Demi Lovato hits the gym six days a week, but for the singer, it’s not just about looking good.
Lovato has been working out religiously at L.A.’s Unbreakable Performance Center (where Nick and Joe Jonas also work out) for the past nine months, and has called the gym her “oasis” on Instagram.
“This is her safe haven,” Unbreakable’s founder Jay Glazer tells PEOPLE. “Demi will be here for four hours a day. It’s her one place where she doesn’t have to be a pop star. She’s talked a lot about her addictions, and this has become her healthy addiction. She lights up when she comes in here.”
And while Lovato wanted to lean up, her main focus was learning how to fight.
“She’s more coachable than most of our fighters,” says Glazer. “She doesn’t put ego in, she does it right — and she is vicious!”
Lovato will start her session with an hour-and-a-half of mixed martial arts.
“Depending on the day of the week, we’ll do boxing, Muay Thai, ground fighting and/or Brazilian jujitsu,” says Glazer. “Then she’ll do some sort of recovery, and then she’ll go do her performance workout.”
Lovato’s performance workout focuses on full-body toning, so she does exercises with high reps and low weights, with little rest in between.
“It’s very intense,” says Glazer. “It’s three different exercises three times through with no rest. She’ll do a push, a pull and lower body move, so let’s say a chest push, a pull for your back, and then some sort of squat, but something low-impact that won’t bulk her. At the end we’ll do abs.”
Following her workout, Lovato does 30 minutes of recovery including I.V. therapy twice a week, cryotherapy two or three times a week, Phoenix Thera-Lase medical laser therapy each day that penetrates six inches into the body to encourage healing and reduce swelling and inflammation, and massaging recovery sleeves every day.
“She goes through the plan perfectly,” says Glazer. “She’s never been late, she shows up, she helps everybody. She’s incredible.”
Since he began working with her, Glazer has seen an improvement not just in Lovato’s body, but in her spirit.
“She glows,” he says. “The happiness that she has, it’s really from the inside out. Physically, she looks ridiculously amazing, but to get her to see herself as beautiful as she is — I can’t tell you how proud we are of her.
This article originally appeared on People.com
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