HealthErla: Stronger After 40

At 46, Erla Guðmundsdóttir is still training and competing in Olympic weightlifting. Exercise has followed her since childhood, and today it connects her sporting life with teaching and a drive to help others care for their health.

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I always just say that I am a girl with a burning passion for having a positive impact on the people around me. It is my calling.

Known as HealthErla, she describes herself as “a girl with a burning passion for having a positive impact on the people around me.” She teaches physical education at Menntaskólinn við Hamrahlíð, hosts the podcast Með lífið í lúkunum, and has taught infant swimming at Suðurbæjarlaug for 20 years. She also works as a health coach and is a mother of three.

Erla began gymnastics at the age of five and continued for 12 years, until she was 17. She later tried athletics, aerobics and dance before taking up Olympic weightlifting. The challenge of becoming stronger and better continues to motivate her.

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We are shaped enormously by the people around us, and my mother and father were very good role models.

Her approach to health developed through experience as well as sport. After struggling with chronic fatigue while working as a flight attendant, she realized how important it is to listen to the body when the strain becomes too great. Her parents also influenced her outlook. They exercised regularly, and she says they taught her that health is primarily about balance and that movement should be a normal part of life.

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I think I learned early from them that health is primarily about a certain balance and that exercise is simply a natural part of life.

She considers the ability to exercise without pain, compete and enjoy the process a particular privilege after turning 40. She is critical of quick fixes aimed at improving appearance when people do not realize that such solutions can damage their health.

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I find this development incredibly sad, and it can simply prove dangerous.