In this episode of Out of the Clouds, host Anne Muhlethaler interviews celebrity fitness trainer and former ballerina Julie Granger. Anne came across Julie via an online recommendation and was immediately struck not only by the instructor’s passion for teaching and the effectiveness of her classes (particularly Brooklyn Barre), but also by the combination of her warmth and dry sense of humour.
In this interview, they dig into Julie’s journey from the outskirts of Paris to the Boston Ballet, why she left her ballerina career behind, and how she decided to pursue new callings, including yoga, fitness and entrepreneurship.
Currently based between Paris and Lisbon, Julie explains how she is ‘three-quarters teacher’, and why she is not teaching by default but as a choice since it’s something she truly loves. Having opened her first studio the week before the first COVID lockdown in 2020, the ex-ballerina opens up on the difficulties she faced then and how grateful she is to have been able to continue to lead her community of students (her ‘Squad,’ as she calls them) virtually.
Anne and Julie discuss the competitive culture of celebrity trainers in New York and the benefits of discipline and passion. Julie also shares how she wants to offer her students not just the benefits of a toned and energised body but for them to have a great time while engaging with fitness, as well as how she hopes to make the benefits of ballet available to all. Finally, Julie covers how she’s learned to be kinder to herself, as we often are our own harshest critics, and why kindness is what matters most.
A passionate, wise, and spirited interview. Happy listening!
Selected Links from Episode
You can find Julie at https://www.julie-granger.com/
or follow her on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/jujuonther0cks/
Her classes are available at https://thestudioparis.com/
https://www.instagram.com/thestudioparis/
The Boston Ballet – https://www.bostonballet.org/home.aspx
The Joffrey Ballet in Chicago – https://joffrey.org/
Pure Yoga New York – http://pureyoga.com/
Keep the Faith by Michael Jackson – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIEiP7kzGjI
Follow that Dream by Elvis Prestley – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zD0xsv2BHFw
La Dame aux Camélias – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Dame_aux_Cam%C3%A9lias
Full Episode Transcript
Anne Muhlethaler:
Hi. Hello, and Namaste. This is Out of The Clouds, a podcast at the crossroads between business and mindfulness, and I’m your host, Anne Muhlethaler. Today my guest is celebrity fitness trainer and former ballerina, Julie Granger. I came across Julie in what I would like to call a twist of fate, just at a time last year where I really wanted to explore ballet and dance. I can easily say that I’m very Zoom-friendly, so I’m used to work and exercising online since 2017. So I very easily jumped into one of her online classes. And what immediately struck me with Julie is her passion for teaching, how fun and yet terribly difficult some of her classes are, but made much easier by her warmth and her sense of humor.
Anne Muhlethaler:
So I was really excited to talk to her about her ‘parcour’, her journey from the banlieue of Paris, to the Boston Ballet, the career that she left behind, and also how she pursued her new callings as a yoga, then fitness instructor, an entrepreneur. And she tells me how she wants to make the benefits of ballet available to all. It was a real pleasure to talk to her, and I’m hoping that you’ll enjoy our conversation as much as I did. Happy listening.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Julie, it’s such a pleasure to see you today. Welcome to Out Of The Clouds.
Julie Granger:
Thank you so much for having me.
Anne Muhlethaler:
So tell me, where are we finding you today?
Julie Granger:
So today I’m in Paris, which is about almost half the time. I split my time between Paris and Lisbon, but today is where I am in Paris.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Wonderful. I love to start by asking all of my guests to tell their story quite freely and tell us who you are, where you from, and what you do today.
Julie Granger:
Okay. Thank you. Okay. I’m going to try to give you the story here. I am originally from the suburbs of Paris, so that’s where I was born. I started ballet as a hobby because my mom always danced at age seven. I didn’t know that was going to be something so important in my life at the time, but I did grow a huge passion for it. And when I was a teenager my parents were… Well, my teachers were always saying, “She has a lot of talent. She should go to a proper school,” but my dad was not so much into that, I guess. So I had my teenager crisis when I was 16 and I said, “Okay, no, I need to dance. I’ve been four years wanting to dance.” That’s all I could think about.
Julie Granger:
And so I went to secretly audition to this very good school with my mom, I didn’t tell my dad. And then a few weeks later we found out I was accepted into what was a youth company. It was really proper, very challenging training, and I was very late because you don’t start professional ballet at age 16, you start at age nine. He let me go, but he was not really happy about it. And that’s where everything really started for me. I did my entire high school in Paris while I was still living in the suburb, so I had like a three hour commute every day, I was training four hours a day in ballet. And I had a lot of pressure to still, because I was like always first of the class, like model student.
Julie Granger:
So I had a lot of pressure to keep those grades up, because my dad was just really mad at me I think for wanting to be a dancer. So I did that, and then when I graduated from high school, I had an injury, a foot injury. And because I graduated with good grades, they allowed me to take a year off, and that was for me to train in ballet some more, and then audition to ballet companies. But my dad had a very good call, he said, “I don’t want you to just do that. You go learn English for two months somewhere.” And that’s where I ended up in Boston, and I was not supposed to dance because I had this small injury. And I actually took my little ballet slippers and started taking class at Boston Ballet. And little did I know at the time when I would just go take class, they noticed me there and they say, “You should audition here.”
Julie Granger:
I’m 18 at the time, and so I did. And the day before I’m supposed to go back to Paris after my two month English learning I get no news from them, so I call and I say, “Listen, I guess I was not accepted, but could you tell me why, because I would like to know what I should be working on?” And they said, “What? You didn’t get the letter? Of course, you got accepted.” And I was like, “What?” At 18 years old here I am calling my parents, “Mom, dad, I actually got into the pre-professional program at Boston Ballet,” which was like a dream. I mean for me it was a something unattainable because I started so late, and I would always look at Boston Ballet’s website.
Julie Granger:
It really where the dream really started at that point because for me it was something I could… Just ending up surrounded with these dancers and in this school, very, very proper training and everything. So, that’s how I ended up in Boston, and I stayed there for a year and a half and then I went to Joffrey Ballet in Chicago. And this is where after all these efforts and just really wanting to dance, and I’m skipping through all the hard teenager that I had because you get yelled at, and I had very long commutes. I would wake up at 5:00 AM, take a 7:00 AM train every day, Monday through Saturday. All of these just to get yelled at that you’re not this and you’re not that, and all these things.
Julie Granger:
But anyway, once I got to Joffrey in Chicago, I just felt somewhat uninspired by this entire world. And I had this injury that was the same from the one that I told you about before, was a foot injury. And I just felt, “Okay, so what do I do now? What should I do?” And because I didn’t know that… It’s like if I had done all these efforts, and all of a sudden I woke up and I got to think. It’s like for years I made efforts without really questioning anything, and all of a sudden I questioned myself a lot. So then I decided to go to New York where I could go to college and keep training. And so I did that, I got my degree, I opened a ballet school at the same time at age 22.
Julie Granger:
I got my degree in entrepreneurship a few years after I opened my ballet school, and at the same time I had trained to be a yoga instructor and a fitness instructor. That’s where everything started in my fitness journey I would say, started in New York, which became a true passion that I didn’t know I could have. And from then on, I decided to move to Paris where I could open my own place because I did not really know what it was to be an adult in Europe. I had only been in the U.S. generally, because my two months trip turned out to be 11 years long. And I moved to Paris. Well, I moved to Berlin first, because I wanted to open my studio there, and then I decided Paris was a better idea, that there was more of a demand for it.
Julie Granger:
It took me one year to get a strong customer base, and get known in Paris and find a space. And I did and I opened my studio, which was the goal was to bring real American concepts to Paris where it doesn’t exist. They’re super behind here as to fitness. And what’s great and frustrating at the same time with paris is they’re behind, but they don’t know they’re behind and they don’t want to know they’re behind. “No, we’re totally fine,” and they’re really not. So it was cool to bring them something very different, but it’s really like making a jump 20 years forward compared to the actual current offer. It’s concepts that I created, but that are based on American concepts that I would teach over there in New York.
Julie Granger:
And yeah, and so it worked very well, and then COVID happened. And long story short, I saw the opportunity to be able to have very little fixed cost and reached a greater number people. And this is how I actually quit all of that and went to Lisbon. And now I live in Lisbon where I operate an on-demand platform that I created last year. I do my livestream classes and then I come back to Paris to teach private clients, to do some nice events. And I have some good collaboration coming up this year with a beautiful friend.
Julie Granger:
That’s basically a short version, but there is many, many adventures in between and changes of directions and things and opportunities that were seen, and opportunities that were lost, but other ones that appeared, and trying to navigate the best I can, and never stay stuck anywhere.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Thanks, that was an excellent summary of your life.
Julie Granger:
It’s hard to follow, I apologize.
Anne Muhlethaler:
No, no. No, no. No. I thought that was great. I’m fascinated by that moment that you described about having worked so hard towards a goal, and then realizing that actually you are not interested in that goal.
Julie Granger:
I have to say, this is a characteristic I have that has really helped me and at the same time really not helped me is, if I decide something, but since I’m a child I’m like that, I will go until I get that thing or until I become that thing, and I will never think twice. And it starts with stupid things that one day when I was 12, and I wanted to save money to buy a surfboard. And I saved money for four years, and then I’m a teenager and I have the money, and I said, “I don’t want to surfboard, what am I going to do?” But for four years I did not ever question why I was saving this money until I actually got it, and then question it. So I’m really like that.
Julie Granger:
And with ballet, I was breathing ballet, I was like a ballet nerd. This is what made me happy. That’s the only thing that I loved, and I worked so hard. And it’s really a hard career, and I think it’s the hardest thing. And now, if I think of everything that I went through in my ballet training and my ballet career, I don’t even know how I did it. I could not do it twice. I’m happy I did it once because I could not do it again now if you asked. And it’s really something that I think teenagers, I think they’re strong. They fight with their parents or whatever.
Julie Granger:
And I think all of this, I never fought with my parents, I never had this crisis of being a rebel. But all of that rage that teenagers have, I put into the discipline of ballet trainings. I was up at 5:00 every day as a teenager when you really need to sleep. And I would wake up and stretch because I was hurting from everywhere, I’d take a 7:00 AM train. It was crazy. I would come back at 7:00 PM and fall asleep on my books and do it again the next day, and while knowing that my dad didn’t want me to be doing that. My mom was very supportive, but it was a very lonely life, because I was taking a train, going to school, going to ballet school, taking the train back. I was really lonely.
Julie Granger:
And it’s a career where you never know that it’s going to work. It’s not like you’re feeling secure in that world. No one makes you feel secure, whether it is the teachers or the girls around you. It’s a very, not unsafe as to safety, but it’s like mentally and everything. So I think that was my way to survive in that world and with the life that I created, because when all my friends from my former school were partying and asking, “Hey. Julie, do you…” And then I was like, “No, I’m tired. No, I need to sleep.” Ballet, you don’t eat so much.
Julie Granger:
Basically my teenage hood was like jail, but that I totally imposed on myself, but no one else wanted me to live like that, but I imposed it on myself. And I think that I didn’t ask myself a question, because if I did, then I think at the moment I had questioned the life I chose, I think I would have probably given up. I did this for two years and then Joffrey, so it’s four or five years of having absolutely no life, and everything revolving around ballet.
Julie Granger:
And yes, and then eye opening, and I think it was building up, but I was not aware of it. And there was one particular event and I had like a breakthrough doing it. Something that seems very silly one moment, and then I decided, “My God, I can’t do this my entire life.”
Anne Muhlethaler:
Can I ask you what that moment was?
Julie Granger:
It’s going to be the silliest moment ever. I’m organizing a party at home in Chicago with dancers from the Joffrey Ballet. I love life, even though I’m very disciplined, I love people, I love… And I’m having this party and there was a girl that comes and she has, it’s Saturday night, and she has her buns still stuck in. We’re supposed to go to a club later. I turn around, this other girl’s wearing these very ugly sneakers, but it’s because her back hurts, so she has to wear them and we’re going to a club later.
Julie Granger:
There is a girl here who probably has not eaten in the past 14 years and is peeling an orange, and that’s probably the only thing she’s going to eat all week. And there is two guys here that were speaking about a video on YouTube from Baryshnikov from like 1976. But this is all true and it’s funny because it’s like if it was a picture on my desk that I see every day. It’s me sitting on my own couch with these two guys about the video, the girl with the orange, the one with her bun, and the one with the sneakers.
Julie Granger:
And I think something very important was happening in the world. There was something very important like political and all we’re talking about is this. And I had, it’s almost like a panic attack where my vision did this on my coffee table, everything became blurry around. And I said to myself, “You cannot be surrounded by this your entire life.” And I love ballet and it’s the most beautiful thing, and I love dancers, don’t get me wrong. But because in my family we were raised, really like school is super important and I really always loved school, I loved to learn and I always loved school. For me it was too close minded, it was too… I sat at a party and I was injured, so it was an injury that it’s chronic, it’s a bone that is…
Julie Granger:
I would always have this injury. So I had the thing, where do I decide, what do I do? I have this injury that’s going to hurt. Sometimes couldn’t even walk and I had to go dance. I have this injury and then this. And I thought, “But it’s not worth me living with this pain all the time and to be in this world.” I felt like in a very tiny little box all of a sudden.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Thanks so much for sharing that. That does sound like a-
Julie Granger:
Silly, but-
Anne Muhlethaler:
No, it sounds like a postcard. I feel like I can almost see the people on the couch and the coffee table. It’s quite a picture you painted. It’s fascinating because I feel like a lot of people are probably going to resonate with your story, even if they’ve never followed a career as difficult as ballet. Because many of us start something, including get into a company, start a job, pick up something and stay stuck. And not everybody listens or notices or makes the change when they get their moment of realization.
Anne Muhlethaler:
And I have a feeling that in the past couple of years, a lot of people have had feelings of the waking up call. But now I’d like to ask you, that must have been a huge change in identity of letting that go, right?
Julie Granger:
It’s very nice that you know that, because it’s something that dancers really struggle with, that most people maybe cannot understand. When you grew up as a dancer and it’s something to somehow that you’re very proud of, and that people around you are really proud of. So you are like the dancer of the family, you’re the dancers in your group of friend. And you’re only a dancer because your entire life revolves around that, because what you eat revolves around that, because what time you go to sleep revolves around that, because even the friends you make.
Julie Granger:
And dancers who have to quit ballet for a reason or another have a very, very hard time just because of this part. And I actually know of dancers who stay dancers even though they’re horribly unhappy in that career, because you feel ashamed somehow. You feel ashamed that this is what you were known as, and all of a sudden, what are you, what do you do? But 100% of the dancers have this syndrome if they stop, or they don’t need to stop to know that they will have it when they quit, or when they get too old and they have to retire.
Julie Granger:
And all this is something very hard, so you have dancers that go to until retirement and get that horrible feeling like, “Okay, so now who am I?” And for me I had that. It was horrible, I mean, I had a couple of years that were horrible, and much later on I was talking to a dancer from the Paris Opera is really not happy in her career and asked me, “How did you do?” And she’s still there four years later, and I kept telling her, “It’s hard, you’re going to spend two years where you don’t know if you made the right decision, where you’re unhappy, where you miss it, where you feel ashamed, where you feel… But if really this doesn’t make you happy, at the end it’s all…”
Julie Granger:
I’m so happy in my life, and then how my life turned out to be. And it’s something courageous to do, because you know what you’re giving up, but you don’t know what you’re getting. But when something makes you unhappy, deeply unhappy, or even just if you’re uninspired or if you ha… But it’s brave. I was feeling very embarrassed, and I was feeling all of a sudden that I didn’t matter to people around me, because I was thinking everyone was, “Oh, she’s the dancer.” And that was really hard, I remember that.
Julie Granger:
But now if I think about it, I’m happy I did it then because I was young. The more you wait, the harder it is. It’s like with everything in life. If you want to learn a language better to… The younger you are, the more adaptable you are. I gave up everything I had worked and without an actual clear plan. I always have a plan. I always have a plan of action, but I don’t always know why. But I was, “Okay, now I’m going to do this, this, and that.” But it’s scary, I went into this unknown territory of moving to New York and studying business school.
Julie Granger:
And it was weird for me to not be in ballet class every day, but it’s a shift psychologically. It is something very hard to do. I’m happy it’s behind me, I’m happy I don’t have to feel like this anymore.
Anne Muhlethaler:
There’s so much stuff to unpack in what you’ve just said, it’s really fascinating. Just for the context, when I was a teenager, I was a singer. My voice is very low today because I’ve had a little bit of a cough this week. And so similarly to you, I think that I decided to pursue a career, even though no one in my family was remotely supportive. And it’s really interesting because I think that it’s something that one of my coaches, Martha Beck, she calls this kind of personality a contrarian when you decide to follow your passion, even though intellectually everything that you’ve been taught or you’re being told is telling you not to do it.
Julie Granger:
Yes.
Anne Muhlethaler:
And it’s fascinating. But I’ve also heard several people explain, and I think there’s a concept that you may be familiar with called the polymath.
Julie Granger:
Oh, I don’t know. I’m not sure.
Anne Muhlethaler:
A polymath is someone who pursues several different specialties. They can also be called a generalist. But by being a ballet dancer at first, then studying business, then doing the fitness training, then doing the yoga, you suddenly have all of these different pieces. And putting them together is creating the unique offering that you now have today with this studio, right?
Julie Granger:
Thank you. Yeah, it’s interesting, I didn’t know that it had a particular name, but I think it’s like that. And I was always like this as a teenager. When I was doing ballet at some point I was also rowing, and the people in the rowing team wanted me in the rowing team. And so I asked my parents, “Can I do the rowing too?” And they were like, “Julie, you can’t. These are different muscles, what do you pick?” So I picked that, but as a kid I was doing ballet, piano, theater, and golf at the same time. So I guess I was always like that and it’s hard.
Julie Granger:
Sometimes I’m the same with the cities I live in. And it’s weird, yeah I am a very passionate person, so I’m very passionate about many different things. And so it makes it probably unique. Sometimes it makes it that you feel like, “Okay, I wish I could just pick and be…” It’s like with ideas, “Maybe I should do this.” My mom to this day, sometimes I start a conversation with her and at first she goes, “Julie, you’re not going to move to Milan, or I was just like, “I was talking to someone in Milan and this.” And it’s like, “No, Julie, you’re not moving again to Milan.” Or I could be anything else.
Julie Granger:
So it’s true, it’s quite interesting. Yeah, it makes it something probably different. It also makes it sometimes that you feel that you’re running out of time in a certain way, because you did so many things so fast, and sometimes it’s time to pick one.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah.
Julie Granger:
I don’t know how to do that yet.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah. That’s really interesting. The one thing that I want to say, just to add to what you mentioned is that most people think that we only have one career or one passion in life. And the thing is that I had no idea, but there’s another wonderful coach based in the U.S. called Tara Mohr who talks about it. And she says it eloquently, and she says, “We can have multiple callings.” And it’s just very interesting to learn when to let go when it’s no longer the right calling, right?
Julie Granger:
I could not agree more with what you just said, and it’s something that I think people maybe do not believe or people are suspicious about, because it’s already hard to get one passion. Maybe some people live their entire life not even finding their one passion. And so for me, when I had ballet, it was everything to me. It’s like if I couldn’t dance, I can’t live. I was capricious as a teenager in that way because I blackmailed my dad even. I say, “If you don’t let me do this, I will never forgive.”
Julie Granger:
Because it was everything, I didn’t care that sometimes I made myself unhealthy. I didn’t care that would hurt people around me. I didn’t care about anyone else or anything else, but me dancing. So it’s a very at the same time selfish thing to do, but it’s also something that takes your entire world. So how could you have space for ever finding another passion?
Julie Granger:
Now where I feel very lucky and what maybe I hopefully want to tell other people, if already you found one passion, you’re quite lucky, but then, yeah you can find two, maybe you can find three. What happened to me is three quarters of my blood is teachers, so three of my grandparents were school teachers, my mom’s a school teacher. But you know like the old fashioned teacher, like very that knew everything. Not ballet, I’m just a school teacher. But for me first, the teaching is something that’s really in me. But when I first took the first yoga class, a friend of mine in Chicago dragged me. I said, “No, why do you want me to do yoga?” I said, “I only like the hard stuff. I only like you know…”
Julie Granger:
She goes, “Come, come, come.” And I was like, “No, no, you will drag me by the hair, but I will not go.” And so she forced me to go and I was like, “I hate her.” And she took me to a hot yoga now because I had an idea that I’m going to have to sit and close my eyes and breathe. Which right now at my age and stuff sounds very good. But at the time I just wanted to do hard stuff and sweat. And she took me to this class with the music and stuff, and to this day, that kind still is not the happening in France.
Julie Granger:
So again, in a way that were behind, because that was in 2010, but revelation. So no, it’s like if you read a book that changes your life or you watch a movie that… I don’t know what happened, but it changed my life. So from then on, I would go to 7:00 AM hot yoga before I would go to my 10:00 AM ballet class and I didn’t skip it. Because then when I moved to New York to study, I would do that, the 7:00 AM hot yoga and it really became a passion. It started with yoga where I was like, “Okay, I really love this.”
Julie Granger:
Then at some point I was lucky enough to get… Our parents gave us a little bit of money to the three kids. And I said, “Dad, I’m so happy. I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to do the yoga teacher training.” So my dad said, “You’re kidding, right?” He did like, “It’s a joke, right?” And I was like, “No, you’ll see, it’s going to be great.”
Anne Muhlethaler:
That’s amazing.
Julie Granger:
That’s where I put my money into this six months training, while I was still full time at school in New York. And I became a yoga instructor that I did not even graduate from college yet, that I became a yoga instructor. And on top of that, I was really lucky to get the best jobs from… My first job was teaching yoga on the rooftop at Soho House. Then somehow, don’t ask me because it’s crazy, I ended up teaching at Equinox, which is the absolute dream for someone in my field. Like the same thing 10 years before where I thought “I will never get into Boston Ballet, I would never.” The same thing, I got in. I mean, it was one of the best days of my life. I remember everything. And, so then a real true, and that might sound weird maybe because it’s a passion for fitness, happens to me. And I’m a fitness nerd, I always said, I became a tall fitness nerd. I’m all about fitness, but it’s like, I don’t know. I am so lucky to wake up every day.
Julie Granger:
And it’s a lot of discipline too. It’s a lot of energy you have to have. It’s tough because at the beginning, it’s not like you can make a lot of money with it, but it’s physically very challenging and you have to be creative. And so that happens to me that this passion just kind of like fell on my lap one day, and I’m so happy because if I had not been in the US I would’ve never known, I would’ve never become a fitness addict in France, this I know. Because I had these great teachers, these great methods, these great places. And I know that the way it is in France, I would’ve never fallen in love as much, but I was so lucky to be where I was and when I was, and everything kind of fell into place. That’s also the reason behind the studio is that for me, when I was in Paris, I was always so, with the fit I couldn’t even take a class. I was just like, ah.
Julie Granger:
And sometimes if I would visit my parents, I would book my plane ticket actually earlier to go back to New York because I needed to work out. So I would just, I was supposed to leave on the 20th and I would leave on the 10th, because I need to go back to Equinox. It was almost like a drug, but so that’s why I wanted to create the space, and hopefully give that opportunity also to other people. But yeah, I’m quite lucky that I ended up in the best thing. It’s a mix of hard work and chance. I can’t say that it was… A friend told me, “You should try Equinox.” I argued with him. I said, “Are you kidding me? I will never get in,” And actually he was right.
Julie Granger:
And it’s a mix of things that made that I got this second passion, and I really want to tell people that it’s not over if you have to stop something, a career. I guess there’re athletes that they get injured and they have to stop, but you never know. I mean you can be maybe a runner and finally, at the end, you’re an amazing sculptor or whatever. It doesn’t even have to be anything to do with your first passion. It could be knitting. I don’t know. But it’s nice to have that quest for your passion in a way, because without that, I don’t know actually what my life would be, because it’s all revolving around that.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah. So one of the things that I feel needs to be said is you have tremendous discipline, and that must be very helpful in pursuing anything, any kind of new passion because I find that… So as a teenager, I studied classical piano. And if you want to be any good, I mean, it wasn’t as grueling as your dancing career, you still have to apply yourself. And I think that one of the benefits in young people learning some of these harder creative paths, because it is a form of creative self-expression when you do master it, right?
Julie Granger:
Yes.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Is that you build a massive discipline. So I’d love to have you tell us how that impacted your life.
Julie Granger:
It’s hard to know. Everybody in my family is very hardworking, not in sports necessarily, but I think we’re all hardworking. What’s with me is that I was hardworking as a teenager, and my siblings weren’t really hardworking as teenagers. So I don’t know where I got that. It’s hard to explain at the beginning. I think it’s a kind of the chicken or egg. I think that the passion gave me, I realized that if I wanted to do that, this is what it took. So I had no choice. And I think maybe some things that I don’t see sometimes in younger generations that can be frustrating is that they want something, but they don’t want to do what is required to become or to get that thing. And for me, ballet’s so demanding, I mean just like classical music and it’s like the hardest thing I’ve ever done was those two years of my teenage year.
Julie Granger:
Then whenever I would have a hard time in life later on, and when I was in college full time and also had the ballet school and we had exams and stuff, I would be stressed out and I would say “Julie high school. Ju… Ah, okay.” But it’s a thing. Every time I go, this is so hard. When I built a studio all on my own, dealing with the constructions, hiring 10 teachers, and running left to right to teach my classes in Paris while I was in construction and all of that, “Julie high school.” So I think it’s something too that is super important maybe to get maybe young, because I think when you get this when you’re young, it is much easier. I don’t know how you get it, if you don’t have… You know what I mean?
Julie Granger:
In French, we say, ‘se faire violence.’ Yes, it’s hard, yes, but can you actually stop complaining or procrastinating? I think if you have motivation, the discipline kind of follows. And so I had much more discipline than I do now. I have much less discipline now. I’m 32 and I’m not as disciplined, but anyone would say I’m very disciplined, but so if I compare myself to my teenage self, I’m much less disciplined. But for me, the discipline in France, it almost has a negative connotation because it also means punishment. And I think language actually shapes the way you think. And I think that for me, discipline is like the foundation of everything that I could do in my life. Everything is about discipline, and if I did not have this discipline, I would not have done all the things I did.
Julie Granger:
I wouldn’t, because I start at 6:30 in the morning, it doesn’t even cost me. It’s really the foundation and the basis for everything else. If you have no discipline, you just kind of let yourself go a little bit. And so then it’s harder to achieve stuff. It comes from being motivated and knowing, because my parents taught me well that nothing’s going to just appear and happen. So you’re going to move if you want some and because they were kind of against it too, I didn’t have the choice. It’s not like, “Hey can you drive me to the…” They kind of let me, “You want to do that? Okay, go ahead.” But I’m so glad that it was like that.
Anne Muhlethaler:
That’s so interesting. It was the same with my parents. They’re like, “Oh, you want to leave the home and you want to live on your own and go sing? Good luck with that.”
Julie Granger:
And then you have no choice. I think it’s nice to not overprotect, to be a little demanding maybe of your child a tiny bit. I had a lot of pressure because I was like, “I can’t make a mistake now.” We were doing all these things, but it’s also nice because my dad worked. But he would leave home at 6:00 AM in the morning, when he would come back we were already asleep when I was a child. That’s discipline. Right? That was the discipline that he had to do to succeed in his work. I think that it’s kind of like, it was engraved in me young that if you want this, if you want to provide a good life to your family, you have to leave the home at 6:00 and come back when they’re asleep and not see them, and that’s the sacrifice he made for us. So I think that’s not something that I’m aware of, but I’m sure that it played a role, because that also discipline, it’s just a different kind of discipline.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah. What I was thinking, as you were telling me this story is discipline was as a foundation that you learned and that was modeled for you, but you also have that very passionate side of you. And I think it’s the combination of the two that probably gets the magic going. Tell me where I’m wrong?
Julie Granger:
Yeah I think that the discipline allows me to not lose track and to not get distracted, and to achieve a lot in a short amount of time. When I tell my life story, sometimes people say, “How old are you,” because so many thing happened. It’s like I had already two or three careers, and I lived in seven different cities in four different countries and all alone. And so that discipline allows me okay I want my degree, I want to become a personal trainer, I want to be certified in yoga, I want to, so that’s discipline. But then yeah, the passion is the… It’s like if discipline is the car, but passion is the gas in the car or kind of. You can have the car, if you have no gas, you’re going nowhere, and if you have just the gas and not the car then you’re not going anywhere either.
Julie Granger:
So I think that’s the combination of both that is the drive. I think people always say “You are so driven you’re so…” To stay with the metaphor of the car, I am driven because of the combination of both. So again, I mean, if I only had discipline, but didn’t love what I did I would still do it probably because I’m disciplined, but yeah, the passion gives me the energy. People say all the time, “Calm down you’re a yoga instructor.” I’m always hyper, it’s just because I’m always on drugs. But because the drug is my passion for what I do now. But even if I’m tired, even if I had a bad day, I’m always speaking with that tone that’s… I’m very tiring to be around basically.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Hey, as a teacher, it works. That’s all I can tell you. Because being in your classes, they are very challenging, but man, your energy and your sense of humor really helps. Now I’d love for you to talk to us a little bit about what kind of fitness you discovered. So this is really for anyone who doesn’t really know what you do, or doesn’t really have an understanding of the New York fitness scene or your scene. I had the pleasure of living in New York for a while. I was a member of Equinox, but I think you didn’t teach downtown did you?
Julie Granger:
No.
Anne Muhlethaler:
I was in West Village.
Julie Granger:
[crosstalk 00:36:45] I did… Yes the one in the West Village on yes Greenwich Avenue probably. Yeah I didn’t teach there.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah exactly.
Julie Granger:
No. They didn’t have barres remember at the wall?
Anne Muhlethaler:
Ah, yeah.
Julie Granger:
It’s so fun to know that we’ve met there. Everything has for a basis ballet to some extent. So I don’t want to say that and people say, “Oh, okay, I’m a dude, I’m not going to do it,” because it’s just a basis. It’s really like a basis. Doesn’t mean you’re going to do ballet or that you have to be graceful or it’s not like that. But somehow the basis for everything is ballet, in a use of music. Meaning I choreograph each class, no matter what the concept is to the playlist I create, which is the reverse process of, I don’t know, 98% of instructors where they create a class and they put some playlist to go with it. I start with the playlist, and it’s what the music inspires me, I really love music. So I do it that way.
Julie Granger:
So music is very important, and then depending on the concept, so for example, my Brooklyn flow is a vinyasa yoga class, meaning a flow, meaning you never pause, you don’t stay in the poses. So a bit different from other more, maybe traditional yoga or the image we can have of yoga, where you’re holding and breathing. So it’s a continuous flow that I called over there. When I created it, I called it cardio flow. And then when I moved to Paris, Brooklyn is like so important to me, I changed it to Brooklyn flow because I wanted a little tribute to my Brooklyn squad. But basically if you think cardio flow, you get more of a thing. So it’s using yoga positions and using yoga moves you somehow get your cardio on, and a little bit of core work and you listen to good music. And this came about because at the time I was teaching eight classes a day, and in New York I would teach one class there, commute for an hour to go teach another class there, commute for an hour to…
Julie Granger:
So I had a 15, 16 hour day every day, but I never skipped a workout. And I needed to workout, so I needed to dance, but I needed to sweat. But sometimes I didn’t have time, because ballet class takes a long day, like it takes an hour and a half, then you have to warm up before. So I couldn’t do that. And I would go to this hot yoga class so I could do yoga and sweat. And it was a hot yoga class where music was blasting. And then I noticed that the way I was doing the movements with my workout buddy, who was also a dancer, was linked to the music. So we were doing yoga, but listening to the music, just like you do in ballet. So, that’s how the idea came to me. And so guys really like it because they do yoga, but it’s very dynamic and they sweat a lot. So that’s for that.
Julie Granger:
And then my other most popular one, the Brooklyn Barre mix is Pilates and ballet position and terms so that you feel that you’re moving with the ballerina posture and the ballet moves: plié, relevés, etc. But you’re really doing Pilates and exercises to really just tone up. So it’s just a fun way to tone up that uses ballet so that you feel graceful at the same time. Right? So, you could tone up doing CrossFit and great. That’s a great thing to do, or this is more like we’re paying attention to the posture at the same time, and it’s also low impact. You can’t really get injured. Doesn’t mean you’re not working hard, you’re working really hard as you know.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Oh yes. I know. Oh yeah, without a doubt. Yeah. I wanted to tell you actually how I found you, because it was so random and I don’t believe in coincidences, but I spent very little time on Instagram and it’s probably a side effect of having been on Instagram so early and driving [foreign language 00:40:27] social media for many years. But I started to follow a coach in France who was mentioned by one of my favorite at writers, Seth Godin. And she is Irish, but based in Paris, her name is Imogen Roy and it’s really funny [crosstalk 00:40:46]. I saw probably the only Instagram post I’ve ever seen of hers was one saying that something like over the course of the first lockdown, the people that got her through were someone, someone, and you. And I was like, “Let’s check her out.” And the next thing you know I was on Zoom the following week. So it’s really interesting.
Julie Granger:
Yeah I love Imogen, she’s a very good client of mine. She knew me when I first arrived in Paris and was teaching in studios to start getting a clientele and just get to teaching before I had my own. And then right away, she asked for private classes. So she’s really a private client of mine. She would come every week and she kept doing the lockdown, also taking the live classes. So we would do a mix of ballet and barre with her. So she’s an amazing person. So I’m very grateful to her.
Anne Muhlethaler:
That’s wonderful. I checked out your name because she was so clear, and so direct about how much she helped her. But also I feel like this must have been a great responsibility for you and many, many teachers during the last couple of years, because you had to deal with your own uncertainty. And then everyone looked up to you to make us feel better about what was going on. Do you want to tell me about that?
Julie Granger:
Yes. And actually I will tell you a little secret. You guys don’t know how much you helped us. So what is hard when… Yeah, I mean at first I had a particular amount of stress because I had just opened my studio, and put my 10 years of savings working like a crazy me person in New York in the studio two weeks before. So I put actually my entire savings into it.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Where was the studio?
Julie Granger:
Right in the center of Paris in the 3rd arrondissement, Arts et Métiers, if you can picture where that is. So, I mean, best neighborhood, I had done three months of construction. It was the most beautiful, I mean most beautiful studio I think, because I designed it to be like that. I wanted it to be the most beautiful, most welcoming. There was like everyone was American, everything was in English. You had a process about how to welcome guests, and I had 10 teachers working for me. We did three months of construction, I mean seven guys, seven days a week, they never stopped so that we opened on time. But we opened March 4th, and I think confinement was on the 16th or something like that. So here I am a 30-year-old girl with all her savings in a space, that’s disgusting a lot of money and rent every month, not knowing when that’s going to stop.
Julie Granger:
And I mean, it was a stress like, I mean, like it was absolutely unbelievable. And I might have helped them somehow I guess. But those classes to me, because when I teach, I am so happy. I am so happy and I would teach five classes a day, which was really hard. So physically I was completely drained and mentally, because I was so worried, but there was that five hour of kind of break in my day. And so you would never see and they told me, and I know I have this weird ability to… You will never know. I can be in the worst, I don’t know the words, something horrible just happened, and that the class, you would never see it. I think it’s the dancer in me probably, or there is something and it’s scary sometimes. At the time I was with someone that he was, “How can you put on this robot mode? It’s almost scary because like it doesn’t…”
Julie Granger:
But those classes to me, they actually held me together. It kept me together. So I’m very grateful that they are grateful to me. To me, it was me expressing my passion five hours a day. And without them being there, I would not have been able to. And it’s the best compliment, and why do we do that, why do we teach? I don’t teach by default, I chose. It’s something that I love to do. So when someone tells you that you helped them in any way, could be “You helped me because before I could never wear shorts and now I’m happy in shorts.” It could be “You helped me mentally, because without you I would not have done this lockdown.” It could be “You helped me, because now I accept this or this about myself,” or “You help me because working in your classes make me be stronger mentally, so at work I can handle more,” whatever it is.
Julie Granger:
If you help as the teacher, if someone tells you helped them, it’s the… Because that’s the only feedback you get. When you work in an office, maybe your project is accepted. I don’t know. It’s a very good presentation. I teach a class if you don’t know. So the only feedback you get and that’s why it’s so important, because otherwise you don’t know. And I’m lucky that my squad members, as I call them are super, super nice because I feel like I get so much feedback, like genuine feedback after class. And I think it’s quite rare when people take a class somewhere, go home and you will never know what they thought. And I’m lucky to have the best people, that it’s like I’m an oversharer. They are also oversharers in the way that they share with me. “It was such an awesome…” So that really, really helps. So they’re really amazing, and so they helped me as well. I’m happy if I did help them, but I know that they helped me.
Anne Muhlethaler:
That’s so cool. Yeah. I feel like you helped me too, even though it was a little bit lighter last year versus 22. Well, and it was supposed to be, it doesn’t feel like that looking back.
Julie Granger:
Yeah. Right?
Anne Muhlethaler:
But it was really funny because I decided, it was right after I first came across your classes, I decided I wanted to renew with things that I wanted to do when I was a teenager, and that I hadn’t pursued for a long time. So I used to play tennis and I loved it. I always wanted to do ballet and my mother was absolutely against it. And I lived so far in the countryside that it wasn’t an option to take a class, because there was no option and no internet so there you go. And I decided I wanted to go horse riding. I really sort of decided to do all of these things. And so you were my entry point into exercising with graciousness and discovering something about, well about dance or something that was almost like a missed passion that I never got to explore.
Anne Muhlethaler:
And recently, so I’m a super nerd and I, like you, like to do several different things at the same time. And so at the moment I am studying a course in what is called contemplative psychotherapy, which is Buddhist psychology. And I have the privilege to be taught by amazing teachers. And I found out that one of the things that can also help us relax and trigger what is called the parasympathetic nervous system is graciousness. So every time that we pay attention to our movements, and the way that you guide us as to hold up our posture, our hands and direct us, it actually slows down our breathing and it helps focus in concentration. And I had no idea, right, but I could tell that I was doing something really, really good. Mind you, yeah your ballerina body training, it’s kind of intense. You want to tell us about how you decided to bring HIIT with Ballerina Hint?
Julie Granger:
Yes. Thank you, because I did mention it earlier in my concepts. Actually that’s the latest one that I created. I had created one called Ballerina Body originally. And what happened is during lockdown, I was doing these Instagram lives that were followed by up to 1200 people every day. It was at 6:00 PM and it was so fun because there is so many people. You know how it was, that lockdown? It’s almost like a weird nightmare, but at the same time there was some stuff that were like, “Oh yeah, that was happening.” And there was the 6:00 PM meetup, and it was like the highlights of my day. And so I was doing this and I had decided I called it the work ins instead of the workouts because we can be out. And it was because I thought, “Okay, people are at home, and I’m going to teach them a yoga class.”
Julie Granger:
So I did these, I think that they were 20 minute HIIT workouts because I thought that’s what people need because I really believe in sweating and jumping around to make you happy. And because I just can’t get the ballet out of my system and out of my thing, I would do this HIIT class. But yeah, I would kind of mix with some movements. It was an actual HIIT class, but there would be some ballet moves or some ballet terms. So that’s how the concepts kind of occurred to me, that maybe I can mix HIIT and ballet. And, so because I had already trademarked the name Ballerina Body and this was somewhat the same principles or workout class that uses ballet. But that was the training version, like you’re wearing sneakers and you… So then I called it Ballerina Body Training.
Julie Granger:
I love this concept. I mean, I hope it’s different and it really gives you good cardio. And that’s also how I like it’s for me to have a portfolio of one class, if we had to find categories, one is a yoga class, one is a Pilates barre class, and the other one is a HIIT class. And I’m so happy and I’m so grateful in a way to have this knowledge, thanks to being a New Yorker, surrounded by the best instructors and being a ballerina and always loving to choreograph and create, and all these things put together. I’m happy that I can say that I have three actual concepts of my own that are completely different from one another. So you could take all three back to back, and you did three very different workouts, yet they were created by the same person.
Julie Granger:
And I love that dimension of my work, which is not… It’s true, it’s not as common. You can be a fitness instructor and never create a class. I love to do that. I actually also created a concept for a studio in Paris that is opening next week. I worked on it for four months last year. They reached out to me to create their concept. So I did. So there is that dimension of my work where I’m lucky to have the understanding, thanks to being in the US and seeing how concept are, and doing so many trainings.
Julie Granger:
I mean at Equinox, when you are an instructor, it’s not like, oh, you’re an instructor and you sit there and you wait. It’s every six months they say, “You’re going to do another training, that you’re not going to be paid for, but you’re going to do it because that’s a requirement.” So okay. So every six months we had to train again for something new. And so I could understand now that I’m very grateful to have that because it adds a creative dynamic. I don’t know, if I didn’t have my own concept, I think that eventually I would be bored teaching.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah, that’s very possible. But now you’ve just linked this to Paris. There’s one thing that I wonder because… So I lived in Paris for two years and I was a member at Le Klay is like a nice enough American type-ish gym. I worked out with an amazing personal trainer called William who was the most hilarious guy, who was trained in Thai boxing, and yet we always talked about food.
Julie Granger:
I love it.
Anne Muhlethaler:
He was a big foodie and his wife, like he was a really great guy, but there was an overwhelming sense as a woman who was training in that gym. And I think it was very similar when I had, I think gone to visit l’Usine, also was a very male dominated and very male driven. And I think that one of the things I greatly enjoy about what your classes offer is actually sort of a direct sense of, so it’s powerful, it’s hardworking, but it’s also gracious and immensely feminine.
Julie Granger:
Thank you so much for saying that, because I am sorry, I mean I’m going to cry right now, because the basis for these concepts is, especially in France, but it’s like, so either they don’t work out and it’s like, “You work you’re crazy. At 7:00 AM, oh, you’re crazy.” So either you don’t work out, which is 75% of the other. And then the others they’re, “Oh, I’m going to do CrossFit and bootcamp. And I feel like I’m really working.” And I so do not believe in that because I’ve gotten a lot of injuries, whereas I am really aware of alignment and I’ve got an injury. So I think that originally my body has a lot of weaknesses, because the injuries I get, it’s not from doing movements badly, it’s from my body having something weird at the beginning, but I don’t understand.
Julie Granger:
And again, it’s weird because we don’t want to be women and men, and it’s not at all, like women cannot do CrossFit. We can do CrossFit just like there’re many things we can… It’s not the problem of being able to, it’s I do believe in being graceful. And sometimes that sounds like, “Oh, what do you mean?” But for me being graceful is just when you see a dancer, how many tell you on the street “Are you a dancer? All right.” And it’s a compliment always. People never say, “Oh, are you a dancer,” as something mean. I guess they always mean it as a compliment, otherwise they wouldn’t ask. Right? So what is it that they see if you on the street wearing a coat and not with a bun, what is it that they see? It’s a posture that they see, and it’s a compliment that they’re giving you.
Julie Granger:
So there is some then right that is noticeable, that is I guess pleasing to see. And then I really want not always only dancers to be able to get those compliments and to be able to get that posture. Right. It’s so important for men and women. But I think that a woman that has like nice and open shoulders and all of that, and also our lifestyle makes us be so much like with the rounded shoulders because of the phone, because of the computer, because we’re sitting that we need to compensate. And so from me, I created all these concepts and almost a particularly Ballerina Body to be the feminine version of. So for me in my world, the boyfriend would go take a HIIT class or a bootcamp class while the girlfriend goes take the same. It’s a HIIT class, Ballerina Body Training, but the way she’s going to move is going to be different.
Julie Granger:
Be I think that’s really what I tried to do. And I’m so happy that you say that, because I think that it’s great to do CrossFit and boxing and all of this, but all these postures, like you need to compensate with something, and it’s difficult if you don’t go to ballet class to get that. And so I wanted to make the benefits of ballet accessible to absolutely anybody. Anyone can do Brooklyn barre, anyone can do Ballerina Body, anyone gets to work on their posture, and get the compliment on the street that they have a good posture.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Oh, that’s amazing. I do think that I have a better posture. I mean, I want to tell you for the story that when I was, I think the first yoga class I took was a teacher in London. I think it took a year or two years for me to understand that my shoulders were always here. Because I mean, I didn’t know what it meant to… I could not understand why she was saying draw up your shoulders. And I was like, what? So I think everyone needs help with that, especially if you’ve never danced.
Anne Muhlethaler:
I don’t understand bootcamp, because the last thing I want is anyone yelling at me. I mean I absolutely do not understand that. I can work really hard, just don’t yell at me. And I think that’s a good transition to something that I wanted to touch on. Julie, where does your sense of humor come from, because you’re very funny in your classes? And I think that I cracked up so much. I think it was one of the earlier classes that we did, and you were having us balanced on one leg, the other leg in the air, and we’re working on triceps with weights. And you were like “You know Giselle the ballet, well it’s like Giselle, but with weights.” And I almost fell over, I was laughing so hard.
Julie Granger:
Thank you so much. It’s a great compliment actually to give me to say I’m funny, because in class I always tell you, “Thank you for putting up with my silly jokes.” Thank you for saying I’m funny. I don’t know that everyone would agree. Let’s say I make jokes. Okay? So we’re going to say I make jokes, whether they are funny or not you guys judge. I am very sarcastic, and I pick up on details and I love to talk and I love to bounce on something I see or something. I mean with humor, you can make any message come across, meaning I can also make you do pushups straight to make a joke. And all of a sudden you forgot you did two more pushups than you were supposed to. And you’re a little less mad at me, right?
Julie Granger:
So I think it’s that. Maybe with this, I really don’t know. Maybe it’s for having this horrible, like very austere ballet teacher when I was a teenager, or that I don’t think she ever laughed one day in her life, the lady. It could be one of these things like you don’t have to be so serious. And it’s also because I think that laughing and having good energy around you is just a necessity. I mean, if you don’t laugh, if your life is serious, it’s just like ah. It doesn’t have to be so heavy. And so I think it comes from that I really, really, really want, and so this is why also something that’s important to me, is people sometimes say to me, “Why don’t you do before and after pictures so we see the results? Because we see, we know the results. My belly is much more flat.”
Julie Granger:
I said, “Because the way that your belly is more flat or your butt is more lifted or it’s so great, I’m so happy for you. But the goal is not that, it’s just a happy result. You’re going to get the lifted butt, you’re going to get the six packs, you’re going to get the toned tricep. All of this you’re going to get, but I don’t want this to be my advertisements, because what I would really, really, really like is that you say ‘I have the best hour of my day.'” And that’s what I try to do. It will give you the triceps, the butt, the blah, blah, blah. It will, so I have no doubts about that, but you can also do a boring video, a boring class and get that and have a bad hour, but you did it because you have to.
Julie Granger:
Me, like I was lucky to do when I was going to New York, I never skipped to workout one day in my life and I was happy to go. And I was happy during it, and I was happy after. It’s not like, “Okay, I’m going to have a bad hour, but at least at the end I’ll feel better.” No, can you spend a good hour? And I think that this is why I try to be creative in a workout. This is why I try to be creative in the music, and this is why I make jokes. Because if in one hour of your time that you dedicate to me, there already I’m very lucky that you do that. If in that one hour you can get the toned everything and feel graceful and feel like you’ve achieved something and love and it’s you maximize your time, right?
Julie Granger:
People don’t have time. Right? We don’t have time. Nobody has time. So can we at least get all of this in one hour? So I think this is where the sense of humour, I’m super sarcastic I make the… So whenever I teach a class somewhere first, my first class in Berlin, my first class, people always with one eyebrow raised like, “Did she,” the first time. Because it’s like, I’m very sarcastic, so you have to understand that what I’m saying is a joke, because I say it with a straight tone or whatever it is. And when I taught my first class in Williamsburg, in Brooklyn, my boyfriend at the time was waiting for me in Equinox and Williamsburg. And one woman left the class and I was still chatting with people upstairs.
Julie Granger:
Actually this woman, she was there at my first class in Brooklyn and she became my best friend. It’s funny, but she went down to the front desk and she said, “Oh my God, there is a girl, I just took a class with the most sarcastic girl ever. That was the most awesome class.” And my boyfriend when I went down was like “So funny because a girl came out of your class and I knew it was you because she said ‘the most sarcastic girl ever.'” And so he knew she was talking about me. And so I was lucky enough that she was someone working at corporate at Equinox, because she fell in love with my class. And so it’s funny, but so the sarcasm this thing for me is like super important, because at the end she said the class was amazing, but she did note that she had fun during the class is what she said. She didn’t say, “Oh great. Oh, I feel like…” So I think it’s just important, entertainment. Maybe that’s why I love ballet, it’s entertaining. Right? So entertainment’s important.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Sure. But I think that what’s lovely is that I feel like you’re showing us who you are. I was listening to a podcast yesterday with an interview of an American entrepreneur that I know of, but don’t follow much called Marie Forleo. And she was joking, this is someone who worked on Wall Street, then became a hip hop dancer in New York, and then a coach and who does that coaching and stuff. And she was relaying that people would say, “I know, it’s you because it’ll be really deep and full of great wisdom, but then there’ll be like three guys in a mankini being in your video.” And I’ve never seen her videos, but I love that, I love when we show people who we really are and get to share our sense of humor. I can feel how French you are sometimes when you make jokes about champagne and I can feel you’ve lived in Brooklyn when you talk about oat milk lattes, and it’s kind of a blend of both that just makes it feel really fun.
Julie Granger:
Thank you so much.
Anne Muhlethaler:
So you’ve appeared in a lot of magazines and I think it is now you could call yourself also a fitness model. Was that ever part of the plan, and how do you enjoy this?
Julie Granger:
Okay. In New York, it was just something I didn’t tell you, but I was a fitness model while I was having the ballet school and the college at the same time and teaching yoga. So I was a fitness model for Wilhelmina, which is one of the biggest agencies in New York. So I love fitness modeling, but I never associated with that, I never, because every time you say, “Oh, I’m a model,” there is somehow it’s like if you’re pretentious or I don’t know, it’s like… So I was a model, but it was like, I was secretly a model. I never said it and sometimes I forget, because to me it was… And sometimes they would call me to casting and be “Julie, you have to be there in half an hour.” No I have a class to teach. The job would give me 10,000 the class would pay me 50 but I never skipped the class to go to the casting.
Julie Granger:
I enjoy doing it because fitness shoots are so fun because you actually have to do stuff. You have to try to find a way, so it’s interesting, it’s like a game. And I loved it and I work with brands like ASICS and Repetto and I really love the job. I just, I don’t love castings. It’s a lot of wasted time where you could be teaching or doing, so I love the job itself. I’m still a fitness model. It’s different, in France there is no fitness agencies, it just doesn’t exist. That also tells you. But yeah, it’s something I really, really enjoy doing as long as it doesn’t take too much of my time on my other stuff, like my classes and what I really love to do even more.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Sure. There’s something that I thought of actually after I did my reading up on you yesterday. So you have a way of making everyone feel very included in your classes. And this is something that is difficult to put across on Zoom, but there’s a lot of warmth. So I knew a few famous trainers in New York, friends are friends. There’s been a lot of falling from grace. And even though they were very lovely to me, but I had a very fancy job title, I worked at Christian Louboutin. I read a lot of sad things about sizeism and a lot of body shaming of students. Is this something that you came across, and something that you consciously work against?
Julie Granger:
I don’t consciously work against it at all because it’s just who I am, but I came across it and very often the mean instructors are very popular. I’ve been in a yoga class in New York of this girl that everybody, the class was always full and blah, blah, and she was so mean to a man that was there, who was there, who was not obviously a professional yogi. I almost, and believe me, she was an Equinox instructor and I was in her class as a student, but she was much more senior than me, I almost stood up and said, “Don’t talk to him like that.” I have this strong sense of justice since I’m a child, which got me in trouble many times in my life, because I always have to take care of other people’s business if I think that it’s unfair.
Julie Granger:
So I hate that. I do not understand why these people have Pilate classes, because it is the first thing that should happen is that people say, “I don’t put up with you insulting me or insulting the next person or…” There is this, something that people maybe in New York have a harder time. It’s in New York where we’re like stars. Right? And I was lucky at Equinox, so my class would book, in 20 seconds it would be booked, and there was this huge wait list. And then I have people fight and I had to call security, Equinox had to call security once because people fought to… I mean, this is crazy, right? And then you have the instructors who get the head like this, because this is happening to them, and now my class is impossible to get into.
Julie Granger:
So you’re a nobody you will never get in, and you will… And I have the absolute contrary approach, which if only I could have pushed the walls so that everyone on the wait list would get in, that’s when I would’ve been happiest. I am not happy that people can’t get in, that doesn’t bring my ego up there. What would’ve made me happy is that the 40 people plus the 30 on the wait list would all be, and then I’d been happy. It was not one person left on the wait list. There is that in America because we’re brought up to the status of stars. People recognize you on the street, people fight, blah, blah, blah, blah. You make good money being a fitness instructor. So people get sometimes a bit over their head, but I’m against that because I genuinely love people, and I do not do this job to bring my ego up.
Julie Granger:
I do it because I hope that it brings whatever it brings to people. I hope that it serves them and that it helps them in any way. If they laugh and that’s it, if they feel better in their body and that’s… Whatever it is, it’s because actually love to be around people, I actually love people. I’m not one of these solitary people at all. I just, I am super social, so yeah that’s why I will never embarrass anyone. And I can see the people that are not at ease when they come to a class, and that they’re shy, and I make a point to go and to make them feel welcome.
Julie Granger:
“Oh, hi, it’s your first time. No worries, you’ll see. You’ll just fall.” Because it’s important to me. I just don’t get a high from being intimidating. It’s just not who I am in life, and it never changed even when the career at Equinox was crazy. You can’t change a person, it’s not going to change me. We’re just here to help each other. Know what I mean? There’s no point in being mean. I hate mean people, so that’s that. I think it’s the thread.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah. Oh, well, but it’s something that I feel in your classes for sure. So the podcast, as I mentioned to you before is at the crossroads between business and mindfulness. And I’d love to hear from you about how you cultivate a sense of being grounded, especially in difficult times, what do you do for self-care. Any rituals that you can share with us?
Julie Granger:
I mean, the self-care for me is mostly physical and I do, I mean, I found finally in Lisbon after my entire life running the royal, I found the best massage therapist in the world. So is in Lisbon and he comes to me every other Sunday, and that’s that. So I do this. I think if you work out, that’s important because a tight body is just like tension and tension resonates and everything. Let’s say you hurt your back, you’re always going to be in a bad mood. You can’t have a bad back and be like, “Hey guy,” it doesn’t happen. So you have to be taking care of yourself physically because the physical pain or it affects your mood. As to mindfulness I’m very bad at. I should do meditation and I’m not going to lie, I don’t, and I know that I need it.
Julie Granger:
I’m someone that can get very anxious somehow. It’s sweet, because I have a lot of energy, and I haven’t found the key other than working out. So then when I work out or when I dance, so that’s the only thing. So I think doing something you love, and the last couple years I faced a lot of personal challenges that are not even related to business and everything. I had a very difficult past three year personally. And I think that what has helped me is to just, I’ve learned to be nicer to myself because as a ballerina, you are always wrong. You’re too this, you’re too that, you’re not enough that, your feet. I mean, you even hate your feet. It’s like, who cares about your feet?
Julie Granger:
But like my foot’s like… so everything is a detail and every detail about you is so horrible. And I grew up for 30 years like that, and the past two years, and it says something that I need to… My friends, always, “Julie stop, you’re too hard on yourself.” When you grow and you try to be the best version you can be, you can’t be perfect. But if you’ve tried to improve yourself after a while, I mean, you’ve done the work. You have to cut yourself some slack, you have to just be a bit nicer.
Julie Granger:
And so I try to catch myself when I’m talking badly to myself and I say, “Would you talk like that to your friend?” And I say, “No, because I never speak badly to people.” So I only speak badly to me. So I try to not do that. And I think it’s mental work that we should all try to do, because sometimes we are our worst enemy our worst critic our worst… It doesn’t take a shrink or a massage. It takes just, can you be nicer? It starts with you right? It’s trying to be nice to you. Sometimes I make mistakes and I say, “Wait, I mean, I didn’t intend badly. Right? So yeah. I made a mistake because we’re humans and that’s what we do. But was I ill intentioned? No. So, okay.” It’s starting with yourself I think.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Yeah. Self-compassion that’s not talked about enough and self-talk is so important.
Julie Granger:
Yeah. Like, oh, it’s okay, don’t do anything for three months, stay on the couch. Not that, it doesn’t ha… I mean, we always go to extremes, but just kindness, just, “Okay. You had a hard month, you had a traumatic event, you had a, whatever it is. So yeah. It’s normal that right now you don’t feel like going to do that. Actually it’s just normal.” And don’t feel that, spend my life feeling guilty for not doing this or that. So I try, but it comes with age I have to say, but I try to not feel as guilty as I used to.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Congratulations. That sounds like a really good plan. Now, before we go to my closing questions, is there anything else you’d like to share, anything that we haven’t touched on?
Julie Granger:
I mean, no, I’m very grateful for all you your questions, because they’re very well informed, and it’s very touching to me. And I think that you really mentioned everything. I am grateful that you’ve asked those questions. So thank you.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Oh, good. I’m glad. So this is one of my favorite questions, actually. What is a favorite word that you could tattoo on yourself?
Julie Granger:
Okay. Just super quick, those are two. The only word I could tattoo on myself is Brooklyn. That’s the only word, but my favorite word is passion.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Oh, wonderful. Okay. Now the next one is probably the hardest question I think. What song best represents you?
Julie Granger:
I think it’s Keep the Faith by Michael Jackson.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Oh, I don’t feel like I know that one.
Julie Granger:
It’s my theme song I think. This and Follow That Dream by Elvis Presley. Keep the Faith and Follow That Dream. Listen to them, they’re family sometimes. I’m like “Yeah. This is exactly how…” Lots of challenges, lots of changes of directions, lots of unplanned thing that I had to figure out, and you have to always keep the faith and always follow the dream.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Awesome. Do you know, I’m starting to put together a Spotify playlist with all of the answers of my guests, so I can’t wait to put that up. What is a secret superpower that you have?
Julie Granger:
I think it’s that my energy is unaffected by anything else. So this robot mode I was talking about, and when I teach it’s an on button, and I’m in the best mood, whatever happened, whatever and you will never tell. And I don’t know why, but it’s something that helps a lot, because when you have challenges, you need to be able to do your work, and my work requires a lot of energy, so I think it’s that.
Julie Granger:
To almost strive on the challenges and almost strive on the fatigue sometimes the harder it is. I convert negative stuff into energy is I think is a super power.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Super power for sure. What is a favorite book of yours?
Julie Granger:
Ooh, a favorite book. I love Lady of the Camellias by Alexandre Dumas because it’s a beautiful love story. Is it basically the story of Moulin Rouge if you know the movie. I guess the movie is based on this book. It’s just that I’m a real romantic person, so I love these tragic love stories.
Anne Muhlethaler:
What is the last lie that you told?
Julie Granger:
The last lie that you… Someone asked me, how I was doing and I said, “Great. How are you?” And I was not really great, but I didn’t want to ruin the mood.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Where is somewhere you visited that you felt really had an impact on who you have become?
Julie Granger:
I mean, I visited, I didn’t take many vacations in my life, so there is not so many places I’ve visited, there’re places I’ve lived, because I don’t have the time to just visit. So I think New York, New York, especially Brooklyn, it’s engraved in me. If I’m in New York and if I’m in Brooklyn, I never feel more home than if I’m in Brooklyn or New York. Because I know all the codes, I know my way, I know everything. You could transplant me right now in New York, and I would pick up my life. There is nowhere else where I feel that much at home. My home is New York and I’m not saying this to be fancy, it’s really where I grew up. So yeah, that place for me has affected my mentality and the way I see things and my work ethic. It’s all New York I think.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Imagining that you can step into future version of yourself, what is the most important advice that you think you’d need to give your current self?
Julie Granger:
I think this is like, as an entrepreneur, you want to know that what you’re trying to achieve you will achieve. If now I knew that what I’m trying to achieve is a given, it’s for sure, maybe I’d relax. So I wish that if you’d tell me, “Okay, you don’t worry, you make it at the end. So chill out, watch TV a little bit.”
Anne Muhlethaler:
And that brings us to my final question, which is what brings you happiness?
Julie Granger:
Just being passionate, being around people who love you and loving people, and being able to make the life that you want to have, kind of like an architect, and never be a slave to anything but just being able to live with your rules and that’s… And I mean, love, I mean, I think of course it’s the basis for life. No? So love, passion, love for people, being loved. I think those are the most important things really, and a good workout.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Thank you so much. Oh yeah, and a good workout. Yeah. You needed to add that. Yes. Thank you.
Julie Granger:
Sorry, my bad!
Anne Muhlethaler:
It would’ve been off character otherwise. Julie, thank you so much for your time today. It was such a pleasure to chat to you, and get to know you better. May I ask you for anybody who wants to find you, where can they you online or in person?
Julie Granger:
Oh, thank you. Well, online, if they go to the site thestudioparis.com, so T-H-E thestudioparis.com. And if they want to find me in real life in general, it’s mostly updates because I’m teaching a lot between Paris, Lisbon, and probably some other European cities at Geneva soon. And I think the best way is on my Instagram. And that’s, if you type Julie Granger Fitness, it’s easier, because my account is jujuonther0cks, but the spelling is weird. So Julie Granger Fitness on Instagram I think is where you have the most up to date info on my fitness adventures.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Awesome, and I will put links to everything we talked about, and your website and everything in the show notes as well. So thank you so much again, I hope that I will see you tomorrow, because I am planning to do the 11:00 AM barre. Although I am playing tennis three days in a row for an hour and a half, so I may a little bit tired.
Julie Granger:
Okay. All right.
Anne Muhlethaler:
I hope you have wonderful plans for the rest of the day and the weekend. And-
Julie Granger:
Thank you so much and thank you for having me, and hopefully I’ll see you in class tomorrow. And thank you so much again for thinking of me with this podcast, and for asking all these questions that really resonated with me, and for allowing me to share my story.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Thank you. I’ll speak to you soon and have a wonderful day.
Anne Muhlethaler:
Thanks again to Julie Granger for being my guest on the show today. You can find her at juliegranger.com or at thestudioparis.com. All the social lengths are in the show notes as well. So friends and listeners, thank you so much for joining me again today. If you’d like to hear more, you can subscribe to the show on any platform of your choice. And if you’d like to connect, you can get in touch with me _outoftheclouds on Instagram, where I also like to share guided meditations and other daily musings about mindfulness. You can also find all of the episodes and more annevmuhlethaler.com. And if you don’t know how to spell it, that’s in the show notes too. And you can subscribe if you’d like to receive the bimonthly newsletter, which is also at the crossroads between business and mindfulness.
Anne Muhlethaler:
So that’s it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening to Out of the Clouds, and I hope you’ll join us again next time. Until then, be well, be safe, and take care.