The Dana Lee Project

The Dana Lee Project Food Freedom & Fitness Mentor for Women 40+ | Heal your relationship with food + your body by reconnecting with your SELF. Hello! I'm Dana Lee.

I have been a fit pro for over 25 years. For the first 18 of those years, I suffered from disordered eating and I hated my body no matter how lean I got, but had no one to turn to to understand why I couldn't figure it all out (I mean, people were looking to ME for dieting answers!) It wasn't until I decided to stop dieting once and for all (it was scary, I admit) and focus more on how my mental and emotional health was impacting my physical body, that I finally found relief and an easier way to live. I now coach women just like you through a 12-month process of healing while providing support, a safe space, a step-by-step framework, and a community of women all rallying for the same thing; to feel lighter in body, mind and spirit so they can get onto live the life they've always wanted for themselves.

I wanted to cancel the class a couple weeks ago, but that part of me that is a woman of my word decided to work around i...
12/22/2025

I wanted to cancel the class a couple weeks ago, but that part of me that is a woman of my word decided to work around it and keep it on the schedule anyway.

There were 2 ladies signed up and honestly, it’s such a valuable method for my clients to know, it is worth doing even if the class isn’t filled. I’m happy to do it and I love teaching it to anyone who is open to learning about connective tissue and fascia.

However, I knew I had a creative project I wanted to work on and was trying to figure out what pockets of time could be dedicated to working on it without feeling rushed and the Sunday morning I planned to offer this class would otherwise be ideal for it.

It happened to be the last Sunday right before Christmas Day, coinciding with the last day of Hanukkah, when we had plans to have dinner with the fam later that day. Eating brisket and latkes, attempting to learn how to play mahjon 🤪and ending the night with the dreidel game 🕎 and giving the girls their gifts 🎁🎁🎁

Back to Sunday morning before all that evening fun.

It’s time for class to start. I’m already at the studio, mats laid out, props set up. Fascianator rollers out, ready to go.

Then I read a text from one, not feeling well. Didn’t sleep great. Needed to rest.
Then the other… completely forgot! Which was not like her at all.

When these messages came through, I wasn’t even mad. Well for a moment I was, at MYSELF because I knew I should have cancelled ! But then quickly, just had to laugh.

I get what I wanted anyway?! …To be home and working on my project. ha!

I thought to myself, “well, wouldn’t ya know it. It would have been ok to take it off the schedule after all.”

I’m giving myself grace here.

Because as this stuff happens, I am getting better and better at listening to my gut with planning and booking out my calendar, taking my creative energy into account as one of my priorities going into this particular winter season.

Mandy and I are doing a planning session for 2026 early in January and we already decided rather than putting all the things on the calendar for The Dana Lee Project, we are going to list out all the fun ideas we have for the year, perhaps narrow them down for each quarter, but leave flexible wiggle-room to be more on the pulse of doing it as we are inspired. Which could result in scrapping ideas entirely or maybe putting them off til 2027 when all is said and done.

I’m so excited about this approach.

It’s not something I’ve done to this extent before. I’ve been dabbling with it, especially since I have spoken recently about energy management (feminine energy) vs time management (masculine energy).

It’s been proven to me time and time again- that an idea I have in January for the month of October doesn’t always hit the same once we get there. I’ve found myself doing things like that anyway, and it feels draining and awful.

What HAS worked?

The most successful things I have done in my life and business have come from last minute creative urges when I’m doing it because I’m fu***ng jazzed about it, not because my planning session says this is what we “should” be hosting for June’s Summer Solstice written on the calendar.

It could make logical sense, but then there are other things not as tangible that contribute to it not being the best thing for us to do.

It’ll be interesting how it pans out when I look back a year from now:
The year I planned for the basics, but left lots of room for magic. More than I ever have before. 💖

How much fun and success did I experience in 2026 because I listened to my instincts that wanted to do it, rather than being dictated by a pre-planned schedule to do it?

Can’t wait to share what happens!

Idk if it’s because we are closing out the year of the snake or what, but I’m drawing a hard line with letting go of a f...
12/21/2025

Idk if it’s because we are closing out the year of the snake or what, but I’m drawing a hard line with letting go of a few things that have been chipping away at my energy levels little by little over time.

I started my YouTube channel in 2012. Wow things were different then. In the social media space, but also who I was at the time in my own career.

I focused on publishing 1 workout a week all the way through 2014 when I finally started building a membership platform so I could receive income for my work.

Over the years, I learned more and more about who I am and what makes me tick. What works for me and what does not.

I also began to really respect the seasons and chapters of my life which lead me to officially adopting the mantra “It works until it doesn’t work.”

This has given me so much peace and freedom to move on from something that may have worked in the beginning, but doesn’t anymore. It gives me the permission to say to myself “It’s ok to let it go. It’s ok to move on.”

This was a really important step for me because looking back, I had a history of holding onto people, situations and relationships way longer than what was healthy for me for reasons I can get into in a future message. (Ways of eating and exercise are included here)

I use 2 questions to measure if something is working for me at the level required for me to thrive

“If I let this go, do I feel lighter and kind of excited of what could come in its place?”

…Or

“If I let this go, do I feel heavier and not quite sure if this is the best move yet?”

Another thing that can happen is another idea already presents itself that feels fun and better aligned with where I’m heading in life.

This also makes the decision much easier.

The beginning of December I started writing again and it’s been so easy and so fun. It just flows. It's not forced or out of obligation at all.

In fact, I've gotten so many messages back from women about their own thoughts, experiences and contemplations after reading what I share… it’s been such a gift to me! I love it so very much. It's for me AND for YOU.

I am writing on the pulse and in the moment. Real time of what I’m observing in life. It’s relevant. It’s real. It’s intuitive and more often than not, one of those messages tells me it’s something that someone out there needed to hear.

Mandy & I have had really fun conversations on my YouTube channel over this past year. It’s been hilarious at times, and serious or emotional during others.

That part is super cool.

What’s not working anymore is that the time we record can only happen at certain times in my schedule, regardless of my inspiration or my mood. That feels performative to me and I don’t like that part.

So I made a decision to close out the year by recording one last episode on my YT channel and sharing what brought me to this decision FULLY (at least for awhile until I have another wave of inspiration that might come to me in video format in the future.)

I have wanted to launch a podcast for a long time, so that might be coming to fruition in 2026… We shall see. 👀 or.. hear??? 😂

May this inspire you to close out 2025 with letting a few things go for you too. What feels lighter at just the THOUGHT of it?

2026 is bringing a lot of change, growth, and reflection for us.In this video, we share what’s new as we head into 2026. Mandy talks about the exciting growt...

please help me put something fun on our merch
12/19/2025

please help me put something fun on our merch

Drawing and creating on this rainy December morning is the coziest feeling. 🥰 I cherish these couple of quiet hours to m...
12/19/2025

Drawing and creating on this rainy December morning is the coziest feeling. 🥰 I cherish these couple of quiet hours to myself first thing because it carries with it the potential to remain with me for the rest of a very full day, tapping back into the peace if I should need it. 🎄

A few years back I started hosting a year-in-review / Intention setting workshop for my mentorship clients between Chris...
12/18/2025

A few years back I started hosting a year-in-review / Intention setting workshop for my mentorship clients between Christmas & New Year’s.

It has been one of our favorite things to do together as a community.

It’s my gift to them, and giving gifts like this - experiences and time together - make my heart so happy. 💓

I host this so that there is a blocked out time in our calendars to pause.
… Take a breath …
And truly reset.

We look back, reflect, take note of, learn from, celebrate, grieve, and acknowledge ourselves. What a gift to be able to do this.

Then, we decide and feel-into what we each want to create for ourselves in the upcoming year - with the support and encouragement of the MindFit collective which helps dreams and visions feel alive, full of energy and doable. Especially when the OG’s get to reading what they pictured for themselves the previous year. Wowsers! It’s so freakin inspiring.

Being that my other career was a graphic designer and I worked as a freelance illustrator for a bunch of years after college and before officially opening my gym, one of my own awakenings during the Covid era cane as a creative urge to break out my pencils and favorite black micron pens and start drawing again after almost 15 years of abandoning that part of myself.

It was one of the best things I’ve brought back into my life. It’s just joyful! and so very satisfying.

I got to a point rather quickly where I didn’t want to leave my doodles and drawings in my own sketchbook just for me.

I had an idea.

I decided to start creating pieces and sharing them as part of how my clients can better learn about themselves and reinforce the rewriting in the brain for healthier thinking using the old school pen-to-paper method that would reignite a fun, childlike approach to heavy topics like food dysfunction or body hate.

With this approach, so many answers and connections can be made, it’s pretty mindblowing.

I did a coloring book companion for The Roadmap to Food Freedom $47 mini-course. Literally drawing out a roadmap with stops along the way.

I have designed a theme to represent each of the 12 modules in my program so that my clients remember not to take themselves so seriously along the way.

And I do this every December ❤️💚 I draw out the little workbook for our end of year ritual together.

It’s so fun for me and I get so excited when I’m ready to email it out a day or so ahead so they can open it and see what the theme is. Then start coloring, doodling, pondering, reflecting and getting excited about what they get to create in the year ahead starting right then and there, and more completely when I take them through the steps in the actual workshop.

Never did I imagine that me, as a fitness professional or food freedom mentor would have the opportunity to bring her artsy creative side into this profession. But here I am! 🤷🏼‍♀️

And have found that letting myself play around and weave my drawing into my work has brought the next level of healing to both me AND my clients.

It’s rather incredible how seemingly unrelated things over a great enough period of time might be all part of life’s master plan after all.

Mentorship clients: mark your calendars for Sunday, December 28th 11am - details & zoom link to come xx

I made a connection about my work and it feels like a pretty big one.One of the reasons I love my work with women is tha...
12/17/2025

I made a connection about my work and it feels like a pretty big one.

One of the reasons I love my work with women is that I am not the one with the answers.

I am the one who is a CONDUIT for the answers.

This is such an empowering role to be in for both me and my client.

I have spent much of my life giving my power away.

Procrastinating on decision-making...

Hiring coaches to do the thinking FOR me then wondering why I’m left feeling so angry & resentful when results don’t happen like I wanted them to happen…

Saying things like “I don’t know.” When sometimes I did and was just too afraid to admit it. I didn’t think I could allow myself to know- as if a part of me was protecting myself from the answer. If I knew the answer, that would mean I’d have to do something about it and I was secretly scared to actually take the step to do something about it…. 🫣

I think this is one reason why so much can be accomplished so naturally in a single conversation with a client who is open to being mentored by me-

They know
that I know
these uncomfortable things
about the real & true process of change and transformation.

It involves one’s identity and identity shifts have such delicate nuance, layers and textures to them. It’s fu***ng hard and it can be scary at times.

I always have tissues on hand at my studio and encourage my clients on zoom to also have them near. I am at the ready to help release the tears.
It does not make me uncomfortable.
I am not afraid of heavy and difficult emotions pouring out of my clients.

I have done the work (am doing the work) to be what they need, as they need it without my own agenda.

I guess if I were to have an agenda - first off I wouldn’t use that word. That’s not accurate -

I would use the word INTENTION.

My intention for every single private or group session with my client is to meet them where they are at and lead them to answers based on what they hold inside of them and only as they are ready.

However fast or slow that is.

I’m also kinda like a speed governor to help regulate so they can tap into getting what they need most along the way.

All while knowing in their hearts and body that I hold intentions for their greatest good and personal power every step of the way.

Even when they take 2, 5 or seemingly 10 steps back for every 1 or 2 steps forward.

To me, ALL of it is forward. No matter what it’s a necessary step otherwise it wouldn’t be happening.

My work with clients isn’t about me.

But it is FOR me.

And, it comes THROUGH me.

I had such beautiful session with a client yesterday that I had to capture and share what I am learning about myself along the way too.

I don’t know what to call myself other than a women’s empowerment mentor. Yes, one’s relationship with food is part of the healing process, yet the work is profoundly deeper than that. It’s just so much more. 🥰

No doubt, I’ll figure it out at some point. Maybe with your help if you are reading this and are or were a mentorship client of mine- I’m open to suggestions if you want to comment below or send me a DM answering the question..
what am I to you?
If you could describe me to a friend, what do you say I do for you/with you?

It’s more than food and body image. Way more.

Come for the food, leave with a fulfilled a satisfied life.

In the meantime, I will say this for sure. I’m always learning myself. Always growing. Constantly evolving. And it’s so exciting to think the best is yet to come & actually fu***ng BELIEVE it.

Now to just figure out a title 🤔😂

I used to want to be perfect.Whatever I did and however I looked, did not measure up. It always seemed to fall short of ...
12/16/2025

I used to want to be perfect.

Whatever I did and however I looked, did not measure up.

It always seemed to fall short of the picture I had of myself - including the prom dress I had in my mind that didn’t exist, not even in Bergen county. (Ask my mom. She’ll tell you 😂 … love you maaaa 😘)

Now that I’m taking the time to give it proper thought at this stage of the game, it could very well have been that those ideas of perfection were merely visions or dreams of what could be possible for a version of me or my life in the future, just there to plant a seed or give me options and I just misinterpreted them as not being good enough. And my younger self chose to hold those idealistic thoughts as an extremely high standard to strive for and to live by. Like a code or something.

Maybe my thoughts of perfection were that creative part in me that knew there was so much in life yet for me to experience and even more within me that could become. It was a nudge from God.. to go for it! Go for better… learn more, become more, be more.

So in many ways, it pushed me to better myself.

… up until it didn’t.

If only I saw it as a dream of a potential future to be excited about, to expand my little mind to explore what could be possible, then it would not have pushed me to burn out and hate myself so much.

It would’ve pulled me forward with excitement and lots of energy because that’s what hopes and dreams have done for me in my life when I let them.

It’s not a push. It’s a pull.

Huge difference.

That time I was crying on my gym floor, ripped off my polar heart rate monitor and made a contract with myself to no longer abuse myself through dieting and over exercising, was also the time I had a pretty big awakening about perfectionism.

I realized it didn’t work the way I thought it did.

When I was able to get real honest with myself, it turned out to be a mechanism that I used to ultimately hold myself back fairly often and in ways that are difficult to admit. I would hide behind perfectionism.

If I couldn’t be perfect, why bother?

Still, I love that that was part of my story.

Perfectionism drove me to be quite ambitious through my 20’s & 30’s.

And yet, the reframing of perfection, freeing myself and my whole transformation from it / through it has been nothing short of spectacular. Life-giving in fact.

I still love certain things a certain way (like how the bed is made 😂 cuz my husband’s aesthetic is definitely different than mine) but it’s more because I appreciate the beauty about it, and because I have really gotten to know myself - What I like, what I prefer, what makes me smile inside, or warm my heart. And definitely what makes me laugh!

I love the opportunity to create those experiences in my life.

Because I now recognize the world in its breathtakingly beautiful uniqueness and individuality, I am able to see myself as forever flawed right along with it, and boy oh boy has that turned out to be an ongoing source of inspiration and freedom for me in the most incredible ways. 🥹

The most beautiful pieces of artwork are thought of as such because it’s the only one and uniquely thought up, designed, crafted and produced by one particular human that roamed the earth past or presently.

To think there is no other Dana Lee Chapman on the planet kinda blows my mind. (Maybe in name but not in human-ness)

And when I think of it that way, exactly what and who would be the standard to measure that up against?

It’s far more fun to think about how my own personal royal f**k ups have produced some really great stories, created quite the plot twist, and sometimes stupid-level laughter throughout my life.

Stories of perfection?

Yes, there are those too. I can recall perfect moments in my life that I will cherish forever.

But when I look closer, what made them perfect also included messiness and didn’t completely unfold as originally planned.

Lucky for me, as it’s turning out, that’s where the most gold can be mined.
Or platinum…

Like when Steve proposed the night we closed on our first home together, putting my engagement ring onto a key chain that held my copy of the key to our front door. The carpets were freshly shampooed so the only place we could sleep was on our mattress on the kitchen floor because we were determined to stay that first night in our house together. 🥰

Messy.
And yet, absolute PERFECTION in my mind. 🤍

I said yes before he even asked. And before that, I may or may not have looked at the ring (a family heirloom) and said, “are you s**ttin’ me?” 😂😂😂

ok yes. Yes, I actually did say that.

Out loud.

Then we hugged and kissed and lived happily ever after… losing that log cabin to foreclosure and rebuilding our lives in an apartment with a garage to keep our motorcycles in.

Millions have never been made from a movie where everyone was doll-like, with permanent smiles, all idealic and predictable. I mean even the Barbie movie didn’t have that story to tell. Cuz that s**t gets boring real fast and has been known to make a sharp right turn down Dystopian Lane because honestly and truly, it’s not very human-like at all. 🫣

I love that I feel like I’m in the middle of making my own epic movie every freakin day.

It’s funny and at times very challenging. There are tears and there are also belly laughs. There are hugs when a client is having a bad day… there are endless audios back & forth with my sister. There are white salt marks and footprints all through my dark brown studio hallway which means I have clients who commit to themselves even when it’s snowy & cold, slushy or raining. Who cares about the floor when I have THAT?! ❤️❤️❤️ I have been known to accidentally hit pause on my touchscreen interval timer during a livestream workout then immediately and firmly state MU********ER. (emphasis on the f**ker) 😂😂😂 as I figure out how to get us all back on track. Which I somehow do. 🤷🏼‍♀️

I always seem to get myself back on track because I now see it’s never OFF track. Exploring detours off the plan IS THE PLAN and makes my life so much fu***ng fun and worth living.

Definitely makes for great stories which will certainly be coming down the pipeline the more I get into writing.

Instead of striving for perfection, I now look at most things, including myself, and can fairly quickly - if not immediately - see where perfection can be found… Exactly as is. Even when the wind keeps blowing my hair in my face and we have to take a dozen pics to get it “right”.
This shot ended up being the keeper. 😂

Some of the greatest moments of my life have been plot twists. Things that I did not see coming and could not have plann...
12/15/2025

Some of the greatest moments of my life have been plot twists.

Things that I did not see coming and could not have planned for. Things that were out of my control.

Which has made me lean into and trust the flow of life more and more throughout my 40’s. Especially now that I’m excited to be tying a bow 🎁 around this decade next year when I turn 50.

I spent so much exhaustive energy planning out and trying to “control” events in my life (including my food and exercise) while deciding and dictating how my future was to play out, all in the name of the *illusion* of safety and security.

Just so I could believe that everything was gonna be ok … .*as long as it happened how I say it’s going to happen, dammit!*

I didn’t know creating safety & security from this angle was an illusion at the time.

I legit thought planning my schedule and living by my food rules down to every minute and macro and meal was where safety and security truly resided.

Turns out, the only thing that did was create more insecurity about my life and the future.

It did the exact opposite of what I wanted it to do for me.

Eventually it started feeling like a trap. And that didn’t feel safe at all. It was suffocating and really restrictive.

(So of course I started rebelling against myself but that’s a message for another day)

That’s because I learned the hard way - I’ve come to understand it was the ONLY way this could have happened for me - security and safety are cultivated from the inside-out, they aren’t found in the external without internal trust and faith in myself FIRST.

I needed to be safe with ME.
I needed to be secure with ME.

That’s when I came to terms with the fact that the real work is becoming the woman who can handle anything that comes at her.
No matter what.

The good, the bad, the ugly.

Now, I no longer seek to control or manipulate my life SO THAT I can handle it.

I’ve done the hard internal work on myself to operate the other way around.

And it’s pretty fu***ng awesome that the women who are attracted to working with me get to flip the script for themselves too. It feels so good that I didn’t leave these epiphanies and awakenings to just die within me. I get to share it with any woman who comes into my world and decides to say yes to herself 🥰

Here’s what I’ve found -
In releasing the need to control, and focus on me first, I get to experience the most control in my life that I’ve ever had.
….And it’s only compounded and gotten easier over time, with practice which is even more fun.

It made no sense at first, it was a leap of faith. Let go of control & have more control??? Whhhhut?!

Yep.

It’s because I took the leap and zigged when I would usually zag, I now I know it makes total and complete sense.

Because of that leap, I’ve become the woman who can handle it.

And I fu***ng love that about this stage of my life and who I am today.

Because I can handle the feeling of disappointment, I can control how I respond to seemingly disappointing things.

Because I can handle the feeling of failure, I can control how I respond to seeming failure.

Because I can handle how to sort through the feelings of fear, I can control how I respond to seemingly scary things.

I stopped trying to control the outcome of life circumstances and instead I started to allow space for “this or something better”

As a business mentor of mine James Wedmore used to say, “go ahead and plan, but leave room for magic!”

I just love that.

Not only did I discover over and over and over that it was an impossible and futile feat to try and control an outcome, I also learned that it was actually part of how the thing that I was trying to avoid the most was fu***ng created anyway !! 🤬

It was created not out of punishment - although that is how I used to see it - it was created as OPPORTUNITIES.

Literally every single time I was up against my need to control I was actually presented with an option to ask myself, “ok Dana, how do you want to handle this differently?”

I was blind and deaf to those repeated opportunities for a very long time. I was so blocked to it, I did not hear the question. 🙉

“I’m sorry teacher of the universe, what was the question???”

Sometimes I ate my feelings to avoid and procrastinate. 🍪🍩🧁🍫

Sometimes I lost myself in 3 sometimes 4 hours of exercise - also a form of avoidance and procrastination. I used exercise as a protective bubble. “Nothing else for me to do here! Decisions and real life happens outside of exercise so….. let me just stay on this dreadmill that I hate for another 45 minutes to burn off the thing I ate that I feel terrible about so I don’t have to face it.” 🫣

Sometimes I booked my schedule so full that I wouldn’t even give myself space to have to think about it. 🗓️

Yet, at the time that’s ALL I could do to handle it.

Looking back… damn!
I give that girl lots of grace.

That younger part of myself was 💯 doing the best she could with what she knew at the time.

I handled tough stuff in life without being fully equipped. Seeing it that way… I did pretty damn good. All things considered.

Seeing myself now and how my life unfolded in this incredible sequence, now makes so much sense;
Of course that’s how I handled it!

It wasn’t until I began seeing things - MYSELF - differently bit by bit, piece by piece.

For me, a major catalyst was how my relationship with food and my body was breaking me. It wasn’t killing my spirit and dampening my soul to such a low level I could no longer live in my safety illusion bubble.

The need to control those things became so crushing that no amount of time on a spin bike would give me enough runway to escape my own self.

Enough! One eye-opening yet tear-filled day, I just. had. enough.

Because of that moment on the floor of my own dream-come-true-but-now-slipping-through-my-grip gym 12 years ago, I can now look back and see how it all made sense in my life - the entire sequence, knowing I’m still in the process of it unfolding. I’m not done yet. Not even close.

What a beautiful story - full of plot twists, decisions, downfalls and comebacks it has been.

Wow.

So when any of my clients hear me say, “the best is yet to come” - it’s for me, for you, & for us and it’s not bulls**t. I fu***ng mean it. And the difference is, we’re not doing it alone anymore.

When I look at my schedule for the week and book out client sessions, I am not just looking at the blocks of time that a...
12/14/2025

When I look at my schedule for the week and book out client sessions, I am not just looking at the blocks of time that are available. (Aka Time management.)

I’m looking at how I know myself and understand that although it appears that certain time slots are available, they are actually off-limits.

Not because I’m afraid of double-booking. That hasn’t happened in… well maybe it has ??? but I can’t recall.

They are off limits because of my energy.

Not in a woo woo way. But in a mood-regulating, getting my needs met, knowing-myself-at-this-level, kind of way.

Ever since high school, I have been a morning person. I used to get up and workout to Gilad Janklowicz and his back up chicks at 6am & Denise Austin and her perma-smile at 6:30 before getting ready to go catch the bus for school.

In college I was forced to take night classes because at some point that was the only time certain ones were offered. After my minor in Ex Phys was more-than-fulfilled and I switched my major to Graphic Design, where many of my art classes were 5 hour sessions, 5:30-10:30pm (if I took the class once a week).

I was still getting up at 5am (& setting 2 alarms) because I was responsible for opening the doors every morning at the little local gym I worked at, Riverdale Health Club.

I quickly came to learn that whole schedule was definitely not ideal for my creative flow. By 9pm I was tapped OUT. But, I was 19 years old and didn’t have a choice.

Now however, I see that I very much DO have a choice.

It needs to be said that even with that awareness, I wasn’t willing to turn that around and make changes for another 2 decades.

Interesting how it lines up with the same years I operated in food and exercise dysfunction on a daily basis. 🤔 isn’t that somethin’?

When I did turn my schedule around about 10 years ago, I knew I had to be super intentional and purposeful about it. I had to get clear on what I really DID want, since it was glaringly obvious what was breaking me.

I have my mentorship clients do the same exercise I did when I came to that realization about how my life was running me and not the other way around. I have them do it early on in our work together because it’s THAT important.

It’s how I saw my future self, (which is my current reality now) living and experiencing life - instead of hectic, jam packed, booked from 8:30am to 8:30pm, I know that before 10:30am is for ME. My creativity is best at that time. Plus I’m an introvert and require that peace alone. Client time is 10:30-6:30pm. After 6:30 at night, I run out of mental energy and focus. It’s time for dinner with my husband and catching up on how our day went before we watch a show together.

My personal energy demands really haven’t changed since my 20’s, but I felt like I had to ignore that and push through because I was building my career and that’s what was required of me.

Even with my art degree, and a full time gig as a designer I would teach classes or workout at 6:30am and then again after work, often teaching my last spin or step or kickboxing class at 7 o’clock at night.

Dear lord.

I did that for a decade & a half before opening my gym.

But that’s when I literally thought that would end because I wouldn’t be working 5 jobs anymore. I’d just have one - as the business owner of my own gym. 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 yayy! Freedom!!!

Ha! Silly girl. Silly, silly girl.

Needless to say, that pattern continued.

Until I had a huge realization. If I created this structure and schedule in my life, well… that means I can also change it.

A fit pro changing her schedule and not meeting the demands of clients before work & after work?? Whaaat?! But HOW? That makes zero sense. Is that even a fitness career in the 2010’s??

Something inside me stopped caring about making sense to the outside world.

And because of that, I fu***ng did it anyway.

It started with getting real honest about my energy. My mood. When I was at my creative best. When I wasn’t.

I got clear on how I wanted to experience my days while remaining in the field of fitness that I loved so much.

Then I watched how it started to unfold.

My mentor says “You’re going to wonder how to do it until you wonder how you did it.”

Such a true statement in my world. Wow.

So, I don’t believe TIME is the thing I need to manage. It’s my own ENERGY and it’s always checking in on what I’m about to schedule & how it measures up to that.

I no longer worry about what society thinks is possible about my own life. It’s mine. I get to live it however the F I want to live it.

Because of that, it’s rather incredible how I got here - I have the honor of helping other women do this in their own lives too.

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