Allow Me to Introduce Myself…

My name is Andrew Baker and I optimize human potential through mental, physical, and spiritual practice.

I grew up in Ottawa, Ontario, and I’ve been in the wellness industry since 2015. I actually first got into it through athletics; I played basketball my whole life and had aspirations of playing professionally.

In high school, I was told by coaches that I needed to improve my athleticism if I wanted a shot at playing at the next level. I found a local athletic performance centre and started training vigorously. I’ve always been a driven person, and I can without a doubt attribute my work ethic to team sports, and it has stuck with me my whole life. When I’m passionate about something, I become hyper-focused on the task at hand.

I ended up playing basketball in college, but it didn’t last long because I developed a new passion, and that passion was training. The funny thing about this is that most athletes start training because they know it will benefit their sports performance, but a lot of the time, training turns into a chore for them. It was the opposite for me, as I actually started looking more forward to training than playing basketball!

In 2015, I started interning at the gym I was training at, and that internship eventually turned into a job. My passion at the time was for training athletes, but I quickly began working with a lot of general population clients; this was actually where I began to make the biggest impact in the lives of the individuals that I got the opportunity to work with.

In 2019, I moved to Toronto and took a job at a boutique personal training studio. The majority of the members at this studio were general population clients. I still had this vision of eventually opening my own world-class facility that specialized in athletic performance, but I was enjoying the ride and relishing in the experience of a new city.

Six months later, COVID hit, and the next year was a year of lockdowns, gym closures, public health mandates, and more. As you know, fitness was not the best industry to be in during the pandemic. I was thankful that I had actually pivoted a large amount of my business online when I moved to Toronto. I wanted to still be able to nurture the client base that I had grown in Ottawa while living in Toronto.

In May 2021, I made the decision to embark on a pursuit of knowledge. Government mandates were very restrictive in Canada while the rest of the world was opening up, and I didn’t want to wait any longer. My girlfriend and I packed up our condo, got out of our lease, and sold most of our belongings. I left my job, and we flew to the U.S. My plan was to tour across the United States and seek out and learn from those I identified as the brightest minds in the industry. After soaking up everything they had to offer, I would return to Canada and complete my vision of opening up my own world-class facility.

What happened over the next 18 months was interesting, to say the least, and will be the topic of discussion for many future blog posts. In short, lots of learning, lots of wins, even more setbacks, spiritual awakenings, and realizations.

The most valuable thing that happened over that 18-month stretch was finding my purpose and sense of direction in life. I learned what truly matters to me and what doesn’t.

I went from wanting to train athletes to help them improve at their sport to wanting to make a monumental difference in the health of the human race.

I came to the realization that the way humans are living is not working. As a species, our health is deteriorating. Evoking change requires much more than training alone, it requires a full-spectrum approach centered around mental, physical, and spiritual practice.

My mission is to move the world forward by providing knowledge and guidance.. and to set humans back on the path of living as nature requires.

Live Virtuously

AB