By Katie Rees, Children’s Librarian
The Fayette County Public Library, a proponent of the Let’s Move in Libraries initiative, was proud to kick off 2025 by partnering with local organization, The Fitness Ranch, to offer a mental fitness class for children in their community. Library staff and Fitness Ranch founders, Coach Q and Nora Pullen, know how stressful life can be and believe it is important for children to learn how to handle stress in a healthy way when it comes into their lives.
The class began with introductions as well as what participants could hope to gain from their attendance. Over the course of the 75-minute class, children would learn how to improve their concentration, boost their confidence, have a stronger mindset, and become more resilient. A strength and conditioning coach as well as a movement therapist, Coach Q was quick to remind the kids that mental fitness is closely tied to physical fitness. He led them through several simple exercises designed to wake up the brain and energize the body. He even gave them homework in the form of a daily assignment since both physical and mental fitness are a lifestyle more than a singular event.
After completing their physical exercises, the children were taught multiple breathing techniques, such as box breathing and meditative breathing, to help them manage stress and improve concentration. Once the breathing techniques had them in a calm, focused headspace, the children were asked to choose a goal they would like to accomplish during the upcoming year and then visualize what it would be like to achieve that goal. Nora Pullen, a mindset-focused life coach, explained to the kids that visualization, creating a detailed image of our success, can be a powerful tool when it comes to realizing the goals we set for ourselves. If the children weren’t quite sure how to reach their goal, they were advised to think of someone who had already achieved a similar goal and find out how they did it.
The last activity of the day reminded the children that, as strong as we can be alone, we are always stronger when we work together. Tying a long rope around his waist, Coach Q challenged one of the children to grab the other end of the rope and try to pull him across the sizable room. When the first child was unable to budge him, Coach Q invited a second child to join them, then a third, and so on. With the addition of each child, it became more and more difficult for Coach Q to hold his ground until he was finally tugged across the room by the triumphant group.
Grinning from their success, the kids returned to their seats for a quick refresher on everything they had learned during their time in class. Coach Q and Nora congratulated them on a job well done and released them back into the care of their parents with one final reminder not to forget about their daily assignment. The day’s class was over, but the children’s journey to becoming the healthiest, most confident versions of themselves was just beginning. Already discussing when their next partnership would take place, the Fayette County Public Library and The Fitness Ranch knew it wasn’t a journey the children would be taking alone.
To learn more, go to https://fayettecountyga.gov/public_library/.
