Happiness Quotient (HQ) is the level of happiness one has achieved in their lifetime. How much happiness do you generally have in your life? This is a simple yet important question and in today’s blog I’d like to help you move your HQ up a notch or two. In addition to becoming happier you may even learn something about our cool little gym.

Most people are stuck at a certain level of happiness. If they won the lottery they would (within a year or two) fall back or climb back to where they were prior to being rich. On the flip side if they were to have a terrible accident, within a year or two they would return to approximately the same level of happiness they had prior to the accident. With a quick google search you will find a few books on this topic. I first read about this idea years ago and it changed my life, my training and my work. Decide how happy you want to be and then be that happy. I understand that I am writing these words during a major shift in our society. I believe that makes these words that much more important.

Union Fitness

I spent twenty years as a strength and conditioning coach at the collegiate level. I have had the ability to work with olympians, pro-athletes and some of the finest humans I could have ever encountered. I truly enjoyed all of what I did as a strength coach and I am proud of what I did as a coach. When I took over at UF in October I was taking over an extremely successful gym that did not need an overhaul. I saw myself as the luckiest man around. Then a pandemic hit and we shut down. I tried to be proactive, we shut down a few days before others. I believed it was the right thing to do. Initially I thought it would be a few weeks and things would be back to normal. Well almost three months later we re-opened our doors. During those three months here are some things we did to try to keep our community together.

1. We hosted over 200 online “classes.”
2. We offered suspension, cancelation as well as deferring payments for anyone who asked.
3. We lent our equipment out to anyone who asked (including non-members).
4. We increased our blog posts to daily.
5. We did the best job we could keeping in contact with our employees and members.
6. There are a few other things we did that you’ll have to ask me to tell you. But, we tried to help.

This list is how we tried to keep some normalcy. When we returned our membership dropped about 35%. Since then we have tried to do what we can to ease people back into the gym. We have offered some free classes, outdoor activities and done our best to keep a clean and healthy training enviroment. I know for a fact even with all of our trying we failed some of our members, and I am not happy about failing anyone. Yet, I know we tried and that makes me rest well at night.

So let’s enjoy the ride together. Knowing that we have some members who are still suspended, some that have left us and others that are nervous to return, I have made you a short list of other groups you can try until you are ready to re-join us at UF. This is a list of companies in the area that host outdoor events and will be perfect to talk to while the weather is still warm, and when the cold returns and you are ready to come back inside come see us at the gym. Until then find ways in this strange time to raise your HQ.

1. Stand up PGH
2. Venture Outdoors
3. Pittsburgh Parks
4. Bike Pittsburgh
5. Trail Pittsburgh

This is just a short list that I have either personally worked with or I know people who have. Go to their sites support local and enjoy the outdoors. When you are ready to return to the gym we will be here for you to come back inside. Unless you are training for a meet or a bodybuilding show then don’t worry about the weights they will be here when you return.

Until then raise that HQ and enjoy your ride, hike, walk or whatever.