MELT Stories: Discovering the perfection of imperfection

MELT creator Sue Hitzmann calls it the “dirty little secret of the fitness industry” – many instructors are injured or have chronic pain.

Gloria Stewart, a long-time personal trainer and Pilates instructor in the Los Angeles area, knows what Sue is talking about: She had pain in her feet, shoulder, and low back. “Ultimately,” she says, “I had trouble admitting my pain.”

Gloria first encountered MELT over six years ago at the IDEA World Fitness Convention where MELT founder Sue Hitzmann was offering sessions on connective tissue, fitness injuries, and pain-free living.

“Sue claimed she could help me enhance my clients’ workouts and help my clients who were in chronic pain, and that is what sparked my desire to take her sessions,” says Gloria. “All the information I learned from her that day was making so much sense to me. I knew Sue Hitzmann was onto something and the MELT Method was special.”

Gloria became a MELT instructor – the first to have ongoing classes in the entire state of California. When she started, she admits, she was so focused on everyone else that she ignored the issues in her own body until her back went out. “After that,” Gloria says, “I stopped ignoring my needs and went into action to get myself on the road to recovery!”

“My MELT practice helped me realize that pretending everything is perfect all of the time can be exhausting on the mind, body, and soul. Trying to be perfect had been a battle for me since I was very young. I am much happier now being imperfect,” she says with laughter in her voice. “I’ve gotten myself out of pain and I have more friends now too.”

She’s proud to have helped countless people get out of pain and says other personal trainers at the gym where she works have sent clients her way to learn MELT.

“Just the other day I saw a bodybuilder who I had worked with a few years ago. He had pain from a shoulder injury and I asked how he was doing,” says Gloria. “He told me he was doing great and was continuing to MELT regularly. MELT is really helping the people I’m teaching it to and that’s pretty cool.”

Gloria recently became one of six MELT Master Trainers, one of the six instructors trained to teach others how to teach MELT. She’s ecstatic to have the opportunity to have even more of an impact by teaching future MELT instructors.

“I’m going to be able to touch the lives of people who I may never ever meet,” she says. “That’s pretty incredible stuff.”