DEANNA: “If you haven’t lifted weights, you might be tempted to think that it’s mostly a matter of brute force, that strength comes from muscle combined with determination and will. These things are important, but something training with Kate has taught me is that strength is a skill. It comes from understanding systems and networks within the body and the brain; it comes from technique combined with practice and smart repetition, from knowing when to push, when to pull, when to tense or relax, when to breathe, and when to rest. But most critically it comes from having a plan: strategic thinking, goal setting, and implementation over time with readjustments as necessary.
These insights are more than just good lessons for creating changes in the body. You could work with Kate and come out of it with delightful new health and athletic accomplishments, and that would be well worth it. However if you pay attention you're also going to get a masterclass from Kate in a far more holistic experience in personal improvement. Kate's practice of starting from a place of curiosity and investigation, which becomes goal setting, which accommodates and adjusts and which finally leads to victories large and small... well that can be applied to all sorts of our efforts in moving through the world, can't it?
When I started to work with Kate I was 100% the cliché of a mid-forties office worker gone extremely extremely soft. We had to start at the very beginning together and Kate's willingness to meet me where I was at, to not judge and to be genuinely enthusiastic about even the tiniest wins in the first few months was the secret sauce which kept me coming back for more. If you want someone who is going to cuss at you to do three more burpees... well move along, you're not in the right place. If you want someone who will teach you three different types of movement to thoughtfully try to get your core engaged, and who you can hear making tiny exclamations of "Yes! Athlete!" when you finally get there... you've found your person.”