I Am Carly Porrello

Along with talking to Lisa Ramos to start off this blog, I got to speak to my other boss Carly Porrello. Carly is the head instructor at The Cycle Studio in Clark, New Jersey, (For more on the studio, check out the I Am Business section). Carly has had a long journey on her road to success and it came with many tough times and hard lessons, but she prevailed and has had many accomplishments in the long run.

The journey began when Carly graduated from Woodbridge High School in Woodbridge, New Jersey, from there she attended Kean University for her freshman year of college. After 2 semesters at Kean, she dropped out and attended Connecticut School of Broadcasting. She graduated from there and was working on a goal of hers to be a radio DJ or a news anchor. However, Carly thought her career would take off overnight and it didn’t. She had different job opportunities to work the mail room or read the news for different radio stations and eventually work her way up, but she declined those jobs. Looking for a career in the limelight she took her journey to New York City and began taking acting classes. She took classes for a year and afterwards got little parts here and there, but eventually she gave it because of the bruteness of the acting world. Carly told me of how the career can be hard because of the harsh criticism of the job. She told me a story about how she would wait on line for auditions for hours, and when it was finally her turn, they would dismiss her; almost immediately if her appearance wasn’t what they wanted such as being “too fat” or “too skinny” or “not blonde”. At the age of 24, Carly decided to go back to school and get her degree in English. She admits that she did not really use this degree much except for a few fitness articles she wrote.

Throughout the years, while in New York, when she was bartending and waitressing a friend introduced her to pilates to help her out with some back issues she was having from all the standing. She fell in love with it. From there her fitness career would begin to blossom. She took a pilates training and a mat training to begin with, so she could start teaching. Eventually she would find herself as head instructor at The Cycle Studio where she currently still works.

Carly has overcome many obstacles in life as well as made many break throughs, but when asked about her greatest achievement, like Lisa, she would say it was becoming a parent. However, she did note that second to that would be the release of her in home work out DVD’s that are still on sale today. And after going through it all, Carly said the hardest thing she has had to overcome as a woman was being taken seriously by the men in the fitness world. She feels as though it has always been slightly harder to gain the respect of men and trying to prove to them that she is just as strong if not stronger than they are in some cases. Recently she has gotten the chance to work with football players entering the NFL draft at her sister’s studio where they work with the players in order to help get them ready for the draft. She notes that she always shows them that everything she asks them to do, she can do it too. That was just a small example of how she proves herself every day.

If there is anything to take from that, it would be to not give in to what other people think of you. Sometimes as women, we have to take an extra step to prove we are just as good everyone else and it should be a challenge we are willing to take. Don’t let anyone male or female make you second guess who you are because it is in those wavering moments of courage that we can make a change. I encourage you to build your confidence and show the negative people in your life, your value and what they could be missing out on.

Thank you for reading!! Be sure to read the post on The Cycle Studio, in the I Am Business category. I appreciate all of the support!! Follow us on Instagram (@iam.wwoman) and Twitter (@iam_wwoman)