Toronto based freelance journalist Zahra Khozema spoke with the program about her evolving relationship with the gym, and her decision to give up her membership, via what she called one of the most difficult emails she sent in 2025.
“ What made me send that email was I think a mix of burnout and guilt and obviously just like with a sprinkle of…shame. I wasn’t keeping up with my membership anymore and I just kept telling myself like, ‘hey, I’m gonna go back.’
Khozema said her relationship with the gym was at first a really positive one, although getting a smartwatch during the pandemic changed things. A few years later, after a change in work impacted her schedule, she found she wasn’t going at all.
“ When I first started, it was amazing…it gave me so much confidence and it was really cool to see how I was able to like push my boundaries and build a routine. And I loved all of those aspects, but I think…as time passed, I think especially with technology, that got a little toxic,” she said.
Now 30, Khozema started going to the gym over a decade ago.
I was diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome when I was a teenager. My doctor said that I really needed to be active. Like my weight couldn’t fluctuate or I would be more prone to cancer or some heart diseases and stuff like that,” she said. “So I think that just really freaked me out and I was like, oh my God, this is the bible, now I have to go to the gym all the time to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
She said her decision to give up her membership came along with an acceptance that one can’t always optimize everything at once.
“ I thought I would lose a really big chunk of myself when I stopped going to the gym…especially if I got rid of my membership, then that just means like, ‘okay, well now I don’t go to the gym like at all. Like, I’m not associated with any kind of gym anymore.’ So I really thought that that would take away part of like my personality. But it didn’t,” she said.
“This is the beautiful part about life…when one thing goes away, something else will fill your time.”
Khozema originally shared her story in a first person piece for the CBC.
“ I think more than writing the story was about the timing that the story came out,” she said.
“When we’re setting goals for our new year, making our vision boards and things like that, it’s always like, ‘I need to go to the gym more. I need to go to the gym X times a week.’
Khozema says, oftentimes people’s resolutions around the gym will fail.
“ I think we set ourselves up for like an unrealistic goal and it doesn’t work out and we beat ourselves up for it, and I just started with like, ‘hey, the bar is so low, so whatever you’re doing is better than this and it’s okay to fail…it’s okay to back up. It’s okay to focus on different things. It’s okay to switch gears.”
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