, I'm more boring. But that's how it goes.
Kate: And if you have a chance to take a class with Natalia, whether it be at the new school or doing IntenSati, I highly recommend it.
Natalia: Come see me. I would love to, whether it's to sweat or just to think together.
Doree: Thank you so much. This is such a pleasure to talk to you, Natalia.
Natalia: Likewise. I'm really honored to come on. Thank you. It's so nice to meet you both.
Kate: You know, Doree, I loved you. Texted me after our conversation with Natalia and you were like, I would love to take her class. And I think there's that, I don't know, talking to her, it was that feeling of just learning so much. What an incredible professor she must be. Can you imagine? I felt like I could have just sat here for a month and learned from her.
Doree: Oh yeah. I mean, she's so dynamic and interesting and clearly, so knowledgeable, and I bet her college classes are just amazing.
Kate: Alright, we have landed in the intention zone, Doree, and last week you shared that you needed a reset. Do you feel like this drawer cleaning has been the start of that reset? Do you think that's it for you?
Doree: No.
Kate: Okay.
Doree: I mean, well, I think, wait, what do you mean by it?
Kate: I mean, do you think that is symbolic of your urge to reset? Do you feel like that was a step into the reset zone?
Doree: Oh yes. I thought you meant, do you think that that is, that's all you need? That's it.
Kate: No, no, no, no. You're not done.
Doree: Yes, I'm not done. But I do think that that was a step in the right direction. I'm also, I feel like I'm taking some steps professionally, kind of rebooting my newsletter and just trying to feel a little bit more centered. I noticed that you posted that you got sucked into a TikTok trend. And I won't say what it is yet, but I also saw a TikTok trend of, I mean, this woman, I went to her profile and she's like 23 and a CMO, and I'm just like, okay, maybe am I taking advice from you? I don't know, but maybe I am. But she had a whole 12 week life plan happening, and I feel like we've talked about something like this previously, a three month plan essentially.
Kate: I swear I saw this video too.
Doree: I'm sure you did. I feel like there's multiple ones going around. And so I downloaded her template. I have not filled it out yet, but I'm like, I don't know. This kind of shit kind of is icky to me, but also maybe it works. There is an aspect of speaking things into existence, I think, that I actually do find powerful. Not to say I believe in the secret, but I think that just sort of stating what you want is a powerful thing. And so I think that would be helpful for me to just feel a little bit more grounded and also feel like I'm working towards something.
Kate: Doree, did we watch the same TikTok videos?
Doree: Maybe.
Kate: So are you going to try to get, well, I'm just curious. Are you going to try to set up a three month plan?
Doree: I'm going to actually look at this template, and
Kate: This is so funny. I watched this video today
Doree: And see what it is. And I don't know, maybe this is not the exact right thing for me, but maybe there's some other sort of version of it that I can do. You know what I mean?
Kate: I do. I had a similar, in addition to the college student who told me about flip phones. Again, a phone that I had 20 years ago, but she reeducated me. This girl also made this video with her friend about how they implemented this luck theory where they just keep repeating how lucky they are and that makes things come true for them. And then I watched the original video of basically this, again, a person who cannot be older than 25 talking about how they have a mantra of essentially good things always happen to me and how that has changed their life and how good things just only happen to them. And again, there's a lot of factors that go into this. one, It was all white presenting women speaking this. So to me, that flagged, because I'm imagining in a society constructed on systemic racism, your whiteness is going to play a big part of your quote, luck. I think that's something to be at least explored. So I'm trying to look at this from all angles and obviously the toxic positivity angle and
Doree: Yep, yep.
Kate: I also, bad things happen all the time and have happened to me and people I love. So I don't buy this idea that you can just mantra your way into a better life. But I also, I tend to think so negatively about myself and I have a lot of negative self talk and discouraging self talk. And I was watching these videos and I was like, what can I take away from this that actually might make a positive impact in my life? And it was just kind of, I mean, it's a little bit of stuff that we've talked about before, this reframing of things. But right now I'm in this, I'm never going to finish this thing I'm working on. It's terrible. I'm a failure. And what if I actually stopped saying that and was like, oh, this is getting better. I'm working on this. I'm proud of, just that kind of thing. So yeah, my intention this week is just this kind of examine positive thinking from coming from a rational place, but examine it and and how I could maybe incorporate it into my life.
Doree: Okay. I like this. I like this alot.
Kate: Oh boy. We have been on an emotional journey on this episode.
Doree: We really have. Ooh,
Kate: Well we appreciate you coming along. By all means, text us (781) 591-0390. Call us or leave us an email Forever35podcast@gmail.com if any of this is resonating with you. Cause I'd love to hear about how the hell it's going on in other people's lives. And of course, forever35 is hosted and produced by Doree Shafrir and Kate Spencer, and it's produced and edited by Sam Junio. Sami Reed is our project manager and our network partner is ACAST. Thank you for listening.
Doree: Bye everyone.