Evelyn Moos

As a tiny tot in a carseat (a story my mom loves to tell), I used to hear the closing cadences of songs on the radio and scream, "NO END! NO END!" This is to say that my appreciation for music began and a very young age, and my love of dance burgeoned soon after. However, my parents couldn't afford to send me to lessons consistently, so growing up I dabbled in ballet, jazz, tap dance and piano lessons, but lost touch with them until my adulthood. A chubby kid, I mostly grew up thinking that exercise and fitness were not for me.

My first adult connection with exercise was with yoga, which taught me body/spatial awareness, and the fact that knowing and using your body is not a privelege reserved for the thin or muscular. Through yoga, I learned to love the process of learning and challenging my body's limitations and improving my power, stamina and grace.

When I found Zumba in 2007, I fell in love with the Latin beats, the expression, and the sense of mastery after nailing a challenging choreography. In college at University of Hawaii, my roommate was a Zumba instructor and I loved the perk of living with her and getting to learn the choreography with her at home and being a "front row diva" in her classes. I loved watching myself go from needing to run out of class to get a drink of water after just two songs to finally getting through the whole class without stopping. I saw how at home she continued to push herself with bodyweight training, yoga, hiking and swimming. But she still had the energy during class to motivate, encourage and push us to go all out! She was my first fitness instructor role model.

When I moved to Pullman, Washington, I wanted to keep doing Zumba as much as possible, but I encountered many instructors who did not live up to my roommate's example. Instructors with the same playlist twice a week every week, instructors with no pre-planned playlist, instructors with no energy, instructors who couldn't cue, instructors who didn't have the level of fitness to teach a solid hour class--the lack of excellence is what finally pushed me to get my Zumba instructor license in 2014. The class I wanted was one where all participants felt welcome, everyone felt appropriately challenged, the music and moves had a lot of variety, instruction was clear, the instructor was knowledgable and could assist in modifications, the instructor was prepared, and the instructor represented a high level of fitness. If I couldn't find the kind of instructor whose class I wanted to attend, I would just have to BE that instructor.

I got licensed and started teaching Zumba about two weeks later. I still can't believe that I actually went from zero teaching experience to learning an entire 60 minutes of music/choreography in that amount of time. While I (mostly) had that 60 minutes down when I started, the other stuff that I wanted to achieve didn't come as easily. Superior group fitness instructing is still and will always be a work in progress, and I have grown so much in the past 3.5 years since I started. I've gained skills in cueing and playlist creation for workout maximization. I've learned big stuff that helps me in my personal and professional life, like greeting my participants and learning their names. I've learned little stuff like how not to have wardrobe malfunctions while teaching. And most importantly, I've learned how to let loose on stage, enjoy the music, and allow my personality to come through.

My passion for Zumba has only deepened since my first class, and I have been trained in Zumba Basic and Zumba Basic 2, Zumba Step, Aqua Zumba and Strong by Zumba. To improve my health, strength, appearance and stamina, I also train at home with bodyweight exercises. In the future, I would like to branch out and be trained in a yoga-based form of group fitness instruction and get in touch with my fitness beginnings. Currently, I teach one Zumba class per week and one Aqua Zumba class per week. I taught Zumba Step for over a year, and will be teaching Strong by Zumba when the school year ends.