Kathryn Gates is an Austin-based psychotherapist and fitness professional working with adults in Texas to improve their relationships with their bodies. Certified by the American Council on Exercise, Kathryn will assist you in releasing frustration with yourself to find peace, energy, and satisfaction in life.
Clients of Kathryn Gates have said that their lives have become more fulfilling than they knew they could be.
For the handful of years after high school, Kathryn taught dance and group exercise in St. Louis, making use of her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance from Webster University. Personal training clients who wanted to “get in shape” brought so many factors to the table, that affected the way their bodies worked. From relationships to work environments to what they had for lunch, body function and feelings about bodies had so much more to do with a client’s “fitness” than the exercise she suggested for an hour out of each client’s week.
Feelings, thoughts, and relationships affect how and why we move.
Beyond basic fitness advice, Kathryn quickly recognized there were more profound ways to help people get what they really wanted.
People regularly do things they say they don’t want to do. And avoid doing things they say they should do. Psychology has sought to understand this phenomenon, along with how people can claim the life they truly want despite it. In 2007, Kathryn began graduate training at Pepperdine University in Southern California, studying Clinical Psychology and Marriage and Family Therapy.
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Accomplishing a marathon or a detox cleanse is not going to change the shame you feel about yourself.
While in grad school, Kathryn continued her work with people’s bodies as a Physical Therapy Aide and Personal Trainer, exploring the relationship between the physical self and the mental and emotional selves. As Kathryn interacted with Pain Management patients, with residents at Tarzana Treatment Center detoxing from substances and with the students she taught in the Kinesiology Department of California State University at Los Angeles, she observed how all were experiencing the interaction between what their bodies were doing and what their thoughts and feelings were doing. And how each person in the various circumstances used physical means to affect or alter their emotional state. Sometimes this was through use of a substance, sometimes through exercise, and sometimes people expressed emotions in hopes of gaining something through a relationship. Physical parts contribute to mental stability or instability. Emotions affect physical status. Relationships affect to a person’s decision to change or not. The interdependence of the physical, mental, and emotional and social aspects of a person continued to fascinated Kathryn everywhere she was able to observe it.
~We can not be healthy without a consistent pursuit of balance.~
Since moving to Austin in 2009, Kathryn has provided fitness consultation for recovery centers in Texas and regularly consults with experts in kinesiology, medicine, somatic healing and psychology. Kathryn provides online psychotherapy to residents across the state of Texas, as well as health coaching nationwide.
Austin-based Body Image Groups for women allow group members to build community and improve relationships: with others and with their own bodies. Kathryn’s personal group experience continues to prove the power of practicing relationships in a therapeutic space that translates to the “real world.”
Kathryn Gates has Body Image Groups that meet weekly, alternating online with in-office meet-ups. For those who are unable to come to Austin twice a month, the Body Acceptance Project, group members’ weekly email supplement, is available to readers worldwide. Through this platform, Kathryn has been called “a consistent and professional presence” offering weekly suggestions, ideas, insights and exercises to heal your relationship with yourself.
Licensed as a Marriage and Family Therapist Supervisor in the State of Texas and nationally certified by the American Council on Exercise (ACE), Kathryn values individuals for their uniqueness. She illuminates the strengths of her clients, her LMFT-Associate supervisees, and her fitness clients.
Contact Kathryn here. (She’d love to hear from you.)
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