‘How hula hooping has taught me more than just a new skill’
It’s been 5 years since a plastic circle changed my life for the better. When I first began my hoop journey in 2013 I could never have foreseen the road it would take me on…
Back in 2013 I was working as a beauty therapist, had recently got married and had just become a mum for the second time. I was extremely body conscious at the time and my ‘mum tum’ would really get me down, especially in the summer months when I couldn’t disguise it under thick baggy jumpers. I was desperate to find a way to get rid of what I considered my ‘wobbly bits’. I joined a gym, attended personal training sessions and started running but I couldn’t get out of the mindset that I was still ‘ugly’ and that my mum tum was all that people noticed when talking to me. This was of course all in my head but it’s taken me 5 years to realize that fact.
I would trawl google for hours on ways to tone up the tummy after having children and one day I happened to stumble across a you tube video of somebody hula hooping and I was intrigued. I decided to purchase a hoop and within the first five minutes of rotating that hoop around my body I was hooked. I loved the way that it empowered me when I was able to grasp a new move. I would hula hoop daily from that point and I loved searching for you tube videos on how to learn new tricks and moves.
Soon after I discovered the hula hoop I found my passion for my beauty career fading and I needed a new direction. The hula hoop had given me a new sense of purpose and I knew that I was destined to help others in some way. It was when I got chatting to my daughters teacher one day and she asked me to go into the school to offer a hoop workshop for the children that I found out where my path would take me.
The whole experience of teaching the children was exhilarating. Seeing the fun that they were having with the hoops was just wonderful. Their excitement for this exercise left me beaming from ear to ear. I soon qualified as a fitness instructor and began offering hoop classes to adults and children in my area. Hooping was and still is fairly niche so my classes filled quickly and the demand soon outweighed the supply. I found myself needing more teachers so wrote my own instructor training programme and took on a number of teachers to assist me in spreading the joy of hooping far and wide. I recently opened my companies very first hula hoop school and established our first children’s hula hoop troupe. I’m loving every moment of what I do and never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined being able to make a decent income out of my hobby. My story proves anything is really possible when it’s driven by passion.
So what has a plastic circle done for me other than create a new career and teach me a new skill? Well… I used to have zero confidence both physically and mentally but now I’m exuding confidence and I have found a brilliant life/work balance. I’ve never been into yoga and meditation but the hula hoop has taught me another way to practice meditation and mindfulness. The repetition and flow of the movements allow me to switch my mind off from everything and concentrate on being at one with myself. The hoop almost acts as a protective barrier between you and everything else so you really feel a sense of protection through it. The hoop is a circle and the circle is also a universal symbol with extensive meaning. It represents the notions of totality, wholeness, original perfection, the self, the infinite, eternity, timelessness, all cyclic movement, God or the universe (whichever you believe in) whose centre is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere. (Quoted by Hermes Trismegistus).
The plastic circle that is the hula hoop has given me a new lease of life and has opened my heart and mind to endless possibilities. It may not be a hula hoop that opens your heart and mind to all this life has to offer but I guarantee something will if you just follow your instinct and your passion.
