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GUEST PROFILE An Interview with Stacy Sims
Stacy Sims resides in Cincinnati, OH. She owns Pendleton Pilates, which now has four studios and features a nationally recognized Teacher Training Program for Pilates instructors. Her first book, Swimming Naked, was published in 2004 by Viking Press and received critical acclaim. But many people would say that Stacy’s greatest contribution is founding and directing the True Body Project. The program is in its second year and is designed to help teenage girls stay connected to their power and potential. MWLM: What is the True Body Project? SS: The True Body Project is a non-profit organization I created to run programs and publish media by teens and for teens to help girls connect to their bodies, their voices and each other. It is a challenging time for teen girls. Girls of all races and socio-economic profiles are falling prey to self-harming and self-limiting behaviors. I know from my own experience that this is a slippery slope. Once you begin to lose yourself to addiction or anorexia or cutting or overeating, you also lose your authentic, powerful voice. My hope is that the True Body Project creates a safe environment for girls to learn to be their best selves. MWLM: What is one lesson you have learned from the girls in the program? SS: I’ve learned that teen girls are not difficult to work with. Instead, they are powerful, smart and kind, and are looking for a safe space in which to raise their creative, ambitious and global voices. If you look to them for answers and solutions to problems, whether world issues or creative challenges, they will surprise you with their talent and integrity. Teen girls may not look like it, but they are looking for role models. They are looking for ways to stay true to themselves. MWLM: What is your long-term vision for True Body Project? SS: My long-term vision is to create places and spaces and opportunities for girls everywhere to be able to engage in the True Body Project ideas. We have created a website called www.mytruespace.org for teen girls to begin to take their own True Body journey and to be able to find safe spaces to move, create and be active in their own communities. We hope to create and disseminate True Body curriculum that can be used to support girls everywhere. MWLM: What is your book, Swimming Naked, about and what did you learn from writing it? SS: Swimming Naked is my first novel. I wrote it in my late 30s, after I had finally found the discipline to do so, after I finally got sober and rediscovered my own voice. It is about the relationship between two sisters and their mother, and illustrates how we can experience the past entirely differently than our siblings. The main thing I learned from writing Swimming Naked is that I actually had the ability to sustain a project. I had always imagined myself doing these heroic kinds of acts – writing novels, helping out in the community – but these are impossible things for an alcoholic to achieve. As a recovering alcoholic, I realized that with time, discipline and good intentions, anything is possible. MWLM: What is the subject of your second novel? SS: I am working on a novel called Reality Show in which a woman is writing her memoir as she experiences the coming-too-soon end of her life on a reality show. On this not-too-far-fetched reality show called The End: The Ultimate Reality Show, the author and four other terminally ill individuals all have agreed to live out the end of their days in a hospice-turned reality show mansion. I know it sounds utterly grim, but it is a chance for me to explore what happens when the end of your life comes far faster than you had hoped. I have the chance to explore lots of questions in this novel. What happens when someone else is interpreting your story for you? What happens when the reality show cameras show the “real” you as someone who is less than perfect? Mainly, I am interested in exploring what, in the end, is really important to have learned. MWLM: What made you decide to leave your job and open a Pilates studio? SS: I was turning 40 and I was halfway through writing Swimming Naked. I had a less-than-satisfying job, so I decided to quit my job to finish my novel. I had a few pennies (and I mean a few pennies) saved so I figured I had about 5 months until I had to do something else. I didn’t have money to be a Pilates student so I learned to be a teacher. When I moved back to Cincinnati from Cleveland in 2001, I figured I would teach Pilates while I waited to see what was going to happen with my novel. Now, five years later, Pendleton Pilates has four studios and employs 6 women full time and another 20 part time. We see more than 700 clients a week. It is really exciting! MWLM: How do you stay balanced with so many projects going on in your life? SS: I learned so much in my 12-step program to help me stay balanced and to just do everything I can each day to be accountable so that problems don’t build up or linger. There is a slogan I have on my screen saver. It says “Do the next right thing.” This is what I try to always remember: that my worrying thoughts can’t change anything. The only thing that matters is what we do. Also, my Pilates practice keeps me in touch with my body and reminds me to eat well, sleep well and be careful about caffeine, sugar and other things that can put me off balance. I work hard to stay in good physical health so I am a better writer, a better mother, a better community activist and a better friend. MWLM: What advice can you offer mom writers? SS: The best thing I ever did was to learn to be an accountable human. When I began to truly take care of my health and nurture my spiritual life, my creative life flourished and I began to have a much healthier relationship with my son. I don’t really so much tell him what to do as I try to model behavior that I think will serve him. If you are shying away from dealing with an addiction or depression or anger or anxiety or overeating, your writing will suffer. If you are spending nights awake with worry, your writing will suffer. The best thing you can do as a mother, a writer and as a human being is take stock of where you need to become accountable and do it. If it feels like you don’t have enough time or energy to take care of yourself, then you need to take action, instantly. Start moving, start breathing, start living, start writing.
Kathy Schlaeger lives in Liberty Township, OH with her husband and three daughters. She has been published in The Cincinnati Enquirer, CIN Weekly, and the Pulse Journal.
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