Welcome to Lessons in Motion

Welcome to Lessons in Motion.

Here we go. A brand spanking new newsletter, which at this point, basically feels like I’m talking to myself.

A bit of a Background

I am a small business owner (Endurance Collective), sport scientist, cyclist, photographer and traveler. I started my business right out of university, in the summer of 2006. You can read more about me here. In January 2007, I started a blog on the OG platform – Blogger (blogspot), which I used until 2010. Do you remember that platform? Honestly, it pretty awesome at the time and I actually had a fair bit of readership. I used it mostly for quick work updates (sometimes only one or two sentences) and random thoughts and stories from training, coaching, nutrition, school (I was in grad school half the time I was using it) and some personal updates.

That blog is still there on the innerwebs somewhere – I read through it last month and had a bit of a giggle. It was actually fun, not too serious, and had value. Yes, I am biased. But it seems like other people liked it.

In 2010, I moved everything to a dedicated website(s) and mostly posted recipes and sports nutrition posts. At some point, like everyone else, I got caught up with social media posting, neglected long(er) form writing and eventually stopped writing all together to post randomly on social media instead. I got back into writing for my business (Endurance Collective) in 2022 and despite not having enough time to do as much writing as I would like to, I absolutely love it.

What should I share?

I enjoy sharing certain aspects of my life, but I prefer doing so with written stories and photos, and the way social media has evolved doesn’t float my boat, meaning I just end up resenting it more and more. I started a personal website several times and never really stuck with it, mostly because I was not sure what I really wanted to share. Photos from my travels? Yeah, sure. My photos are pretty awesome, if I may say so myself, but its not like I make a living with my photography, mostly because I don’t want to go in that direction.

So, if that’s out, what about sharing restaurant, coffee and general travel guides for the 33+ countries I visited? Yeah, that’s original (insert sarcasm font here). The internet is full of that, and restaurants come and go all the time, so it’s potentially not all that helpful to my readers. Helping fellow ‘gluten challenged’ individuals navigate travel was as close as I got to an idea that I was happy to explore, but no dice there too, although I might revisit that one down the road.

Of course, writing about cycling and travelling was something I actually enjoyed, but I only have time for ~2 big trips a year, so that is kind of limiting from a content consistency stand point.

Earlier this week, I was texting with a friend who is going through a career shift right now. She is a crazy smart bad ass individual and obviously, people are already chasing her for consulting roles. I casually mentioned that every now and then I wonder if I should share my experience in the cycling industry and go into consulting for businesses within the endurance sport industry in addition to my work with athletes and just putting those words out there cleared the fog a little bit.

What is Lessons in motion about?

I have been an athlete my entire life, I have travelled extensively since my mid teens and I lived in 3 different countries on 3 different continents. And of course, I have been running my great little business for almost 19 years. I have 27 years of coaching experience working with athletes. I would like to think I have a fair bit of experience and have learned a few business and life lessons from all my travels, my athletic background and from coaching others.

It’s time to share some of the business and life lessons I learned (and still learning), through my travel and sport, sharing all the stories that helped me learn those lessons. To be fair, lets face it, a lot of what I can share with you is not necessarily ground breaking. That said, how we learn certain lessons is just as imports, if not more important than the lessons themselves. And that is where the magic happens (I hope?).

What is the vibe for Lessons in Motion?

I guess I am going for the feel I had when I was blogging on Blogger. It was simple, it was authentic. I just wrote whatever was on my mind and then hit the publish button… It was good for my soul, and it was good for my business, too. I want this to feel like that OG content platform, but with modern functionality and automation, and API’s and stuff. A blog. A newsletter. A publication. Whatever the hell you want to call it.

I’m calling it Lessons in motion.

Hey, thanks for reading. It’s cool that you found this messy introduction post, written on a whim, after midnight. I suppose that could be lesson number one – Just start the thing. And don’t do as I do… Go to sleep earlier, okay? But in all seriousness, I will share an actual story and an actual lesson next week.

I am here to take you along with me as we explore celiac friendly eats, great coffee spots, epic photography locations and go on cycling challenges around the world. But that’s not all! I’m here to share the stories behind the lessons I have learned (and obviously still learning) from sport and travel, and how I apply these lessons to business and life. Subscribe below ⤵️