What Does HAES-Aligned Personal Training Actually Look Like in Practice?
Health At Every Size gets talked about a lot in inclusive fitness circles. It gets misunderstood just as often.
Some trainers hear HAES and assume it means ignoring health entirely. Others think it's a philosophy you agree with in theory but that doesn't really change how you work. Neither is right, and the gap between understanding HAES as a concept and actually practising it is where a lot of well-meaning trainers get stuck.
What Does HAES Actually Mean for Personal Trainers?
HAES is a framework built on the premise that health-supporting behaviours; movement, rest, eating in ways that feel good, managing stress, having access to care, are worth pursuing regardless of body size, and that body size itself is not a reliable indicator of health or behaviour.
It challenges the assumption that a smaller body is inherently healthier, that weight loss is an appropriate universal goal, and that people in larger bodies need to change their bodies before they deserve access to good care and good coaching.
For personal trainers, this means one fundamental shift: health outcomes, not body change, become the measure of success. Improved cardiovascular fitness, increased strength, better sleep, reduced pain, more energy, greater confidence in movement; these are all meaningful outcomes that have nothing to do with what someone weighs.
How HAES-Aligned Training Changes Your Programming
HAES-aligned programming starts with a different question. Not "what does this person need to do to change their body?" but "what does this person want to be able to do, and what does their body need to do that well?"
That shifts everything downstream. A plus-size client who wants to go hiking needs cardiovascular endurance, hip mobility, and lower body strength. A client recovering from disordered eating who wants to feel stronger needs a slow, trust-building approach that keeps movement feeling safe rather than punitive. A client with chronic pain who wants to be more active needs you to understand their pain patterns before you build anything.
None of those programmes look like a standard weight loss protocol. All of them are built around what the person actually needs; which is what good programming has always been supposed to do.
Progress tracking also changes. HAES-aligned trainers don't track weight. They do track the things that actually tell you whether training is working: performance metrics, mobility, energy levels, how a client reports feeling in their body. These are more useful data points anyway; they tell you something real about what's changing, rather than a number that fluctuates for dozens of reasons that have nothing to do with your sessions.
How to Build a HAES-Aligned Intake Process
A HAES-aligned intake process doesn't ask for goal weight or target dress size. It asks what a client wants to be able to do, what their relationship with movement has been like, what hasn't worked before and why, and what they need from a trainer to feel safe enough to actually show up.
It also makes your approach explicit upfront. Not as a lengthy disclaimer, but as a clear statement that weight isn't a goal or a metric in your work; so that clients who need that approach know they've found the right person, and clients who are looking for something different can make an informed choice.
This matters especially for clients who've been to trainers before and been harmed; congratulated for weight loss from illness, put on treadmills without being asked a single question, told to "just lose weight" by someone who was supposed to be helping them. When your intake process signals something different, it starts rebuilding trust before the first session.
How HAES-Aligned Practice Changes the Language You Use
HAES-aligned language is consistent; not just in the big moments but in the small ones that happen without thinking.
It means not commenting on a client's body changing, in either direction. It means not using food as reward or punishment framing, even casually. It means not reaching for "you've earned this" or "you'll have to work that off" language, not even as a joke. It means not telling a client they look good when you mean they look smaller.
It also means being careful about how you frame health itself. "Health" is sometimes used as a euphemism for thinness; "I just want to be healthy" often means "I want to be thinner" when it comes from a client who's been steeped in diet culture messaging their whole life. HAES-aligned practice means engaging with what health actually means for that individual, in their body, with their history, rather than defaulting to a culturally loaded shorthand.
What HAES-Aligned Personal Training Doesn't Mean
HAES-aligned training doesn't mean pretending all bodies function identically or that body size has no relevance to programming. It means you programme for the body in front of you rather than the body you think they should have.
It doesn't mean refusing to work with clients who want to lose weight. It means you don't treat weight loss as the default goal, and you know how to work with clients whose goals and your practice don't perfectly align.
And it doesn't mean you know everything. HAES is an evolving framework and genuine practice requires ongoing learning; from people with lived experience, from researchers working in this area, from the clients themselves.
Why HAES-Aligned Training Makes You a Better PT
HAES-aligned practice makes you better at the actual job because it forces you to ask better questions, build more individualised programmes, and measure outcomes that actually matter.
It also makes you significantly better at retaining clients. People who've been failed by mainstream fitness don't have endless patience for trying again. When they find a trainer who actually works differently; not just in language but in practice; they stay. And they refer people like them.
If you're building a HAES-aligned practice and not sure how to market it without falling back on diet culture language, the Anti-Diet PT Survival Guide maps it out. Free download, no fluff. Download it here →
If you're working this way or actively building toward it, the Not So Typical™ PT Network is where trainers practising HAES-aligned, weight-neutral, neuroinclusive training find each other; and find the clients who are specifically looking for them.
