Overcoming Stress with Fitness & Energy Coaching

The two biggest things that have affected my health is stress and sleep (or I should say lack of sleep). I’ve always been relatively healthy, eaten well, exercised a lot. Stress affects me physically very quickly, so I know straight away when things aren’t working well.

The first time it made a big difference to my body was when I was studying for my MSc. I was very stressed. I didn’t realise quite how stressed out I was. It stopped me sleeping well, which exaggerated all the issues. I felt sick every time I ate (I hate the feeling of nausea because I can’t do anything properly). I had non-stop headaches (headaches that painkillers wouldn’t stop).

Then it got worse, I felt dizzy most of the time, like how when you’ve drunk too much alcohol and everything is spinning, like that. Driving was not nice, because when we were in slow moving traffic, it felt like I was physically moving but it took a second for my head to catch up with me. These symptoms lasted a good 4/5 months. I also developed a small lump in my breast, which was benign, but a symptom of stress.

I went to see my doctor at the time and she said it was stress and that it would all go away after I had finished my degree, which didn’t really help! However, once all my assignments were in (apart from my dissertation), most of the symptoms went away relatively quickly. I had also decided to make some changes to my sleep routine. I’m pretty nocturnal, so I can't sleep early and mornings aren’t my friends. As we didn’t have lectures to be at in the mornings, I decided I would go to bed when felt good for me and wake up later in the morning. This made a huge difference, because it meant I got much more sleep, which in turn helped de-stress and heal the body.

This kind of stress has come up several times since then. The last two times have affected my periods massively, my mood, again my sleep. It affected my ability to focus on doing my job, and just enjoying life.

Throughout all of this, fitness and taking time out to exercise has been vital. It has always been the one thing that has brought sanity to my life, the one place I can go to not think about everything going on. I just get on with the exercise, focusing on what I’m doing, on my body, on my breathing, on feeling the burn and joking with the others in class and there isn’t time to focus on anything else. I don’t even want to think about how bad the stress would have been if I didn’t have that exercise outlet.

Exercise helps de-stress, takes your mind off everything, boosts the good hormones and brings some clarity and focus to your life. Even when I didn’t feel happy and was stressed, low in energy, upset, worried, overthinking, exercise lifted me up, maybe not fully, but enough to be able to keep going with the day and week.

This is one of the reasons I love teaching fitness, it makes such a massive difference. When my clients are doing Pilates or Burlexercise with me, there isn’t time to think about anything else, they are too busy thinking about the movement, the muscles, the breath. I see my clients come in tired, in a bad mood, stressed and leave with energy, smiling, more peaceful. This is huge. It gives them the space to let go of whatever is going on in their life.

The other thing that has really helped me work on my stress and keeping it low when it wants to rise, is energy and mindset work. Working on this side of things, actually started when I was training as an actor. It was all about noticing the emotions and barriers we were holding on to. Those things that sometimes you don’t want to admit to or you don’t even know are there. It was the first time I was tuning into what was in my energy and what was holding me back.

Since then I discovered the Energy Alignment Method (EAM). What I love about this technique is how easy it is to use. I discovered it at a time when my relationship was not in a good place. The relationship was affecting how I felt, bringing up a lot of negative emotions and thoughts in me, like worry, jealousy, frustration, anger. There was stress there too, but not in the usual obvious way, but it was there. It again affected my sleep, because I wasn’t in a mentally good place with everything.

My boyfriend at the time was very good at using all this to his advantage, taking digs at who I was, trying to lower my confidence (and he did to a certain degree), bitching about my friends and family, getting his way.

All of this affected my wellbeing because I spent too much time in a negative place.

EAM was there to help me shift this negativity. Firstly, by identifying what was going on in my energy and then letting go of it, aligning to what I wanted to feel and what I desired. This really helped me notice what was going on in me and to bring myself to a more positive state, for a short time it even improved our relationship.

When I broke up with that boyfriend, I was now in a city where I knew no one, I didn’t have money, I had restarted my business from scratch. This brought up a lot of stress, worry, anger and everything else that comes with a breakup. EAM really helped me get things under control. I used it to really tune in to what was going on in me – there was resistances that were suppressed from years before that needed releasing because they were keeping me stuck. When I worked on that, it meant I started to feel like me again, to lift up my energy and mood, tune in to what I really wanted and eventually attract a man and a relationship that was what I wanted and desired.

Once I started to feel like myself again and raise my confidence, everything started to fall into place. I felt amazing. I attracted my ideal man. My business is thriving. Financially I’m in a much better position. I have more clarity and focus. I am happier and feel lighter as I’m not carrying a whole bunch of negative shit that was pulling me down.

I know I wouldn’t have turned things around as fast as I did without EAM. This is why I trained as an EAM Coach and Mentor. The results are mind-blowing. When I’m working with my clients, I see the big changes in them, how they become more confident, improve physically, get more in tune to how to look after themselves, so they can be the best version of themselves to do the things they want in their life, to have amazing relationships, to be happy and enjoy their life.


Photo by Aditya Saxena on Unsplash

There is nothing more powerful than letting go of the things holding you down and keeping you stuck. Once you let go of these, it is like a breath of fresh air. Mentally and physically you feel better. Your energy, moods, body, mindset, ability to achieve your goals, all of this improves. The more you work on this, the stronger and more resilient you become.

I want everyone to be able to reduce stress, even when things are in a bad place, to be able to have a way to release the things weighing down on them. This is so important for mental and physical wellbeing.

If you are stuck in a place that isn’t where you want to be, feeling like the world is on your shoulder, affecting your ability to have an amazing life, then get in touch, I’m here to chat and see what steps you can take. Alternatively, you can join one of my classes or find out more about how EAM can change your life too, on my website: warriorintraining.co.uk.


Ceza Ouzounian