How one Mom Pivoted: Career Change from Graphic designer to Personal Trainer

“You know what I absolutely love about the women I get to interview on this podcast? It’s their raw honesty about the messy, beautiful, complicated journey of being a mother who’s also trying to figure out who she is and what she wants from life ”“Meet Moriah from Mighty Mama, from graphic design to personal training, from England to Costa Rica, Moriah’s journey shows us that sometimes the most winding paths lead us exactly where we need to be”

When I think back on my journey, honestly, it’s kind of all over the place. I’m definitely not someone who graduated high school, went, and stayed in the thing. It’s definitely been kind of all over the place. And I think that’s an entrepreneurial mindset. And that’s why I knew I was supposed to be working for myself.

I live in Nanaimo, BC now. I was raised in Ontario, Canada. I have a partner and an almost three-year-old baby girl. My journey in fitness started back in 2012. I had studied graphic design in school. I realized I didn’t actually like sitting at a desk. I felt very fidgety. I fell into the gym world classes and then eventually the weight room and I just really loved how my body felt.

I thought at the time, wow, I’ve never even heard of this before, but maybe I’ll be a personal trainer. Maybe I’ll pursue this because I grew up in a small town in Ontario. There were no gyms. So I was a late gymmer – I was 20 when I went to the gym for the first time.

Finding Direction Through Experience

I started out with personal training working out of a gym. Didn’t quite like the whole grind of it all and the lack of appreciation towards the trainers. Then I moved out of that, met somebody who was opening their own gym, managed that gym for a while which was a really enjoyable job because I got to work with so many members versus just clients. I really loved managing and running the show, but I realized I should be running the show though. That was kind of the kicker and what took me out of that environment.

Then I just took off and lived in England for two years just because I needed a break and still pursued fitness over there, studied more, did all kinds of jobs. When I came back, I went right to the island – Vancouver Island – and met my husband here. That’s when I decided, okay, I want to work for myself. I want to grow something. I was diving into the health coaching. I studied it and I got pregnant and things kind of went on pause.

We lived in Costa Rica for nearly two years. That was like 2021 to 2023. And that’s where she was born. But when I came back, I was like, I’m ready. I want to do something. And I need to be very aligned with me.

The Birth of Mighty Mama: Career Path Personal Trainer

I was definitely feeling like I wanted to be pulled back. I knew that I wanted to keep doing this, supporting people. I could just be a stay at home mom, but I felt like I really wanted to do more. It was after my daughter was born that I realized maybe supporting just moms is all I need to do. It doesn’t need to be so complicated. I can just focus on moms. They’re the ones who need it the most. They’re the ones who I relate to the most at this time in my life.

So I started that business when Zara was about a year old. My husband was actually the person who chose the name Mighty Mama, which is kind of funny. I was going through this “what do I call it?” vibe. And he was just rambling off names to me.

I wanted to encompass the feeling of you want to be strong and powerful, but even when you’re not doing the things, you remember that you still are.

It’s kind of the duality of who we are as parents. We’re in the grind of raising children. And then we’re also in the “I need to still look after myself” mentality. Sometimes we don’t do that other one.

The Heart of the Mission

That’s why I’m there – to help moms remember that actually their health is the foundation to the health of everyone in their family. And if they’re not looking after themselves, it’s going to ripple effect into everyone else. So I’m there to be that guide.

Your health isn’t just your own. It’s the heartbeat of your whole family. We’re not supposed to be the ones that are put last. It’s like a life mask on an airplane – you actually need to look after yourself so that you can properly look after your children.

Another aspect is that if you’re looking after your health, you’re demonstrating that to those in your family. So your children are getting led by a good example of how they should look after their health. I didn’t grow up with that. It’s a miracle that I even discovered it. We ate well, but I never saw my parents exercise and I was almost taught not to.

My mom did a bit, but then she moved out of it and definitely wasn’t into strengthening. It was more like Jane Fonda era. So I wasn’t really taught anything other than spandex workout videos, which don’t help you in the long run at all. The weightlifting is very important.

Making Fitness Fun and Accessible

What I find always works is that if I just break down the one thing that I need to do into smaller steps, I can start doing it and the momentum builds and then things flow and get easier. That’s what I teach too – breaking it down for people who are just getting started in fitness and healthy lifestyle in general. It’s food, it’s sleep, it’s all of it together.

I always really focused on my core strength from the beginning of my fitness journey, but I think sometimes people don’t have the guidance on how to do that. It’s not super difficult. But once you have the guidance on it, it definitely makes it so much more easy. And I like to tie it back to fun too, because if we just think, “Oh, fixing my pelvic floor, oh, strengthening my arms,” you’d be like, “This doesn’t sound very fun.” But when I work with people in person, I like to make it a lot of fun and find out what they actually enjoy doing. Everyone’s so different.

The Importance of Strength Training

I think you can definitely do strength training at home. The clients that I serve, I come to them because they either don’t have enough time to get to the gym or they don’t want to be in a gym environment or they have kids at home with them. So it definitely can be done at home. If you want to do just body weight, you just need a space. If you want to do strength training, then you would invest in some weights.

I do strength training with my clients because it’s really important as we age that we continue to get stronger so that when we’re in our 70s and 80s, if we fall, we’re not going to break a hip or something. We’re going to have some muscle still there, bones are strong.

I love training agility and stability. I love getting my clients to stand on one leg and do a shoulder press because it’s challenging their stability and their coordination. And then 30 years down the road when they’re walking outside and they slip on some ice, they might be able to catch themselves.

Results and Reality: Career Path Personal Trainer

I think they’re going to start seeing results immediately in terms of their energy. They’re definitely going to feel a bit sore the next day, if they’ve never moved their bodies, but the energy that they’ll feel trickle in is one of the most amazing things. So right off the bat, they’re going to sleep better. Their mood is going to be increased. They’re just going to feel like more vitality pulsing through them.

I think muscle starts to really show up after about a month, two months, three months, definitely. But it also depends on how many times you train in a week. There’s all these variables. One of the things that’s the most important to remember when you’re just starting is that anything is better than nothing. So if you can only do one or two times a week, like my clients, I see them twice a week, that is better than nothing.

Overcoming the Mental Game

“Breaking through comparison mindset was probably the hardest challenge when creating my business.”

I think that was the hardest one because it’s such a big industry and it’s such a shiny object industry as well. You see that perfect person doing that perfectly lit thing or that skill and it’s just not good for anybody to dwell too much in comparison.

We can get so swept into comparison and it’s paralyzing. When you have the comparison, what ends up happening is you start doubting everything. You’re just like, “Well, I can’t do that. Who am I to show up in this space? That’s not me, I can’t do this.”

Having a toolbox full of strong points and reminders really helps. Having those reminders that somebody who’s 20 steps ahead of you should not be somebody that you’re even considering to compare yourself with. Somebody who wants you is going to find and want you, not the shiny object or the other person. There’s so much more that goes into it than just somebody having that shiny skill or that much experience or that many followers. The people who find you want to work with you are going to be drawn to you for your own unique personality.

The Power of Community

“One of the things that’s super important is having people around you who want to hold space for that and can see you and what your potential is.”

I’m very grateful that I have a couple of friends in my life who are in the same space as me that I can talk to when these things happen because I don’t think anybody should go through stuff like that on their own.

We’re not supposed to be alone. We’re supposed to live in clans, with lots of people. And when you’re an entrepreneur, being in community is so important. If you have to put money into it to do it, that’s what you’ve got to do. If you have good friends who understand it and you can walk it together, that’s really powerful as well.

When people are starting their fitness journey, they often feel alone. Sometimes their partners don’t even give a crap about exercising. Most of my clients’ partners don’t even want to. So they’re very much like, “Yeah, he’s okay, he’s supportive, but I’m kind of in this alone.” It’s very powerful when they have somebody come into their life or if they’re joining a group of people who are all moving through a program together that they can have each other for accountability and support.

Speaking Your Truth

“I think we can sometimes end up just wanting to people please or do something that isn’t aligned with us. Speaking your truth is about how you truly feel in your heart about things that are going on outside of you, but it also applies to things that are going on inside of you.”

So if you’re wanting to move your body more, go for a new career, feeling unaligned in your job that you’re currently at, unaligned in your relationship, it’s being able to ask yourself what you truly want, if something doesn’t feel good anymore, if you’re not actually in alignment and then speaking that out loud.

It can be scary though, because instead of taking a change and then moving into a different direction can feel more safe and comfortable to stay in your comfort zone, even though it’s not supporting you in the long run.

To me it’s more uncomfortable staying in something that you don’t want to be in than the temporary discomfort of moving into something new that’s scary. It’s ripping a band-aid off doing it anyway because I know deep down that that’s what I want. If I stay with the band-aid on I’m always going to have the wound versus ripping it off, giving it some air and trusting that it’s going to heal, trusting that I’m going to find my path.

Finding Faith and Trust

“I have to ask myself, “What are my intentions? Am I doing good? Is this something that is going to bring joy to me and joy to others?”

That gives me the foundation of knowing that at least it’s something that is supposed to be in the world and not a bad thing. And then trusting in myself, I just have to always go back to the tools and the strengths and the different things that I’ve overcome to trust that it’s no different. It’s just a different thing, but it’s no different.

I am definitely a believer in God and I try to be in alignment with what his power or his plan is for me. I wouldn’t say I’m super religious in the sense that I haven’t given enough dedication, but I’m very curious and that’s definitely a chapter that’s coming. But I trust that there is something that’s supporting me that wants me to do well. That’s beyond what I can see.

Dear Mama, This Message Is For You

If you’ve been putting everyone else first while your own self takes a backseat, if you’ve been telling yourself “not this time, it’s not important,” then Moriah’s story is exactly what you need to hear today.

You are not selfish for prioritizing yourself. You’re not taking away from your family when you invest in your wellbeing. In fact, you’re giving them the greatest gift possible – a mom who is happy, who knows how to value herself, who honor her needs, and is confidently showing up as her best self.

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