By Barrett White
Content warning: This article contains references to eating disorders, depression, and anxiety.
If I see one more fitness influencer share an image of a donut alongside how many squats it’ll take to erase it, I just might pack all my things and fly to Mars.
Let’s be real: Your fitness journey is just that—your fitness journey.
Everyone’s body is different. Your relationship to a workout routine and the food that you consume is a deeply personal one. Paramount to all of this is your relationship with your body. You’ve got one body—don’t let people on the internet make you feel bad about it while you’re here on Earth.
Bethany C. Meyers is the best in the business—and I don’t say that lightly. They’re the founder and CEO of the be.come project, an online fitness course and community that is succinctly described as a “body-neutral, I-can-do-it, go-on-and-love-yourself approach to boutique fitness in an accessible 25-minute routine.” Courses are online and can be completed in the comfort of your own home. As Meyers once described it to me, the be.come project has “the alignment of Pilates, the lengthening of yoga, and the musicality of dance.”
Photo: Bethany C. Meyers.
I’ve been following Meyers online for fitness advice and general good queer vibes for years, since before they launched the be.come project. In fact, I interviewed them about their life ahead of be.come’s launch back in 2018. People will tell you not to meet your heroes lest they let you down, but I can’t say that advice holds true with Bethany. They’re the best in the biz because they’re real.
“I don’t know that I have the answer for anything,” Meyers starts. “I think it’s important for people to understand that no one has it figured out. We’re all on this journey together.”
They jump right in: “Really, one of the biggest things is being very discerning of who you’re following, who you’re supporting, and who you’re choosing to workout with. Like, what does that look like?”
Take stock of the fitness influencers, the workout routines, the diet plans, and the blogs that you’re consuming. Do they recognize that health exists at every size, or are they pushing you to look a certain way? Do they call certain sweets “guilt free” while shaming sugar? How does that affect diet complexes?
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, there has been a marked increase in mental health issues such as anxiety and depression during the COVID-19 pandemic. Unsurprisingly, in a Kaiser poll published in October 2020, as many as 53 percent of U.S. adults aged 18 and older were struggling with their mental health, up from 39 percent in May of the same year.
The National Institute of Mental Health’s most recent data on eating disorders such as binge eating disorder, bulimia nervosa, and anorexia nervosa is listed as being from 2003 and 2004. However, the data, though nearly two decades old, is staggering considering the collective state of the mental health of the nation, and the world, in the present day. The occurrence of people who experience anorexia nervosa with anxiety as a comorbidity is nearly 50 percent; anxiety and binge-eating disorder over 65 percent; and anxiety and bulimia a shocking 80 percent. To push unhealthy and unrealistic diet and fitness jargon onto a nation in distress is downright irresponsible.
Meyers warns against falling into the influencer all-or-nothing black pit. Rest days, self-care, and attention to your body’s needs are principal to your overall health. “Your physical self needs rest; it’s a part of our cycle and a part of our health,” they say. “Understanding that is so helpful in that your rest day may be the day that is best for you physically.”
“And it may not even be one day,” they continue. “I’m wary of ‘30-day challenges’ because I don’t think that our bodies—as primal humans—are made to work that way. Everything in life has a cycle, including the plants outside. They grow, they rest, and they come back. I believe that we’re the same way.”
Often while teaching the be.come project, Meyers reassures clients that it is in fact okay to sit and chill while watching the video, or to hang out in child’s pose on the mat. “The most important thing is taking the dedicated time for yourself,” Meyers concludes. “I think that plays into our physical and mental side.”
As a fitness-minded person myself, I have pinballed between numerous diets and fitness routines to find what works for me: I was vegan for two years. I started CrossFit. I got into weightlifting. I went back to CrossFit. I started cycling. I started jogging. Health and diet have never been one thing for me—I saw the six pack come and go, but that was never my endgame.
Instead, I choose to focus on how my food makes me feel. Do I like the recipe? Is my body nourished? The workouts, too: Did I enjoy that hour I took for myself? I pay attention to what my body can do, what it used to be able to do, and what I want it to be able to do in the future. I don’t own a scale.
Following my interpretation of Meyers’ advice over the years, I’m less concerned with my weight or the shape of my body and more concerned with how the food and workouts make me feel. If I am healthy, inside and out, I don’t require the six pack I lost or the before-and-after photos that Instagram wants from me.
“A lot of times, when we’re at our [physically fittest], we’re not at our happiest or healthiest,” Meyers told me in our 2018 interview. Those words stick with me to this day.
While Meyers is forging the be.come project’s path through inclusive and considered fitness, they aren’t the only one. Meyers is inspired by others online who offer safe and welcoming environments for all people of all body types:
- Decolonizing Fitness
- Wolf Medicine
- Jessamyn
- Yaya
- Sunrise Nutrition
- The Fatphobia Slayer
- Underbelly Yoga
- Alisha McCullough
- Nonnormative Body Club
- Queer Healers
- Martinus Evans
This time of year, we are inundated with diet and weight-loss media. No matter your journey, it is important to consider that your health does not hinge strictly on one thing. Remember that your health journey is not a journey to health, but rather an ongoing relationship with your body and the state of your current health along the way. Find what works for your body and your peace. Above all, be kind to yourself.
You can find Bethany C. Meyers and the be.come project on Instagram at @bethanycmeyers and @thebecomeproject. For more information on the be.come project, please visit their official website.
