Today we’d like to introduce you to Maria Voisin.
Maria is an NASM certified personal trainer, a Power Pilates 600 Hour Full Comprehensive Certified Instructor, a Professional Ballroom, and Latin dancer for over 15 years, teaches Stand Up Paddleboard, and she is Stretch Therapy Certified and Red Cord Trained. Her specialties include corrective exercise, spine and alignment health, stability training, and post-op rehab from surgery or injury recovery.
Maria believes an active healthy lifestyle is the key to a happy life. She has always been on the go; a ballerina as a child, an athlete through high school, a dancer in college, and continued to dance professionally after graduating. Once a chubby youth, she fought a serious sugar addiction and eventually won. She advocates for a healthy life, in body and mind, and has an endless supply of energy and enthusiasm. Maria loves to travel, try new things – rock climbing and skateboarding currently, and has “the coolest dog in the world”, Oliver.
She is a DVIDA trained Ballroom Instructor, has 15 years experience teaching Salsa, Latin Dance and Afro-Cuban, at universities including UNCA, Blue Ridge Community College, Georgia Institute of Technology, and Emory University, and countless Salsa Congresses and festivals around the country. Maria had her own Latin dance academy and company for over 15 years and danced additionally in the Academy Ballroom Dance Theatre company. She is known for her stage presence, her unique choreography, and her fun and detailed dance classes.
She has been teaching Pilates since 2012 and is certified as a Power Pilates 600 hour Full Apparatus Instructor. She also instructs in Red cord and Stretch therapy, and has an advanced ability to teach using all the tools necessary for her clients to achieve their goals. Maria is patient, funny, and finds unique analogies to help her clients truly comprehend the movement.
Maria inspires her clients to shift the way they see their health and their bodies. Her sincere purpose is to see her clients transform into their best selves. She goes beyond the session to encourage and support her clients to persevere.
Has it been a smooth road?
It’s true that our personal trials and tribulations can be our best assets in life. In order to heal my back and hips from a very intense dance career, I found Pilates and started the rehab and realignment process. I learned more about mindful movement and self-awareness through this process and discovered I was very weak with compromised joint health. After 3 years of teaching Pilates, I wanted to learn more about overall strength and stability training and turned to NASM for that knowledge. With the tools of Stretch, Pilates, Neuromuscular re-education, stability, and strength training, I have gotten much closer to muscular equilibrium and have gained significant strength. It took years for me to define my ‘brand’ as a trainer and health coach, but through years of client experience and feedback, education, and self-analysis, I figured out a pretty adaptive and mindful approach to personal fitness and health. I’m still working hard on my alignment and correctives to be able to rock climb with the big dogs without suffering post- climb back pain, and I’m getting there. To me sitting still is soul crushing, so I refuse to let injury or weakness slow me down!
What were you like growing up?
My childhood was kind of a whirl of perpetual motion, adventure, and running in circles until I fell down. I’m guessing I may have been diagnosed with ADD if it was offered as an explanation for hyper kids back then. I always had the neighborhood kids and cousins involved in a spy mission, a publication to sell on the block, a lemonade stand, or a play to present to the adults – we did an interpretation of Miami Vice. I was a ballet dancer then moved on to athletics; basketball and tennis mainly. There was also tons of tree-climbing and abandoned building investigations. I’ve always pretty much been idled on high, or not idled at all. And always curious, and into learning.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
Hard to choose. Early childhood is my epic first adventure on a catamaran in the Dominican Republic..Hanging off the side and feeling like a superhero. Middle school was rock climbing for the first time at a camp in North Carolina and feeling like a boss.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
Near future is just to build my skill set as a trainer and steadily gain more experience and knowledge about the body so I can get more specialized with rehab and alignment correctives for clients. I want to get strong in mind and body so I can climb more vertical rock faces with a calm mind and steady hands. I’ve had so many big changes already in my life that I’m pretty stoked on subtle and enduring curves in the road for now.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.RoseandKiteFitness.com
- Phone: (828) 280-7880
- Email: Maria@RoseandKiteFitness.com
- Instagram: @rose_and_kite
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RoseandKiteFitness/
