Episode 004 - Jessie Lockhart

Get ready for an exciting interview with Jessie Lockhart, a Certified Personal Trainer and 6-Figure Entrepreneur with a powerful message of motivation and inspiration.

On Model the Master podcast, Christin sits down with Jessie to discuss her incredible journey of transformation, from a career pivot into a new field of business to a total revitalization of her physical, mental, and emotional health. As the owner and founder of The Swoleistic Collective, Jessie has a wealth of experience and expertise to share on how to achieve success in both business and personal life.

Discover Jessie's secrets to overcoming challenges, achieving wellness, and building a thriving business, and get inspired to take your own journey to new heights! Don't miss out on this uplifting interview about transformation and achieving your goals.

Transcript

Christin Gutierrez (00:00):

Welcome to Model the Master Podcast, brought to you by Increpreneur, where we believe the fastest path to personal and professional growth is to model those who have gone before us. I'm your host, Christin Gutierrez,

Christin Gutierrez (00:13):

And today we're here with Jessica Lockhart. Jessie is a six figure realtor turned holistic fitness coach and personal trainer whose personal health journey led her to launch The Swoleistic Collective. Now she empowers other entrepreneurial women to ditch their quick fix diets and unrealistic workouts, and helps them to feel their best by working with their bodies instead of against them. Welcome to the show, Jessie.

Jessie Lockhart  (00:41):

Thank you, Christin. I'm really excited to be here. 

Christin Gutierrez (00:47):

All right. So back to the name of your company - it’s super awesome:  Swoleistic. I love that. Tell me a little bit about that..

Jessie Lockhart  (01:08):

Yeah, so it really came out of my own personal journey that I experienced between 2020, 2021 and into 2022 when I actually launched the company. And it really, like I said, stems from my own personal story. I went through a holistic health journey. I came from an autoimmune diagnosis of my thyroid and imbalanced hormones, dysfunctional gut, and all of this stuff. Honestly, at the expense of my career as a real estate agent prior to going into the fitness industry and going through my own journey, I realized how much those types of things aren't talked about in the fitness industry. It more or less comes down to how many workouts you're doing or how many calories you're eating a day, and we don't take the extra steps to look at our health from a wider perspective as entrepreneurs, women. As an entrepreneur woman myself, I know exactly how we operate.

(02:21):

We put everything else before ourselves, including our business, our relationships, our children, things like that. And we are always the last one to do something for ourselves, and we end up burned out, stressed out, tired, and wonder where it all went wrong. And the reality is we just haven't been making ourselves a priority, or our health a priority. And so then our body forces us through symptoms and getting sick and things like that to actually take a beat and rest. And so I saw all of these different things going on in the fitness industry. None of this stuff was being talked about, and I wanted to fill those gaps. And so I became a certified personal trainer using the knowledge that I'd acquired through my own holistic health journey, and launched The Swoleistic Co. And now I coach women and help them make their health a priority and create long-term sustainable habits, and just ultimately help them become autonomous over their own bodies, making informed choices and being able to move forward in that way.

Christin Gutierrez (03:32):

That's so beautiful. I love that so much. And what you're saying is a hundred percent true. I'm a serial entrepreneur and found myself in exactly the same spot. I have auto autoimmune diagnoses as well. I have Hashimoto's disease with hypothyroidism, lupus and a couple of other things. And I found myself just completely at a point of breakdown where I was actually dying. My organs were shutting down, and I wound up having to completely change my whole life - just rearrange everything. I wound up going whole-food plant-based. I wound up working out every day and just really taking more time for myself and putting my own health and my own needs ahead of some of the other things that I was putting first. And I've seen such a tremendous change in my life. I'm no longer dying. My blood work is all perfect, and it really wouldn't have been possible if I didn't take the time to figure that out. So what you're doing for these entrepreneur women is so important, and I think that you have an amazing business model and an amazing mission.

Jessie Lockhart  (04:53):

Thank you. Well, yeah, that's incredible. I didn't know that about your story, and I think you can absolutely just attest to the fact that if we don't take care of ourselves beforehand, that our body will eventually kind of turn against us… it can be screaming for support, but we are not listening to it at all. 

Christin Gutierrez (05:17):

And when you get distracted by business and then don't listen to it until it's too late... I love that you're getting in there and trying to reach people before it gets to that point.

Jessie Lockhart  (05:30):

Yeah, absolutely. It all compounds. That's the thing: it's not an overnight type of problem. It's things that we're doing on a daily basis that turn into a weekly basis, monthly, yearly, and then decades later, we're having these problems. These things don't happen overnight and they don't heal overnight either. And so that's kind of the catch 22, is we have to develop those long-term sustainable habits and quit the up and down of intense workouts and bad diets and all of that stuff, because all that's doing is creating more chaos inside of your body.

Christin Gutierrez (06:09):

It really is. It really is. And you know what the truth is, is that diets don't work. Lifestyle changes do. So those bad diets are just hurting people and they have no idea.

Jessie Lockhart  (06:22):

Very, very, very true.

Christin Gutierrez (06:24):

Yeah. So what problems do you see most often in your practice and what's your solution for that?

Jessie Lockhart  (06:31):

So most women who come to me know that they need to be working out in some way, shape, or form, or they want to or have a desire to start strength training, but honestly just don't really know where to start. They don't know how to craft a workout for themselves, and they're also looking for an extra sense of accountability - someone to kind of kick them in the butt when they need to get to the gym, and someone that's going to follow up with them and say, “Hey, did you get your workouts in? How are you feeling?” Those types of things. But the other thing that I see in my practice is women come to me because they are wanting actual education within the holistic health industry, within just fitness in general. And they want someone to actually teach them the why's of what we're doing.

(07:26):

Most trainers go through the very generalized certification, which is still a certification. There's something to be said about that, but the certification is very general and most trainers just keep it very surface level. And for me, in my practice, I like to focus on stress management and blood sugar regulation, your mindset and your relationship with yourself; your gut, gut function, hormone function, and then strength training as well, because muscle mass is really important for overall health and wellness. And so yeah, most women come to me and they're wanting to create long-term sustainable habits. They're sick of all of the diets and having them not work, or they work and then they get off of them and then they're back to where they started. They're looking for long-term solutions. And my goal is that by the time someone is finished working with me, they have the education, the tools, the resources, and the drive to be able to continue working on their own health without necessarily having me holding their hand through the process.

Christin Gutierrez (08:37):

I think that's amazing because a lot of trainers and coaches kind of build it into their program so that you need them forever.

Jessie Lockhart  (08:46):

Yeah, it's just a monthly thing. They don't really provide any education. All they're really doing for you is the workouts, the fitness apps, and stuff like that. So there's very little education. I like to say that my coaching practice is really rooted in education. People who work with me are not just going to get macro goals or meal ideas or workout programs. You're going to get tools, education and resources to be able to actually change your life on your own.

Christin Gutierrez (09:22):

That's so important! So important, and I love that about you, that you have actually made education your platform. Amazing. So what are a few of the things that our listeners could do to make their health a priority?

Jessie Lockhart  (09:40):

I think it all starts with an awareness, and this is something that I tell my clients as well. If you're not aware of a problem, or aware of what's going on inside of your body, you have no motivation to change. And so, honestly, just becoming more aware, taking time to slow down and do those internal check-ins with yourself is critical. For me, the awareness started in 2020 when I realized I was dealing with the same symptoms all the time. I had headaches, I was having gut problems. I started to develop cystic acne and some eczema spots, and things like that. And becoming aware of those problems then altered me and motivated me to change and to seek out further testing to figure out and get to the root problem concerning why the symptoms were happening. And so the first thing I would recommend is just become more aware of what's going on inside of your body.

(10:43):

How are you feeling today? Did you notice that you had a headache 3 out of the 7 days, 4 out of the 7 days of the week? Notice how you feel after eating, after your meals? Do you feel good, super full and bloated? Do you feel pretty good and energized? How are you feeling a couple hours afterwards? Just really tuning into that awareness because your body is always talking to you. It's always trying to communicate to you through symptoms and how you feel. And if we're not listening, then we end up with catastrophic problems and then we're forced to make those corrections and things like that, just like you were saying. So yeah, that's the first thing. The second thing I like to tell people is, and most people find this silly coming from a personal trainer, but I truly believe there are hundreds of different things that you can do to improve your health before you ever step into a gym. I think walking for example, is completely underrated!

Christin Gutierrez (11:52):

It really is.

Jessie Lockhart  (11:56):

It is. Again, I am all for strength training and I am all for muscle growth and all of that stuff, but if that is difficult for you, start by walking and build your way up to a gym workout or something. 

Christin Gutierrez (12:12):

That’s where I had to start, and I could only walk barely to the end of my cul-de-sac and back. But I increased each day and worked my way up to where I was walking for 90 minutes before I even stepped foot into a gym. 

Jessie Lockhart  (12:28):

Yep, a hundred percent. And so walking properly, hydrating - we hear it all the time, but we hear it all the time because it's true. We need to be hydrated. Hydrated, and then focusing on whole nutrient dense foods and cutting out as much processed foods and as much added sugar as you possibly can. Sugar is in absolutely almost everything in the grocery store. It's ridiculous. It's in ketchup, it's in soft drinks and cereals by the pound. Insane. And that much sugar is not necessary. We actually don't need sugar to  live because our body can produce it on its own. So also just paying attention to your ingredients lists are things you can start doing - reading your ingredients.

Christin Gutierrez (13:20):

If we can’t  pronounce the names in the ingredients,  if you're looking at it and there's like 30 or 40 ingredients and half of them you can't even pronounce and you don't know what they are. It's just not for you. Keeping it to just a couple of ingredients is the best, right?

Jessie Lockhart  (13:41):

Yep, a hundred percent. The shorter the ingredients list, the better. The more organic options, the better, because we are also being exposed to a ton of different environmental toxins on a daily basis through pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, our cleaning products inside of our house, our beauty products that we're putting on our skin, things like that. So like I said, there are hundreds of things that you can do before you ever step foot into a gym or cut calories or anything like that, that you can do to improve your health.

Christin Gutierrez (14:20):

Absolutely. I remember whenever I first started, I was bringing the daily dozen and the Clean 15 list with me to the grocery store so that I could check all the different organic fruits and vegetables against it to see which one needed to be organic or not. Now I just know them by memory, but yeah, absolutely. Organic is the way to go because conventional produce is so bad for you, and people really have no idea. Even whenever it says things like Non-GMO on it, still organic is so much better for you.

Jessie Lockhart  (14:56):

And that's the problem with the big food industry too, is that they've found ways to confuse consumers and make it very difficult for them to know exactly what's going on with their food products. And that's part of the whole education piece. I can't physically go to the grocery store with all of my clients, but I can educate them and arm them with those tools to look up the dirty Dozen, to look up the Clean 15 and the filthy 7. Absolutely. And be able to make those choices on their own. And then what they do with their bodies, what they do with those choices, what they buy at the grocery store is none of my business because they're informed and they're making those choices on their own. But yeah, absolutely. I am reading a book right now, it's called The Liver Cure, and there was an entire chapter on herbicides, fungicides, pesticides, and the impact that they have on our health and our liver specifically. So scary. And it is very scary, very frightening. And again, it starts with the awareness that starts with that education and then being able to just make decisions and move forward from there.

Christin Gutierrez (16:12):

Yeah, absolutely. I love that. So if you could go back in your story, is there anything that you would do differently?

Jessie Lockhart  (16:21):

Yes. Actually, not long ago I recorded a podcast episode of my own, on my own show, about what I wish I would have done. So some of the things that I feel like I did was I went immediately to a naturopathic doctor for functional medicine testing. I got my hormones tested, my thyroid tested, and food sensitivity testing. So I didn't go into the conventional medicine industry at all. I wasn't passed around with them saying, “your labs are great”, even though I felt like garbage. And I feel very grateful for that because I know so many women who went through that exact experience. So I went straight to a naturopathic doctor, got that testing done. What I wish I would've done after meeting with a naturopathic doctor is hired a coach of some sort, whether it was a nutritionist or someone similar to me, like a holistic fitness coach, just someone to help break the new protocol from my naturopath into more bite size, easier to implement type of steps because, and I'm sure you can attest to this as well, you get dumped with this information. So it’s like, you have information and you have this laundry list of food sensitivities and things like that, and it's overwhelming too, that kind of information.

(17:49):

I had to go gluten and dairy free, which I had never done before in my life - I was a big dairy person, big gluten person… and I had to cut those out of my life, and it was very difficult, and I struggled with it a lot.

Christin Gutierrez (18:05):

Yeah, it's difficult to find good recipes. It's when you're just thrown into it and then you start and you're eating stuff that tastes like cardboard and you're like this, this supposed to make me feel better because I'm not happy about it.

Jessie Lockhart  (18:20):

<laughs> yeah, exactly. And so for me, one of the things that I really wish I would have done is have found a coach or a nutritionist or someone that could have parceled up this new protocol that I was supposed to follow and created more structure surrounding it. And so through my own journey, of course, I saw that missing. And that's what I want to be to people, is helping them make those small changes on a daily basis. I'm trying to remember what else I would've done differently. I wish I also would've prioritized more walking actually at the time because I was lifting and strength training on a pretty regular and consistent basis. But I wish I would have incorporated walking more because I believe in the movement. Our body needs the movement, even if maybe not necessarily every single day, but maybe on the days that I didn't go to the gym, just keep up some type of movement through walking because it is so good for our bodies. We're out outside in the sun, moving our bodies, sweating, so we're  detoxing. So there's just so many things about it that are so good for us.

Christin Gutierrez (19:44):

And the reason why, other than those reasons, I love walking too, is because I habit stack my walking time. I listen to audiobooks or trainings and things like that while I'm walking, so I'm doubling up on the benefits of that exercise.

Jessie Lockhart  (20:05):

Yeah, a hundred percent. It's a great time to kind of double whammy, knock out two birds, one stone: you're walking, you're catching up on your podcasts, catching up on your audio books, and it becomes a really educational and fun time for yourself. Yeah.

Christin Gutierrez (20:24):

Yeah, it's amazing. So what advice would you give to someone who's thinking about starting out and becoming a coach right now, but they're just maybe a little nervous about taking that next step?

Jessie Lockhart  (20:37):

One thing that's carried me through my coaching journey for the last almost year now is you don't have to know everything in order to help somebody. I think sometimes we get really caught up in feeling like we have to have all the answers, or we need to know all of everything, or I need to be able to treat this, or help someone like this or whatever, or, oh, I don't know enough about this. And I still get caught up in it too because there's so much information out there that I could learn and could be taking in. But at the same time, yeah, I have to run my business. So to someone who's wanting to become a coach or is right on the threshold of taking that step forward, I would say take messy action, move forward. You only need to be really a couple of steps ahead of someone to be able to turn around and help them. And there's always going to be room for improvement, whether you've been coaching someone for 1 year, or ten years, there's always going to be things that you can improve on. And so don't let that stop you from moving forward because people need your help, and they need your story, and your guidance to help their lives become better.

Christin Gutierrez (21:58):

Beautiful. Yes, I love that advice for them. So what is your greatest tip, technique, or strategy for achieving success?

Jessie Lockhart  (22:09):

Consistency. Day in, day out. And recognizing and acknowledging that consistency looks different every single day. I like to use a graphic of two lines of circles. So on the top line, all of the circles are filled in, and this is what consistency looks like, but also on the second line underneath it, you still have all of the same amount of circles, but they're all filled in at different levels. Some days are filled in all the way, some days are filled in halfway. Some days are barely filled in, but the thing is there's something every single day. So showing up 1%, becoming 1% better every single day, or just showing up at whatever level you possibly can. For me, relating it to the gym, I don't have great workouts every single time I go to the gym. I have great workouts, I have mediocre workouts, and then I have workouts that are just like, oh my gosh, is this over yet - 

Christin Gutierrez (23:20):

And I don't don't want to go to the gym, but I'll go - 

Jessie Lockhart  (23:22):

Exactly. Like, I'd rather not be here. There's other things I'd rather be doing. But it's still the showing up and maintaining that consistency and knowing that it's going to look different every single day. And I think that's where a lot of people fail is they assume that in life, in business, in the gym - whatever it is - they think every day is going to be that exact same thing, but when you can just acknowledge every day is going to look differently, but I'm going to show up anyway. I think that's where you can really start to make some significant progress towards whatever success looks like for you.

Christin Gutierrez (24:01):

Yes. I love that, and I love that visual that you just gave us because that is so true. If you think that every day your circles have to be completely filled in, you're going to feel like a failure. And also if you realize that no matter how much they're filled in, as long as you're showing up every day and you're putting in some kind of effort, then you're making forward movement, you're making progress, and you should give yourself some grace because you showed up, and every day is not going to be a filled in circle day, and that's okay because there's always tomorrow. I love that.

Jessie Lockhart  (24:38):

Yep. You're exactly right.

Christin Gutierrez (24:41):

Well, I really appreciate you coming on the show and taking this time to talk with me. Before you go, I have one last question that I would like to ask you.

Jessie Lockhart  (24:49):

Yeah, of course.

Christin Gutierrez (24:50):

Would you rather learn a new skill or would you rather dive deeper into one that you already have?

Jessie Lockhart  (25:00):

That's a good question. I honestly would probably have to say I would rather learn a new skill. I love learning new things, constantly, and I feel like it's just embedded in my personality to try different things and to learn different things. And only after I've given whatever I was into previously a nice college try without quitting or feeling like I gave up or something like that. But I would probably rather learn a new skill.

Christin Gutierrez (25:39):

Awesome. Yeah, I'm a lifelong learner too, and I love learning new things, so that resonates with me as well.

Christin Gutierrez (26:03):

You've been listening to Model the Master Podcast, brought to you by Increpreneur. If you found value, please remember to subscribe and leave us a review and until next time. Remember, to take the next step.