The Beginning

I took my first fitness class in the 1980s when I was 8 years old alongside my mom in a church basement in Powder Springs, Georgia.  I always loved dancing and had rhythm so it was natural to join her aerobics class.  It was love at first sight, or rather, love at first grapevine as were the early steps of aerobics.  I started running around the neighborhood and doing little workouts like I saw my mom do at home everyday and soon I was on my way as an early fitness adopter.  In high school I decided to try out for cheerleading and once on the squad became accustomed to the rounds and rounds of conditioning we did as part of our training.  In the South, cheerleading is a sport and we lifted weights and ran with the football team.  Were jumping lunges fun?  Hell no!  But what I came to quickly realize was that the hours of conditioning made me better at my sport.  The laps around the track made it easier when I went on a hike.  And the pain I originally felt from the exercises was lessened when I just stayed in shape.

What I did not make the connection to early on was how it made me feel.  Happy and strong.  What I did not realize until much later in life was that it taught me my earliest lessons of resiliency.  What I am grateful for now is that it gave me one of my greatest attributes, discipline.  I heard someone say once they wished there was a giant syringe of happy medicine that you could inject into your brain.  I’ve been screaming from the mountain tops for over 2 decades that there is.  It’s called exercise.  The “happy” secretions in your body that occur from movement and hard physical work do just that.  Improve mood, reduce pain, make you feel happier.  I recently heard information presented in this manner that I hadn’t yet heard before and it blew my mind.  Because humans were originally (and intended to be) hunters/gatherers/wanderers, the “happy” secretions were created by our bodies as a built in reward system for hard physical labor.  If we were going to have to wander to find food all day, we would be rewarded for that physical work.  In no way am I diminishing severe mental health scenarios, but this nation would be much more mentally healthy and would feel better if we went on a walk or lifted some weights over our head and got up from our desks and recliners that have robbed us from these biological incentives.

I’ve had a long and winding personal health and wellness story and will share more here over time but wanted to start with the origin.  The root of where it all began.  When movement became medicine and I stepped into my life calling.  It wouldn’t manifest until years later but the seeds were planted and I was set on a path to change the world one jumping lunge and one track lap at a time.

Liz Van Voorhis

Founder & CEO, FIT COLLECTIVE