Exercise is often the most neglected tool in our wellness arsenal. Not only is fitness uncomfortable as we begin and progress, but precious time can be hard to come by between work, extracurricular commitments, and social engagements. The excuses for neglecting our fitness are endless, so we turn to miserable diets to supplement our lack of physical activity.
But what if we could find balance in our daily lives between work, family, social commitments, and fitness? What if regular exercise felt as routine as taking a shower, going to a hair appointment, or making dinner?
This balanced approach to wellness is a motto Rebecca Harper lives by. The Body Balance founder and fitness instructor grew up in Louisiana, attending Louisiana State University, where she met her husband and earned a degree in elementary education. Harper’s background in gymnastics and dance, no doubt, fueled the foundation for her love of pilates and barre; however, her journey to opening her homey movement studio at Crystal Flats didn’t begin until well into motherhood.
“We moved to Denver for a little bit, but when we started having kids, we moved to Arkansas, where my husband is from. I knew I wanted to be a mom, and this was always our plan: to put all of my time into raising our kids.”
A decade into raising three children with husband Leeth, Harper had effectively put movement on the back burner; her identity had become so interwoven with her family that she described feeling a little lost.
“I had lost myself in motherhood,” she said. “I didn’t have any way to connect back into myself; I was constantly pouring out.”
Looking for a place to reintroduce herself to fitness, she says she ‘stalked’ a studio online for a year before stepping through the doors for a barre class. “I loved it. With my background in dance, it felt like getting back to myself.”
Soon after, Harper’s barre instructor invited her to join her in taking Tracey Mallett’s pilates and barre teacher trainings. “I didn’t intend to teach, so when I found out how much the lessons were, I was going to back out. But my husband encouraged me to go even if I didn’t end up teaching. I think he saw that I had this spark again. So, I went, and it just felt like, this is where I’m supposed to be.”
Harper spent the next decade teaching pilates and barre classes throughout her community, reallizing that, one day, she wanted to open her own studio. At first, she envisioned a classic studio with barre and floor pilates, but when she visited a friend’s Ohio studio to do some recon, she fell in love with the reformer machine.
“It was the first thing I’d ever done where I felt my core immediately; it’s not a buildup, you can’t cheat at it.”
After years of teaching, 2020 was around the time Harper felt ready to start planning for her studio, and she had her eye on the Crysal Flatts project. Living in the area, she and her neighbors were apprehensive about the mixed use development, but something told her, ‘Maybe God has a plan and this is where my studio is meant to be.’
Harper met her business partner, Elda Scott, on a walk when she had first moved to NWA. “I was 25 and a new mom in a new place; I think she could see I needed a friend.”
She and Scott formed a fast friendship and, as neighbors with children around the same age, spent many play dates and special occasions together. While Harper began unpacking plans to open her own business, the pandemic was forcing folks out of gyms and studios, so Scott asked Harper to train her at home. Listening to Harper’s dreams to open her own studio, Scott asked if she could be a part of it.
“I’m a little bit more of an owner than she is, just because it’s my passion, but she’s a great partner and sounding board for me. I’ve never owned a business before, so I can always go right to her and she grounds me.”
When I asked Harper how she came up with the brand, Body Balance, she said it had a lot to do with her own journey to finding balance in wellness after having kids. Her Instagram @Balancing_Rebecca is a place where Harper likes to share her life as a wife, mom, fitness lover, and business owner, so ‘balance’ was her word.
Body Balance may seem like an on-the-nose name for an XFormer pilates and barre studio, but for Harper, she’s creating a space to shift her students’ mindset about wellness.
“You name it, I’ve said it – any excuse you can think of to no work out,” she said. “I think the thing that keeps us from committing is the mindset –it’s not sustainable. We want to work out to look good, or because it's bikini season; that mindset needs to shift to wellness. How does it make you feel? Not just during the workout, but after. Does it make you feel good? Do I feel good when I don't do it?”
One of the reasons Harper focused so much on atmosphere when designing her studio was because she wanted Body Balance to feel like home. “This needs to be a place where they feel comfortable, so they can focus on what they want for their life rather than the moment. Instead of looking good for a wedding, they focus on things like, ‘I want to live long. I want to be pain-free. I don't want to be on this medication, or I want to play with my grandkids.’”
“I always tease people about squats. We have to get our knees to bend because if we don’t, what comes next is someone has to help us off the toilet.”
She described witnessing this exact scenario with a loved one, and how painful it can be to see someone you care about so frail and vulnerable. So, the Body Balance founder uses this and her own experience with starting over as motivation to keep moving and encouraging others to do the same.
“Some people go on vacation and feel like they have to start over, but it comes back quicker as long as you keep going. You just have to keep moving. That's why it’s called a movement studio and not a fitness studio.”
Body Balance promotes cross-training to avoid plateaus. Instead of just Xformer classes or just traditional Pilates and Barre, members have access to both in one studio. Body Balance also offers rebound classes, yoga, and weight training.
Learn more at www.BodyBalanceNWA.com and on Instagram @BodyBalance_NWA.
“This needs to be a place where they feel comfortable, so they can focus on what they want for their life."
“I always tease people about squats. We have to get our knees to bend because if we don’t, what comes next is someone has to help us off the toilet.”