Some call it a pivot. Some call it a redirect. It's all just growth.

Hey Fam, Getting back into some writing and wanted to share a little thought with you all. Some of you know how much I enjoy putting ink to paper (much more than being on video that's for sure) but a lot of you might not, given that we've switched our marketing pretty heavily towards Instagram. Words just don't carry that much weight anymore. I'm not even 100% sure kids these days know what 'dog earring' a book means. Just like I'm sure 'hanging up the phone' will eventually move on "red dot that mf-er" or something. In the spirit of quick reads and keeping my brain as young as possible, here's a little piece on how The Movement Warehouse slogan became Culture. Community. Fitness. If you enjoy it shoot me a reply (also to let me know you're reading these). And yes, I'm aware there are a ton of run-on sentences, I enjoy writing, doesn't mean I'm technically good at it, just like how I enjoy golf but doesn't mean I'm going pro this year... also there's a few more blog posts on the website.

It’s every San Diegan’s favorite season again. Beaches, bikinis, board shorts, wetsuitless surfing, suntanning and golfing till 7:52p. I still don’t understand how everyone doesn’t want to live here but I think people are catching on. I have a buddy who’s shirt says, “California. You can’t afford it.” over a VW bus and a retro colored rainbow. It's more true now than ever, so let's just keep pushing that and hope people keep moving to Austin and Denver. All that aside, the people that do live here are some of the healthiest, fittest, happiest and sexiest people in America. You can look that up for verification but what’s the point when you can literally just look around wherever you are and see for yourself. I’m really hoping most of you are working from home and as you read this there’s a mirror next to you ;) Seriously though, I made that up but there's no way we're not at least top five. If you don’t know the back story of The Movement Warehouse and it’s evolution from how it started to what it is today, it’s a pretty short but I think kinda cool story. When I opened MVMT in 2017, I had a passion for training athletes. I knew Southern California was a hotbed for young talent in volleyball, lacrosse, tennis and golf so I wanted to gear my training (and marketing) towards youth sports. The slogan was “The Movement Warehouse. Move Stronger. Move Faster. Move Smarter.” I was pretty content when I finally came up with it all. That was five years ago. While I still highly enjoy training middle and high school athletes; 99% of our members fall outside that 12-18 year old range. The Stronger. Faster. Smarter. tagline still fits, but it wasn’t the heart of the gym anymore. So I changed it. We changed it. My goal for this gym was to make people feel comfortable and safe lifting heavy weights. It wasn’t supposed to be a competition like CrossFit, it couldn’t be cardio like Orange Theory, Renegade or Barry’s and it had to be heavier lifting than F45. I wanted to show our members that through heavy weight lifting you could achieve your best physique. It would take longer than strictly losing weight and getting skinny with endless hours of cardio but the rewards would last much longer and in my opinion having the curves and definition of the human musculature is hot AF. “The Movement Warehouse. Culture. Community. Fitness.” is now the embodiment of MVMT. I don’t remember who came up with it, might have been a trainer, might have been me, but it doesn’t really matter. What does matter is that “fitness” comes at the end. Obviously, fitness is WHAT we do, but it’s not what defines us. We all know consistency is what drives results but to achieve consistency you need to truly enjoy the process of whatever you’re doing. If you want to be a better golfer, you better love actually practicing at the range (not just smashing balls as far as you can) and working on your short game. If you want to eat cleaner, you probably should learn to enjoy cooking, at least a little. If you want to get stronger, you better enjoy lifting weights. The events and vibe of the gym aka culture is supposed to be inviting, inclusive and non threatening. The members and trainers (and dogs, Rani and new gym pup Rufus) aka community are supposed to be welcoming, happy and open. If we do both of those things right, you’ll want to keep coming back day after day, week after week. That is what we call consistency. To me, enjoying your workout is more important than any individual workout alone. It’s the volume of work you put in over the course of a year that will define how you look and feel at the end of it. If you’re having a bad day, workout. If you’re stressed, workout. If you’re tired, come laugh and hangout with your friends (and workout). If you’re happy and having a great day, definitely workout. If you’re drunk, do not workout, instead be happy, but do not workout. You can always workout when the hangover kicks in then go back to being happy again. It could have been “Fun. Friends. Fitness.” but that would have been terrible, this isn’t a Chuck E. Cheese’s for working out. Have fun. Make Friends. Workout. Then do it again and again and you’ll see the results you’re looking for… (if you’re still struggling, keep an eye out for the next blog about how to know if you’re working hard enough) We’re all here to lift each other up, we’re here to hold each other accountable and we’re here to help you through whatever it is you might be working through on any given day for a million different reasons. Now when I say "we're here" I'm talking about all of us, everyone that walks through the doors at MVMT every single day, not just Meagan, Nate, Brad, Andrea and me. We are all in this together and WE wouldn’t be anything without you. Much love, Michael