A Strength Coach's 7 Step Guide to Physical and Spiritual Growth

Four weeks - That's how long a simple Bible verse held a former college strength coach hostage. Eileen Noyes, who had spent years perfecting training programs that transformed college athletes across multiple sports, found herself completely stumped by Proverbs 31:17. The verse that speaks about girding yourself with strength should have been smooth sailing for someone who lived and breathed weight rooms, proper technique, and muscle development. Instead, it became her most challenging chapter yet, refusing to be written despite her decades of expertise.

The irony wasn't lost on her. Here was a woman who understood progressive overload, hypertrophy, and every technical aspect of building physical strength, yet God was making her wrestle with a single verse about strength for an entire month. At 52, navigating the hormonal changes of menopause while managing kids ranging from age 7 to 22, Eileen discovered that sometimes your greatest area of knowledge becomes your most unexpected classroom. Her background as a college strength coach and her journey as host of The Unsidelined Life podcast positioned her to see connections between physical training and spiritual growth that most people miss entirely.

In this episode of The Unsidelined Life, Eileen shares this unexpected struggle, that became the foundation for understanding how the Seven Essential Phases of Strength Training mirror spiritual development in ways that transform both body and soul. Through her month-long wrestling match with God's perspective on strength, Eileen uncovered three sneaky ways women get sidelined in life and developed practical methods for staying strong through every season, whether dealing with changing hormones, family demands, or the challenge of maintaining priorities when resistance shows up disguised as your biggest growth opportunity.

When Your Expertise Becomes Your Classroom  

Eileen expected writing about Proverbs 31:17 to be the easiest chapter in her devotional series. The verse speaks directly to her wheelhouse, mentioning strength and strong arms - concepts she had mastered through decades of coaching college athletes. With her background working with volleyball players, football teams, and various other sports, she felt completely prepared to tackle this topic. The resistance she encountered wasn't about writer's block or summer schedules with loud kids interrupting her flow. It was God's way of showing her that expertise in one area doesn't automatically translate to understanding His deeper perspective on that same topic.

This humbling experience reminded her that knowledge without divine insight only scratches the surface of true understanding. While she knew everything about muscle development, training cycles, and proper technique, God wanted to teach her something entirely different about strength. The month-long journey with a single verse became the perfect example of one of her core training principles - that resistance is necessary for growth, and sometimes the areas where we feel most confident are exactly where God wants to do His deepest work.

God was stripping away her reliance on human knowledge to reveal His higher ways. This struggle taught her that transformation often requires uncomfortable wrestling periods where assumptions get tested and expertise gets challenged. Just as muscles must be pushed beyond their comfort zone to develop, spiritual understanding often requires seasons where our confidence gets shaken so deeper wisdom can emerge.

The Seven Phases That Transform Everything  

The parallels between physical strength training and spiritual development became undeniable as Eileen worked through her coaching methodology. Each phase revealed connections that changed how she viewed both fitness and faith development.

1. Phase One - Initial Assessment begins every serious training program with an honest evaluation of current capabilities and weaknesses. In the weight room, this means testing athletes' bench press max, squat numbers, and major muscle groups to establish baseline measurements. No two athletes start at the same level, so understanding individual starting points becomes essential for creating effective programs. This phase mirrors the biblical call to examine yourself in faith, taking an honest inventory of your spiritual condition without comparison to others. Just as Eileen would gauge where athletes stood physically before designing their training, spiritual growth requires understanding where you currently stand with God, identifying areas that need strengthening, and establishing markers for measuring future development.

2. Phase Two - Starting Light and Simple focuses on basic exercises without complexity or overwhelming challenges. Eileen never threw athletes into power cleans or advanced movements right away. Instead, she started with curls, dumbbell bench press, leg press - fundamental movements that build a proper foundation. This approach allows athletes to acclimate to weight training without burning out or injuring themselves through premature intensity. Spiritually, this translates to beginning with the "milk" of God's word rather than diving into complex theological debates about denominational differences or deep doctrinal disputes. Eileen learned this principle through her own early discipleship experience, where mentors focused on fundamental relationships with God - loving Him with heart, soul, mind, and strength, and loving neighbors as yourself - rather than getting caught up in the theological complexity that could overwhelm new believers.

3. Phase Three - Higher Repetitions with Lower Weight builds muscle memory and proper technique before adding significant resistance. Eileen was particularly strict about this phase because so many injuries happen when athletes skip proper form development. Starting with lighter weights and higher repetitions allows the body to learn correct movement patterns while building the neurological connections necessary for safe progression. This phase prevents the hardheaded approach where athletes want to jump straight to heavy weights without proper preparation. In spiritual terms, this represents the discipleship phase where consistent practice of basic spiritual disciplines - prayer, Bible reading, fellowship - creates the spiritual muscle memory needed for more challenging seasons. Strong discipleship early in faith development, like Eileen experienced through mentors who took her up mountains for Bible study, establishes the proper spiritual technique that carries believers through heavier spiritual loads later.

4. Phase Four - Progressive Challenge and Complexity introduces more demanding exercises, heavier weights, and increased difficulty as athletes adapt to training stress. This is where real muscle development happens through the process of hypertrophy - breaking down muscle fibers through resistance so they heal back stronger and larger. Muscles must be challenged beyond their current capacity to grow, which requires systematically increasing demands on the body. This phase parallels spiritual maturity where God allows greater trials and tests as faith grows stronger. Eileen uses the hide-and-seek analogy to explain this progression - when children are young, parents make themselves easy to find by sticking out body parts or hiding in obvious places, but as children mature, the hiding becomes more challenging. Similarly, new believers often experience quick answers to prayer and obvious signs of God's presence, but as spiritual strength develops, God allows seasons where His presence feels hidden, trusting that mature believers can push through uncertainty to find Him.

5. Phase Five - Maximum Testing and Heavier Loads occurs after athletes have progressed through weeks of systematic training and are ready to test their new capabilities. This phase involves attempting personal records and pushing limits to measure growth since the initial assessment. Athletes who started bench pressing 135 pounds might discover that same weight has become their warm-up after months of progressive training. This testing phase requires more rest between sets because of the increased exertion and overload on the system. Spiritually, this represents seasons of intense testing where God allows circumstances that require every ounce of spiritual strength you've developed. These seasons often feel overwhelming, but they're actually opportunities to discover how much spiritual muscle you've built through previous phases of development. The increased rest requirement parallels the need for deeper spiritual rest and restoration during intense seasons of testing.

6. Phase Six - Recovery Cycles provides planned breaks after intense training phases to allow complete physical and mental restoration. After athletes complete a full training cycle and reach their maximum testing phase, Eileen would give them weeks away from the weight room. This isn't laziness or lost time - it's essential for preventing burnout and allowing the body, to fully recover from systematic stress. During these breaks, all the microscopic adaptations from previous training consolidate into lasting strength gains. In spiritual development, these recovery cycles represent seasons of rest that God provides after intense periods of growth or testing. These aren't seasons of spiritual stagnation but necessary periods for integrating lessons learned and allowing spiritual adaptations to solidify into lasting character change.

7. Phase Seven - Coaching Accountability provides external perspective and motivation that athletes cannot provide for themselves. Even experienced athletes need coaches who can see technique flaws invisible to the trainee and push beyond self-imposed mental limitations. Coaches provide accountability when motivation wanes, encouragement during plateaus when progress seems stalled, and expert guidance for breaking through barriers. A coach can see when an athlete is capable of more weight than they believe possible and provides the external push needed to discover new potential. In spiritual development, this represents the role of mentors, spiritual directors, and mature believers who can see blind spots in your spiritual development and challenge you beyond your comfort zone. Just as Eileen could see when athletes were ready for more challenge than they recognized, spiritual coaches can identify when you're ready for greater spiritual responsibility or deeper levels of faith that you might not recognize in yourself.

Breaking Free From the Sidelines  

Women get sidelined in predictable patterns, and Eileen identifies three primary areas where this happens most frequently. The first involves being told you don't matter or have nothing valuable to contribute beyond traditional domestic roles. Eileen experienced this directly in her first marriage, where she was told she wasn't created in God's image and had no purpose beyond cooking, cleaning, and childbearing. This type of sidelining attempts to reduce a woman's entire calling to basic household functions while ignoring the broader purpose God has placed on her life.

The second pattern emerges when women sideline themselves waiting for others to change before taking action on their own growth. This particularly shows up in marriage relationships where wives focus all their energy on what their husbands need to fix instead of addressing their own areas for development. Eileen discovered this trap in her own healing journey with her spouse Michael, realizing she had been waiting for him to work on himself while ignoring the spiritual healing and personal baggage she needed to address independently.

Physical health represents the third major area where women accept being sidelined, especially as they age. At 52 and navigating menopause, Eileen recognizes that maintaining strength requires different strategies than when she was younger. Running no longer works for her body the way it once did, but lifting weights becomes essential for bone density and overall health. This shift requires letting go of past approaches and embracing new methods that work for the current season, refusing to accept physical decline as inevitable just because of age or hormonal changes.

Resistance Becomes Your Secret Weapon  

The breakthrough moment in Eileen's understanding came when she realized that resistance isn't the enemy of growth - it's the essential ingredient. In strength training, muscles only develop when they encounter resistance greater than what they're accustomed to handling. This resistance creates microscopic tears in muscle fibers that, when properly recovered, heal back stronger and larger than before. The discomfort and challenge aren't signs that something's wrong; they're proof that adaptation and growth are happening.

This principle applies directly to spiritual development, where trials and challenges serve the same function as weights in the gym. The resistance you encounter through difficult circumstances, spiritual attacks, or seasons where God feels distant aren't punishments or signs of failure. Instead, they're opportunities for spiritual muscle development that couldn't happen any other way. Eileen's four-week struggle with writing about strength became the perfect example of this principle in action - what felt like frustrating resistance was actually God's way of developing deeper understanding.

Biblical pruning provides another layer to understanding resistance as a growth tool. Just as gardeners cut away dead or excess growth to encourage fruit production, God allows circumstances that strip away things that hinder development. This pruning process feels like breaking down, but it's actually preparation for multiplication and increased fruitfulness. Learning to embrace rather than resist this process accelerates growth and builds strength that can weather any storm life brings.

Your Strength Training Journey Starts Now  

The connection between physical and spiritual strength isn't just metaphorical - it's practical and actionable. True strength requires both physical discipline and spiritual maturity working together, taking care of your body as the temple it was designed to be while building the spiritual muscle needed to handle whatever challenges life presents. The seven phases provide a roadmap for development in both areas, starting with honest assessment and progressing through systematic challenges toward lasting transformation.

Begin by choosing one area where you've been waiting for circumstances to change before taking action. Whether that's starting a consistent workout routine, pursuing spiritual growth through stronger discipleship, or addressing patterns that keep you stuck, the first step is always the same - decide that you're worth the investment and commit to showing up consistently, especially when resistance appears. Your future strong self is waiting on the other side of that decision.

Ready to stop living #sidelinednomore and start building real strength in every area of your life?  Join the wait list and immediately get Proverbs 31:10 as a preview, as well as each new chapter of Proverbs 31 - Lady Bellator Edition as it releases.

For more inspiring conversations about moving from the sidelines to center field in your life story, tune in to The Unsidelined Life podcast with Eileen Noyes. Each episode features real stories from women who have navigated the complex journey of balancing family, faith, and finding their own purpose. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and join a community of women who are ready to live the full life God created for them.

“She sets her heart upon a field and takes it as her own. She labors there to plant the living vines.”
— Proverbs 31:16 (TPT)