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Trucking Yoga: 5 Moves to Help You Physically and Mentally

It’s always fun to build a balanced workout with a variety of movements depending on what your cardio focus is. Most people may go from extreme sitting in an office setting to intense exercise causing their body to ache or get a muscle strain. Ouch!

Set your mind and body up for success by incorporating these yoga moves into your daily routine.

Here are 5 moves to help you physically and mentally for better truck driver health.

Here are 5 trucking yoga moves that any driver can do at home or on the go. They are about finding the balance to help you continue to do what you love and enjoy… without the body aches or unnecessary pain.

  1. Move #2: Core Care Rolling Forward Bend

Trucking Yoga: 5 Moves to Help You Physically and Mentally Rolling Forward Bend Mother Trucker Yoga Blog

Who doesn’t like core work? Well, I know many don’t, and that is because they are still being taught outdated sit-ups- YUCK!

If you are in need of combating a tight front body… Good news! This yoga extension move works your core ten times more effectively than flexion. And this fun move will help you liberate your tight spots!  I call it a stretch and strengthen combo (the best moves are both).

Here, powerfully release your spine and hip flexors as you fully engage your core from the inside out! You don’t have to have a yoga mat to practice trucking yoga moves.

  1. Find a comfortable hips distance footing.
  2. Exhale, bend the knees, and “fall” into a forward bend with soft (even bent) knees.
  3. Inhale with bent knees begin to roll up the body focusing on getting your pelvis underneath you and then stacking the spine as you rise.
  4. Keeping your knees bent, before the head and shoulders stack, start to glide the pelvis forward.
  5. Imagine the pubic bone hitting a wall to open the hip flexors and extend your spine.
  6. With the arms extending alongside the ears you should feel the core quiver (earthquake) and turn on as you open the entire front line of the body.
  7. Exhale, bend the knees a bit more, and roll back down into a soft flowing forward bend.
  8. Repeat this rolling sequence 5 to 10 times.

 

Move #2: Sinking Runners Lunge

Trucking Yoga: 5 Moves to Help You Physically and Mentally Sinking Runners Lunge Mother Trucker Yoga Blog

Psoas tightness is a chronic issue and if you are someone who goes from sitting all day to running or biking, you may be finding more pain than gain. Liberate the psoas to help aid the lower back and dissolve possible knee pain and possibly shoulder pain (as the psoas can pull down the shoulder).

This is one move every driver should do daily.

  1. From a runner’s lunge (low lunge) with the feet hips-width and fingertips on the highest level of the block (option to use stools or chairs).
  2. Square the hips forward, tucking the glute of the front leg underneath the body for more stability and a better stretch.
  3. Keeping the spine long, exhale and begin to sink the hip of the back leg down, pressing long through the back heel and up through the crown of the head.
  4. Inhale and rise back up to a comfortable lunge.
  5. Continue this dynamic movement and imagine you were sinking into the front pocket of your jeans. Try finding the areas you normally don’t automatically default to. Try to find the areas that are, otherwise, avoided and sink there.
  6. If the stretch is too intense, just focus on sinking into the hip and let up on extending up through the crown of the head.
  7. Repeat this dynamic movement 10 times, stepping up into standing forward bend in-between.

Move #3 Psoas Release

Trucking Yoga: 5 Moves to Help You Physically and Mentally Psoas Release Mother Trucker Yoga Blog
Another great hip flexor stretch. This pose is meant to help alleviate hip flexor and psoas pain and discomfort. If your back feels stiff after your cardio workout this move is for you! As a bonus, you also aid in releasing quad or knee pain and back stiffness.This is an easy move to do in the sleeper. If you don’t have a yoga block you can use a folded towel or pillow under the hips. Trucking yoga can be easy and can be one move done consistently.
  1. Lying down supine on the mat place a yoga block underneath the sacrum (or just lay flat).
  2. Slowly begin to extend one leg out, down, and away from the body like pushing your heel through sand (do not worry if the leg does not go straight).
  3. Breathing calmly slowly begin to draw the opposite knee in towards the abdomen.
  4. Do not aggressively pull the bent knee in. Slowly and mindfully draw the knee into the place where you first feel a stretch, when that sensation passes, draw the knee in a bit closer.
  5. Work through this process one layer of tension at a time as you continue to reach out, down, and away through the heel of the straight leg.
  6. To be effective with the psoas hold this pose for 3-5 minutes.
  7. If you feel the stretch in the lower back, remove the block.
  8. If unable to clasp the bent knee, use a strap to hold the leg, or place a block under the bent knee’s foot. The tighter the psoas the more likely you may need head support.
  9. Repeat the opposite side.

Watch the video with Hope on how to step by step release that pesky psoas muscle and get your trucking yoga moves to go!

Move #5 Sliding Side Lunge

Trucking Yoga: 5 Moves to Help You Physically and Mentally Sliding Lunge Mother Trucker Yoga Blog

All that stepping, sliding, moving and lunging can create some lines of tension or restriction from foot to hip. Wring out your lower body and leave yourself with happy hips. This is a perfect pose to do with a workout or if you find yourself stiff when you wake up when you get out of the truck or have back pain and can’t fall asleep.

Trucking fitness does not have to be complicated and doesn’t have to mean a gym-style workout. It’s time for out with the old and in with Mother Trucker Yoga. 

  1. Begin in a wide straddle with the feet in a parallel position, firmly planted into the mat.
  2. Inhale rise up to the fingertips, and extend the spine out from the hips.
  3. With a strong belly and long lower back exhale and begin to bend one knee and slide your body towards that leg.
  4. Use your elbow, shoulder, or tricep and press into the inner leg to help open the hip.
  5. Do not lift the heel of the bent leg or roll into the arch of the straight leg.
  6. Stay plugged into the feet and engage the quad of the straight leg to help direct the stretch along the inner thigh.
  7. Hold the side lunge for 5 – 10 breaths before you return back to the center and repeat on the opposite side.
  8. If your fingertips do not comfortably, reach the ground, use blocks to assist.

Move #7 Stretch It Out Side Bend with Chair

Trucking Yoga: 5 Moves to Help You Physically and Mentally Stretch it out side bend with chair Mother Trucker Yoga Blog

Think about the direction your lifestyle choices and movements are taking you in? Much of what we do is forward-moving (Sagittal Plane).

  • Sitting in the driver’s seat.
  • Walking.
  • Running.
  • Sleeping.
  • Working on X.

All forward-moving (bending).

It is vital that we change up our movement patterns and move in other planes of motion to help reduce pain and tension patterns. For many drivers, trucking fitness can feel like doing moves your body just won’t let you do right now. But with Mother Trucker Yoga and our take on trucking yoga, those moves can be both easily accessible and beneficial- like this chair yoga stretch.

Here release your side body from hip to shoulder in one quick move. All that sticky fascia under your arms will surely get the acknowledgment it deserves. What’s fascia? Well, it’s the catsuit your body is covered in (and every muscle and every fiber of every muscle- but that for another day).

  1. Take a seat on a chair (preferably with no sides).
  2. Open your legs wide to expose the edges of the chair (if able).
  3. If your feet do not comfortably, reach the floor, place blocks under your feet.
  4. Grab hold of the opposite side of the chair with one hand (think right hand to the left side).
  5. Gently rotate your body in the same direction (towards clasping hand).
  6. Extend your free arm up alongside the ear, with the palm and elbow fold facing your head (think external rotation at the shoulder)
  7. Inhale deeply, and now exhale and begin to side bend feeling the clasped arm’s shoulder roll more deeply into the slight rotation.
  8. Relax the shoulders, and anchor the hips.
  9. Keep breathing and work to hold this pose for up to 10 breaths.
  10. To come out, roll your body to the center of the chair and relax for a moment before you roll up and repeat the opposite side.

If you are still on the fence as to yoga is right for you. Look at the five yoga poses above, is there one you can try? Is there one move you can commit to for one week, one month, and then tell me how you feel?

One pose is yoga, one mindful breath is yoga, and when you take a mindful breath in a yoga pose, well you, my friend just took it to a whole new level.

Trucking Yoga Made Easy For Drivers Like You

Have you heard about Mother Trucker Yoga LIFESTYLE JUMPSTART Platform & APP? It’s a subscription-based service that provides you with more than 100 videos, downloads, and lifestyle-focused content made just for drivers.

While everyone else is still taking the traditional route of gym-style exercises and diets, we see the gap and want to help.

You are busy, you are always on the go, and who has time for a long-drawn-out workout?

Come check out Mother Trucker Yoga LIFE STYLE JUMPSTART Platform & APP and see how we can help you feel better one small simple change at a time.

 

Mother Trucker Yoga is the only place you can get trucking yoga moves from an instructor that has been teaching yoga for more than 20 years and has customized yoga and functional movement (fitness) to a drivers biggest needs.

Mother Trucker Yoga LIFESTYLE JUMPSTART App and platform image

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Why Yoga Is Ideal For Every Type Of Person

Whether you are a newbie to yoga in particular or are just looking to get more from your practice, this age-old exercise is packed with a whole plethora of benefits designed to increase your fitness and improve both your mental and physical wellbeing. Yoga is ideal for every type of person. No matter what your fitness level is, whether you are someone who works out regularly or someone looking to get fit, or if you have done yoga lots or never before, it is a workout that will suit you.

Why yoga is ideal for every type of person trucking yoga mother trucker yoga blog

It is something that can be done in pairs, in a group such as at HOTWORX, on your own, or by downloading our new Mother Trucker Yoga app and joining our LIFESTYLE JUMPSTART Platform family, you can always reap incredible benefits from yoga. If you are a truck driver and tight on time and trucking fitness is essential, yoga can be a solution. Here are a few reasons why yoga is ideal for every type of person, no matter your ability or fitness level…

There are many different levels.

One of the best things about yoga is that you will find one suited for you no matter what type of yoga you are looking for. There are many different levels of each type of exercise and movement, meaning that you can start easy and then progress as you get better. This means it’s not too daunting starting, and you can adapt the workout depending on your skill level and need, pushing yourself when you want to or taking it more gently when you wish. And when you work with an instructor that is educated, experienced and understands the environment you are in, yoga or what we call trucking yoga can be easy.

It can improve your strength, flexibility, and balance.

Yoga is one of the best exercises for improving your strength, flexibility, and balance – all essential qualities for keeping your muscles, joints, and body healthy. As a truck driver, it’s easy to become stiff and sore from sitting. Trucking yoga can be a great way to limber up. The slow movements and deep breathing also help increase the blood flow around your body, which in turn warms up your muscles, making them more robust, more flexible, and healthier. Holding poses and building on this can help you become much stronger in yourself and teach you how to balance much better. And remember, trucking fitness doesn’t have to mean push-ups or running. It can be as simple as yoga.

It helps manage stress and relax you.

Life throws us a lot of stress, and unfortunately, it is something that we will all experience every once in a while. If you often suffer from stress, you probably also suffer from other symptoms such as headaches, trouble sleeping, and perhaps dizziness or irritability. This can significantly impact your life, but yoga can help with this. Doing yoga regularly has been found to reduce stress levels and help you feel more relaxed. Yoga encourages mental and physical relaxation, reducing tension in your mind and body, removing muscle knots, and alleviating any pain you might have. It also sends positive endorphins to your brain.

These are just a few reasons why yoga is ideal for every type person. No matter what you are looking to get from your yoga practice, whether helping you when you’re on the road to improve your posture or sorting out any back pain, it can do this. What are some top benefits of yoga you’ve found? Let us know in the comments below. We would love to hear from you!

 

If you want to learn more about yoga and how it can fit into a trucking lifestyle. Read more about Mother Trucker Yoga and our mission >> https://www.mothertruckeryoga.com/about/

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4 Signs You Are Overexerting Yourself Physically

It is not a good idea to overexert the body, no matter how fit and healthy you might be in general. When you use the body too much or in too strenuous a manner, it can lead to injuries and pain, which can often be severe and last a long time. If you are keen to avoid that, you’ll want to know what the signs are that you might be overexerting yourself physically. Driver fitness is you paying attention to how you move and how you exercise. In this post, we’ll take a look at some of the clearest of these that you might want to be aware of right now.

 

 

Inflammation

 

Sometimes when you are working out too hard, you will end up with some serious inflammation in your joints or muscles. This is very much your muscles telling you that you need to relax a little more and not take it quite so hard. For instance, you might find that you get shin splints after running, and you have to make use of posterior shin splints taping with KT Tape. It is clearly best to avoid that altogether by just taking it a little easier when you are running in the first place.

 

Weak Muscles

 

If you are feeling a lot of sudden weakness in your muscles after you have been exercising, then this can be a sign that you are doing too much during the workout session. Driver fitness can be challenging given your schedule and space, but when you do have time make sure you exercise smart. Of course, you might often feel tired after working out, and if you didn’t then you probably wouldn’t be doing it right. But having incredibly weak-feeling muscles is a sure sign that you are doing too much. So rein it in a little and try to do a little less next time around when this happens.

4 Signs You Are Overexerting Yourself Physically Image Mother Trucker Yoga Blog

Dark Urine

 

It sounds unpleasant, but it is worth taking a look at what your urine looks like after you have been exercising. If it is particularly dark, that might mean that your body has gone through a lot of dehydration during the process, which is itself a clear sign that you are probably overdoing it. It might mean you need to relax a little, and also that you could probably do with a little more water. Remember when it comes to driver fitness and truck driver health you want to be getting in at least eight cups of water. Many health issues can be resolved by improving hydration. Ideally, your urine should be clear or very close to being clear.

 

Confusion & Agitation

 

Bear in mind that there are also some clear psychological signs that you should look out for too, and if any of these present themselves it is time to stop exercising and relax a little and look after yourself as best as you can. For instance, you might find that you feel confused or agitated after you have overexerted yourself, or even while you are in the middle of the workout session itself. This is a sign that you are doing too much, and it’s something you should pay close attention to.

 

As you can see, there are a few signs that you might want to pay attention to, and change what you are doing accordingly. You’ll find that these are important to bear in mind.

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5 Reasons You Should Take Regular Driving Breaks & Move More!

If you drive for a living, you’ll spend multiple hours a day behind the steering wheel. Needless to say, this isn’t great for your health and wellbeing. One of the essential things to do when it comes to truck driver fitness is to take regular driving breaks whenever you can. There are many benefits to doing this, and here are five reasons you need to avoid driving for long hours:

5 Reasons You Should Take Regular Driving Breaks & Move More! mother trucker yoga blog

Image Link (CC0 License)

You ruin your posture

It’s well documented how much damage you do to your posture by sitting down and driving for hours on end. It messes up your hips, spine, shoulders, and neck, leading to a life of chronic pain. The problem is that your body becomes fixed in the seated position, meaning lots of muscles become overly tight, shutting off the muscles that need to be active. 

 

So, taking breaks will help you unglue yourself from this poor posture. Yoga is such an effective way of preventing postural problems and avoiding chronic pain and you know at Mother Trucker Yoga we love trucking yoga. A five-minute stretching break every hour or so will work wonders for your body and stop you from ruining your posture. 

Being inactive lowers your testosterone

That’s right, sitting around every single day could actually lower your testosterone levels. This hormone is so important for men as it’s responsible for a lot of crucial processes throughout the body. If you want to have children, you need decent T levels to get someone pregnant. If you want to build muscle and be strong, you need testosterone in your body. Unfortunately, studies show that being inactive can mean you have lower T levels than active people. Truck driver fitness is not about being the biggest and baddest driver, but it is about taking care of your body and you need to move to do that.

 

For someone that spends hours a day driving around, this is bad news. Thankfully, your testosterone levels don’t stay fixed – you can control if they go up or down. If you think your levels have already decreased due to constant inactivity, visiting a TRT clinic could help you boost your T levels back up. For those of you that want to avoid treatment, preventing your T levels from dropping is the best approach. So, take as many breaks as you can throughout the day, getting up and walking around or doing some yoga to stay active. 

 

Sitting down makes you gain weight

The longer you drive, the less active you will be every day. Even the simple act of walking around a service station will contribute to your daily activity levels. A lack of activity will mean that you burn very few calories all day. Your body is basically at rest while you drive, so it requires very little energy. This means that, at the end of every day, you’ve barely burnt any calories. It doesn’t take much to consume more than you burned, meaning you gain weight. Everyday life movements get you burning more calories and yes, you can do that from the driver’s seat, it’s called truck driver fitness and you are “fitting in” movement.

 

Taking breaks prevents this by racking up your steps, burning calories, and helping you maintain a healthy weight. Even if you stop and walk around for 10-15 minutes during your breaks, you’ll rack up a few thousand steps each time!

 

Driving for long periods makes you tired

Despite the fact that you’re inactive, driving actually tires you out quite considerably. Sure, there’s no physical effort required, but it’s mentally very draining. You need to keep your eyes open and alert at all times, meaning you can quickly start yawning and feel the urge to sleep. 

 

Obviously, tiredness on the roads is a massive problem. A lot of accidents are caused by drivers falling asleep at the wheel. If you’re behind the wheel of a truck or van, the risks associated with auto accidents increase. Thus, stopping for regular breaks helps you give your eyes a rest and recharges your batteries. 

 

You can avoid the worst traffic

Yes, believe it or not, but you could actually reach your destination in less time by taking breaks. If you drive all day, you can easily get caught in the terrible traffic on the highway. But, by taking a well-timed break, you can be parked up while all the traffic trundles along. 

 

When your break is over, you’ll have clearer roads with less traffic, meaning you can drive to your destination with minimal disruptions. As a bonus, you use up less fuel, making your trip less expensive for both you and the environment. 

 

If possible, try to park up and have a little break every hour or so. Yes, you might be working to a schedule, but you should still meet your daily targets with these breaks. Even if you stop for five minutes, it can make a world of difference to your health. 

 

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Truck Driver Health: Guided Meditations for A Happy Mind

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A happy, healthy mind is critical to a driver’s well-being in truck driver health.

The high amount of stress drivers have to deal with day in and day out is often normalized by the industry and never taken seriously. Telling a driver to “exercise” is not a solution and can often lead to more stress, anxiety, and unhealthy practices out on the road.

With the amount of time a driver spends behind the wheel, it only makes sense that they use that time to their advantage.

The entire premise Mother Trucker Yoga is based on is easy three to five-minute moves you can do, strategies you can implement into your day from the cab of your truck. We are the first company to break down fitness and wellness for drivers into bite-size pieces. We have a unique approach to driver wellness because we are not just coming from a fitness, therapy, or exercise background. We are coming from a yoga and functional movement background. Where we focus on the whole person and practical application. And one of those applications is stress relief in the form of guided meditations and relaxation.

Truck Driver Health: Guided Meditations

And while everyone else is compartmentalizing your health, we are integrating it. If you truly want to get healthy, you have to look at the whole self. , Your Body, Your Breath, Your Internal Health, Your External Health, Your Mind, Your Spirit. It would be best if you recognized them all.

The reason yoga played such a big role in my health and wellness journey had nothing to do with a yoga mat and everything to do with what the mat taught me about living and life. And that is what I do with Mother Trucker Yoga.

And when it comes to truck driver health, guided meditation can play a big role in your overall health and happiness.

Because we have to address the mind, or nothing you try to do will ever stick.

We are currently running our 2nd Annual Going the Distance Health Challenge for Truck Drivers and helping support our drivers more during this challenge; I have created several guided breathing, meditation, and relaxation practices to help support the need for mental health mental wellness.

What is Mindfulness?

When you Google the word mindfulness, you get the following:

mind·ful·ness
/ˈmīn(d)f(ə)lnəs/
noun
  1. 1.
    the quality or state of being conscious or aware of something.
    “their mindfulness of the wider cinematic tradition”
  2. 2.
    a mental state achieved by focusing one’s awareness on the present moment while calmly acknowledging and accepting one’s feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations, used as a therapeutic technique.

 

While driving, there are dozens of distractions, and they all take you away from the present moment of driving. There is a difference between something you need to pay attention to while driving and a distraction. Do you know the difference? Can you tell when you are distracted VS paying attention to something while driving?

Distractions ask you to leave what you are doing and bring your attention elsewhere. They often lead your mind down the rabbit trail of other emotions linked to the past, future, or something outside of what you are doing currently driving.

I created a driving meditation to help support truck driver health. With the time you spend sitting in the driver’s seat, you might as well do something that builds you up, leaves you happy, and supports your health.

A Mindfulness Driving Audio For Truck Drivers

This audio is not meant to distract you or make it more difficult to focus while driving, but the opposite. Give it a try and let us know in the comments what you think.

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How To Deal With A Vehicle Accident: Helpful Tips For New Drivers

What do you do when your vehicle gets into an accident? Knowing the best course of action can be challenging, whether it’s a fender bender or more serious. Here are some helpful tips that will keep you safe and protect your vehicle.

Stay Calm And Assess The Situation

It’s easy to get nervous when in a car accident, but you must stay calm and assess your situation before moving. This will ensure that no one gets injured or damages their vehicle needlessly.

Get To Safety

If you are in a severe accident, it’s essential to get yourself and anyone else involved out of the way of any oncoming traffic. If your vehicle is still operational, move it somewhere safe so that no one gets hit by another driver who might not be paying attention or be impaired.

Call Emergency Services

Even if only minor injuries, always call for help when an incident happens with your car. An ambulance will come along with police officers to take statements from everyone involved about what happened before sending them home safely.

It is also possible that someone else was injured more seriously than they let on at first, which means calling emergency services can save lives! This is especially true if both parties were responsible for causing the crash because then nobody would be helping those who need it most.

Call Your Insurer And Call A Lawyer

If you were involved in the accident and caused damage to someone else’s property (including their vehicle), then your insurance company will be getting a call shortly! It is always best that all relevant information about what happened gets passed along as soon as possible so that everybody has an accurate picture of how things occurred. This way, there won’t be any confusion later on if something like liability needs to get sorted out before repairs can begin. Insurance companies are known for playing hardball when they feel they have been wronged by customers making claims against them. With this knowledge at hand, though, drivers can ensure that everything goes smoothly and that both parties feel satisfied with the result.

Many people overlook calling a lawyer as soon as an accident happens, but this is actually one of the most important parts of dealing with your insurance company and any other drivers involved in the incident. Even if you do not think that there was anything negligent about what happened on your part, it’s still worth consulting the best legal representation who can help protect your best interests and guide you through all of the steps to take once an auto accident occurs.

Accidents are scary situations for many people because they often involve unknown or unforeseeable circumstances, which can put anyone at risk of being taken advantage of by others looking to make some easy cash from someone else’s mistake! Calling a lawyer right away helps ensure that no matter how complicated things get within the first hours after an accident, somebody will always be there looking out for you.

Gather Evidence And Take Photos

Even if it’s just a small fender bender, take photos of the damage done to both vehicles involved to present them as evidence when talking with your insurance company or any other drivers who might have been at fault. Make sure that nothing gets moved around until after all necessary pictures are taken so that no one’s story about what happened becomes muddled while trying to piece together what occurred before police officers arrive on the scene (if they do). This is important because once someone moves something from its original place, it can make figuring out where everything should go much more difficult later down the line! Remember, though. It is always best to leave anything that could be considered a piece of evidence alone until the police arrive on the scene or you have been instructed by them otherwise.

In this blog post, we went over what exactly happens when an accident occurs and how important it is for new drivers, in particular, to follow these steps carefully if they end up being involved in any vehicle crash! Even though there are several legalities at play here which might seem daunting at first glance, the most important thing about dealing with auto accidents involving other people’s property (including their vehicles) can come down to simply following orders from your insurance company about what needs to be done next. Keeping calm under pressure will help ensure things go smoothly without too much stress getting in the way of the best possible outcome for all parties involved.

And always remember, if you work for a company, reach out and gain clarity on the policies and procedures that they have in place for their drivers to ensure you have done everything you need to do to ensure the best possible outcome despite the accident.

 

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Mother Trucker Yoga on PBS this Fall

Mother Trucker Yoga’s CEO and owner Hope Zvara is making her mark this fall on the PBS show Start Up this fall.

Hope Zvara is a former yoga studio owner and yoga teacher trainer from Hartford, Wisconsin, whose mission is to help 1 million drivers move towards healthier, more active lives by 2031 with small, simple changes that lead to big results so that you can feel better wherever you are.

PBS Start Up Mother Trucker Yoga

>>This isn’t just an idea.

>>This isn’t just a bunch of gym-style exercises.

>>This isn’t just a business.

This is a mission, a lifestyle, to change how the men and women in trucking breathe, move and live within the industry.

I am not a trucker; I never claim to be, but I grew up around hard-working blue-collar men and women, and although my husband holds a CDL, he drives heavy equipment, not over the road.

There is a gap between what most Americans get and what is offered when it comes to a traditional job, and then there is trucking. I want to bridge the gap and help these amazing men and women have their trucking lifestyle, their career, and have their health. You can have all three.

Hope Why Trucking? 

I found trucking by fate. I was looking to step out of the yoga world as I thought I didn’t really fit in there but didn’t know where that next place was. Then by chance, I met my former business partner, and the next thing I know, we are starting a company for truckers called Mother Trucker Yoga.

“Because this is where I belong. If you want to learn how to dive a truck, ask a truck driver. But if you want to learn how to move more in your everyday life, live healthier as a driver, that is where I come in. Time and time again, I have seen what I do work for drivers, and I believe that is because of how I deliver it. Anyone can memorize exercises in a book and either post a picture of them or make a video. It’s an entirely different experience when you experience the why, how’s, and when’s to movements, healthy choices, and strategies. I know this first hand because this was my experience in fitness, health, and yoga for years. And when I noticed this, I decided I would change this for myself and those I taught.”

Hope Zvara Mother Trucker Yoga PBS Start Up Show

What shows on PBS?

The show is called Start-Up. They are in their 9th season and showcase unique, interesting start-up businesses and what it takes to go from zero to hero in their industry.

When will Mother Trucker Yoga be on Start-Up?

Mother Trucker Yoga will be on Start-Up on PBS sometime this fall between September and January 2022.

You can watch previous episodes at PBS.org

Who is the show for?

Everyone, this is a family show focusing on unique niche start-ups who are making a wave in their industry. During the show, Hope shares her journey to Mother Trucker Yoga, both personally and professionally. The highs and lows of running a business, what she wishes she would have done, and the advice she wants every new business owner to have. You don’t want to miss her episode.

PBS Start up Mother Trucker Yoga Story

How do you get in touch with Hope?

You can get in touch with Hope via email at hope (at) mothertruckeryoga.com. 

If you are looking to have hope speak at your event, conference, company, or on your podcast or show, you can reach out via email or fill out the form HERE.

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12 Things to Say to Yourself Everyday

What we say to ourselves might be the most powerful thing we can do for our health and well-being.

Some joke about the current state of their health.

Some pretend it’s not an issue.

Some respond they had no idea.

But the truth is, bottom line, we know. We know if we are in a healthy state of being or not. I’m not talking about being a fitness model or professional athlete or size zero. The state of health I am speaking of says you can move, breathe and live with ease. You sleep well, feel good, and have a good attitude towards life and yourself.

Your Health Is Not a Means of Punishment

After spending more than half my life struggling deeply with addition, I 100% understand how the conversation inside your head plays into how you live life and the choices and actions you make that play into that.

It might seem silly, but you are enough. And many use their health as a means for punishment. Many choose everyone else and everything else over their health even when the reality is they can’t be 100% all-in when their health is less than optimal.

Today I’m not here to tell you to eat healthy, because correct me if I’m wrong. We all know we need to eat more fruits and vegetables, less processed and greasy foods. We all know we should be drinking more water and less soda. We know that! You know that! I know you do. So the big question is, why don’t we?

When I began my journey into recovery, I realized my choices were directly related to how I felt about myself. When I felt like I was a loser, ugly, a nobody, I made choices that reflected that. But when I had a moment that I felt good about myself, I made choices that reflected that.

On days that I am stressed, the moment I allow myself to “think about it,” I choose the couch, a snack, other needs above mine. But when I catch myself and act accordingly when I get up and move, eat the damn salad, I find I am a better version of myself. I have better internal conversations. And that is worth something.

If push-ups, sit-ups, and squats were the answer, then we’d all be fit.

If meal plans, food apps, and simply eliminating a food group were the answer, then we wouldn’t be having this conversation.

But it has to start with you.

The Link Between Thoughts, Feelings, And Behavior

An article on Forbes said: “Your thoughts are a catalyst for self-perpetuating cycles. What you think influences directly how you feel and how you behave. So if you think you’re a failure, you’ll feel like a failure. Then, you’ll act like a failure, reinforcing your belief that you must be a failure.”

The article discussed that once we draw a conclusion for ourselves, we are likely to do two things:

  1. Look for evidence that reinforces your belief.
  2. And discount anything that runs contrary to your belief.

Once you do that, you are going to act based on the above. It’s your thoughts that are determining your actions, your choices, not a fancy app or workout program. Those can help, but if they don’t help address the mental and emotional, you may find yourself spinning your wheels and wondering why nothing is changing.

12 Things to Say to Your Self Everyday Mother Trucker Yoga Blog Image 1

Shift Gears

When you find yourself stuck in a corner, reinforcing negative beliefs or thoughts that hurt you rather than help you challenge yourself, there are several things you can do that include self-talk.

  • Talk out loud to yourself.
  • Say CANCEL CANCEL; when you say that within 20 seconds of thinking or saying those negative thoughts, you can rewire your brain away from those thoughts.
  • Do it right away in the morning. When you start the day out on the right foot, the rest of your day is more likely to go that way. Drink a large glass of water, go for a quick 10-minute walk, deep breathe, recite positive affirmations like, I love myself, I am enough, I got this. 
  • Engage in activities, programs, and groups that don’t overwhelm you where they mean well, but you feel like you won’t be able to do that in the end. To figure this out, you have to listen to the conversation in your head. Sometimes, you need to push through, but make sure the pushing is through an overwhelm of information that you aren’t even applying. (Mother Trucker Yoga Program)

It must start with how you talk to yourself.

You are worth it.

You are good enough.
You can work out.

You can eat healthily.

You have what it takes!

That self-talk is the first conversation you should be paying attention to in your daily life and the one that creates all other conversations you have here on out.

Notice your internal response after reading those statements?

Are you rejecting them?

Embracing them?

Do they inspire you?

Or make you feel uncomfortable?

 

Get clear on that, and you, my friend, have your next step!

Things to say to your body everyday mother trucker yoga blog

If you think this is too simple. You are right. It is, and that is why most think it’s not worth it. But the truth is. What you say to yourself is worth focusing on. If your kids listen to everything you say, is your brain not listening to everything you say too?

If you want to learn why Mother Trucker Yoga and how we are different than the rest. CLICK HERE 

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