The Green Door Life Team
Eka is a lover of embodied expression and has been passionate about movement, health, vitality, and self inquiry her entire life. She has spent the bulk of her adulthood as a professional circus artist, dancing and playing in the sky on an aerial rope. She has performed as a solo artist and company member, as well as coached students of all ages. She brings with her over a decade’s worth of experience and knowledge in movement, training, and injury prevention.
Through the extreme demands and physicality of circus, she came to learn about and understand her body; to push past her own sense of boundaries, limiting beliefs, and what she thought was possible for herself. This ignited her desire to know her mind and spirit in the same way and set her on the path of unifying and integrating her mind, spirit, and physical body.
She learned many things throughout her years of inquiry and training, but there was always an essential component missing; irrefutable knowledge of nutrition and how to properly fuel her body from a place of loving awareness, being in friendly cooperation and collaboration with her body. This unknown need was filled in spades when she said Yes to The Green Door Life and signed up for Awaken Your Nutrition. Eka felt so illuminated and inspired by the course, the community, and the collective that she chose to heed the call and further align herself with the Green Door by becoming a coach to assist others in their own personal discovery quests. It is one of her greatest joys to aid others in their own process of gathering awareness and reclaiming agency, so that they may operate from their fullest embodied expression and be their most vibrant and vital selves.
Eka has been certified as a personal trainer through the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM), and a certified nutrition consultant through the National Academy of Metabolic Science (NAMS).
You can find Eka leading 1:1 coaching calls as well as joining our group calls and special workshops
Life Lessons Learned Through Nutrition
1. I grew up in a household where anything less than absolutely perfect was simply not acceptable. I was taught early on that to be perfect was the way to earn love and value, and anything that was not perfect would earn me the title of "loser." I sought my worth and validation through the pursuit and achievement of academic "perfection", as well as in the weight of my body. Of course, this ended up backfiring and earning me many years in the severe teenage depression camp, complete with an advanced case of body dysmorphia and a budding eating disorder. These issues carried through to adulthood and were exacerbated by my chosen profession: circus performer. As you can imagine, this world is hyperfocused on the body and on perfection of technique and execution. Small, lithe bodies are celebrated and one's level of exhaustion is bragging rites to personal worth.
Through this program I have learned to soften my edges around these old beliefs. I have begun to relinquish my death grip on the idea of perfection and exhaustion as a measure of worthiness. I have learned to embrace a more balanced, moderate approach. For me this means valuing and cultivating rest and placing as much importance on the inhale time as the exhale time. It means treating my body as a trusted ally and a beloved, collaborative partner. I have learned that there is so much more to life than the all-or-nothing mindset, and that sometimes "okay" is actually perfect.
2. I used to believe that I could out-exercise a mediocre diet. I would just train and train and train and train, thinking that would get me a leaner body, and if I just trained *really* hard, it shouldn't necessarily matter if I ate an entire bag of cookies in one go, right? Wrong!
Through this program I have come to know and understand the value in consistency, specificity, and accuracy when it comes to my nutrition intake. I have learned how to give my body what it needs in order to perform at its best and to help me along the path to my goals. Having this understanding gives me this feeling of deep, empowered calm. It feels like gaining magical power!
3. This program has completely changed the way I think about and engage with alcohol. I had always been a light, social drinker. Alcohol was always a part of social times with friends, as well as part of the post-show ritual in my circus work. It was just something that I did when I wanted to, sometimes when I didn't really want to, and never something I thought much about. I thought, "I'm only having a drink or two, 0-3 days a week, give or take. It's not a problem. My body can handle it."
This program has helped me to understand the true effects of this behavior, as well as shine the light of my awareness on its roots. When I choose to engage with alcohol I now do so mindfully and moderately and am happy to be saying "no thank you" much more often.
