Читать книгу Calisthenics X Mobility - Monique König - Страница 11

My exercise path started quite early. At age two, I was on the Wildenrath golf course, which was largely built by and then managed for many years by my father. He often reminded me that I had talent and that the other guests on the driving range spoke of “the next Tiger Woods” in my presence. Surely, they were joking!

Nevertheless, I must thank my parents, who–instead of dressing me in polo shirts and plaid pants–put me in a pair of soccer shoes. I can still hear my father saying, “The boy needs to learn a team sport. It builds character!”

So at age three, I was on the soccer field. Although I spent more time picking daisies (for my mom) during those early years, soccer had a formative influence on me. Then, after playing for fifteen years, I hung up my soccer shoes. By the time I graduated high school, after a move, and several personal changes, I found myself in a deep performance slump, which is why I didn’t connect with my new team at Fortuna Köln.

In my first book, Pragmatisch Gesund, I talk a little about my health problems, which, among other things, caused my athletic interests to change. In short, my growing interest in strength–or, rather, fitness sports–caused me to adopt a one-sided diet that ended up costing me my performance capacity and, in the end, my soccer career. But as it turned out, this difficult time was the best thing that could have happened to me. When in life does one ever get the opportunity to completely redefine oneself and embark on a new path?

The new path led me to a place where I wanted to learn more about people’s health and the human body overall. Where I wanted to help people get out of the hole they’d fallen into, through one-sided diets proclaimed by the fitness industry as panaceas or due to poor exercise habits. During my active soccer career, I tried out lots of different sports, even though I always stayed with soccer.

Thanks to my mom, I was able to try out other sports, such as hockey, tennis, basketball, swimming, judo, and dance. I loved any type of exercise during my free time: table tennis, bowling, cycling, badminton, wrestling with my younger brother, and more. All these experiences with exercise would serve me well on my new path and lead me to where I am today–my small but awesome monkey gym in the space I share with Monique in Cologne.

Nearly every day, clients come from all over the German-speaking world to my 12-square-meter (130-square-foot) gym, where together we search for the cause of their pain and where, in typical Moving-Monkey fashion, I make them strong, flexible, and pain-free. But how did I get from my soccer career to starting my YouTube channel, Moving Monkey, and becoming a student of physical therapy?

Next to one of my best friends, Alexander Wahler, who convinced me to upload my first YouTube video, it was primarily one other man’s influence that I embarked on the exercise journey, and his name is Ido Portal. Over the years, a number of others have certainly joined the ranks as mentors from whom I’ve been able to learn, but it all started with him.

After Ido’s workshop in Munich in late 2015, my head was practically spinning. I even told him in person that everything was whirling around in my dreams the night after the first day of that workshop. I was effectively able to experience my beliefs, views, and, last but not least, my body get turned upside down, spun around, and newly aligned.

Ido’s response, in his typical terse and concise manner was this: “It’s a scary place, the place of change. But it’s worth it!”

In retrospect, I have to admit he was right. My greatest takeaway from my days with Ido was that we should pay more attention to the way we move (quality of movement, variety of movement, and movement culture) rather than chasing the next workout.

Even today, this philosophy still guides my actions and way of thinking. Not just with respect to Moving Monkey but also in my everyday life. After all, we humans are made to move, and our greatest gift is that we possess a body that’s capable of doing so much.

I want to spark in you the same enthusiasm that burns inside me for movement and the human body. Maybe after reading this book you’ll start to add a little morning mobility routine to your day. Or you’ll choose to take the stairs instead of the elevator.

Some people start with lots of baby steps, and others prefer to take a few big ones. What’s clear is that everyone is on their own journey at their own pace. And every journey begins with movement–namely with the first step.