No. 13

“The best thing about being a beginner is that you don’t know the rules yet. You get to play.”

Last week, I wrote about ‘what the bike has taught me’, and we discussed motivation, and what it means to keep showing up. What I’ve realised since then is that sometimes, the biggest gift movement gives us isn’t the push forward… It's permission to start again.

There’s something quietly wonderful about being a beginner. It’s humbling, yes, but it’s also deeply freeing. Beginners don’t need to prove anything. They just need to try. Somewhere along the way, being a beginner started to feel like a weakness - as if not knowing meant not enough, BUT I think that’s where the good stuff hides: curiosity, humility, and creativity.

When we’re new at something, we notice the details we’d otherwise miss. We’re less focused on performing and more connected to the experience itself. Every small win feels worth celebrating. Every setback is a lesson, not a failure, and in a world that moves at full speed, that kind of presence feels rare. 

Being a beginner asks you to drop your ego. To accept that you might wobble a bit. To be patient when things don’t click straight away. It’s that same feeling you get when you clip into a bike for the very first time - awkward, nervous, unsure of what you’re doing, and then, little by little, your body learns the rhythm. You trust yourself more. You stop overthinking and start moving.

“It takes courage to be bad at something new.” Jon Acuff

When I think about being a beginner, my mind goes straight to last year’s London Marathon. An absolute beginner's moment for me. Running was something I’d left behind without even realising it. I loved it as a kid, but somewhere along the way I decided, ‘I don’t run.’  It became a quiet belief I stopped questioning.

Cut to being in treatment and promising myself that I would lift any limits I’d ever placed on myself. The first one was simple: run again. I could run, I’d actually been very fast, but I’d just convinced myself I couldn’t. At that point, I’d been at Peloton for five years, surrounded by incredible runners, so it took a moment to build confidence and get over the insecurity of starting from scratch. I did a 10K with friends for charity, and then decided the next logical step was obviously 26.2 miles for the London Marathon. 

I knew I wouldn’t get a time anyone would say ‘wow’ at, and I really didn’t care. The point was to do something I once told myself I couldn’t do, but always wanted to. To enjoy the freedom of running. To see what mental clarity or ‘runners high’ it might bring.

I gave myself grace, walked when I needed to, cried when I thought I’d never finish. I couldn’t get to grips with splits or pacing, but every run taught me something new about myself. Every mile was a quiet rebuild of confidence.

When you move beyond being a beginner, so in this case, the more you run, the more you start to chase progress: a PB, a longer distance, a new challenge. Last year, I was new to it all. The challenge was simply getting to the end. I was excited, terrified, and ready to give it a go with no expectations. All I wanted was:

It was hard, but I loved it. I took every second in! 

I found such joy in being a beginner as an adult.

There’s a lightness that comes when you stop trying to be great and just let yourself enjoy learning again. I remember laughing at myself on runs, the kind of laughter that comes when you know you look ridiculous but you’re doing it anyway. There’s joy in that - in being both clumsy and brave at once.

I’ve been thinking about all the different ways we can be beginners, and how often we forget that we’re allowed to be.
- You can be an expert in one part of your life and brand new in another.
- You can be strong and certain in your work, but still figuring things out in love, or health, or motherhood, or healing.
- You can be someone who teaches others, and still be a student yourself.

Being a beginner isn’t always about skill, sometimes, it’s about mindset.
It’s choosing to look at something familiar with fresh eyes.
It’s saying, ‘I don’t know, but I’m open.’
It’s asking for help, allowing others to guide you, and trusting that not being perfect doesn’t mean you’re failing, it means you’re growing.

I think there’s huge joy in learning something slowly. In taking your time instead of rushing through the uncomfortable bits. In remembering that even the things that now feel effortless - from riding a bike to leading a class, once felt brand new.

Right now, I’m in a season of becoming a beginner again in ways that feel both exciting and unknown. My routines are changing. My body is changing. My priorities are shifting. Instead of resisting it, I’m trying to lean in. To find joy in the ‘I’ve never done this before.’

Every expert you’ve ever admired was once a beginner who decided to keep showing up.
So wherever you’re starting - on the bike, a brand new career or chapter - know that it’s okay to not know yet. That’s where all the best stories begin. Let yourself be the beginner. Let yourself get it wrong, laugh at the mess, and find joy in the fact that you’re still learning, still moving, still beginning.

“Beginners see beauty where experts see routine.”  

So, if this first part has been about starting again as a beginner, our next segment extends the theme inward: strengthening the mind through movement, rest, and perspective.

So, I’m standing right on the edge of change, not quite in my old world anymore, but not yet in the new one either. It’s a strange space to live in. Physically, my body is feeling it, but emotionally I’m still catching up. Everything looks the same, but somehow, everything feels different. It’s calm one minute, overwhelming the next. You can’t focus, but you can’t stop overthinking. A quiet hum of anticipation that sits somewhere between excitement and fear. I can feel it in my body - this mix of gratitude, nerves, joy, and uncertainty, all wrapped up together. 

In just a month, everything will shift. There’s this awareness that life is about to get bigger in a way that’s impossible to picture, and yet, it’s all I think about. There are moments where I catch myself placing a hand on my ever growing bump, trying to imagine who they’ll be. Will we have a son or a daughter? Will they look like me? Will they have Ben’s calm energy? Will they arrive early or take their time? Will it all go OK? The questions circle, and underneath them all sits one feeling: awe. We waited so long for this, and our journey, like many others, has had its challenges, so to be at this point and preparing for birth, feels almost dream-like. Sometimes I feel like I’ve only just got my head around being pregnant. 

Everyone tells you that having a baby changes everything, but what they don’t always say is that the before changes you too. From the day we picked up on our IVF journey and started the road to embryo transfer, the injections began and all of the ‘this is so hard’ didn’t matter, it was all for my baby. I already felt like a Mum doing all that I could. Even though there has been months of anxiety that the pregnancy is going as it should, there’s now this instinctive slowing, a softness that creeps in without asking. My world feels smaller and quieter (at times), but also heavier with meaning. I’m aware that these last few weeks of ‘just us’ are precious, and I find myself wanting to hold them tighter. 

Holding everything tighter when you’re in deep hormonally, emotionally and physically, is challenging in itself. There’s this want to just shut out the world and nest, and rest HARD because time is ‘running out’, yet that’s not always the reality for most. You’re trying to get ahead, even though you're already exhausted. In our case there’s renovations to finish, a job that you’re not quite ready to stop, other demands and commitments to keep that sometimes mean this fairytale run up to birth doesn’t always look how it does on social media. And that’s OK. I have to keep reminding myself that not everyone is sitting around ironing their babies' teddies in their totally finished nurseries as my algorithm would make out. 

There’s a lot of talk about ‘new beginnings’ (I certainly have done that in this newsletter),  but not enough about the waiting that comes before them. The bit where you’re holding your breath, where you know life is about to expand in ways you can’t prepare for. It’s tender, but it’s also wobbly. Dare I say, there’s a quiet grief in change too, even when it’s the kind you’ve hoped and prayed for. You’re saying goodbye to a version of yourself you’ve known so well - a version of your relationship, a version of family life that exists at present, a version of a career, a version of a social life. It’s all going to look and feel different. I embrace change, but just on the edge of it, and I find myself nostalgic and a little sh*t scared at the same time. 

I’ve loved this version of me, and I’m sure parts of me will always be there, but I can feel that I’m ready to make space for someone new. It’s strange how you can feel so sure and so uncertain all at once. I’ve been trying to remind myself that you don’t have to have it all figured out to walk forward. You just have to keep stepping. 

Change always asks something of us. It asks us to soften, to surrender a bit of control, to lower standards (we set upon ourselves) a little, to trust that the ground will still be there when we take the next step. The last few weeks are the hardest to explain, but this is where it starts. Letting go. Becoming. Embracing the version of me that’s so close to meeting everything she’s been waiting for.