By Sandor Slomovits
It was a fall day in 2014. Dr. John Farah, at the midpoint of a ten-mile training run, tapped the wall of the State Theater before heading back to his home on the west side of Ann Arbor—a little tradition he originated with his running buddies—when a thought came to him: Imagine would be the perfect name for the fitness, yoga gym, and studio he and his wife had been planning to open. “It’s a word I’ve always loved,” he wrote in his recently published memoir, also titled Imagine. “It represents so many of the principles that have guided my life…inspiration, flexibility. The power of thinking in new and challenging ways.”
It is not surprising that Dr. Farah got the idea for the name of the fitness and yoga center while on a long run. After all, he has been an athlete and a fitness enthusiast for most of his life. He has run competitive distance races, including more than 100 marathons for decades—19 of them in the famed Boston Marathon. (For several years and last summer at age 79, he ran the Crim which is a 10-mile race in Flint.) He’s also been a sailor, a skier, snowshoer, and bicyclist, and has been leading fitness classes at Imagine Fitness and Yoga ever since it opened in the summer of 2015, less than a year after he got the idea.
“I've always been kind of a people person,” he said. “And I was always disappointed with gyms and fitness studios where people come and go. They'll walk in, work out, and leave. But do you ever meet anybody there? Does anybody ever talk to you? So, I was thinking it'd be nice if there was a place where you get to know people and they get to know you. Working out is fun, but the social aspect of it would be a part of it as well.”
John’s wife, Jackie, felt the same way. “I’ve always wanted to be active, not doing really formal exercise, but outdoor things. I was always doing something. Typical gyms and fitness centers always made me feel isolated. To me, if I was going to feel isolated, I might as well do my own thing where I want.”
“When Jackie and I created Imagine, we had a vision of what it would look and feel like,” said John. “We wanted it to be different. We wanted it to be unique. Fitness, yoga, and health have been a part of our lives for years. We love how yoga and exercise makes us feel, how it energizes our bodies, our minds, and our lives. We truly believe exercise is something that is best when it’s shared in a supportive environment.”
John recently retired after a more than forty-year career as both a highly respected dentist and as the founder and publisher of an influential magazine for dentists, The Dental Advisor. Both John and Jackie refer to Imagine as their “retirement gig.” “Some people buy a house in Florida,” Jackie said. “Some people buy a yacht. This is our yacht. We're going to sail out there healthy!”
John added, “People spend a million dollars on a yacht, and they use it twice a year. Here, at least I use it almost every day.”
Imagine occupies the ground floor of the building on Ann Arbor’s west side that houses Dr. Farah’s former dental offices. It is also on the same property as the former offices of The Dental Advisor. “When we decided to do this, [start Imagine] it was across the street from my full-time job at The Dental Advisor,” said Jackie. “I was coming back and forth, overseeing things here. That's how it started evolving.” When a tenant left, John said, ‘We'll just turn it into a yoga center, and we'll make it a one-stop shop.’ A lot of places just do one thing and so you're going there for this, and there for that. We have Yoga, Pilates, fitness classes, biking, we have Tai Chi. It's a little bit of everything. We also put in a massage room, so you can have just one membership and find everything you want.”
The studio where most of the yoga, Pilates, Tai-Chi, and other classes are held, features a comfortable, heated floor with a beautiful view of woods through large windows. There is a deck out back surrounded by trees. In nice weather, they do the yoga and fitness classes there. The gym room features a variety of weight machines, free weights, bikes, BOSU balls, Pilates rings, blocks, and more. The walls are lined with framed posters of some of the marathons in which Dr. Farah competed and pictures that he took in his travels. There is a small, separate room for personal training work, which includes a Pilates Reformer machine that’s available for clients to use with guided instruction. The lounge has comfortable chairs and couches. Coffee and a variety of teas and snacks are always available.
Imagine weathered the pandemic, though—like most other businesses—not easily, especially at first. Jackie’s long experience with computer technology was the saving grace in setting up virtual classes. “I think Imagine would not have survived without Jackie, quite frankly,” said John. “But,” Jackie added, “what I found was that people were back to being anonymous. It got to the point when we were doing virtual classes that people would say, ‘Can you start class fifteen minutes early so we can talk to each other?’ That was a testament to the community feeling that we had created.” Once the pandemic eased, John and Jackie saw that, “People were anxious to get back into the personal, cozy space we offered. It's still the case. While many studios and instructors remain virtual, our community is just that, a community where people enjoy being with one another.”
Many of the people who come to Imagine come for the classes. “They like the guidance. They like the chitchat. They like the community feel of seeing the same people” Jackie said. “Especially in the wintertime. They'll come and take one class after another. Then they'll be in the lounge having coffee and snacks. If you're retired, and you're at home, and it's another gray Michigan day, you come here, you meet up with friends, you get some exercise in, have a coffee.... It's a nice feeling that we can offer that to people, and it's healthy for them.”
The daytime classes are primarily retired people, some at-home moms, and people that are working from home who come for a break in their day. “In the evenings, we get more of the after-work professionals,” Jackie said.
“We're not training athletes,” said John. “We're not training sports enthusiasts. We're not bodybuilders.” Jackie agrees. “We're working with people that are trying to maintain their health and do what they can to strengthen functional movement through life.”
In his first book on running, Let’s Pick it Up a Bit, John wrote, "Injury, pain, the natural wear and tear on your body, even the aging process itself, are not things that can just be ignored or even fought through—they must be dealt with, embraced in a smart, measured way that neither admits defeat nor takes victory for granted. Acceptance, hard work, persistence. Those are the true keys to longevity.” They’re a part of Imagine’s guiding philosophy to this day.
Jackie said, “What's heartwarming is when someone comes back and says, ‘I stumbled and started to fall, but I caught myself. It made me realize if I wasn't coming to Imagine, I might not have been able to recover.’ Or they’ll say, ‘I notice a difference because I can do this.’ My favorite is when they go to a gym with their kids while visiting them out of town, and then they tell us, ‘My kids are so surprised at how much I can do!’ That's very fulfilling.”
John and Jackie, as well as their instructors, are always on the lookout for new things they can bring to Imagine. “We are able to offer special clinics to our community from other health care professionals, including nutritional consults and people with posture expertise,” said Jackie. “We're very fortunate to have some incredible instructors.”
“Jackie and I, we wanted some place where people knew each other” said John. “I think we've succeeded in creating that kind of community feeling here.”
Learn more about Imagine Fitness and Yoga online at ImagineFitnessandYoga.com. Imagine Fitness and Yoga can be contacted at (734) 622-8119. It is located at 3100 West Liberty Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48103.
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It is not surprising that Dr. Farah got the idea for the name of the fitness and yoga center while on a long run. After all, he has been an athlete and a fitness enthusiast for most of his life. He has run competitive distance races, including more than 100 marathons for decades—19 of them in the famed Boston Marathon. (For several years and last summer at age 79, he ran the Crim which is a 10-mile race in Flint.) He’s also been a sailor, a skier, snowshoer, and bicyclist, and has been leading fitness classes at Imagine Fitness and Yoga ever since it opened in the summer of 2015, less than a year after he got the idea.