The Team

Meet the others

Louise Ellengold 
Psychologist/Health & Wellness Coach/Personal Trainer

Louise is an amazing woman who needs no introduction. Here at Elevate we are very excited to have Louise on the team. Most Psychologists/coaches understand the importance of health and fitness in relation to positive mental health and encourage their clients to lead an active positive lifestyle however, very few actually live their lives in the fashion that they so strongly promote. Louise, who is also a qualified personal trainer is definitely an exception to this rule. Louise lives a positive, active and fore filled lifestyle working with her clients to achieve such a lifestyle within their own ideals.


Interview with Louise Ellengold

Where do you come from/ where did you grow up?
My parents originally from England but immigrated to New Zealand where I was born and raised in Hawkes Bay. I am the second eldest out of five children, 3 brothers and a sister.  Have a very global family with mum and dad still in NZ, my older brother lives in New York, my sister and one brother in London and my youngest brother is moving to Sydney soon.

What were your interests growing up?
My passion for sport and fitness started at a young age and has never stopped.  Netball, athletics, swimming and tennis occupied a lot of my time up until about 17 when I discovered the gym and weight training, which I found much more enjoyable than school.  I also loved music, learnt to play the violin and guitar, and sang in the school choir right up until my last year.

Culture and history of other countries fascinated me and the travel bug started to appear in my final year of school.  As I did not want to go straight to university I made the brave decision to move to London instead, and at aged 18 off I went.  The highlight of my two years there was meeting and spending time with my extended family, and travelling around Europe on my own seeing all of the amazing things I had studied in Art History.

What got you into the health industry?
I had an interest/curiosity in health from early on in life which progressed into a passion, which turned into my chosen life long career. Experiencing first-hand the benefits of living a healthy lifestyle and wanting to share it with others.   Also wanted to be able to bring more awareness of how important it is to include mental/emotional health in a person’s overall well-being, rather than the sole emphasis being just on the physical.  The mind/body connection in my view is too important to ignore.


How would you define optimal health and lifestyle/what is your philosophy?

To me, health is not defined by one aspect only.  It is a state of complete mental, physical and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or illness. Being healthy is about being whole and is about being in balance. Balance doesn’t mean that you never lean to one side or the other. Balance is about how quickly you come back.

Optimal health can be described as an individual person's physical, emotional and mental health abilities. That is, it is the health goals that a person can realistically achieve to feel their personal best. Optimal health is an individualised matter because no two people's health goals are the same. For one person the focus might be on physical health while to another, healing an emotional wound is a matter more pressing. What is important really comes down to you. Likewise, one person's optimal health may be another's bare minimum. There is no wrong or right when it comes to optimal health - it's just a matter of finding what best suits you and your abilities.

Qualifications/Education:

Bachelor of Science (Hons) (Industrial and Organisational Psychology)
- Victoria University of Wellington, NZ

Bachelor of Arts (Psychology and Criminology)
- Victoria University of Wellington, NZ

Psychologists Registration Program
- Australian College of Applied Psychology, Sydney

Post Graduate Diploma in Counselling
- Australian College of Applied Psychology, Sydney

Diploma of Life Coaching which includes: Cert IV in Life/Executive Coaching; Cert IV in Business; NLP Practitioner Certification
- The Coaching Institute, Melbourne

Certified AIF Master Trainer

Certificate III Fitness (Gym Instructor)

Certificate IV Fitness (Personal Trainer / Older Adults Trainer)
- Australian Institute of Fitness

Certified THUMP Level 1 Instructor (Boxing for Fitness)

Certified THUMP Advanced Level Instructor (Boxing for Fitness)
- THUMP Training Systems, Sydney

What makes you different from other practitioners in your field?
My unique combination of psychology, coaching and personal training professions gives me the ability to work from a multi-dimensional approach. 

What makes you an expert?
Ten years of uni/post-grad study and qualifications, continuing professional and personal development.  Experience in the field, including corporate and community settings and experience as an athlete which gives me the knowledge and practical expertise surrounding health and performance.

What are your proudest achievements/career highlights?
In 2008 I signed up to do an Ironman in Florida USA.  I did this despite having never done a triathlon before in my life.  I was also terrified of the ocean.  My first week of training in February that year I could physically only swim 100m in the pool, run 1.5km, and ride 30kms on a bike.  Nine months later I crossed the finish line having completed the distances of 3.8km ocean swim/180km ride/42.2km run (marathon).  It was the toughest challenge I had overcome, both physically and mentally but achieved it through pure determination and self-belief.

My motto in life in trying to achieve something no matter how big or small, whether it’s related to career, personal life, sport, relationships, friendships etc:

“Feel the fear and do it anyway”

Anything else that may be good to share with the world?
My favourite quotes which I use as guidance through life:

“It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new.  But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful.  There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power”
- Alan Cohen

“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The only way to discover the limits of the possible is by going beyond them into the impossible"
- Arthur C. Clarke