The World Doesn’t Stop When Bad Things Happen So Why Should You?

As a lifelong follower of basketball and avid hoops fan, I've come to appreciate the important life lessons the game has to offer. When I was a teenager, I religiously followed the on court exploits of players like Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson not realizing that the benefits would be more than just entertainment.

The life lessons of persevering through adversity, determination and hope were glaringly obvious when my eldest daughter, Vanessa became involved with organized basketball.  It provided me with a great opportunity to teach what I learned.  She was about nine years old when she started and played until her mid teens. As a “basketball dad”, I naturally was excited that she gravitated to a game that I loved. Despite this, I made a point of making it clear that the decision to start or stop was always hers to make.

During the practices, I used to sit on the sidelines and observe with the other parents as her coaches ran through various drills and plays. Despite knowing the game well enough to coach, I didn’t interfere with whatever instruction given by her coaches. I played a support role and left the “real coaching” for the car rides to and from practices and games. I remember one instance when Vanessa wasn’t feeling particularly well and experienced severe cramping just before practice started. I gave her the option of skipping out and taking a break but she insisted on going.

She got to about the half way mark when the pain of the cramping intensified and I noticed Vanessa really started to struggle and was moving significantly slower than her teammates.

Her inability to keep up slowed down the practice considerably and I could sense the agitation level in her coach rising. He perceived it as “lack of effort” or not trying on her part. My natural instinct as a parent was jump in pull her out of the situation and take her home but I held back and decided it would be best to let the situation play itself out.

At one point, Vanessa gingerly jogged by me during one of the drills with tears in her eyes. As I offered her water, I gave her the option of calling it quits. She declined and pushed on.

Her coach became infuriated and abruptly ended practice citing lack of effort by a "particular individual" as the reason. Vanessa was pretty upset during the “car ride” home and the tears flowed profusely the moment the door slammed shut. I have to admit that as I was consoling her, I was extremely curious about why she insisted on continuing forward with practice despite the obvious pain so I asked. She responded by simply saying, “I didn’t want to quit”.

Vanessa learned a very important lesson that day in perseverance and as a parent I couldn’t be any more thrilled. You see, the ability to fight the tough times is a skill that all children will need as they progress through their personal journey into adulthood and the earlier they’re equipped and understand its importance, the better.

One of the hard realities of life is that there will be days when things won’t go our way and you're going to want to quit.  Take heart in the fact that persevering through adversity and demonstrating resiliency will be the difference maker between you reaching your goals or not.  

I recently had an opportunity to listen to the incredible story of Kevin Rempel who's a member of Sledge Team Canada. You see, it was Kevin's dream to be a pro dirt bike racer but after an accident in 2002 that saw him fall from a height of nearly 30 feet, he became a paraplegic.

Despite being told by the doctors that he too would never walk again, Kevin wasn’t willing to take that answer. After months of intense therapy, he got back out of the wheelchair and back on his bike. In just one year, he kicked it over and went riding again.

His sledge hockey team has their eyes on  a gold medal from the next Paralympics in Sochi, Russia in 2014!  

Congratulations Kevin!

You can read more about Kevin's inspiring story by visiting his website.

Being resilient means bouncing back despite the number of times you've been pushed down and believe me, you will get pushed but at the end of the day you have the final call as to how far you'll end up because  nothing is truly over unless you believe it is.

The world doesn’t stop when bad things happen so why should you?










See you on the court!

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My Mom Talks "Gifts From Others"

It was the world renowned business investor Warren Buffett who once said, "Tell me your heroes and I'll tell you how your life will end up".

It's a great quote with lots of truth to it and I think we all can admit to having heroes in our lives that we've looked up to and admired at some point.  It could have been a specific trait they possessed you valued, perhaps it was their approach to living that struck a chord with you? Or maybe they simply performed some remarkable feat that you admired.  I can say for myself that I've had people in my world who've displayed qualities I thought were worth emulating but they didn't quite make the cut as far as being a hero in my books.

That spot has always been exclusively reserved for my mother who was the real hero in my world.  When I look at the example she laid out through her daily living, it doesn't come as a surprise that I'm doing the work I do or that I've written a book like "Gifts From Others"

Winnie Marshall originally immigrated to Canada in the early 70's from Kingston, Jamaica in the West Indies  with a dream in hand of creating a better life for her four children.  After a variety of jobs, she eventually found employment at a seniors nursing home in he heart of downtown Toronto called, St Thomas House.  She worked as the head cook and was there for over 20 years until the home eventually closed down.

She took her cooking skills, good nature and distinctive laugh to the local Salvation Army church our family attended to help start up a community outreach program almost 25 years ago.  The program is still going strong today and my mother can be found at the helm preparing and serving meals to 400-500 people every Thursday on a weekly basis.


It's estimated that during her time with outreach program, she's joyfully served over 450,000 meals to hungry people from all over Toronto and her compassion for people has never wavered.

She recognizes the kind of impact we can have on one another through the process of giving to others and she looks to do so continually.  I remember her humbly telling me once after her efforts were publicly acknowledged that, "These hungry people are coming with needs and I'm doing my part in my own little way to help"

I had to correct her by letting her know that what she's doing is not little.

She's had quite a run with the outreach program and I'm constantly inspired by her dedication, perseverance and commitment to people despite times when she was tired or not feeling well.  Much of who I am and what I've done can be attributed to my mother so after giving her a copy of   "Gifts From Others" I decided to call one morning and get her thoughts on a book she helped influence to write.

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See you on the court!

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