Fit­ness isn’t just about phys­i­cal strength—it’s al­so about men­tal strength and con­fi­dence.

That’s what per­son­al train­er Kelon Philbert tells clients at her Sum Ting Sweet Fit Gym in Lange Park, Ch­agua­nas, to help them over­come self-doubt.

Philbert said many of her clients strug­gle to be­lieve in them­selves, and she mo­ti­vates them by show­ing them what they are ca­pa­ble of and help­ing them achieve their fit­ness goals.

Philbert said she had her strug­gles with self-doubt.

She has al­ways been ac­tive, even be­fore she de­cid­ed to pur­sue a fit­ness ca­reer.

Af­ter fin­ish­ing school, there wasn’t much to do, and a friend sug­gest­ed they start go­ing to the gym. Philbert agreed and start­ed work­ing out, do­ing weights and aer­o­bics.

Then one day an aer­o­bics in­struc­tor asked if she ever thought about be­com­ing a per­son­al train­er. When he ex­plained what it en­tailed she was im­me­di­ate­ly in­ter­est­ed.

Philbert has been a train­er for more than 15 years bu at first, as a woman in the fit­ness in­dus­try, it was hard for peo­ple to see her as a cred­i­ble train­er.

Her ad­vice to any­one pur­su­ing fit­ness goals is: “Sur­round your­self with pos­i­tive peo­ple who will push you, keep you learn­ing, and en­cour­age you to step out­side your com­fort zone.

“And nev­er for­get to pray—keep God at the cen­tre of every­thing you do. Your jour­ney will have its ups and downs, but it’s im­por­tant to keep mov­ing for­ward and trust­ing the process.

“Be­lieve in your­self, and the re­sults will come.”

Philbert said one of her great­est joys is see­ing her clients achieve their goals whether it’s build­ing strength, get­ting health­i­er, or just gain­ing more con­fi­dence.

“Be­ing part of their jour­ney makes all the hard work worth­while, through the pow­er of con­sis­ten­cy, ded­i­ca­tion, and stay­ing true to them­selves,” she said.