🏳️‍⚧️ Safe to be you...

This week marked Transgender Day of Visibility, a day which matters now more than ever in our community. Trans rights are under attack, with laws making some of the most basic human rights challenging. Making sure our fitness community is a safe space for everyone regardless of how you identify, who you love or how you look is one of the most important things to me.

For our trans community, being visible in fitness spaces isn’t always safe or comfortable.

Within and outside the LGBTQ+ community, it’s not much better.

That’s why our community exists.

Not for the fittest.

Not for the most coordinated.

Not for the people who “have it all together.” But for people who want to move, feel better, and be part of something.

That’s what we’re trying to build in every single class.

The Challenge

Walking into any ‘fitness space’ can feel like stepping onto a stage you didn’t audition for.

You might be thinking:

• “Am I the biggest/ oldest/ un-fittest one here?”

• “Why does everyone else look like they know what they’re doing?”

• “What if I get it wrong?”

Add into this if your body has changed recently; through your 30s, 40s, 50s, menopause, hormones, injury and life doing its thing, it can feel like you’re learning how to move all over again.

Joints feel different.

Energy is limited.

Coordination says “not today, babes.”

No one talks about how disorienting that can be.

So let me say this clearly:

You are not behind.

You are not the problem.

And you are definitely not the only one feeling this way.

Your Official Permission Slip 🎟️

You have full permission to:

• Be off-beat

• Be yourself

• Go the wrong way (we’ve all dramatically salsa’d into someone)

• Forget the routine halfway through (I do it all the time)

• Take it easy, pause, breathe, laugh

Because none of that means you’re doing it wrong.

It means you showed up.

At Fitness with Matt, effort will always matter more than perfection.

Bodies Change.

It changes with age, stress, hormones, life, identity, healing… all of it.

That doesn’t make it worse. It makes it human. It makes you real. And you, you.

Movement is something you give yourself because:

• it boosts your mood

• it reduces stress

• it helps you feel more like you again

• it allows you to express yourself

So if you’ve ever stood on the sidelines thinking “I’ll come back when I’m fitter / smaller / more confident…”

I’m going to lovingly call you out.

Confidence doesn’t come before you start. It comes because you start.

And you don’t have to do it perfectly.

You just have to show up.

Even with two left feet.