How Does a Pastor Build Community at His Gym?

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Mike (00:01):

Fitness businesses and churches: Is there a connection? Gym owner and pastor Tres Kennedy will answer that question today on Two-Brain Radio. I’m Mike Warkentin, your host for this edition of Two-Brain Radio. Before we roll, please pound a like onto this video with my sincere appreciation, and don’t forget to subscribe. Now. I’ve had some religious experiences in my gym, usually after a benchmark workout that left me in a higher state. Tres Kennedy has taken that a lot further. He’s the owner of CrossFit Wotown and a pastor at Move Church, both in sweet home Alabama, just north of Birmingham. Tres, I’m super curious how your life as an entrepreneur influences the church and vice versa. Are you ready to go?

Tres (00:40):

I am beyond ready to go.

Mike (00:42):

All right, let’s hit it. I wanna know which came first. We talking gym or church. And when did both come into be?

Tres (00:48):

Yeah, so the church came first. Our church Move Church is seven years old. So me and my best friend, we planted it in really kind of our hometown seven years ago. So we did that, go through the whole, you know, find a location, meet people, build like your web of folks. And then hopefully from there grow and do all those types of things. For seven years and in the middle of that, or actually in the beginning of that, I went through this whole fitness journey, transformation, lost 80 pounds, all this stuff doing CrossFit. Oh yeah, it was wild. And then, somewhere along the way, you know, I met my wife, we got married, asked her to do CrossFit with me. It’s kinda like I got down to one knee with a little Qalo ring and was like, Hey, will you do CrossFit with me? It was super cheesy. If I could go back, I wouldn’t do it.

Mike (01:40):

It’s a good story though.

Tres (01:41):

But then she got really, really good at the fitness and exercising cause she had like a background playing college softball. And so she started coaching at the gym that we were a part of. Did that for several years. And then she was like, she was a dental hygienist and she, one day we were actually on vacation and she said that she didn’t wanna be a dental hygienist anymore. Or for the rest of her life. I was like, well, OK. Like what do you wanna do? And she was, she said, I honestly don’t know. She’s like, I like coaching at our gym. And I was like, do you wanna like open our own gym? And she was like, I don’t know, maybe. So, I was like, OK, well we’ll pray about it. You know, maybe in the next five years, we’ll figure out how to do that. I talked to our gym owner, all that good stuff. And literally that was a conversation in July. And then October of that same year we opened our gym. So it was just a few months. It was just like, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And that was two years ago. So October two years ago, we opened up our CrossFit gym.

Mike (02:42):

So when you started the church, did you have zero members? Like, was this just starting from zero and away you go?

Tres (02:48):

So we had a net of people. We knew like people that we had been in relationship with for literally probably half of our lives. And they went and planted this church with us. I wanna say it was probably around when we started probably around a hundred folks and we successfully grew it to like 60, you know, in our first year. And then from there we have just continued to figure out our DNA and kind of grow from there. So yeah, the bumps and bruises of like figuring out your culture, what you stand for, getting the right people in the right seats and honestly, you know, pouring into people, it’s a whole lot while managing finances and having your own kids and families and all that stuff. Sounds like a gym life, right?

Mike (03:38):

And that’s where I’m going with this because there’s some obvious similarities between coaching, you know, a coaching gym and a church. Like I think a lot of people will see that right away. You’re trying to help people live their best lives in both and you’re building community. Right. So what are some of the specific aspects of Move Church that are gonna be very familiar to gym owners and Two-Brain clients specifically?

Tres (03:57):

So, a lot of, because I make the joke all the time, people are like, wait, how did you do this with your gym? I’m like, it’s literally the same thing as planting a church. Basically you have people that you care about and they’ve got road blockers and you’re trying to remove those road blockers so that they can move forward in their spiritual journey. Same with fitness journey. Right. So like literally our service. So our once a week gathering of people, actually operates like a no-sweat intro for non-believers or new folks to the area. And then it’s also where your member, your group class happens on a weekly basis, as well as is the service. Beyond that, like we’d have like, so an on-ramp program or a foundations program or whatever, to get someone acclimated into your specific movements or stuff, we have the same, literally like the same thing.

Tres (04:53):

It’s called Move classes. What do we believe? What are our statements of faith? You know, what are like the path of a believer? What could you do inside the church, all this stuff, boom, that’s their next step, right? To get ’em acclimated. Then we, you know, we got a private Facebook group, just like our gym has a private Facebook group where we’re engaging with people on a weekly basis, creating new content, video, content, blogs, all that stuff, sharing with ’em, whatever, you know, help them with resources. We got one on one like coaching that would be like discipleship, right? So figuring out where people are in their life, figuring out what some good next steps are holding, ’em accountable to those things, helping them where they’re struggling, all that, just being present in their life with the one on one types of goal reviews, checkins. Literally see it’s a hundred percent the same. That’s kinda like a client journey Growth ToolKit. We’re mapping out the same stuff with people, you know, in their relationship and their life with God. Cause it’s like literally, like they’re trying to better themselves spiritually in the same way people are trying to better themselves physically.

Mike (05:55):

  1. So this is fascinating. And I love the parallels that you’ve got there. Now tell me this. Did you have this stuff in place at the church initially, and then you kind of started doing the Two-Brain thing and realized it synced up, or did you backfill some of the stuff from after learning more about the Two-Brain and the business aspects?

Tres (06:11):

It cleaned up a lot when we started doing the Two-Brain stuff, what was funny is my best friend. He’s the other pastor at our church. He actually coaches at our gym too. And so we were sitting in a staff meeting for the church one day and he was like, Hey, all these systems and things we have in place at the gym, it’s really easy for someone to figure out where they are in life or in their fit life. And know what that next clear thing was like. So what could our no sweat intro be? And then like, that’s what he said. He’s like, what do we do. So we started, like, we literally listed out all the stuff that we use at the gym with Two-Brain, like, OK.

Tres (06:56):

So how could we use some of the same things for our church? So we had all this other stuff along the way, but we just saw so much success on some of these things as well. Maybe this is kind of more of some of the things that we’re trying to do, because it really is customizable to everybody rather than just like a cookie cutter. Hey, here’s the flow, here’s the system you gotta do these steps one two and three. But so we took more of the customizable approach with the one-on-ones and stuff like that.

Mike (07:25):

In the religious community. How common is like an introductory process or a member journey? Is that a thing in the religious community or is that, you know, a newer thing that you were developing?

Tres (07:34):

No it’s been around, shoot. A lot of churched just have like a membership process. We don’t really have like a membership process. We’re just like, like some core things in discipleship, honestly. Like, Hey, here’s like some pillars in faith that we should be moving towards as, you know, go back to teachings in the Bible and try to figure out what those things are and kind of just move towards those spots. But as far as like helping people get acclimated into it, those things are probably newer in the last, I would say church history, maybe the last 40 years has been a slow development towards those things.

Mike (08:12):

And that’s fascinating because, like the average person who doesn’t work out can be very intimidated to join a gym. Right. It’s scary. There’s all these tattooed people in the corner, grunting and sweating, it looks horrifying and all this stuff. And Two-Brain has realized that like, yeah, you need to show people how to become a part of this group. And then on the other side for non-religious people who decide to join a church and become religious, that could be intimidating too, because you’re walking into this congregation of, you know, people who all believe the same thing. And they’re obviously very welcoming because that’s a tenet of faith, obviously, but it’s still intimidating because you don’t know anyone. You don’t know, like where do I sit? What do I do? All that other stuff. So that integration process must, I’m guessing that that makes it so much easier for new members of your church to find their home and feel better.

Tres (08:55):

Yeah. So that was like the other thing too, is like the biggest intimidating factor walking into a church, really two things, one, like everyone’s a goodie two shoes and they have it all together and perfect. And no one else, like if someone who just walks in off the street, like, oh, I’m nothing like them or two it’s like, oh, these people are like major hypocrites and I don’t wanna get sucked into being a hypocrite. Right. And so trying to break down those barriers and just, Hey look, nobody is perfect. Please don’t think that I’m perfect. Please don’t think, you know, that anyone is, we’re all trying to figure out life together is really the biggest thing. So the same way of posting pictures at the gym of not the, like the dude with this shirt off doing all this stuff, right. It’s the mom who is trying to figure out, you know, what’s for dinner while she’s swinging a kettlebell or something like that. You know, that’s kinda the same thing with the church that we’re trying to portray as well.

Mike (09:51):

Yeah. And in your client journey at the church, have you identified like common dropping off points where people might struggle to keep going and things like that? Just like in fitness we realize, OK, 90 days, getting tough for some clients, you know, we know those points are coming. Do you see that in the, I’ll call it the member journey at the church, I suppose.

Tres (10:08):

Yeah. Major life events. Whether it be loss of family member or job change, new season of life as a parent, someone who’s walked through divorce, you kinda see what those key indicators are like, OK. If these are the things like, we need to be aware of these things. And so we’ve started like building out like one day events, kind of like, you know, the tinker calls or anything that would happen in Two-Brain where you’re like on these special calls talking about specific things, we’re doing those now, whether it be for finances or marriage, or, you know, the whole gamut on that end and figuring, OK, what are the things that we need to be building beyond just a sermon, but we can incorporate into these people’s everyday lives and how do we create those tools to give it to them?

Mike (10:55):

So do you do that as a reactive thing, like, OK. Oh, I know, like, you know, Chris had a divorce, we need to kind of reach out and see if we can help. Or is it something where you are more proactive and you’re like we teach you finance and we teach you coping skills for life events, or how do you operate like that?

Tres (11:12):

Both. Yeah. Current experience. So you gotta like your finger on the pulse on what’s going on in your congregation, or like what’s going on in the members of your gym. That’s a big part that we’ll talk about later. It’s like, if you know what’s going on, then you need to create things for the people who are already there. It would be kind of pointless to come up with all these lists of things for people like, yeah, those are great ideas, but that’s nowhere near where I’m at right now. So I’m like, OK, where are you in your life? So the reactive, but also with the proactive, like, Hey, I think the proactive is important. Cause it gives someone an idea of where they can be in the future. So creating both.

Mike (11:52):

  1. And what about, call it general self improvement, like finance and fitness and things like that, do those things carry over from your gym, into your teaching as a pastor with your congregation?

Tres (12:02):

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So we talk about holistic discipleship. So your whole life being transformed into the image of Jesus. So I think he has a say beyond just what’s in here and like what’s in here, but how you act and respond like in the world. So I wanna be a good steward of my money. I wanna, you know, I wanna be a good steward of my body. We know the longer, like the better, like the healthier we are, the longer we’re probably gonna live, which means the more impact we’ll have in our family’s lives and our friends’ lives and our communities’ lives. So it’s important to do those things. So it absolutely translates to those things. How you treat people at your job, you’re growing in education, so you can just contribute to as society as a whole, all those things are important.

Mike (12:50):

So do you teach your congregation finance fitness stuff as well, or is that, you know, maybe a recommendation saying like, Hey, you know, your life could be improved by, you know, getting your financial house in order or maybe working out. Does that ever kind of cross over?

Tres (13:01):

Yeah. So we do financial, we call ’em financial workshops. Yeah. So I’m huge into financial education and learning that stuff. Cause we don’t learn it in our schools, not the right way. So trying to teach young people, one, like, Hey, how do you budget your money? How, but beyond that, what’s passive income? What’s cash flow? All these, what are investment strategies? Like obviously we can’t say, Hey, you need to do this. Invest here. We’re not investment, you know, professionals, but teaching them, you know, about real estate, teaching them about cash and passive income. Those are not words that I knew at 18 years old, or I didn’t learn about those till like I was 30. So trying to shrink that gap to help people say, Hey, look, if you’re, you know, financially, if you’re healthy, you don’t have to be a slave to your job and work 80 hours a week and do all the extra overtime and all that stuff and miss out on just life in general. And then the fitness side, it’s like a, there’s a tightrope there. Cause I don’t wanna use my influence in the church to persuade people to join our gym. So I’m like, Hey, you should definitely take care of your health. You need to be a steward of your body. So whatever works best for you works best for you.

Mike (14:14):

It’s interesting. I’m actually, I’m editing an article right now. It’s our yoga mentor, Shannon Brasovan. And she’s talking about how money is often, you know, a bad term in the yoga community because a lot of people do it for the love of yoga and so forth. And they’re almost embarrassed about making a profit. Her position though, is that if you make a profit and you get your finances in order, you can have a bigger impact on the world by doing good with that money. Chris Cooper obviously subscribes to that too, in his help first philosophy. It sounds a lot like you, you’re gonna be less stressed, less angry, less, you know, you’re gonna be able to focus on your family and do more as a person, whether it’s through tithing and giving and all the other important things if you have your finances in order, than if you’re just stressed, working 80 hour weeks, like you said, so I love the holistic approach to it. And the same goes, I won’t get into the, you know, the details of all the gym owners already know, the same goes if you’re healthy. If you’re not, you know, it’s hard to take care of someone else or your, you know, your brother, sister, if you can’t, you know, get the log of your own eye, I think is the biblical reference. If I’m not mistaken.

Tres (15:10):

I use Coop’s story all the time about, or the question about who eats the sandwich on the airplane. All the time. With folks. But then even like, as a believer, it’s like the most valuable resource you have is your time. Like one on one time with somebody, if all of my time is spent at my job, then I’m not using my resources properly. So I’m trying to help people say, Hey look, you can do stuff with your finances to free up your time so that you can make a much bigger impact

Mike (15:40):

Listeners. If you don’t know the eat the sandwich story, the short version is if there is a pilot on a plane full of people and there’s one sandwich, who gets it? The answer is the pilot, because if he or she crashes the plane, everyone goes down. So you gotta get that person whole before you can serve the rest. Same thing. Principle is putting your own oxygen mask on before someone elses. So that’s the analogy there. Let’s flip it the other way now. So talk to me about your experience as a pastor. How does that influence your business and your life as an entrepreneur? Because that’s gonna be a really interesting one. You had this church going and you decide to open a gym and now you’ve got the church of fitness going on the other side.

Tres (16:16):

The church of fitness. That’s great. Some of my friends are gonna listen to this and they’re gonna start using that term.

Mike (16:21):

I’m sorry.

Tres (16:24):

No, that’s a good one. I’ve not heard that one at all. So it really is like, it starts with belief and faith. Like I do believe, cause the question was, how does what I’ve learned as a pastor translate over to me being an entrepreneur. I do believe that I think God works in the world through believers, right? And the church. And that’s not just like in the literal building and the lives of the church, the church’s people, it’s not a building. And so through that, the term is build the kingdom of God. So building the kingdom of God really is like in all these other areas of life. So individuals, marriages, families, towns, businesses like leaders in businesses, all those spots, that’s where God’s doing stuff. So like my life, my worldview, my like scope is I want to do those things and be parts of all those spots.

Tres (17:21):

So what I’ve been learning this stuff. So I’ve been a pastor for 12 years. So now it’s translating over into all these other areas. Cause I see it and I’m in my small town. Our town is super small. Wanna say like 3000 people total. And that’s like, if you add up two other small towns with us, right. So really kinda a small town, but I just see like how, as you care for people, you can really see things begin to shift and change in a community. So I’ve learned all this stuff, how to care for people on the spiritual side, like be in their life when they’re going through the worst stuff they’ve ever been through. That’s the first person they’re gonna call is like, in our context, the person they’re gonna call is their pastor.

Tres (18:06):

Cause they’re like, Hey, you obviously know something I don’t know, like help me through this. You can see from like, you know, up in the air what’s going on, which is so crazy to think about, but it’s always the call. And it’s tough to be with somebody after they’ve received news that they have cancer or that someone they love has just died. And you’re like the first phone call or first interaction somebody has with somebody. So that prepared me a lot just for like, people are gonna go through stuff in the gym. Like, like there, it would be a great spot if no one dealt with anything in their year. And they just came and worked out, went home, had a nice meal, woke up, did it again tomorrow, but that’s not the case. It’s stressful day at work or my kids going through something or I’ve got 5 million things on my calendar, whatever, you know, the gamut on ? Side.

Tres (18:57):

I know all gym owners do, but like, OK. So what do you do with that information as a gym owner? Be like, well, you know, suck it up. Like do the stuff. Yeah. Like, but that’s not it, that’s the part that I took into it from the very beginning is just caring about people. And knowing that it’s so much more than this one hour that they’re spending in the gym with us, I want to get them to spend that one hour in the gym with me, but what do I have to do that? What barriers do I have to remove so that they can spend that one hour at the gym with me or that they’re like, you know what? It is worth it for me to be here. So that was like the biggest lesson on gym ownership side that I’ve learned.

Tres (19:37):

But as far as just like the town and community, I feel like we are responsible as business owners and entrepreneurs to make our communities better, not just like, not just bring new businesses or every chain restaurant, whatever possible so you can make the most money or bring as much business or development to the community as possible. I love my small town. I want my small town to stay a small town, but I would love for there to be valuable things within our community that last beyond my lifetime, for sure. That’s not like I want to see the biggest movie theater possible in our town. Right. I think it would be way more valuable to just have some business leaders who actually care about their community and know finance or whatever, you know, all the help first model, I think those things really do matter.

Mike (20:28):

I think you’ve really hit on an important point of coaching where, you know, maybe 10 years ago, maybe less, a lot of gym owners and coaches really thought, you know, being the best technical coach was super important, more certifications, more tech, cues, more knowledge about, you know, sarcomeres and all the other Krebs cycle and all the things no one really cares about except in a textbook. But what we are realizing more, and this is with Two-Brain Coaching and Two-Brain Business is the best coaches are really the ones who get clients to work out and do the workout that’s gonna help ’em with their goals. And so that gets into a whole different side of things where it’s not about squat cues anymore. It’s more about life coaching, you know, and its very interesting. Do you find that that life coaching then they kind of bleed over like holistically, if you’re talking about, I look at your church and you’re talking about dealing with people as a whole and you’re talking about finance and body and soul and so forth in the gym, you’re kind of doing the same exact same thing.

Mike (21:16):

And that must make you guys great coaches in your gym.

Tres (21:19):

Yeah. I dunno if you’ve ever heard the quote before people don’t care about how much you know until they know how much you care.

Mike (21:25):

Is that Roosevelt?

Tres (21:25):

Sure. I don’t know. I’ve heard it so much in my life. Michael Scott said it, who knows. But that really is true. Like if you know all the, the points of a squat like, but you don’t know that my daughter’s been in the hospital for like a week and that’s why I’ve not been at the gym. And like, how does that translate over, you know, at all, literally that was a conversation I had with one of our members today. And I just got on Facebook, saw that they were at the hospital, turns out they’ve been in the hospital for a whole week. Just shoot ’em a message on Facebook messenger. Hey, I just saw this. How are y’all? Is there anything I can do? Like that stuff really does like translate cause they’re like, oh, well they really do care. So then the next time they’re in. OK. Tell me about all these points of the squat. Again, why do they matter? But if you don’t have that, you know, that buy in from them, then it really doesn’t matter.

Mike (22:20):

And you’re not doing it, you know, as a retention tool, but it does turn into a retention tool because I think it was Greg Glassman I think that said it’s easy to quit or it’s easy to quit a gym. It’s hard to quit a relationship or some variation of that. And what our goal is as coaches and you know, even as a pastor, working for self improvement in any avenue, you need people to keep doing the stuff that you know is going to work. Building that relationship we found in gyms is absolutely critical to getting people, to do it. Cause the best workout program in the world is useless if they don’t show up to do it. So your actions in building community and relationships definitely become a retention tool. Does that actually show in your numbers at the, do you have retention numbers at your church?

Tres (23:01):

Yeah, but yeah, I do, but there’s a fine line there too though of the caring do I care because I’m trying to get this person stay here for as long as possible or do I really care about this person and their stuff? There really is a fine line there, so you have to figure out like, think you have to do soul searching on that end. Cause at the end of the day, like people are gonna leave our gym. People leave our gym all the time. Right. And at first that was the hardest lesson was learning at first people weren’t leaving — I thought people were leaving me, but actually they just have other things going on. So as a gym owner, business owner, whatever, you can take that stuff super personal. And that was a hard lesson to.

Tres (23:41):

Oh, I a hundred percent did. I was like sitting in the corner and like, like, oh my gosh, I thought me and this person were tight.

Mike (23:46):

They don’t like me!

Tres (23:47):

Exactly. And that’s not the case. And so it’s like, you know what, for every one person that leaves, there’s probably like 10 people who like will stay and find these things worth value. And that’s totally fine. So whoever it’s supposed to be, it’ll be those people and whoever it’s not supposed to be, I mean, it’s not gonna be that person and it’s not no sweat off our back, but that was a hard, hard lesson to learn. So, but yeah. The question was leg length of engagement for church?

Mike (24:17):

I mean, that’s interesting one I’ve never thought of, but it’s key.

Tres (24:20):

Yeah. I, well, I didn’t think about it until a year ago. I was like, I wonder what the length of engagement of people at our church is. And so I just started plugging it in because we do like our Move owners class, or our membership class. And so we know when people went through those and so our just got this Excel sheet out, started like actually I used the Two-Brain one and just plugged the people in with those start dates. It’s really wild. But yeah, our membership or our LEG is like 45 right now.

Mike (24:51):

45 at the church?

Tres (24:51):

Yeah. 45 at the church.

Mike (24:53):

And that’s months?

Tres (24:54):

Yeah. 45 months.

Mike (24:55):

Is the gym higher or lower?

Tres (24:57):

Our gym’s only two years old. So it’s hard. Our LEG at the gym’s like almost 11, 10, 9.

Mike (25:04):

Yeah. And I’ve known from interviewing other gym owners the longer you’re in business, the higher your LEG will go because at least if you’re a good gym owner and you survive, you have a 10-year client, that’s gonna bump it also.

Tres (25:14):

It’s yeah. It’s only grown. It’s never decreased.

Mike (25:16):

They’re going up though. That’s the key though, right? OK. So that’s interesting. Let’s now we’ve often talked, when I worked at the CrossFit Journal, we published an article on this, but gyms and churches are often called third places. It’s that place you go when you aren’t at home or at work, it’s that other place, you know, Cheers where everyone knows your name, that kinda thing. Right. What advice can you give gym owners who are looking to create tightly knit supportive communities? You’re obviously a master at this because you’re doing it at the church and at the gym. How can other people do that in their gyms?

Tres (25:47):

So you have to know what’s going on in your members’ lives outside the gym. You have to know. I know Coop talks about it a good bit. Like just set a goal, talk to somebody about, you know, Hey, you got a kid, do they play sports? And then following up with them the next week, Hey, did they, how did Johnny’s game go or whatever, but that’s just like one small instance, but you have to know. And I think it’s important to know that. And then to hire people that also have that same framework. Yes. It’s great to have coaches who are experts in all this other stuff. But if they don’t like, if they can’t translate over to how this, how you’re leading someone to a healthy life, not just a healthy one hour, but a healthy life, then they’re gonna miss it on that end in my experience, you have to know what’s going on.

Tres (26:33):

I needed to know that two of our members, their daughter was in the hospital. I needed to know that. So then I can reach out and that would explain why they’re at risk and haven’t been to the gym in a week. So, I mean, now you’re not freaking out on all this other stuff, but you need to know when people are going through stuff, seasonally, like, you know, members who maybe have lost a family member around this time of year. And that’s why they’re not motivated to come to the gym. It has nothing to do with what cool program or offering you have at the time. But like there’s other things that correlate outside of this one hour, yes. This one hour or this time in gym is going to help them reap huge benefits in their everyday life.

Tres (27:15):

But what happens outside of the gym is the number one contributing factor to if they’re gonna come be a part of your gym or not. So you have to know, and then you cannot be cynical towards people when they leave or you get hurt. You know, we’re talking about that earlier. Cause what can happen is you can get super cynical. Like, you know what? I put myself out there, people left, I’m not doing that anymore. They’re all gonna leave at some point in time. And you know what, they might leave at some point in time, but maybe you weren’t supposed to be their coach for the rest of their life. Maybe it was only supposed to be for 12 months, six months, six years, whatever. And just kinda have to settle in your identity and worth stuff as a coach, knowing like, I know what I’m doing is making a difference in our community and in people’s lives and whoever’s here is that’s gonna happen. So you can’t question that stuff and not like get cynical that, oh, this person’s only gonna be here for like two months and then they’re out.

Mike (28:08):

You know, when I hear you talking about that, I’m gonna guess that you’ve had to have the same conversation with yourself as a pastor when someone leaves the church. Am I right?

Tres (28:16):

Oh, hundred percent man.

Mike (28:17):

That’s so spiritual. You’ve got this deep spiritual connection. Yeah.

Tres (28:21):

Yeah. You’ll pour your life into someone. I just honestly just I’m walking through this right now where I have poured myself into someone for years and years and years and years. But now they’ve decided to leave the church and you’re like, OK, how do I not take this personal? And you just have to identity and self worth, you know, it’s not in like it’s not in that person. It was in the task that I was responsible for doing for that time.

Mike (28:48):

I really like that one that you might not be the coach or the gym or the pastor for life, but you serve a purpose for a specific period. I really like that one because that could certainly help some people. I know I’ve beaten that crap outta myself a few times when people have left and maybe there were some failings on my part, but on the other side of it, you know, there were aspects where it’s like, I couldn’t control this person moving to another city to take a new job that’s gonna better their lives. You know, I couldn’t stop that.

Tres (29:14):

Yeah. I mean, if the same person was leaving all the time for the same thing, OK. I need to look at my systems or look at how I’m delivering something. Maybe it is me, but you know, a lot of the times it is just certain circumstances that are outside of your control. You can’t do anything about it.

Mike (29:29):

Listeners, I’m gonna give you a couple of assignments here based on what Tres has told you. I want you to contact five members today and just ask them and do it right now. It’s not gonna take very long, just text them or direct message them or even call them whatever you have the most direct line of communication. Just check in with them. How are you doing today? OK. And if you know something specific about that person, like someone that might be struggling, check in with them on a specific thing. OK. That’s your first assignment. Second assignment is, I want you to pull out the last group photo that you took at a holiday workout or at your gym when there’s like 10, 20, 40 people, whatever. Go through that group photo, go to every person. And can you name what that person does for a living?

Mike (30:09):

Can you name a family member of that person? And if you can’t, make a list and I want you to find out over the next months or weeks, even better, as soon as possible, find out something about these people and that may, you’re gonna have to start a conversation. You’re gonna have to chat with them. You’re gonna have to find out, you know, cause you can’t just go up and say, uh, OK, what, what do you do for a living? What’s your wife’s name? OK, bye. Right? It’s gonna seem weird. You gotta have a conversation and get to know your members. Some of you are going to go through this exercise and you’re gonna find that, you know everything about those two things about every member. And that means you are already having great connections, find out something else that you don’t know about those people. Those are the tasks that I’ll give you guys listeners to do today. After this show. Tres, I wanna thank you for this. This has been fascinating because I haven’t had a chance to talk to someone who runs a gym and a church at the same time. The parallels are incredible. I wanna see in a couple years what your length of engagement does at both. I wanna see if the gym can catch the church.

Tres (31:02):

That’s the long-term goal. On my side, I’m trying to have more members at our gym than we do at the church personally.

Mike (31:10):

Fascinating. Thank you so much for sharing your time with us today.

Tres (31:14):

Hey, thank you so much, Mike.

Mike (31:16):

That was pastor and gym owner Tres Kennedy on Two-Brain Radio. I’m your host Mike Warkentin, and I’m all about telling stories of amazing gym owners. Subscribe for more episodes. And don’t forget to hammer a like on this content. Here’s Two-Brain founder Chris Cooper with a final word.

Chris (31:32):

Thanks for listening to Two-Brain Radio. If you aren’t in the Gym Owners United group on Facebook, this is my personal invitation to join. It’s the only public Facebook group that I participate in. And I’m there all the time with tips, tactics, and free resources. I’d love to network with you and help you grow your business. Join Gym Owners United on Facebook.

 

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