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Speaker 1: wonder Suite. When Laurie mahaalik Levin, CEO of Mindful Return
Speaker 1: and author of Back to Work After Baby, returned to
Speaker 1: work as an attorney after maternity leave, she discovered she
Speaker 1: could find a course on pretty much any baby related
Speaker 1: subject under the sun, but she couldn't find any resources
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Speaker 1: If you're looking for a tool to retain your working parent,
Speaker 1: top talent Mindful Return is for you. Before we start
Speaker 1: this show, I want to take a moment to talk
Speaker 1: about the Supreme Court's decision to take away women's right
Speaker 1: to essential reproductive health care. This show is based on
Speaker 1: the privilege of choice, choice in every aspect of our lives.
Speaker 1: I've been open about the fact that having children had
Speaker 1: an impact on almost every facet of my life, but
Speaker 1: I also chose to have those kids. There are so
Speaker 1: many women who have had to make the difficult decision
Speaker 1: of having an abortion. Having a child should be a
Speaker 1: conscious decision, and if you're not prepared, for any reason whatsoever,
Speaker 1: no one should be forced to have a child. This
Speaker 1: podcast firmly believes in a women's right to bodily autonomy.
Speaker 1: I know this is an extremely heavy time for so
Speaker 1: many of us, so take care and keep fighting. I
Speaker 1: want you to know that this episode has references to
Speaker 1: addiction and suicide. If you or someone you know is struggling,
Speaker 1: call eight hundred two seven three eight two five five
Speaker 1: the National Suicide Hotline, or call the Substance Abuse and
Speaker 1: Mental Health Services Administration Hotline at one eight hundred sixty
Speaker 1: six y two Help. Welcome to She Pivots. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Emily Tish Sussman. I had left my decade long political
Speaker 1: career in DC after having my first two kids during
Speaker 1: the Trump presidency, and felt burnt out after having my
Speaker 1: third child, spending a year in lockdown with my family,
Speaker 1: and another tough and exhausting election. I began to find
Speaker 1: solace in the stories of women who had made these
Speaker 1: big career decisions and then found success and happiness in
Speaker 1: their I began to realize that so many women had
Speaker 1: pivoted due to personal reasons, and they still found success
Speaker 1: through non traditional packs. This new show celebrates these stories,
Speaker 1: and I'm so excited to bring them to you with
Speaker 1: She Pivots. Selena Samuela is well known in the world
Speaker 1: of at home fitness as a star Peloton instructor. She
Speaker 1: hosts strength boxing and my personal favorite, the outdoor runs.
Speaker 1: Her intense but warm classes encourage us to push ourselves
Speaker 1: to the max. An Italian American immigrant, her journey to
Speaker 1: Peloton began many years ago when she found a love
Speaker 1: for surfing and performing while living in Hawaii, but her
Speaker 1: story is defined by a tragedy in her twenties. By
Speaker 1: channeling the strength she found in the healing process. She's
Speaker 1: built a cult following or what she calls her fam.
Speaker 1: What's up, Plato Fama? All right, what's up? Fam? We
Speaker 1: did it? Twenty minute glutes and legs, ten minutes just
Speaker 1: in bad All right, fam, We've got forty five minute
Speaker 1: rock at that boot camp coming up. This is our
Speaker 1: last rock at boot camp for a while. I'm going
Speaker 1: on vacation. I'm Selena Samuela. Well, I guess now, I'm
Speaker 1: Selena Simula Virtue because I'm recently married, and I'm a
Speaker 1: Peloton instructor and I teach classes on the tread and
Speaker 1: on the mat so floor for strength, cardio and boxing,
Speaker 1: and I feel so honored and so blessed that I
Speaker 1: get to do this. This is my job that I
Speaker 1: get to do some of my favorite stuff. I get
Speaker 1: to run, and I get to lift, and I get
Speaker 1: to celebrate some of my favorite artists. A lot of
Speaker 1: people are familiar with you. Peloton is so huge. I
Speaker 1: don't even know the numbers now, but it's all over
Speaker 1: the country. I'm sure a lot of people are familiar
Speaker 1: with you, and those who are new to your classes
Speaker 1: will soon learn, but don't always know that you're from Italy.
Speaker 1: I'm from Italy. Yeah, you speak really without an accent. Yes,
Speaker 1: So I moved to the States at like that perfect
Speaker 1: age that they say you can lose an accent. So
Speaker 1: I moved to the States when I was in fifth grade.
Speaker 1: I was born and raised in Italy. We did a
Speaker 1: little bit of back and forth in the first few years.
Speaker 1: My dad was still in school and my mom is
Speaker 1: from Italy. My father's American. And yeah, I moved to
Speaker 1: the States when I was in fifth grade, and the
Speaker 1: first thing I wanted to do was lose my accent, because,
Speaker 1: as you probably know, kids can be kind of mean
Speaker 1: at that age, you know, I was an outsider. Especially
Speaker 1: the town I moved to is called Elmira, New York,
Speaker 1: and there was certainly no other foreign kids there. I
Speaker 1: was definitely the only immigrant in that school, and I
Speaker 1: was considered weird. How do you feel, I mean, you've
Speaker 1: gone into a little bit, but how do you feel
Speaker 1: like your immigrant experience has impacted your path that it's
Speaker 1: been such a huge catalyst because I had to learn
Speaker 1: how to pivot, pivot and adjust like at such an
Speaker 1: early age. You know, I was essentially taken away from
Speaker 1: my home, my friends, my family, everything that I'd known
Speaker 1: and like plopped in a new world and I had
Speaker 1: to like figure out how to exist and find like
Speaker 1: a new identity as an American girl. In fact, Selena
Speaker 1: truly is an American, although she immigrated at a young
Speaker 1: age from Italy, her father was a citizen. It was
Speaker 1: perhaps the first of many times that she'd need to
Speaker 1: straddle to identities because I was I was also an
Speaker 1: American girl, and I, you know, like my dad's American,
Speaker 1: Like I'm Italian, but I'm also American, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I really wanted to stand my ground and like make
Speaker 1: that known. So I think that, Yeah, I think that
Speaker 1: being an immigrant played a huge role in how I
Speaker 1: approached life, and I think it made it possible for
Speaker 1: me to see the possibility and opportunity in the unknown.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's such an important point to make,
Speaker 1: that we're so quick to categorize people, but we are
Speaker 1: you know, it's duality. It's more than that. We are
Speaker 1: so layered and so many things and can be two
Speaker 1: things at the same time. You can be Italian and
Speaker 1: an immigrant and American at the same time. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: figuring out how to figure out that path absolutely and
Speaker 1: and it's also it was also a lesson in like, Okay,
Speaker 1: this can be scary, but you can make it work.
Speaker 1: Like it's scary, but it's worth it. So you've always
Speaker 1: been active and in Hawaii found a love of surfing,
Speaker 1: but you also found acting around then. Yeah so when
Speaker 1: So when I was in school in Hawaii, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: went to high school in upstate New York. That's you
Speaker 1: know where I moved to Elmira, New York. I was
Speaker 1: there for junior high school, high school, and then I
Speaker 1: ended up going to Hawaii. And I went to school
Speaker 1: in Hawaiian and I loved it, but I didn't feel
Speaker 1: like I wasn't passionate about anything that I was doing,
Speaker 1: Like none in my class as we're really like inspiring me.
Speaker 1: I loved learning about new things. I studied a lot
Speaker 1: of Hawaiian studies when I was there. I was obsessed
Speaker 1: with surfing, so I wanted to learn everything about the land,
Speaker 1: everything about the ocean, everything about this amazing culture that
Speaker 1: cultivated and bred this like this sport that I was
Speaker 1: so obsessed with, and via Aloha spirit, like all of
Speaker 1: it just like really jibed with me, and I was
Speaker 1: really just all about it. And I wanted also to
Speaker 1: just like pay respect to the land, because I like,
Speaker 1: I had such an appreciation for the land and I
Speaker 1: just wanted to, you know, give back. And I did
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff like organizationally, like locally, and that
Speaker 1: was really cool. But I still wasn't like this is
Speaker 1: my path, Like this is what I'm supposed to be
Speaker 1: doing for the rest of my life. I didn't feel
Speaker 1: that then, and so I'd always had this itch to perform.
Speaker 1: I loved performing, and I think part of my obsession
Speaker 1: with surfing too is that I actually had I had
Speaker 1: a chance to perform on a wave, like I was
Speaker 1: creating my own art and my own expression. It was
Speaker 1: like an expression session every time I was on a way,
Speaker 1: like oh, this is me, this is you know. Selena
Speaker 1: knew that she loved theater and performing when she was
Speaker 1: in high school back in New York. She had her
Speaker 1: first taste of it. Although surfing filled part of that void,
Speaker 1: she realized she was missing something and she was forced
Speaker 1: to really examine what brought her joy. When I came
Speaker 1: to a moment where I had to pivot or felt
Speaker 1: like something was coming or felt like, you know, like
Speaker 1: something needed to change, I would always take myself like
Speaker 1: what made you really happy? It take myself back to
Speaker 1: that place, like what's something that made you really happy
Speaker 1: that you didn't fully get to explore that like you
Speaker 1: should do. And that's when I decided, you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna move to New York. I'm gonna study acting
Speaker 1: and I'm going to write. I want to be a writer, director,
Speaker 1: an actor. I want to do all the things. That
Speaker 1: was really just what I felt I wanted to do.
Speaker 1: So I did it. I just knew like there was
Speaker 1: just something in me that like physically, I couldn't stay
Speaker 1: there anymore. I had to try this thing out. And
Speaker 1: I was like, I know, I can always come back
Speaker 1: to Hawaii, but I need to try. And so I did.
Speaker 1: I you know, dove in head first, and then a
Speaker 1: lot of things happened from there. But that eventually did
Speaker 1: lead me to Peloton in a really weird way. And
Speaker 1: so that's where I ended up kind of leaning towards
Speaker 1: like when I auditioned for UH I audition for a
Speaker 1: number of schools. I auditioned for Yale, I auditioned for RATA,
Speaker 1: I auditioned for Juilliard, and I always chose I would
Speaker 1: choose one ingreeneu and like one kind of charactery character,
Speaker 1: whether it was like, you know, you have to have
Speaker 1: two monologues like Shakespeare and then contemporary. So I'd always
Speaker 1: have one of each. And I wonder if I made
Speaker 1: the wrong choice, because I always ended up choosing the
Speaker 1: character you want, like the character actor piece, rather than
Speaker 1: the like the ingreeneu. And I you know, I didn't
Speaker 1: get I didn't get picked. And so in that time
Speaker 1: when you were acting, you met a boyfriend who eventually
Speaker 1: became a fiance. Yeah, and so, I mean, this is
Speaker 1: a tough story, but yeah, so I met this amazingly talented,
Speaker 1: smart just all the things, like checked all the boxes,
Speaker 1: this person who wanted to do all the things I
Speaker 1: wanted to do, wanted to act, wanted to direct, wanted
Speaker 1: to write, just such a talented writer. We were just
Speaker 1: so we were so on par He even spoke more
Speaker 1: languages than I did. Yeah, and I just fell head
Speaker 1: over heels. Yeah, how did you guys meet? So we
Speaker 1: met through a mutual friend. It was a friend's birthday party.
Speaker 1: And you know, I don't know, I just I think
Speaker 1: I was in a place where I was I got
Speaker 1: to a place like this a lot, but I had
Speaker 1: already been like whatever, I don't you know, I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'm about my career, like I have this thing that
Speaker 1: I want to do, like I don't care about having
Speaker 1: a boyfriend right now. And I was young. But it just,
Speaker 1: you know, it happened as it does when you're in
Speaker 1: your early twenties and didn't move kind of quickly. It
Speaker 1: moved so fast. It moved so so fast to the
Speaker 1: point where where I mean, now, looking back, I'm like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: OUs obvious red flags that I just didn't understand because
Speaker 1: I was like twenty two or something, you know, I
Speaker 1: was so young. We were together for four years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we moved in together really really quickly. I was in love.
Speaker 1: I thought this was the person. We were going to
Speaker 1: do everything, Like you said, we're going to conquer the
Speaker 1: world together. We're just we're going to make it and
Speaker 1: we're going to do amazing things. And it started off great.
Speaker 1: We were like bouncing ideas off each other, sharing our
Speaker 1: idea like our scripts, reading our work, you know, doing
Speaker 1: monologues together, stuff like that. It just felt so right.
Speaker 1: We moved in together, a first boyfriend I ever lived with,
Speaker 1: and it just boom like felt like magic and it
Speaker 1: was so amazing. Then six months into it, I learned
Speaker 1: that he was an addict, and I literally, in my
Speaker 1: life had never experienced anything like that before. I don't
Speaker 1: have any I didn't have any understanding of it, Like
Speaker 1: my parents don't really drink. There's no like alcohol, there's
Speaker 1: no addiction in my family. It didn't like so maybe
Speaker 1: there were signs. I couldn't have picked up on them
Speaker 1: because I wouldn't have known what they were. But six
Speaker 1: months into the relationship, there were It just became like
Speaker 1: there were things that started happening that were like painfully obvious.
Speaker 1: And then the more it became, you know, indoctrinated into
Speaker 1: his world and became friends with his friends, it's the
Speaker 1: pieces started kind of coming together and information started kind
Speaker 1: of slipping, and I started to like kind of get
Speaker 1: the picture that this wasn't the first time, and that like,
Speaker 1: you know, the first time that he had had problems
Speaker 1: with drug abuse and alcohol abust and that it was
Speaker 1: like this is like a career for him. Essentially. It
Speaker 1: was what was that conversation like when you found out?
Speaker 1: I think that that's really when I started doing all
Speaker 1: of the things things that now I understand are you know,
Speaker 1: the wrong things. But that's like when I started either
Speaker 1: making excuses or coming up with ideas on how I
Speaker 1: was going to fix it. And like it's a great
Speaker 1: quality that I have is that I want to help people,
Speaker 1: and and I am very optimistic, and I can always like, Okay,
Speaker 1: there's a way out of this, like we can do it.
Speaker 1: Like yeah, but it you know, in a case like this,
Speaker 1: it can be detrimental to to someone's well being and
Speaker 1: to my own well being. But I was losing myself
Speaker 1: in it regardless because and I think I don't know
Speaker 1: if that was a good thing, because he would start
Speaker 1: to do well and kind of get get into a
Speaker 1: good place where he wasn't abusing drugs or alcohol for
Speaker 1: a while, and I'd be like, Okay, I see the
Speaker 1: proof is in the pudding, like it works, like we're
Speaker 1: doing it, and I would, but I was doing so
Speaker 1: much of the work. I was doing so much of
Speaker 1: the work. And I mean this is when people say,
Speaker 1: like you can, like you can't want it for them,
Speaker 1: They have to want it for themselves because like it
Speaker 1: can work for a little bit, and it did, but
Speaker 1: it will eventually fall apart. But in the process. I
Speaker 1: was really losing myself because all of my focus was
Speaker 1: going to keeping him healthy and keeping him working. So
Speaker 1: did it fight with your like, with your vision of yourself,
Speaker 1: with your own ambition. Yeah. And I think it took
Speaker 1: a while before I understood even understood that because I
Speaker 1: got so lost and enveloped in him and his world.
Speaker 1: I was just really like almost obsessive. It was toxic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I can only imagine. Yeah, And quite frankly, I don't
Speaker 1: even really know how to ask this question, but I mean,
Speaker 1: can you tell us what happened to him? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: struggle with this for a number of reasons because I
Speaker 1: want to be respectful to him, his memory as family
Speaker 1: members who are remaining. But you know, I also think
Speaker 1: that it is a I think that there are probably
Speaker 1: many people out there that are experiencing something similar to me.
Speaker 1: And I also think that this is not I'm not
Speaker 1: an outlier. This is a prominent issue in our country
Speaker 1: right now. There are a lot of people that are
Speaker 1: suffering from I mean, they call it like it's like
Speaker 1: essentially an epidemic, like's there's a real there's a problem.
Speaker 1: So lex was eventually like in our relationship, one of
Speaker 1: the downs got really bad. I gave him an ultimatum.
Speaker 1: He went to rehabit. He did really really well for
Speaker 1: a while, eight months actually eight months clean seemed like
Speaker 1: it was we were on a good trajectory. He went
Speaker 1: out to rehab in Los Angeles while I stayed in
Speaker 1: New York. But he had a relapse and I Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: How did you manage that? I didn't at first, I
Speaker 1: honestly did did nothing like. I did nothing. I froze.
Speaker 1: I mean I would, like, you know, cry and have
Speaker 1: literally scream because I felt so powerless, and I myself
Speaker 1: had like I struggled with depression anxiety. I was very,
Speaker 1: very sad. I was a sad person. I sheltered myself
Speaker 1: from the world. I wasn't pursuing my career anymore. I
Speaker 1: stopped writing, I stopped I even stopped reading, Like, I
Speaker 1: stopped doing most of anything except for feeling sorry for
Speaker 1: myself for almost an entire year. What was your support
Speaker 1: system like then? Well, I shut a lot of people out.
Speaker 1: I don't like, I don't know what exactly got me
Speaker 1: to start trying again, or what like got me to
Speaker 1: recognize the hope that still existed. Do you remember was
Speaker 1: it like one moment when you started to see yourself
Speaker 1: come out of it. Yeah, So I think it was
Speaker 1: kind of a slow process. So it started, you know
Speaker 1: with like writing again. I started playing music again. I
Speaker 1: play guitar. I'm not great, but I play guitar and
Speaker 1: I like to I like to write songs. So I
Speaker 1: started to do all the like cathartic stuff, right, the
Speaker 1: things that like again I knew that I like the
Speaker 1: things I loved, and like, find the things that you
Speaker 1: love and start doing them, or maybe find the things
Speaker 1: you love and you haven't fully explored, and you know,
Speaker 1: started started working on my songwriting again, started working on
Speaker 1: my even if I knew it wasn't necessarily going to
Speaker 1: be a career, but just doing it to like get
Speaker 1: it out, like and find a little joy maybe, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because even if I was writing sad songs, you know,
Speaker 1: or songs about my experience, there is catharsis and there
Speaker 1: is joy, and there's like there's you want to keep
Speaker 1: doing it, you know, because it feels good. Yeah. Do
Speaker 1: you think you had felt guilty about finding joy during
Speaker 1: that first year? That's I'm so glad that you brought
Speaker 1: that up, because I think that that that a lot
Speaker 1: of that, A lot of my kind of pushing people
Speaker 1: away had to do with guilt. Like I think there
Speaker 1: was a part of me that was like why, Like
Speaker 1: why do I get to like to not have the
Speaker 1: same kind of problems that you had, like and to
Speaker 1: still be here and like like live. I think there
Speaker 1: was definitely like a part of me that was like
Speaker 1: why my special There came a point where I I decided,
Speaker 1: you know, I started kind of a little by little
Speaker 1: the journaling, the music did it, and then I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: what else, Selena like, let's go back, Let's really go back.
Speaker 1: Let's let's find these like moments of like pure joy.
Speaker 1: And I was like moving my body, surfing in Hawaii,
Speaker 1: going on your runs, having a routine. So that's when
Speaker 1: I started doing some fitness classes in New York City,
Speaker 1: and then I was doing some like boxing for fitness classes.
Speaker 1: And then I totally did this crazy thing. I dropped everything,
Speaker 1: quit my bar jobs, quit like the all the stuff
Speaker 1: that was unhealthy, quit everything and went to Indonesia. As
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Speaker 1: Some show me how that her best friend from Hawaii
Speaker 1: was living there at the time, and after the trials
Speaker 1: of the year before, she knew she just needed to
Speaker 1: get out. And I was like, you know what, I'm
Speaker 1: going to go out there and I'm going to surf
Speaker 1: and I'm going to spend time with one of my
Speaker 1: kick ass girlfriends who's just a total badass, like living
Speaker 1: her best life, like starting her own business, like doing
Speaker 1: the thing. And I was like, you know what, I'm
Speaker 1: going to go out there. I'm going to just like
Speaker 1: soak in all this like good energy for my girl,
Speaker 1: and I'm just going to go out and surf every
Speaker 1: day and like try to recenter myself because at that point,
Speaker 1: I was like kind of coming out of it. I
Speaker 1: was like, all right, like you got to do something
Speaker 1: like yeah, this isn't this isn't you like he died,
Speaker 1: you didn't, right, Like you you're alive and there's a
Speaker 1: reason why you're alive, and you like being alive, remember,
Speaker 1: so come on, girl, get it together. Like so that's
Speaker 1: what I did. I went out there, I and I
Speaker 1: I surfed and I read. I read tons of books.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. I was like I was a voracious
Speaker 1: reader to begin with it. That that summer, I was
Speaker 1: like just ingesting so much so when I I did
Speaker 1: end up going back to New York because I'm like,
Speaker 1: you're not done, you know, like this is this is
Speaker 1: there was a dream that you had go pursue your dream.
Speaker 1: Went back to New York. Was doing a lot of
Speaker 1: my fitness boxing stuff. One of my friends, who was
Speaker 1: a stunt coordinator, was like, you know, you're still trying
Speaker 1: to get your SAD card and you're still trying to
Speaker 1: do the acting thing right, And I'm like, yeah, totally
Speaker 1: is like you should get into stunt work because you'll
Speaker 1: like you're perfect for it, Like you're you do all
Speaker 1: these sports, like you're super fit and like, you know
Speaker 1: the boxing thing, like you can make that your fight technique.
Speaker 1: And I was like, great, okay, sure, why not? So
Speaker 1: I went to stunt school. So that's how I kind
Speaker 1: of got into boxing, deeper into boxing because I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: I got to perfect this fight technique so I can
Speaker 1: look like a you know, real pro when I'm a
Speaker 1: stunt when I get hired as a stunt person and
Speaker 1: then I got into like I got into boxing in
Speaker 1: a real way. Somebody was like, you're pretty good at that,
Speaker 1: you should fight, and so I started actually competing and boxing.
Speaker 1: But that's how I ended up getting recruit into teaching
Speaker 1: group fitness. So there was like a little boxing shadow
Speaker 1: box was this. I don't know if it's still around,
Speaker 1: but it was a boutique kind of fitness studio that
Speaker 1: focused on boxing. And then I started doing personal training
Speaker 1: as well, and I was like, this is a great
Speaker 1: This is so much better than you know, working in
Speaker 1: a bar and trying to get a job as an actor.
Speaker 1: So at the time, I was still kind of had
Speaker 1: this like dream that maybe I would still pursue acting,
Speaker 1: but it was started to fade at that point because
Speaker 1: the deeper I got in the fitness, the more I
Speaker 1: was just like, this is kind of like I'm utilizing
Speaker 1: all the skills that that I'm like just naturally that
Speaker 1: I'm naturally good at, right, like being an athlete, but
Speaker 1: also being a performer and being able to like convey
Speaker 1: important information to like help help people kind of lift
Speaker 1: themselves up. Yeah, So it was just like this perfect
Speaker 1: fit this perfect marriage. This is perfect belonge of all
Speaker 1: my skills, and I really was just enjoying doing the
Speaker 1: fitness thing. While teaching her classes, Selena found a strong
Speaker 1: community and eventually met a student who would change her life.
Speaker 1: Rebecca Kennedy was the master instructor for the Tribe program
Speaker 1: and recruiter for Peloton, and she made a proposal to Selena,
Speaker 1: and she recruited me to audition for Peloton. And you know,
Speaker 1: Peloton's literally the dream job. It's all of the things
Speaker 1: that I love. It's all of the things. Do you
Speaker 1: still get that same performing fix on camera even without
Speaker 1: the live audience? Honestly, it's so much better. I just
Speaker 1: went to see a play yesterday and I just remembered
Speaker 1: how hard acting is, and I was like, I get
Speaker 1: to perform, but as myself, Like, right, it is so
Speaker 1: much better, Like I feel, it's not so heady. I
Speaker 1: don't have to like get into this other headspace where
Speaker 1: I'm this other person and then come back to me
Speaker 1: and maybe get confused in the in between, which I
Speaker 1: think happens with a lot of like great performers. And
Speaker 1: I just I'm like, I get to actually just be myself,
Speaker 1: but also just like be a star for a moment.
Speaker 1: You know. I'm a Peloton user. I take all of
Speaker 1: your classes. I find them very inspiring over the last
Speaker 1: I started using Peloton right after I had my first
Speaker 1: kid about five years ago. But then I kind of
Speaker 1: dropped off in the middle because I had gained a
Speaker 1: lot of weight with my pregnancies and got really out
Speaker 1: of shape and it felt I don't know, I just
Speaker 1: I couldn't. I was like so depressed about it, like
Speaker 1: everything just felt too much and depressing. And after the
Speaker 1: third kid, during the pandemic, I thought, Okay, I've got
Speaker 1: to get my life together. I got to start doing this.
Speaker 1: And that was right around when you guys launched Peloton Outdoor.
Speaker 1: So I started using the outdoor walks. I started with
Speaker 1: just the walks, and then I moved up to like
Speaker 1: the walk runs, and then like got myself into the runs. Yes,
Speaker 1: and I lost forty five pounds last year and five months. Oh,
Speaker 1: that is so amazing. Congratulation. And I've taken all of
Speaker 1: your classes and did it with your classes, Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1: And it really kept me going. Like I liked the
Speaker 1: way that you spoke to me. It felt not judgmental.
Speaker 1: Like it was okay that I could start where I
Speaker 1: was starting. How do you prepare for your classes? There's
Speaker 1: so much encouraging conversation, like do you think about what
Speaker 1: stories you're gonna tell ahead of time? Yeah? Sometimes? And
Speaker 1: I think that's that's great that you touched on that,
Speaker 1: that it's okay to start where you are. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think I'm just primed to tell that story because
Speaker 1: like I had to do that too, you know, And
Speaker 1: and if I didn't do that, I wouldn't have gotten
Speaker 1: anywhere at all. Like you, the best way to like
Speaker 1: success is to start. You gotta start right, you know.
Speaker 1: You know what's wild too, is all this I have
Speaker 1: these wild stories along the way from auditions that like,
Speaker 1: from things that I didn't get that had I gotten them,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be in the place that I am now.
Speaker 1: One of the girls that worked the front desk at
Speaker 1: shadow Box auditioned this same year, same week that I
Speaker 1: auditioned at Yale, did the monologue that I chose of
Speaker 1: the entree that I chose not to do, got into Yale,
Speaker 1: seriously got into Yale. And then she was working front
Speaker 1: desk and she was like, I hate my life. I
Speaker 1: am so in debt, like I can't get any parts,
Speaker 1: and I was just like, oh my god, I could
Speaker 1: be you. I mean, do you feel like you found success?
Speaker 1: Like what do you how do you define success to you? Well,
Speaker 1: I think that, Well, god, that's so hard. I think
Speaker 1: there's so many different ways to define success. But I
Speaker 1: think feeling, you know, right now, being married, being in
Speaker 1: a job that I love, working with people that I
Speaker 1: love to work with. We have such a great culture
Speaker 1: at Peloton, Like it's just it's such a great space
Speaker 1: to be creative. I don't actually I don't actually think
Speaker 1: about like what am I going to do next? Because
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about like what cool program and am I
Speaker 1: going to come up with next? So right now, my
Speaker 1: folks is like currently at Peloton and like how to
Speaker 1: come up with like better content for the members. Selena
Speaker 1: has a way of connecting with her members. In her
Speaker 1: focus and drive to provide top tier instruction, she always
Speaker 1: makes sure to make space for anyone and everyone. She
Speaker 1: is a partner of the Trevor Project and continues to
Speaker 1: prioritize making safe spaces for anyone who takes her classes
Speaker 1: or comes across her platform. I think I definitely think
Speaker 1: about the member, and I think the member can be
Speaker 1: so many different people, so I do try to think
Speaker 1: of a broad I try to be as inclusive as
Speaker 1: possible in my language, but I see myself in members.
Speaker 1: So in a way, I know this is going to
Speaker 1: sound really weird, but I like kind of it's like
Speaker 1: how I talk to myself. So I talk to you
Speaker 1: in the way that I talk to myself because I'm like,
Speaker 1: I know I know how you feel because I am you.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned that you recently got married. How did
Speaker 1: you meet your husband and was that When did you
Speaker 1: tell him? When did you tell him your story? I
Speaker 1: told him my story like pretty right away, like early on,
Speaker 1: because some people could be spooked by something like that,
Speaker 1: and I just didn't want skeletons. I didn't want it
Speaker 1: to and I also didn't want to make it seem
Speaker 1: like it was that it was a trauma that I
Speaker 1: hadn't dealt with, and you know what I mean, that
Speaker 1: it was something that was going to come up and
Speaker 1: affect us and the way that we could grow together.
Speaker 1: And had he met me maybe two years earlier, it
Speaker 1: would have been and I don't think I would have
Speaker 1: been able to be comfortable telling him immediately, but I
Speaker 1: told him right away and he was such a champ
Speaker 1: about it. I think he just knew. He also knew
Speaker 1: that like that doesn't and that didn't define me, like
Speaker 1: you know, because he's just like such a cool dude.
Speaker 1: Was there was there anything? Just looking back now, is
Speaker 1: there something? Was there a moment in your life where
Speaker 1: you felt like, Uh, this thing that is happening to
Speaker 1: me right now, this is insurmountable, like I don't know
Speaker 1: how I'm going to get out of this, And now
Speaker 1: that you look back on it, it set you up
Speaker 1: on a positive trajectory. Yes. I think the year that
Speaker 1: I talked about where I did nothing and I was like, oh, this,
Speaker 1: I'm incredibly unsuccessful on the this is the opposite of
Speaker 1: the success story. I think that year was so important,
Speaker 1: like allowing myself the space and the grace to grieve,
Speaker 1: to be sad, to not expect a lot out of
Speaker 1: me because you can't. You can't when you're in that place.
Speaker 1: And to also understand that feelings can't be erased, they
Speaker 1: can't be fixed. You can metabolize feelings, you can kind
Speaker 1: of break it down, but you can't you can't like switch,
Speaker 1: you can't switch it on and off. Right. I think
Speaker 1: that that was so so important, like learning basically learning
Speaker 1: that in that time and giving myself that space and
Speaker 1: being able to say, like, you are worthy of something better, right,
Speaker 1: despite this ugly year that you had, you are worthy.
Speaker 1: I think there's something that I say a lot in
Speaker 1: my class that if you don't take my class. It's
Speaker 1: one of my favorite sayings is that fears are valid,
Speaker 1: but they're not trustworthy. Thank you so much, selenas'm well,
Speaker 1: it's been a pleasure to have you on and Dolly, yes,
Speaker 1: so much fun. Thank you for having us. Selena still
Speaker 1: works as an instructor for Peloton. She has started for
Speaker 1: Rock That boot camp classes and is continuing to pursue
Speaker 1: the things that bring her joy. This spring, she married
Speaker 1: her husband, Matt Virtue in a dreamy Florida ceremony, and
Speaker 1: they're now expecting their first baby. They live with their dog, Dolly,
Speaker 1: who made a guest appearance during our interview. To learn
Speaker 1: more about Selena, follow us on Instagram at she Pivots
Speaker 1: the podcast. Thank you for listening to this episode of
Speaker 1: She Pivots. Writ talk with women about how their experiences
Speaker 1: and significant personal events led to their pivot and eventually
Speaker 1: their success. Leave a rating in comment if you enjoyed
Speaker 1: this episode wherever you listen to podcasts to help others
Speaker 1: learn about it. A special thank you to our partner
Speaker 1: Marie Claire and the team that made this episode possible.
Speaker 1: Talk to you next week. Tired of ads interrupting your
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