A few summers ago, my friend Anna and I were at a party, sitting at the bar, laughing and catching up the way you do. Two men nearby made small talk. Eventually one of them asked what I did for work. I told him I was a personal trainer. He looked me up and down — and I mean that literally — then said in a tone I recognized immediately, "You're... a personal trainer?"  And before I could respond, he reached over and poked me in the stomach. Not a joke between friends. A stranger . Assessing me. Deciding, in about four seconds, that my body didn't match his idea of what a personal trainer should look like and feeling completely entitled to say so physically. I laughed at him. Told him I wasn't in the habit of lying about a decade-long career. And that was the end of it. I had a great night. I didn't carry it home with me. But for two days afterward, I kept thinking — not about him, but about myself. About the distance I'd travelled to get to the place where a moment like that could roll off me and land in the garbage where it belonged. Because it wasn't always like that. What That Same Moment Would Have Done to Me 10 Years Earlier In 2008, a classmate told me I wasn't fit enough to be a personal trainer. We were talking about career paths. He said it casually, like it was obvious. In 2011, after my first employer posted an ad announcing I was taking on new clients, I received an email from a complete stranger. It said I'd probably get more clients if I lost weight. I want you to sit with that for a second. A stranger. Took the time. To email me. To tell me my body was the problem. I was 21 years old. There were incidents between those two moments, and incidents after them, right up to the party that summer. Comments from people who had decided, based entirely on how I looked, what I was worth and what I was capable of. And for a long time, I let them decide. I hid. I questioned myself. I made myself smaller in rooms where I should have been confident. I carried other people's opinions of my body around like they were facts — like they belonged to me. They didn't. They never did. What This Has to Do With You I'm telling you this because I know I'm not alone in it. I have worked with hundreds of people in Edmonton over 15 years — the majority of them women and almost every single one of them has walked through my door carrying a version of this same weight. Not always from a stranger at a bar. Sometimes from a doctor who said something dismissive. A parent who made a comment at the dinner table thirty years ago that never quite left. A partner. A friend. A magazine. A mirror moment that went sideways and stayed with them for decades. The specific source varies. The damage it does is remarkably consistent. It shows up as apologizing for your body before a session even starts. As prefacing every conversation about your health with "I know, I know, I've let myself go."   As believing, somewhere underneath everything, that you don't deserve to take up space in a gym — that fitness is for a different kind of person, a smaller person, a person who somehow already has it together. That belief is not yours. It was handed to you. And you are allowed to hand it back. The Work Nobody Talks About Here's what I've learned from both sides of this — as someone who did the personal work myself and as a coach who has watched clients do it in real time: The mindset work is not separate from the physical work. It is  the work. You can have the best program in the world. You can train three times a week, eat well, sleep enough. But if you spend every session quietly believing you don't belong there — that your body is a problem to be fixed rather than a vehicle to be strengthened, the results will always feel hollow. The most powerful shift I watch happen with my clients isn't when they hit a new personal best on a lift or lose the first ten pounds. It's when they stop apologizing for showing up. When they walk in and start the session instead of spending the first five minutes explaining why they haven't done enough, eaten well enough, been consistent enough. When they start measuring themselves by what they can do  — carry groceries, play with grandchildren, hike a trail, climb the stairs without thinking about it — rather than by what they look like doing it. That shift changes everything. And it doesn't happen overnight. I'm over fifteen years into my own version of it and I'm still working. But it's worth starting. I promise you it's worth starting. Your Body Is Yours Not your doctor's. Not your family's. Not the stranger at the bar who thought his opinion was a gift. Yours . It is not an invitation for commentary. It is not a before photo waiting to happen. It is not evidence of your failures or your lack of discipline or your inadequacy as a person. It is the thing carrying you through your life. And it deserves to be treated that way — by the people around you and by you. The comments you've absorbed over the years, the ones that still surface on hard days — those are not facts. They're other people's insecurities, projected outward. You don't have to keep them. You're allowed to decide what the narrative is from here. To the stranger at the bar — any other questions? [Book a free intro call with me →] Here [Download: 5 Things I Wish Every New Client Over 55 Knew Before We Started →] Here

The day is Monday and you have decided that this is going to be a fresh start to the week. Work went smoothly, you got home sooner than expected—traffic was slow and work was productive. You’re feeling comfortable and satisfied after a nice dinner. Most of your meals for the week have been prepped. Around 9pm you’re about to watch a few episodes of the latest Netflix addiction. Suddenly you’re standing in front of the pantry with your hand in a bag of chips living your best life.  The other scenario is it’s the middle of the week, the boss has handed you some extra files to go over, clients to call and meetings to book. You’re running behind, but looking physically calm. The metaphor you would use to describe yourself is a duck swimming—kicking its legs veraciously under water, while everything else is seemingly gracefully. You haven’t eaten much today but are meeting friends for dinner. You’re finding yourself barely reading the menu because it doesn’t matter what you eat, it just needs to be something. The two situations are very different, but involve a quick ‘need’ for food. The first scenario is the craving for the chips and the second is the need to eat because of hunger.  A craving and hunger are often misinterpreted for one another, so how do you decipher between the two? Hunger True hunger can often be associated with some slight discomfort—that grumbling gremlin in the pit of your stomach. This can show up when you haven’t eaten for a few hours or most of the day. You may even feel a bit of a headache or weakness. A big determinant of hunger is the feeling is not for one specific thing, but food/calories in general. True hunger also doesn’t pass with time.  Craving A craving usually shows up sporadically in the form of comfort foods like chocolate, ice cream or chips. Often these are circumstances like an emotion (positive or negative), being in a particular situation—like needing popcorn in the theatre. The need can occur after you have just eaten and can typically go away with time.  When you’re making lifestyle changes it’s often said that diet is the harder part of the change because food is associated with our comfort, copping mechanism and social supports. But confusing cravings for hunger is a huger deterrent for people reaching their health goals.  In the future if you’re finding yourself in a situation where you’re asking, “hunger vs. craving?” the easiest answer is:  If you are all of a sudden in the need for something random—even it’s persistent; it’s probably a craving . If the need for food in general comes on slowly and doesn’t disappear or increases in discomfort, it’s most likely hunger . Also, just asking yourself “when was the last time I ate?” is a quick decipher tool.

Three weeks into my diet, my most recent Google search was: "If there are no carbs in gin, where do the calories come from?" For the record — it's the alcohol itself. You're welcome. I decided early in the year to go on a structured diet and training plan. I had a trip coming up, I wanted a physical challenge and honestly, I'd been comfortable in my eating habits for long enough that comfortable had started to feel stagnant. I coach clients every week. I believed in what I was telling them. But I hadn't lived inside a structured plan myself in years — and I wanted to close that gap. What I didn't expect was how much it would teach me. Not about macros or meal timing. About people. Why a trainer who preaches moderation went back to tracking I'll be honest about something. Over the years I'd shifted away from rigid calorie counting toward a more flexible, mindfulness-based approach to eating. It works well for most people, most of the time. But I recognized that in doing so, I'd also drifted away from remembering what it actually feels like to make a significant nutrition change — the friction, the fatigue, the social awkwardness of it. Going back to tracking macros, managing protein and carb targets on training versus rest days, being deliberate about every meal — it was more uncomfortable than I'd expected. And I say that as someone who has been training consistently for over 15 years. That discomfort was the point. Because if I'm going to sit across from a client in their 40s, 50s or 60s who's overhauling the way they eat — often for the first time in decades, often after a health scare or a doctor's recommendation, I need to remember what that actually feels like from the inside. Not theoretically. In my body, on a Tuesday night when everyone else at the table is eating bread. The thing nobody warns you about: other people Here's what surprised me most and what I think is the most underrated struggle in any nutrition change. It wasn't the hunger. It wasn't the tracking. It was managing everyone else's reaction to the fact that I was doing it. Well-meaning friends and family said things like: "But you don't need to do that — you look great already."   Colleagues noticed I wasn't eating certain things and felt compelled to explain their own food choices to me, unprompted. Social situations that should have been simple became small negotiations. Do I explain my plan? Do I just eat something off-plan to avoid the conversation? Do I stay home? I've heard versions of this from clients for years. I understood it intellectually. But living it reminded me how relentless it is. For people in their 50s and 60s making real nutrition changes, often after decades of eating a certain way, often in households where their choices directly affect someone else's dinner plate, this social friction is a genuine obstacle. It doesn't come from malice. It comes from the fact that when you change, it holds a mirror up to the people around you. And not everyone is comfortable with that reflection. What I learned, or re-learned, is this: your health is not a group decision. You don't owe anyone an explanation for the choices you're making to take care of yourself. The most effective response to unsolicited opinions about what you're eating is usually no response at all. What actually matters when you're changing how you eat after 50 The nutrition principles themselves are not complicated. Adequate protein — more than most people think, especially as we age and muscle maintenance becomes harder. Reasonable consistency, not perfection. Flexibility built into the plan so that real life doesn't derail the whole thing. But the harder work is the mindset layer. Learning to separate your self-worth from what's on your plate. Recognizing that a difficult weekend doesn't erase a solid week. Understanding that the goal isn't to eat perfectly — it's to eat well enough, consistently enough, that your body and energy reflect the investment over time. That's what I coach. And going back through the experience myself — the tracking, the social pressure, the occasional gin-related Google search reminded me exactly why it's harder than it looks from the outside. If you're navigating changes and finding the human side of it harder than the food side, that's normal. That's actually the work. And it's something we can work through together. Book a free consultation at shanekokas.com/contact

I'll be honest about something from my younger years. I used to be meticulously regimented Monday through Thursday. Workouts done, meals tracked, everything under control. Then Friday arrived and the wheels came off completely. Late nights, whatever food was available at whatever hour, zero structure. By Sunday I was rebuilding from scratch. The worst part was that I genuinely believed I was practicing moderation . I told myself the weekdays compensated for the weekends. They didn't. My cousin put it plainly: "Shane is so regimented, but the moment he drinks, he'll eat anything and everything." She wasn't wrong. It took me longer than I'd like to admit to see what was actually happening. The strict weekday approach wasn't discipline — it was deprivation. For me it came that rebounded on Friday nights. For a lot of people I work with in Edmonton, it happens on Saturday afternoon. The weekend looks different after 50 — but the pattern is the same The version of weekend sabotage I see most often with clients in their 50s and 60s doesn't involve 2am food runs. It's quieter and more socially embedded than that. It's the Saturday dinner party where the week's careful eating gives way to three glasses of wine, appetizers, a full meal, and dessert — not because you lost control, but because you were so restricted all week that your body and brain were both ready to cash in. It's the Sunday brunch that stretches into the afternoon. The long weekend where the routine disappears entirely and doesn't quite come back until Wednesday. The grandchildren visiting and the house full of food you don't normally keep around. None of these situations are failures of character. They're predictable consequences of a weekly pattern that isn't actually sustainable. The research on this is consistent: people who maintain rigid restriction during the week and allow themselves complete freedom on weekends don't end up in a moderate middle. They end up in a cycle of compensation and rebound that keeps their body in a constant state of adjustment without ever settling into real progress. I've watched this pattern repeat in clients for 15 years. The solution is never more restriction. It's almost always less. Why strict weekdays create difficult weekends When you run a tight deficit Monday through Friday — eating very clean, eliminating foods you enjoy, treating every meal as a discipline exercise, you're drawing on willpower constantly. And willpower, as anyone who's made it to Friday evening after a full week of work and responsibilities knows, is not a renewable resource on demand. By the time the weekend arrives, the psychological and physiological pressure to eat more has been building all week. Your body wants energy. Your brain wants relief from restriction. The moment the structure loosens — a social event, a relaxed Saturday, a holiday, both take what they've been waiting for. This is not weakness. It's biology responding predictably to the conditions you've created. The three shifts that actually work Stop treating weekdays as a performance.   The goal isn't to eat perfectly from Monday to Friday. It's to eat in a way you could sustain indefinitely — including on days when life is full and unpredictable. If your weekday approach requires white-knuckling, it's too restrictive to hold. Ask yourself honestly: could I eat this way for the next five years? If the answer is no, the plan needs to change — not your willpower. Build your indulgences in deliberately.   The foods you enjoy most have more power over you when they're forbidden. When a burger or a glass of wine is a planned, guilt-free part of your week rather than a banned substance you're resisting, it loses the psychological charge that makes it feel like a rebellion when you finally have it. This is the real moderation — not restriction with occasional lapses, but a framework flexible enough to include what you actually enjoy. I eat burgers. I have wine. I enjoy dessert on occasions that matter to me. None of it derails my training because none of it is a special event. Distinguish between a relaxed weekend and an abandoned one.   There's a meaningful difference between enjoying yourself socially and treating the weekend as a 48-hour write-off. One is healthy flexibility. The other is the rebound from a week that was too tight. A useful question on a Saturday morning: am I eating this because I want it, or because I've been waiting all week to stop holding back? The answer tells you a lot about whether your weekday approach is actually working. What I tell clients when this pattern comes up The goal is a week.... all seven days, that feels sustainable. Not a five-day performance followed by a two-day recovery. When Monday through Friday is liveable enough that the weekend doesn't feel like a release valve, the cycle stops on its own. That shift is simpler in concept than it is in practice, especially when you've been running the same pattern for years. But it's the change that makes every other change stick. If your weekends keep undoing your weeks and you're not sure why, that's exactly the kind of thing worth working through properly. Book a free consultation at shanekokas.com/contact

This is a very common concern I get from clients and the general public. Depending on who you are, you’re probably more particular to one over the other. For myself, I prefer weights to cardio. When I was just beginning to enter the gym I preferred cardio. Mainly because I did not have the self-efficacy to confidently walk into the weight room. But which comes first? Is one more important than the other? Let me just get this stated off the bat: they are very different, but both serve their purpose. Strength and cardiovascular endurance are on opposite ends of the training spectrum. It can be a challenge to improve both at the same time. However, we aren’t here because we want to be an award winning Olympic athlete. We are here because we just want to not feel so winded going for a casual run or walking up stairs, but also showcasing a little more muscle tone. So, what can we do to solve this? Do both. I know, I know. “Not helpful, Shane.” Stay with me. Alex Hutchinson, Ph.D. states a study from Derek Hansen, a head coach for strength and conditioning in Vancouver, BC where he used both training aspects for training his basketball players where they saw a benefit in both training aspects. However, Derek places an emphasis on weight training because strength is their main priority. Alex describes how researchers are able to measure which proteins are created in muscles after different forms of exercise. Both are important, but what comes first? There is no right or wrong here. The way I generally program for my clients (and myself) is I place the cardio portions at the end of the workout.  I start out with the weights because most of my clients come to me with a goal that needs some form of strength training. I design weights to be first because this is when we are feeling the freshest and can use all that focus and energy into proper form into the lifts that require more attention. But also, it depends on your goal. Alex Hutchinson describes a “switch” that happens at the beginning of a workout that determines if “better endurance” or “more muscle” will be created. Unfortunately, this cannot occur at the same time. So, if you’re goal is to increase strength, build muscle or tone your weights should come before cardio. If you’re goal is to improve cardio endurance, then your entire cardio workout should come before the weights. If you want to improve both, change it up from day to day or incorporate resistance training circuits that give you that “cardio feel”.

I was at my aunt's place on a Sunday when she put a plate of freshly baked rice crispy squares on the table. I'm not a rice crispy square person. Burgers, yes. A gin soda, absolutely. But rice crispy squares have never been my thing. Still, I grabbed one. It was fine. And then I caught myself reaching for a second — and in that moment, I heard my own voice in my head: "Moderation. It's okay." I put it back. Not because one more square would have derailed anything. But because I recognized what I was doing. I was using moderation as a scapegoat. I didn't even particularly want the second one. I just wanted permission. And I was using a legitimate nutritional philosophy to give it to myself. That moment stuck with me because I hear the same thing from clients in Edmonton every week, just with higher stakes. The problem with how we use "moderation" Moderation is genuinely good advice. I coach it. I believe in it. For most people, a flexible approach to eating, one without rigid restriction or obsessive tracking is more sustainable than any structured diet plan over the long term. But somewhere along the way, moderation became a hall pass. I'll have the dessert — moderation . A second glass of wine — moderation . The fries instead of the salad, again — moderation . And individually, none of those choices are a problem. The problem is when moderation becomes the answer to every food decision, every day, without any real awareness of what's actually happening. For people in their 50s and 60s, this matters more than it did at 25. If you're managing blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol or trying to maintain muscle mass as your metabolism shifts, and most people at this stage are navigating at least one of those things, the cumulative effect of daily "moderation" decisions adds up faster than it used to. The body is less forgiving. The margins are smaller. And the advice you got in your 40s may not be serving you as well as you think. This isn't about restriction. It's about awareness. The framework I actually use: negotiable vs. non-negotiable Here's what works better than a vague commitment to moderation and what I walk clients through when we talk about nutrition. Decide in advance what your non-negotiables are. These are the foods or experiences that genuinely matter to you. The meal at your favourite restaurant. The glass of wine on a Friday evening. Your aunt's baking on a Sunday. These are worth having fully and without guilt, because they're chosen deliberately and they add real quality to your life. Then identify the negotiables — the things you eat not because you love them or they bring you joy, but out of habit, convenience, or the vague permission of "moderation." The second square you didn't really want. The side of fries you ordered automatically. These are the places where awareness actually changes behaviour without requiring willpower or restriction. I'll give you a practical example: I wanted a burger one evening but didn't want everything that came with it. So I had the burger — the non-negotiable — and swapped the fries for a bowl of black beans. Still sat at the table, still enjoyed the meal, still participated in the social experience. I just made a conscious swap on the part I wasn't attached to. That's what real moderation looks like. Not permission for everything. Intentional choices about what actually matters to you. What this looks like in practice after 50 The clients I work with in Edmonton who make the most consistent progress with their nutrition aren't the ones following the strictest plans. They're the ones who've gotten clear on their non-negotiables and stopped spending energy managing everything else. They know what they're not willing to give up and they protect those things. Everything else becomes a lot easier to navigate once you've drawn that line honestly. If you've been told to "eat better" but nobody has ever helped you figure out what that means for your actual life — your schedule, your health history, your relationship with food, that's the conversation worth having. Nutrition doesn't have to be complicated. But it does have to be honest. If you're ready to work through it properly, I'd like to help. Book a free consultation at shanekokas.com/contact

A few years into my career as a personal trainer, I walked into a public gym for the first time in a long while. I'd been working out of a small private studio since 2011. Quiet, controlled, no crowds. I knew every piece of equipment, every corner of the space. Walking into a large commercial gym that day, I was not prepared for what happened next. "Everyone here is incredibly fit." "There are people everywhere." "I don't belong here." Those were my actual thoughts. Mine. A personal trainer with years of experience, standing frozen in the middle of a gym floor, suddenly feeling like the kid who got picked last in gym class. I share that not to be self-deprecating, but because I want you to understand something clearly: Gym anxiety doesn't care about your credentials, your age or how many times you've done this before. It shows up uninvited. And if it can show up for me, it can show up for anyone — including the people around you who look like they have it all figured out. What gym anxiety actually feels like after 50 For most of the clients I work with in Edmonton, people in their 50s, 60s and 70s — gym anxiety isn't about vanity. It's not "will people think I look fit enough?" It's quieter and more serious than that. It sounds like: "What if I do something wrong and hurt myself?"   Or: "Everyone else seems to know exactly what they're doing and I have no idea where to start."   Or the one I hear most often, usually said quietly at the end of a first consultation: "I'm worried it's too late for me to be here." That last one is worth addressing directly. It is not too late. I have worked with clients who started strength training in their late 60s and early 70s and built real, functional strength that changed their daily lives. The gym is not a place reserved for people who were already fit when they arrived. It is, or should be, a place for exactly the kind of work you're considering right now. But knowing that doesn't always make walking through the door easier. So here's what does: 1. Name what you're feeling before you walk in. This sounds simple. It works. Before you enter the building, acknowledge the anxiety out loud or in your head. Not to fix it — just to name it. "I feel nervous. That's okay." The act of naming it separates you from the feeling slightly. You become the person observing the nervousness rather than being consumed by it. That small shift in perspective is often enough to take the next step. I did this standing in that gym parking lot. It didn't make the anxiety disappear. It made it manageable enough to walk in anyway. 2. Have a plan before you arrive. A significant portion of gym anxiety comes from not knowing what to do once you're inside. You walk in, you look around at the equipment and the uncertainty of where to start makes the whole environment feel overwhelming. The fix is simple: know your first three exercises before you arrive. Not your whole workout. Just the first three. When you walk in with a specific destination — that machine, that area, that movement — the gym stops being an intimidating unknown and becomes a place where you have a job to do. This is one of the most practical reasons to work with a trainer when you're starting out or returning after a long break. Not because you can't figure it out eventually, but because having a clear plan from day one removes the biggest source of anxiety before it has a chance to take hold. 3. Narrow your focus to what's directly in front of you. Once you're inside and moving, the comparison trap opens up fast. Someone younger, lifting heavier. Someone who moves more fluidly. Someone who clearly has been doing this for years. Here's the thing about that: you have no idea what that person's story is. You don't know what they went through to get here, what they're recovering from, or what their first session looked like. What you do know is why you're here and what you're working on. That's the only information that's relevant to your workout. Bring your attention back to your own body. How does the movement feel? Are you breathing? Is your form solid? Those are the questions that matter. Everything else is just noise. 4. Lower the bar for the first session — deliberately. Not because you're not capable. Because finishing feels better than quitting and quitting is what happens when the first session is too hard, too long, or too far outside your comfort zone. Your first session back does not need to be impressive. It needs to be done. A 30-minute workout you complete and walk away from feeling capable is worth ten times more than an ambitious session that leaves you sore, depleted and dreading the next one. I tell every new client the same thing: the goal today is to leave wanting to come back. That's it. Everything else is secondary. The anxiety doesn't fully disappear. But it does get smaller. Every client I've worked with in Edmonton who pushed through that first session or that first month has told me the same thing eventually. The gym stopped feeling like someone else's territory. It started feeling like theirs. That shift doesn't happen because the anxiety vanishes. It happens because you show up enough times that the unfamiliar becomes familiar and familiar stops feeling threatening. You don't have to feel ready to start. You just have to start. If you want someone in your corner for that first step, someone who will meet you exactly where you are and build from there, that's what I do. Book a free consultation at shanekokas.com/contact

A guide for anyone over 55 who's walked through those doors and wondered if they belonged. Walking into a gym when you're not sure what you're doing is one of the most uncomfortable feelings there is. I know — because I've been there. I was the kid picked last in gym class. The one who tried to blend into the back row. The one who, even as an adult, felt that familiar tightening in my chest every time I walked into a room full of people who looked like they knew exactly what they were doing. That feeling doesn't just disappear because you're older. In fact, for a lot of people I work with — men and women in their 50s, 60s, and 70s — that feeling gets louder. Add in a joint that's been rebuilt, a doctor's note with conditions or 10 years off the gym floor, and suddenly walking through those doors takes real courage. So if that's you — this is for you. Here are 5 things that actually help: 1. Walk in with a plan — not a hope. The most anxious people in any gym are the ones wandering. When you don't know what you're doing next, every glance from a stranger feels like judgment. The fix isn't confidence. It's preparation. Know exactly what you're doing before you arrive. Every exercise. Every set. Every rest period. When your brain has a clear instruction to follow, it doesn't have room to spiral. That's one of the first things I do with every client: build a plan so clear that the gym stops feeling like unfamiliar territory and starts feeling like their  territory. Not sure where to start? Download my free guide — 5 Things I Wish Every New Client Over 55 Knew Before We Started. 2. Bring a person, not just a workout partner. There's a difference between someone who holds you accountable and someone who actually makes showing up feel worth it. For my clients who train as couples or in small groups, the shift is immediate. When someone you trust is beside you, the room gets smaller and the intimidation fades. You're not performing for strangers anymore — you're just working alongside someone who's on the same journey. You don't need a gym full of allies. You need one good one. 3. Understand what the anxiety is actually telling you. Most gym anxiety isn't really about the gym. It's about being seen struggling. About not looking competent. About the fear that your body won't do what you're asking it to do — and that someone will notice. That's not weakness. That's human. And it's especially real for people who haven't trained in years, or who are managing health conditions, or who spent most of their life being told fitness "wasn't for them." Here's what I've learned in 15 years and over 13,000 sessions: that anxiety is almost always about a lack of familiarity — not a lack of ability. The gym feels foreign. Not forever. Just right now. 4. Let the reps do the convincing. Nobody walks into the gym on day one and feels at home. Nobody. Confidence doesn't show up before you start. It shows up because  you started — and kept going. Every session you complete is a deposit. And deposits compound. I've watched clients in their 60s deadlift for the first time. Watched them pull movements they swore their body "couldn't do anymore." The look on their face isn't surprise. It's recognition. Oh — I can do this. That moment doesn't come from a mindset shift. It comes from showing up enough times that the unfamiliar becomes familiar. 5. Choose the right environment from the start. This one matters more than people realize — and it's the one most often skipped. Not every gym is built for you. The big-box facilities with 200 strangers, loud music, and zero guidance aren't where most people in their 50s and 60s thrive. That environment is designed for a different person. You deserve a space where the trainer knows your name, knows your history, and builds every session around your  body — not a generic template. When the environment fits, the anxiety drops. Not because you changed — because the room finally did. The Bottom Line Gym anxiety is real, it's common and it doesn't mean you don't belong. It means you're doing something that matters to you — and that's worth pushing through. If you're over 55 and you're ready to build real strength in a space that's actually built for you, I'd love to connect. Book a free consultation → Or start here — download the free guide: 5 Things I Wish Every New Client Over 55 Knew Before We Started →

A few years back I went on a road trip and got a flat tire. So I popped the other three. Obviously I didn't. But when a client described their pattern of missing a couple of workouts and then stopping completely to "start fresh next week" or eating something unplanned at lunch and deciding the whole day was a write-off — that's exactly the analogy I reached for. One flat tire. Three slashed. It doesn't hold up logically when you say it out loud. But in the moment, when you're frustrated and tired and the plan has already been disrupted, it feels completely rational. I know because I used to do it myself. A few drinks at a party — might as well hit the snack table. Pizza for dinner — ice cream seems reasonable now. Miss Monday's workout — no point going Tuesday, I'll restart next week. I kept that pattern going until I recognized it for what it was: self-sabotage dressed up as logic. The real problem isn't falling off. It's the wagon itself. Here's what I've come to believe after 15 years of coaching people in Edmonton: the wagon is the problem. The moment you frame your health as something you're either "on" or "off" — fully committed or completely abandoned, you've built a system with zero tolerance for being human. And human beings are not consistent. Life isn't consistent. Work gets intense, families get demanding, sleep gets disrupted, seasons change, motivation fluctuates. None of that is failure. It's just life. The "wagon" mentality treats any deviation from the plan as a fall — which means the only available response to imperfection is to climb back on. And climbing back on requires a fresh start. And fresh starts require a Monday, or a new month or January. So you wait. And while you wait, you might as well, you know the rest. For people in their 50s and 60s, this pattern often has decades of history behind it. You've been on and off more times than you can count. Every restart feels heavier than the last because the gap between where you are and where you want to be has been accumulating for years. The wagon isn't just frustrating anymore — it's exhausting. The fix isn't more discipline. It's a different framework entirely. Change the expectation before you change the behaviour. The expectation most people carry into a health or fitness plan is perfectionism — that if they follow the plan correctly, every day will be a good day. When a bad day arrives, it doesn't fit the model, so the model gets abandoned. Replace that expectation with this one: Your best effort will look different every single day and that's acceptable. There was a week I couldn't get to the gym. Every session I'd planned fell through — work, a family situation, a day where I just didn't have it in me. So I went for a 30-minute walk. Not what I planned. Not intense. But it was the best I had that day, and I did it. That walk didn't set me back. It kept the thread alive. And keeping the thread alive — even when it's thin — is the entire game. A missed workout is one flat tire. It doesn't require you to slash the other three. You change the flat and you keep driving. Stop trying to eliminate your favourite foods. The other version of wagon thinking shows up in nutrition and it sounds like this: "I'm cutting out all sugar, all processed food, all alcohol — starting Monday." Most people can white-knuckle that for a few weeks. But complete deprivation doesn't teach you how to live differently. It just delays the moment when the restriction becomes unsustainable and when it does, the rebound tends to be proportional to how hard the restriction was. I've never told a client to permanently eliminate the foods they love. I eat burgers. I have chocolate almonds. I enjoy a glass of wine. None of that derails my training because none of it is forbidden — which means none of it has the psychological power that forbidden things accumulate. The goal is not a life without your favourite foods. The goal is a life where your favourite foods are something you enjoy deliberately, not something that controls your choices because you've been denying yourself for weeks. When nothing is off-limits, bingeing loses its logic. There's nothing to binge toward. What consistency actually looks like The clients I've worked with in Edmonton who have built the most durable results — the ones still training years later, still feeling strong, still making progress are not the ones who were perfect. They're the ones who stopped treating imperfect weeks as failures. They missed sessions and came back the next day instead of the next Monday. They had a rough weekend and ate well on Sunday instead of waiting for a fresh start. They stopped measuring themselves against an ideal and started measuring themselves against their own previous week. That shift — from perfection to persistence, is the difference between people who keep starting over and people who simply keep going. You don't need to get back on the wagon. You need to stop believing the wagon is the only way to travel. If you're tired of the cycle and ready to build something that actually holds, that's the conversation I'd like to have. Book a free consultation at shanekokas.com/contact

I have been chatting to a lot of people recently about one topic: change. I am assuming this topic is showing up more and more because people are doing a lot of assessing and reassessing within their lives. Around this time of year it’s common to begin thinking about where you’re headed for the remainder the year or what you want and need to set out to achieve in the next. Fall is a time where change is prominent. You can look everywhere right now and see someone in transition. People are shifting from summer vacations back to their work routines. People are walking through the doors of a new school. I’ve chatted to people prepping for moves across the country. I’m working with clients who are creating new fitness goals. I’m also working with clients who are beginning to take their first steps towards their fitness goals.  I’ve heard discussions about people looking to expand their business, break into new markets or experiencing a shift in management. Heck, you can look outside to the leaves beginning to change color. Everyone has gone through a form of change before, so why do we struggle so much with it? We struggle with change because we can’t control it. Change carries a sense of uncertainty. “Uncertainty is an essential part of change. There is a natural process of dis-integration and re-integration that change provokes. Uncertainty should be seen as a natural state. It constitutes the starting point from which people can reorganize their self-structure and find a new view of life.” - Krista Scott Dixon Change creates discomfort. I’m not aware of anyone who actually enjoys to live in discomfort. (Side note: we often overlook the fact that this discomfort is only temporary). When experiencing change there are moments of struggle and resistance. When I start a new workout plan, diet plan, recipe or even a route to work, I like to remind myself: if it’s easy, it probably isn’t change. Change is inevitable. Growth is optional. Change is inevitable. We will all age, experience loss and gain. Whether the change is positive or negative, there will be moments of struggle. You have the option to resist the inevitable or to learn something new. This occurs whether you’re taking on a new job or signing up for a new exercise class. I remember signing up for a new fitness class at a studio I have never been before. It was hard, unfamiliar and at times, uncomfortable. Afterward, I met some great new friends and learned some new exercises and workout structures. I currently describe 2016 as one of the best but most challenging years to date. Coincidence? Probably not. This year I’ve changed by embracing vulnerability - putting myself out more in my blogs, interviews and social media postings. Even in my personal life, having the hard conversations with loved ones. I’ve purchased a home with my boyfriend and moved to another side of the city. A shift from renting to owning is definitely a change. Most recently, I’ve decided to resign from my personal training position after 5 years at a downtown studio. A difficult decision because I was dealing with a lot of uncertainty. I had a stable schedule, wonderful clients and got to spend a lot of time with some nice people. But I needed to listen to my gut. How did this happen? By changing something. Change isn’t an easy process, and with a lot of self-reflection, at this moment in my life, I am ready to dive into uncertainty. It’s a time to reorganize my goals and to step aside from the fear of the displeasing someone or waiting till perfection strikes. So, if you’ve been putting something off for too long, I challenge you to embrace the change. Stop waiting for the perfect moment to begin that new exercise program, join that gym, have that difficult conversation, ask that person on a date. The perfect moment will never actually arrive. Waiting for the perfect time actually keeps us from moving forward, at all. Friends, let’s set some new goals. Create an action plan, and go forth. Cheers to discomfort and uncertainty.

I had a great talk with a client who was doing a fantastic job on daily workouts and their nutrition. Everything was perfect. Until life dropped a couple bombs. They didn't workout in weeks and dove head first into piles of processed foods and sugars. All while feeling horrible, guilty, stressed and struggling to get through the weeks. What was our conclusion? It's done - you can't go back and do the workouts. You can't take back the poor nutrition choices. Forget that, its over. We're moving on. All we can do is get back to the way we were - with one minor change. We are going to stop trying to be perfect. Cut that crap out. You're not perfect, I'm not perfect, your neighbour is not perfect. Beyonce herself, is not perfect (craziness, right?). Life is not perfect. So lets stop trying to make our exercise and nutritional habits that way. We're setting ourselves up for failure. We need to set healthy lifestyle habits that work for us and our lifestyles. Ones that hold longevity in our lives. 80%, 100%  OF THE TIME. I like to follow the 80%, 100% of the time. Allow room in your life for those setbacks - they're going to happen. We all know they do. Life never goes as planned, but you can plan for when chaos strikes. I've learned many times that when a storm strikes - it can really strike, and then strike some more. But you know what? Just like every storm in nature, the storms that cause the life battles, will too, settle down. The sun doesn't shine everyday for us and it won't for our health regimes either. Moderation is key. Allow moderation in your life. I was first really introduced to this strategy by Jill Coleman. When we allow ourselves lenience in health regimes, we are less likely to dive into the dark places when stress hits. Eat the foods that make you feel amazing. Do workouts that make you feel strong. Allow the foods in every now and then that give you some enjoyment. Don't set yourself up for a roller coaster of “on/off the wagon” with a side of guilt. Guilt is a feeling, responsibility or remorse for some offence, crime or wrong, whether real or imagined.That sounds awful. So lets quit that. When you want to have a treat every now and then, don’t stress about it. Enjoy that little treat now and then. Ain’t nothing wrong with that. Guilt is a shitty feeling and just don't allow that into your way of thinking. You deserve better.

I was moving through a buffet line when a woman I'd never met stopped me. "I hope that isn't all you're taking?" She said it with the tone people use when they think they're being helpful. I half-laughed, told her it wasn't and kept moving. It was a ten-second exchange with a complete stranger. It should have meant nothing. And yet I was still turning it over in my mind three hours later. Not because it hurt. Not because I was angry. But because I recognized it immediately — that specific flavour of unsolicited commentary that gets dressed up as concern but lands as judgment. And I started thinking about how many people I work with who navigate some version of that every single week. Not at buffets with strangers. At dinner tables with people they love. The Commentary That Never Seems to Stop If you're in your 50s, 60s or 70s and you've made any kind of change to how you eat or exercise, you already know what I'm talking about. The adult child who raises an eyebrow at your plate. The friend who says "you're not eating that?"  or "you're really going to have seconds?"   The well-meaning partner who reads an article and decides your nutrition needs an overhaul. The sibling at Thanksgiving who makes a comment about your weight — disguised as a compliment or otherwise. Food commentary from people around us is relentless. And it's often the people closest to us who are the least filtered about it. After 15 years of working with people on their health, I can tell you with confidence: this is one of the most consistent sources of stress my clients deal with. Not the workouts. Not the nutrition itself. The opinions of the people around them about both. What's Actually Happening When Someone Comments on Your Plate Here's what I've come to understand — and what that buffet encounter helped me see more clearly. When someone comments on what you're eating, it almost never has anything to do with you. Think about what's required to look at another person's plate and feel compelled to say something. That's not concern. Genuine concern looks like a private conversation with someone you care about. What it actually is — almost every time — is projection. The woman at the buffet wasn't worried about me. She was in her own head about her own plate, and I walked past at the wrong moment. Her comment was her insecurity looking for somewhere to land. I just happened to be there. The same is usually true at the family dinner table. The comment about your food choices, your portion size, your new way of eating — it's rarely about you. It's about the person making it. Their own complicated relationship with food. Their discomfort with change. Their need to feel like they're doing things the right way. Understanding that doesn't make the comments disappear. But it does change how much power you hand them. Why This Hits Differently After 50 I want to be specific here because this isn't the same experience at every age. When you're in your 30s and someone comments on your food, it's annoying. When you're in your 60s and you've spent decades navigating other people's opinions about your body and your choices — and you're finally, finally making intentional decisions about your health on your own terms — those comments carry different weight. They can feel like a challenge to your autonomy. Like the people around you aren't fully on board with who you're becoming. Like the work you're doing is somehow threatening or inconvenient to them. That's a hard thing to sit with, especially when it's coming from people you love. What I tell my clients when this comes up — and it comes up often — is this: You do not need permission to take care of yourself. Not from your family. Not from your friends. Not from a stranger at a buffet. The decisions you make about what you eat, how you move and how you invest in your health belong entirely to you. The people who love you may need time to adjust to the version of you that's prioritizing herself. That's their work to do, not yours. Whose Business Is Your Plate? Yours. Full stop. What you eat serves your body, your health, your energy, your longevity. It has nothing to do with the person next to you, regardless of how invested they seem in having an opinion about it. This doesn't mean you need to be defensive or combative when the comments come. You don't have to justify your choices, explain your program, or get into a debate at the dinner table. A calm "I'm good, thanks"  and moving on is a complete sentence. What it means is that you get to decide — in advance, before the dinner, before the buffet, before the next comment lands — that other people's opinions of your plate are not your responsibility to manage. You can hear the comment, acknowledge it internally for what it is, and let it pass. That takes practice. It takes the kind of mindset work that runs alongside the physical work of getting stronger and healthier. But it's worth doing — because as long as other people's opinions have a seat at the table, your own choices will always feel like they need defending. They don't. The Person I Was Before I Understood This I'll be honest with you — a younger version of me would not have handled that buffet moment the same way. A few years earlier, a comment like that from a stranger would have followed me home. I would have smiled it off in the moment and then quietly turned it over for the rest of the evening. Questioned myself. Maybe even changed what I ate for the rest of the meal. The shift didn't happen overnight. It came from intentionally working on separating my choices from other people's comfort levels with those choices. Understanding that someone else's reaction to my plate is information about them — not a verdict on me. That work runs parallel to every physical goal I've ever had. And honestly, for a lot of people, it's the more important of the two. You're Allowed to Mind Your Own Plate Eat in a way that makes you feel strong, energized, and well. Make choices that serve your health and your goals. Enjoy the food that brings you joy without performing guilt about it afterward. And when someone decides to weigh in on any of that uninvited — at the buffet, at the dinner table, at the holiday gathering — remember: That's their plate to deal with. Not yours. [Book a free intro call with Shane →] Here [Download: 5 Things I Wish Every New Client Over 55 Knew Before We Started →] Here