Staying in your lane: politics and small business

Bang Personal Training has evolved over the years. So has my thinking around what staying in our particular lane means.

In the beginning… There was doubt. As a new business, the language and branding we used looked a little more scaled up and corporate than things actually were. And that’s because I was a bit embarrassed by the reality: that we were just a tiny, bootstrapped upstart on Queen West. I didn’t want people to dismiss us because we might be gone in a week or two. Of course, that was around 2008… Not that the anxiety has ever entirely left me (shout out to the pandemic).

At the same time, I still believed that better exercise technique alone would be the skeleton key for just about everyone. I had thoughts on environment and community too – but they were much less developed. I was a little stuck, though, when our standard approach wasn’t working. That led to a pretty involved exploration of nutrition. This was the first place I encountered what is now a common problem: how unparalleled access to information is so frequently unhelpful – a cognitive error BJ Fogg calls the Information-Action Fallacy.

As our roots grow deeper within the Toronto fitness community, I felt the freedom to be more ourselves. This is something that LinkedIn-folk call authenticity with such frequency that the word has lost all meaning. The process – whatever you want to call it – was bolstered by clearer awareness and a more developed philosophy. But being comfortable in your own skin takes real time and I was not yet outspoken because we wanted to stay in our lane as a business. Then again, as Howard Zinn said, “You can’t be neutral on a moving train.”

Let’s be clear: I don’t think every single personal viewpoint needs to be broadcast. Particularly in an age where everyone can pretend (with varying success) to be an expert on anything. To wit, a friend and physical culture historian recently wrote about fitness expert Mike Israetel, who is wise in the ways of muscle-building but speaks with embarrassing levels of confidence on issues outside his wheelhouse, including “race science” which is, in reality, a hateful little turd dressed in a lab coat, still clutching its phrenology tools. But people believe experts with big platform and that’s dangerous.

So, where are we more outspoken? Or at least willing to be? By this point, you may have heard me talk about bike lanes, safe-injection sites, or the power of community. Maybe even the grand enterprise of public health. That’s because we’re in the health business – not just the fitness business.

Fitness alone is valuable on a personal level but it’s also limited. We all experience diminishing returns on our efforts because that’s human physiology for you. There’s a point where you’ve gone beyond the basics and now have to be diligent – even about maintenance. Progress here becomes tougher, more involved, and more expensive. And that’s where the road forks.

On one side is solipsism, where everything feeds you, your progress, and your platform – no matter the cost. And on the other is community, social responsibility, and just generally seeing yourself as one of many, instead of the main character of the universe. Working toward solutions lives here. Collective action lives here. Cheering each other on during birthday squats lives here too. That’s our lane.