Description:
Early on in LifeBalance, Cory Everson tells a story about a woman she knows. This woman, a personal trainer, works out like a fiend year-round. She always looks like she's ready to pose for the cover of a fitness magazine. Most days, she's so tired from her exercise program that she goes home and collapses. She has no energy for friends, lovers, family. No life--except on the Fourth of July, when she wears a stars-and-stripes bikini at a party and has all the men panting after her. All that work, to be the center of attention one day a year. Everson, a former bodybuilding champion (back in the era when female bodybuilders still looked like women), is regarded as one of the genuinely nice people in the fitness world, where relentless self-promotion and rival deprecation are the standard business model. In LifeBalance she comes off as a trusted friend who understands obsessions--whether they be about work, workouts, boyfriends, or housekeeping--and knows they inevitably lead to burnout. And so this book is chock-full of advice to women for moderating extreme behaviors and beliefs; for finding some joy in fitness if you've previously considered it drudgery; for cutting back if you've been living in the gym; for shutting down the little voice in your head that tells you you can't do things. Everson punctuates these lessons with tales of her own negativity (believe it or not, as a kid, she hated her muscular, athletic legs, and other kids made fun of her almond-shaped eyes), some research on how people really end bad habits and begin new ones, and solid advice about exercise and nutrition. Of course, she also fills the book with pictures of herself and her perfect body, which may, for some readers, negate the message of balance. Fortunately, she's very open about the fact that this was the body she was born with and all she's done is work with what she already had. The message of LifeBalance is that all women can do the same. They won't all get the same body, but they can achieve the same satisfaction with life. --Lou Schuler
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