How Changing My Relationship With My Body Changed My Life And How IT Will Change Yours
Lessons earned from a lifetime performing as an elite athlete
AUG 10, 2026
Hi, my name is Lucien Postlewaite, and I’ve spent the majority of my career pushing the edges of my capacity. I became a principal ballet dancer in one of America’s top ballet companies at 24 and kept pushing the edges of my limits further and further until I retired at my peak at 42.
A lifetime of elite physical and mental training, combined with 23 years of performing at the most committed level of my artistry, earned me a lifetime of lessons. Most often learned the hard way.
I’m here to share my most valuable treasures with you so that you can hopefully avoid some of the painful pitfalls on your way to your highest version of self.
Today we’re uncovering how healing your relationship with your body will improve your life exponentially.
The Blind Spot
“We do far better when we are encouraged and supported toward our goals rather than guilted, shamed, teased, or bullied.”
Researchers in the field of Positive Psychology and my lifetime demanding excellence from my body and mind both come back with the same message: we do far better when we are encouraged and supported toward our goals rather than guilted, shamed, teased, or bullied.
Intuitively, this is a concept most of us can get behind pretty easily. And yet, in practice, the negative tone we can use to speak to or relate to our bodies points to a huge blind spot. How many of us treat our bodies harshly? Talking to it unkindly, depriving it the rest and fuel that it craves.
If you’re not treating your body with the love and kindness it deserves, there is nothing wrong with you. We are a products of the environments you are raised and exist in.
Living in America, with our toxic food systems, diet culture, beauty standards, gender norms and on and on, we are lucky if we don’t develop a warped relationship with ourselves.
Layer in the negativity bias that our ancestors evolved to avoid danger and survive (you have to pay more attention to the tiger hiding in the bush than the berries on said bush if you want to survive) and we are set up nicely to land in relationship with our bodies that is… “complicated.”
Demanding the Superhuman
I spent my life demanding the superhuman from my body. I also spent the beginning of my career in a toxic relationship with it. Looking back, I am amazed I could get my body to do for me what it did, when I treated it the way I did. I had to learn the hard way that my approach was not only unsustainable, but it was keeping me from reaching my highest heights.
“Everything changed for me when I started prioritizing my body’s needs before expecting it to perform at the farthest limits of my capacity.”
I used to see my body as a tool, a resource to extract my goals from. I would burn so hard that I would run myself into the ground, only taking care of my body when it was breaking down. Like taking my car in to get fixed, I’d address the specific acute issue: a pulled muscle, a back spasm, a tweaked ankle. The way I talked to this body was as if it were separate from me: “my body isn’t working.” I would get frustrated, even angry at it, in the moments when it couldn’t perform what I expected.
How many of us burn the candle at both ends and extract more from our bodies than is sustainable? How many of us ask first what our bodies can do for us before asking what we can do for them?
Unlearning in Order to Learn
Over the years, and through my longevity in excellence, I learned to heal. I learned to unlearn the messages fed to me through Western medicine, that our bodies are systems made up of individual parts that can be treated in isolation. The harsh messages that saturated my American cultural context and the ballet industry around body shame and guilt.
The new approach I learned came at a cost. It came after years of what I would now consider long-term, internalized, abusive thought patterns. Thought patterns that had to be broken before they could be fixed.
“We are always limited by the depths of our awareness, so I am graceful with myself that I didn’t know better.”
I’ve come to learn that we are always limited by the depths of our awareness, so I am graceful with myself that I didn’t know better. We cannot see what we are not prepared to see.
I was doing the best I could at the time, and looking from the outside at my accomplishments, it would be easy to claim that what I had been doing was more than working, because I was in the beginning of a wildly successful career.
And yet, a whole new world was about to open up to me when I learned a new way of relating to and working with my body. The old approach, the old me, never could have imagined how radically my new approach would improve my performance and overall wellbeing.
The Old Mindset vs. the New
In my old mindset, if I was going into rehearsal sore, or feeling tired or weak in my legs for example, the old me would have focused on the deficit. I would have been annoyed at my body for not being prepared for peak performance (this only compounded the pain and frustration).
In my new mindset and practice, I start each day with lovingly waking up my body. Tapping and rubbing my legs as part of my warm-up, thanking them for being so strong, thanking them for the incredible work that they help me do, loving them and talking to them.
“I love you body. I’m going to take care of you, so don’t worry.”
As I warm up and throughout the day, I talk to my body, “I love you body. I’m going to take care of you, so don’t worry. You don’t have to hold tension or look out for yourself, because I am going to take great care of you today.”
My healing practice includes releasing the negative, and thanking my body for the miracle it is.
Learning Pre-Care
“Instead of waiting for something to break before taking care of it, I learned pre-care.”
Instead of waiting for something to break before taking care of it my new practice taught me the value of pre-care as well as self-care. With the help of my physical therapists, integrative medicine doctors, mental health therapists, coaches, and mentors, I learned tools to fully resource my body with the rest, fuel, mindset, and environmental exposures that support the superhuman demands I place on it.
I learned that our bodies are not a collection of individual parts, but a beautifully intelligent, integrated, and highly communicative system.
Everything, and I mean everything, in our system communicates and impacts the other, from one far corner of our body to the next.
“I learned that when we listen first, before demanding, we move in integrated alignment and are able to meet each moment fully prepared to be our best.”
Anticipating and caring for my body’s needs enabled me to perform at my peak and continue to sustainably move my edge further and further, until my retirement at 42.
Through this healing process of loving integration, I learned to take immaculate care of my system and found that I became more one with my Self. In this state, I have become available to be more present and prepared to make the most of each moment, from the mundane to the monumental.
Where to Start
Learning to work with your body, rather than fighting it, guilting it, or shaming it, will unlock potential you never could have imagined. And the first step is something you can do right now.
“The first step is listening to your body.”
Next, talking to it. Telling it, in one way or another:
“I love you. I am listening, and I am here for you. You don’t have to take care of yourself alone, because we are a team. We take care of each other.”
