For every newly married brand new mommy who left her underpaying full-time job to raise her newborn child that feels totally exhausted, out of balance, unsupported and withdrawn as she has placed herself on the back-burner placing her family's needs and wants ahead of her own this journey goes out to you!
Who is Amanda Shivers?
My name is Amanda Shivers and I am a recovering perfectionist, new wife, and new mother to a booming bundle of joy who turned my life around from lost to focused on a path where I decided to create my life by design. I love fashion, design, and feeling and looking amazing.Beautiful, I get it. You're driven. You're a high achiever but you're also extremely tired and you don't look and feel your best. How do I know? Because I was that person. Always drained with more to do than energy to spare. And I gained a lot of weight as a result of it. Don't you feel its time you feel and look as amazing as you push to do for everyone else?
I promise to help you get into better physical, emotional, and mental shape by offering nutritional and fitness coaching that works around your schedule and the much needed loving kick in the butt so that you can finally start living your life by design backed by the most sought after home-fitness workouts with a full and growing community of mommies that have made the physical and mental transformations themselves,
My Journey Here
I was notorious for always putting myself on the back-burner and being a people pleaser - I was the go-to person that literally did everything that my former manager did without getting compensated for my expertise for a full year until I was forced to consider how much my newborn son would need me and how he would become the only person that should have my undivided attention the way I freely gave it away. It finally hit me; if I continued to let myself be taken advantage of, not properly recognized for my hard-work; if I didn't fight and stand up for what I want in life, what type of example would I be setting? In fact, if I continued to allow my energy to be drained for things that did not allow me to live out my purpose, what was the point?At eight and a half months pregnant and literally weeks till his blessed arrival, I was just shy of 50 work hours per week fumbling my way to pay the bills with a capped income. There was always more bills in my house to pay than there were checks. No matter how many hours I worked or level of expertise contributed I was paid the same. In my workplace I did not feel that I was truly respected or recognized always going above and beyond the task at hand. I was annoyed, frustrated, and quite frankly disgusted. When it was time for me to go on maternity leave, I was hesitantly given my 12 weeks off - completely unpaid. Every bit of control that I thought I had left was gone in that instant but I refused to give up. Ever feel like you're trying too hard in life to maintain control and realize that you cannot control everything?
I knew that my baby would require my undivided attention in his infancy, my undying love, and a role model for freedom. I did not want to carry that lesser lifestyle as the broke hotel worker as my legacy and quite honestly I could not think about going back to that lifestyle of not having enough or being able to do the things that truly mattered to me. So throughout my pregnancy I committed to get back to optimal health through simple clean eating and functional nutrition so that when I delivered there wouldn't be any reason why I couldn't perform at my best and do for my family as I had so deeply desired. I needed a solution.
So I started speaking to God about it. He told me that I needed to release control in order to have everything that I required and the abundance would reign in. Hmmm... I didn't understand it at the time but I decided that I had nothing to lose and everything to gain by following his lead.
So our landlord spontaneously decided that we couldn't live in our apartment any longer due to the fact that our baby was coming. This was literally 14 days before my son was to be coming home and we were running rampant to set everything up. Thankfully, I remembered the conversation that God and I had and He told me to be still. I silenced the voice of fear and stood. No fighting. No trying to control it all and gave into God. In tears, I told God that I wanted help.
Literally, the following day I got a call from my mother that she was coming over to see our place and in a matter of 7 days (YES 7 days) we were able to have a new apartment with everything that we needed for our son's arrival even though I now didn't have the "security" of my job anymore. God had come in and used my sorrow and turned it into joy.
After my delivery I was back at my pre-pregnancy weight of 180 pounds minus about 4 pounds. I still didn't have the income yet to do much but I remembered my conversation with God and He said that I was to release control to Him. I felt rather peaceful knowing that everything would work out for my good because I loved Him, I loved my son, I loved my husband, and I loved myself.
And then God showed me a vision of how He would use me to become a vessel for His kingdom in this current time. I started to look for opportunities and behold my commitment to Beachbody was born. I knew that God could take my uncertainty, doubt, and fear and turn it into something amazing. I saw more positive things unfold in my life day by day. The day that I committed to Beachbody was the day that I decided that God could continue steering as the captain of my ship in everything.
So right now you are catching me at the beginning of my commitment and I am preparing myself for 90 days of P90X. As a new mom, my body is healing from my natural birth (no Epidural) and there are still tons of learning and changes happening each and every day.
This blog is designed to take you on the journey of being a complete control-freak, broken, and perhaps lost beyond measure individual to show you how to let go and let your life start to play out the way that God intended for it.
