Rachel Taylor

I would attribute my success to my own grit, but also my amazing support system. My family and my coaches and my mentors have been instrumental in my journey. I think that it really does matter who you surround yourself with, and I just can't thank my family and coaches and mentors enough for everything they've done for me.

The best career advice I ever received came from my older brother, who has since passed away. When I was facing a major life decision about switching from pre-med to personal training, knowing it might not be as lucrative as being a doctor but being focused on the impact I was going to make, my brother told me something that I carry with me all the time. He said that when you're making these big life decisions that have a ripple effect, even if you don't know the outcome, sometimes you have to leap without looking and just pray that your feet will catch you. I use that all the time now. Whenever I'm about to make a big decision, I just say, you know what, you have to do it full force. You have to leap without looking and trust that your feet will catch you. I carry that with me a lot.

The advice that I would give is just to not be afraid to take up space. I think in the beginning, I was very nervous being both a personal trainer and coach in a male-dominated field, and then also being a female professional athlete. Sports are very male-dominant, and women's sports is just now finally starting to get the traction and engagement that it deserves. It wasn't without women being loud and taking up space that we got here. I think just consistently showing up, and owning your expertise, and just exuding that confidence is the advice I would give to people entering my field.

I would say the biggest challenge, especially with personal training but also with sports, is the misinformation about prioritizing aesthetics, like how we look, instead of how we feel or our performance. I think a lot of people are drawn to these quick results, or trends, or four-week challenges, and it can take away from truly building long-term strength that you stack day over day with consistency. However, I think with this challenge, it is also what creates the biggest opportunity, because there's a growing demand for coaches who really focus on real education and sustainable training, not these quick fads. I see it as both, and I see it as a chance to kind of shift the narrative, especially for women, for feeling strong and capable and confident long-term. Not just wanting to look a certain way, but wanting to feel a certain way. We don't want to always be losing 3 inches off your waist in 4 weeks. We want long-term health, how do we feel from the inside out, because that's true health.

My biggest value is grit and resilience. Life is a long road, and there's a lot of bumps on the road. What happens to us, we can't control, but how we move forward, we can control. Just being resilient as an athlete and a coach has kind of shaped how I navigate those challenges and move forward. And I want other people to feel that too.