#81: Learn to Lift - The easiest way to get started weight training at home or at the gym

In this episode of 40+ Fitness for Women, I’m pulling back the curtain on my strength training programs and how they’re designed to help women in midlife build real, lasting strength. 

Whether you’re just starting out or looking to refine your routine, I share how my approach makes it easy to fit strength training into your busy life—whether you train at home or in the gym.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why real strength training—not the watered-down versions often marketed to women—is key to staying strong and healthy as you age
• How I make strength training accessible with flexible options: home or gym, 2, 3, or 4 days per week
• My focus on choosing effective, no-nonsense exercises that deliver results
• What the difference are between my self-study course, group program & 1-to-1 coaching

Interested in working with me? Here are three ways to get started:

• Learn to Lift Self-Study Course (now 30% OFF with code SCHOOL) >>
• Small Group Coaching Programs >>
• 1:1 Coaching Details >>

If you’ve been searching for a straightforward, effective way to start strength training, this episode gives you a peek into how you can get started today—no matter how busy your life is. 

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 1:36 Why I do what I do - my motivation
• 5:32 Learn to Lift - self-study courses
• 14:24 Small Group Coaching Program - Learn to LIft with Lynn
• 15:05 1-to-1 coaching
• 15:49 Monthly Membership
• 17:20 Update on my life

Transcript

#81: Learn to Lift

Welcome to 40+ Fitness for Women. I'm Lynn Sederlöf-Airisto, your host, and I'm a certified menopause fitness coach helping women build the bodies that they want to spend the rest of their lives in.

And today I'm going to be talking about the easiest way to get started on your weight training journey and even to continue your training journey If you've already gotten started on your own.

So this is a very unconventional episode. I don't know how many podcasters actually do this. Maybe I'm breaking some rules of podcasting, but I'm going to do it anyway, which is that I'm going to spend this episode talking about my courses. So basically my offering. And the reason that I want to do this is twofold one is because a lot of you out there who are listening to this, know, really nothing about weight training until you are listening to my podcast.

And so maybe you're curious, like, what is it really like to get started in Lynn's program? And my program, I think is very different from the other programs I've seen out there that are. You know, aimed at 40 plus women. So I wanted to explain how it differs. 

Now, for those of you who are already lifting on your own, this might be an interesting episode just to understand how I am doing the programming, and maybe that will help you with your programming as you're doing it for yourself.

Okay. So first I'm going to take just a tiny step back. So a little bit about like my motivation here. So as I have told in previous episodes, really what happened to me was that in post menopause actually, I noticed, A real loss of muscle mass and a gaining of belly fat. And it seemed to happen overnight.

And I think this is such a familiar happening for a lot of women, maybe in their fifties, maybe in their forties, they just noticed that, Oh my God, the things I'm doing now aren't working. My body is changing. Yikes. And for me, as somebody who was divorced.  On the dating market, it was really important for me and for my identity to look fit, feel good in my body.

As you know, you're going out on dates, you're taking off your clothes for people who've never seen you before, all those kinds of things. And so my original, motivation was very much external appearance. And I realized that all those pump classes that I was going to, all the boot camp, all the spinning dance, whatever that I was doing where I was sweating and using tons of calories, those were not doing the trick.

And I discovered weight training. Now, weight training was not a new thing for me because I had done it back in college. I was a college division one lacrosse player at Dartmouth college and we had a strength coach. So weight room was Completely familiar to me. And even after I left college, I was weight training up until my first child was born or the very end of my pregnancy when I started to feel so bad that I had to stop.

And then I just never got back into the weight room because I thought that, doing all these pump classes and everything was taking care of my muscles. So for me, like when I realized that, Hey, I had this all wrong, I just felt like desperate to let other women know that, Hey guys, if you're noticing this kind of thing, we're missing out on this key ingredient that the fitness industry has not told us about, which is strength training and that we actually need to be doing it in order to maintain our muscles.

Guys. And that going to all those classes and, you know, going harder and raising your heart rate even more is not going to do the trick. And so I, you know, started doing this and I also started studying at the same time to be a menopause fitness coach and biomechanics, program design, all these things that you need, you know, to be a good personal trainer and also to train myself.

 And the thing is that over the years, yes, I am still super excited about the fact that I look good. I feel good in my body. My body feels good. My body is capable. I can do hard things with my body. But what I am Even more excited about as, you know, the years go by about the huge health benefits for, you know, preventing diabetes and all kinds of other disease.

So all cause mortality is down for people that strength train all these kinds of benefits that mean that I am really setting myself up for the rest of my life, for the quality of my life, for my health span to be better. So there's so much in this. And so as you can maybe hear from my voice, I'm super passionate about sharing this information, like this revelation that, wow, this is the thing that we need to be doing.

And my Learn to Lift courses are really my way of helping you to get started. You know, they are strength training, right? So many of the other women out here who are offering programs, they're not doing standard strength training in their programs. And the reason for that is that it is not exciting, you're trying to shift a group of people who are used to going to group fitness classes where the choreography changes every time, where there's exciting music, where the instructor's up there, you know, encouraging you the whole way. And it's easy to walk in and kind of forget your cares and just let go, you know, for an hour. And strength training is so different from that. There's so much resistance to, doing something that's so boring, so monotonous.

It's the same thing over and over again. But the thing is guys, That is what is going to get you the result  I mean, that's just it, right? I mean, you know, if, if you were going to train for a marathon, you would. go and figure out like, okay, so what's the way that I train for a marathon, you're not going to go to a group fitness class where you jump in place. You're going to go do a marathon program. And I am offering a beginner strength training program. And it is strength training. It is not, making strength training fun, disguising it as something else, it is real strength training. 

So what my program is, if we go down to like the nitty gritty. So I have designed a strength training program. I've chosen the exercises for you to do. each week. And in the beginner program, it is the same exercises for 10 weeks. Now you can choose to work out at home or the gym.

So I have variants on this, because I know so many women do not want to go into the gym first time. I didn't either, you know, I mean, I was feeling crap about my body. The last thing I was going to do is go into the weight room and be like, I don't have a single muscle on me. And here I am, you know, I just, sorry, that just isn't me.

I know some people are braver than me, but. That was not me. So I completely understand women want to get started at home and absolutely you can do a ton at home. And some women are brave enough to go to the gym and the gym offers variety. So I have the both options. I have, you can train at home and all you need is dumbbells and like a sturdy chair and enough space to roll out a yoga mat.

So it really like you can do this in a small apartment. I'm, I'm trying so hard to lower the barrier for people. Okay. And at the gym, standard gym, I pick equipment that 95 percent of the commercial gyms have. And if there's an exercise there, or equipment that your gym doesn't have, just let me know. I'll give you a substitute exercise, not a problem. Okay. 

And then the other way that I really want to lower the barrier is to give you the option of training two, three, or four times a week. Because I know we're busy. Honestly, I was just on a call with a new client yesterday and. Man, we were trying to figure out , how is she going to fit in three days or do we need to do it in just two days?

And it was really a struggle and she doesn't even have kids, so I get it. And honestly, for you to start doing something is so important. So important. Don't put it off till you have three days a week to do it. Don't put it off until you, you know, have a gym membership. Don't put it off till you lose those pounds and you dare to go into a gym.

No, no. Get started now. So I do have the two, three, and four days a week options. So what you do when you sign up in my learn to lift course is you let me know, you let me know, two, three or four days. And then I set up your program in my app, and I'll send you a link to the app. So it is an app that you can access from your computer or from your phone, and the app has your program. And what your program looks like is that every training day, you will have six exercises to do. .

And the app has, instructional videos on how to do each of the exercises so that you can look at the video and learn how to do the exercise. The app includes tracking because I talk so much about progressive overload and in order for you to do the progressive overload, you need to be able to track.

So there is a tracker in the app. 

 I can see everybody's input into the app. I can go into my back end of the app and I can look you up and see what you've been doing and what, you know, weights and reps and all that. And I do that for my one to one clients and for the people in the group program, I go in and I check out how they're doing.

And in addition to the app, what you'll get is access to a course. So if you've ever taken an online course, that's what it is. It's a set of videos that are prerecorded, and those really distill the information that you need to know to get started weight training. So part of that is. Things like setting yourself up, like, um, how to use the app, right?

There's a video about that. Um, there's a video about how to choose your starting weight. There's a video explaining when to go up in weight and how to work in rep ranges. The essentials that you need to know to get started. And then. About a week after you've joined the course, I open up a second module of videos and those talk about more of the things that will help you to understand why you're doing what you're doing, 

so it's got a little lesson on muscle biology, lesson on protein and things you need to be making sure that you're doing to get the best results. So there, there are the essentials that you need to know.

And though this sounds maybe like there are a ton of videos in there, there aren't. You can watch all the videos you need to watch before you actually start training in less than an hour. So it's like one masterclass cut into little sections, right? So an hour, you can listen to it while you're taking a walk. Or cooking dinner, whatever. And then, then you just get going. 

And then in addition to that, I have a Facebook group, which is for clients and customers. So join the Facebook group. And this is something that's very new. So it's just growing and that is the place that if you have questions, please ask questions in the Facebook group, and then I am posting, hints and other kinds of information plus we do a weekly accountability post where you can share your What your plan is for the week. How did last week go? This kind of thing to help keep you feeling accountable to doing this. Okay. 

But the training sessions themselves, I mean, I'm not picking like crazy exercises. Some of the, , coaches online who are working with people who have been training for years, right.

They're coming up with new variants and, you know, different ways of setting up equipment at the gym and this kind of thing. I really am trying to make this easy for you. So we're going to go over basic movements, which are really powerful in strengthening you. 

And by the way, one other thing to know is that when you buy the learn to lift course, you have lifetime access to that program. A lot of online courses, it's like when you sign up, if it's a 10 week course, you have 10 weeks to complete it. This is not like that. You could sign up today and start it in a month.

You could sign up today and start working through your 10 weeks. Then you go on your vacation to Aruba, , for a couple of weeks, and then you continue when you get back. That is perfectly fine. 

So I have these learn to lift self study courses, which I just described and they really have helped dozens of women to get started

then I have my group courses and the way that the group program. What differs is a, you get a customized program. So I've had people who, for example, have some additional equipment at home, they might have more than dumbbells. So I give them a different variety of exercises where we can take advantage of the equipment that they have at home,

plus in the group program, you get weekly live video calls with me and these are small groups.

Okay. So, uh, till now, I think the most amount of people that have ever been on a call at once is. four we're talking small groups, right? 

 and then the third option of working with me is one to one coaching. And that is really. Just all about you and your needs looking at your goals and how are we going to achieve it and that can include fat loss nutrition coaching habit coaching Looking just at weight training so there you have access to me all the time, we have a messenger , weekly check ins on video calls, totally personalized programming. So that is the full package, and that's for a minimum of 12 weeks , but often like to get the results that you really want, you will want to continue beyond the 12 weeks, but it's a minimum of 12 weeks

Now, when you've finished one of the learn to lift programs, you can join my membership. And that continues kind of the programming philosophy that I have, which is based on what has worked in building muscle, you know, for people who are really working on building muscle. Okay. And that is To have programs that you stick to and evolve them gradually over time and keep applying progressive overload.

So there, I publish in blocks. of eight weeks, your programming and each block has some changes from the previous block and some things that will stay the same. And the reason is that honestly, you are going to be able to progress a particular lift for more than eight weeks. I mean, if I, if I think, for example, like I've been doing the assisted pull ups in my program for a year, okay, and, and I am still progressing, there's in a way, no reason to take that out.

And I enjoy it. So, so the reason that you do want to change over time is you want to stimulate your muscles in slightly different ways over time. And also to give you a little bit of variety because yeah, we do get bored every now and again. So, Yeah. But mostly you'll be doing the same thing from one month to the next with small changes.

And one more thing I should add here is, and why I'm talking about this maybe now is that, you know, I've been doing this as a side gig for The last couple of years, really, as I've been working in a small startup and actually this spring, the startup wasn't doing very well and had to downsize and I was downsized out.

And I know I haven't talked about that, but I see this as an amazing opportunity. I've been so much happier because I've been able to focus so much more on this work and helping women get started because. I mean, I feel so passionate about this. It makes me feel so good when women get going on their weight training journey, when they finally dare to pick up the weights, because somebody has given them the blueprint, the simple, easy to follow instructions on how to do it.

 In my group program, one woman said, Hey, she's been going to the gym, but she just feels so much better going there now that she knows what she needs to do there. And she'd been avoiding a particular section of the gym, the one with the free weights and, and the squat racks. And now she goes over there and she's like, why couldn't I do this before?

You know? And it's just given her so much courage. And it's these kinds of things that, that just, ah, they fire me up. So anyway, so I would love. To help you get started lifting or continue your lifting journey. If you have any questions, please let me know. And all the links to my programs are in the show notes.

And, if you happen to know somebody else that is interested in getting started and doesn't know how to get started, then point them in my direction. And thank you so much for listening to this one. I know this is very unconventional to do like a, Total, whatever, sales pitch, whatever you want to call this, but, hopefully it was useful for somebody to understand like, what do you get when you sign up in case I haven't been able to explain it well enough on my website. All right. And with that, I leave you for this week and wish you happy training