Life, work & fitness in balance
If you’re striving for a life where your work, wellbeing and fitness support each other, my coaching is designed for you. I help people change their lives for the better by:
- Improving physical health to gain more energy and headspace.
- Reducing work stress and becoming more present for the people who matter.
- Making time for what they need to thrive physically, mentally and emotionally.
- Using the synergies between physical and mental wellbeing to make lasting changes.
My coaching services
Expert life and work coaching, asking the right questions to help you make the best plans and carry them through to success.
A unique fusion of coaching and personal training to bring your life into the best balance possible.
Personal training programme and hands on supervision to help you stay motivated to optimise your fitness.
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Milestones
It’s six months since I started posting my reflections on my exploration of life, work and fitness coaching. It has been an interesting journey, full of ups and downs. I’ve just read back through my posts and realised how far I’ve come in that time. The frustrations and fears I have overcome. The new dreams…
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The difference a year makes
I read a really interesting article on Runners Connect about fitness gains – they have some great resources on the science behind running. Lots of interesting takeaways from the article, including explaining why beginners tend to improve so quickly. But my favourite bit was this (VO2max is the maximum amount of oxygen your body can…
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Back again…
That was a longer gap between posting than I had planned but I had to focus on getting my portfolio for my level 3 PT qualification finished. It took lots of work to get it over the line, but it was great to be putting all that knowledge to the test with a real life…
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Quiet burn
I’ve come to welcome the ache of muscles rebuilding after a workout. It’s obviously not enjoyable in itself but it reminds me that I’m getting stronger. That I’m doing the work I need to do to regain my fitness. And it reminds me that I need to care for myself and give my body the…
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Goldilocks zone
People are often advised “listen to your body” to guard against overtraining. But many people would retort “if I listened to my body I’d never get off the sofa!”. Training too hard can lead to injuries and burnout. But not training enough will stop you reaching your goals. So how do you tell the difference…
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Doing something is the biggest win
https://acsm.org/resistance-training-guidelines-update-2026/ New ACSM guidelines came out earlier this year – I love the emphasis on consistency over complexity. It underpins my sense that as a personal trainer, the coaching skills that you bring to motivating clients are more important than ability to come up with the latest flashy technique. I’ve been learning a lot about…
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Challenge
I’ve been reflecting recently on coaching and AI, and I think the issue of challenge is one of the biggest downfalls, as highlighted in this article. https://www.ap.org/news-highlights/spotlights/2026/ai-is-giving-bad-advice-to-flatter-its-users-says-new-study-on-dangers-of-overly-agreeable-chatbots/ Learning to challenge appropriately in coaching is a skill and an art. Challenging in the wrong way, or at the wrong time, can be damaging to the coaching…
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Setbacks and identity
I confess my recent humbling attempts to start upper body exercise again have had me questioning some fundamentals of my identity. Joy and pride in getting stronger has been a really important part of my fitness journey, and something that has motivated me to start building up my skills to offer personal training. These last…
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Tail of the snake
When you’ve built up your strength and fitness, it’s tough when you realise you’ve lost fitness. You’ve slid down the snake and there aren’t any ladders in sight. And the square you used to be on seems unreachably far away. It can happen so easily – injuries, illness, life events or just getting older. It…
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Change
Looking back, I see I’ve written a lot about change, and I came up with three reasons why. Firstly because coaching is about making changes. Our goals generally don’t drop in our laps – we need to do something, however small, to make them come to life. At its best, coaching is about the inner…
Jessica Smith - Life, work and fitness coaching 