Tag: one decision at a time

Categories
Be The Best.

I see you.

I turned to one of my favourite poems this week.  Ok, I only know a few poems and most start with Roses are Red and Violets are Blue, so maybe this doesn’t count, but I love that Invictus poem that you’ve seen here before.

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

There is something so empowering in that text.  The mindset of continuing to make decisions about my own outlook despite whatever comes my way…that is the power of that poem to me.  I am the captain of my soul.

My sister Grace who lives in Vernon and was very active in helping with Mom and Dad suffered a heart attack this past weekend.  What? Really? Yes…out of the blue.

Ironically, she is in the ICU just a couple of doors down from Dad.

He continues to fight hard, but is up and down.

Mom wrote an email yesterday that made us laugh at the visuals of Dad being encouraged to walk with the aid of a walker, going down the hall in the ICU and stopping at Grace’s door and saying Hi Grace!  I called her on her cell and laughed with her too at that story.

We are scared to ask, what next?

Grace is doing pretty good and under excellent medical care as is Dad.

I see you.

ICU.

Yup, I’ll see you in the ICU.

I said to Mom that this was like our own personal tsunami sort of.  These forces of nature pounding our family at this point.  Of course our hearts go out to the families in Japan coping with loss from the real earthquake and tsunami and we wish them the strong HOPE for recovery and the future as discussed yesterday.

For our family, we will continue to regroup, rethink, revise and re-engineer as we move forward.

Dad and Grace…get ready for some hospital scrabble this weekend.

Categories
Be The Best.

Hope is an action word.

What is hope?

It’s a noun.

It’s a verb.

It’s actually both.

That being said, any way you use it, I’ll argue that hope is an action word.

What do I mean?

Hope may be a state of mind or the expression of a state of being but when hope is combined with action…it truly is an action word.  I hope for a great future.  How am I making that future happen?

This past weekend, a trail on private land was dedicated to Chris’ memory.

The name of the trail…Hope Trail.

Totally love it.

Chris’ story is one of sadness sure…but it is also oozing with hope.

This trail leading down from a beautiful Valley property to the river below is not for the timid.  It’s a tough trail fit for a hard training athlete doing the equivalent of bleacher runs as Chris would do many times.

What is hope?  Hope is a massive tree crashing down in a windstorm and then the thought, desire and action to cut the barrier in pieces to get the trail through.  Hope is not seeing a cliff, but seeing a trail…

Steve addresses the assembled at the trail dedication...(ok, I think he was telling a joke)

Hope Trail.

It’s a beautiful thing.

Many thanks to Steve and Evy Klassen (Steve spoke at Chris’ funeral) and their family for this amazing remembrance for Chris.

Be The Best!

Categories
Be The Best.

The best day ever.

There has been an ongoing little joke in our family for years.

My Dad is a pretty positive guy especially when it comes to stuff like ping-pong, tennis and skiing.

The joke is that if you’d ask him how his day was on the slopes for example, he would always say…GREAT, the best ever.

Each trip, it seems, would outdo the previous.

Now where it got funny was we knew some of the days weren’t that great.  If you’ve skied in a minus 20 degree day of an Okanagan winter or the liquid snow of Hemlock Valley or the driving sleet of a December day on Mt. Baker you know what I mean.

On those days if you asked him how his day had been he’d say…GREAT, one of the best ever!

Notice the subtle difference?

On this Saturday, having survived a very tough Thursday night and sensitive emergency surgery, he noted to my sisters Grace and Val that this was one of his BEST WEEKENDS EVER.  He was indeed very alive and got to spend it with his bride…and of course a couple of his kids.

Interesting perspective…and I love it.

That’s a hospital bed BE THE BEST moment direct from the ICU.

Nice work Dad.  We’ll call that your living sermon for this week and give you the day off tomorrow!

Categories
Be The Best.

Rice Krispy Squares and Cleaning House

It was a long day at work.  A good day, but long.

Leaving the campus just after 8pm, we settled in for the 35 minute commute.

Ingrid handed me a wrapped package.  Rice Krispy Squares, homemade by you know who, she said.

I knew.  I won’t publicize here, because I don’t want anyone else encroaching on my secret Rice Krispy Square baker!

They were fantastic.  My friends and colleagues know my weakness for Rice Krispy Squares.  Ok, it’s an addiction really, not a weakness.

It brought back many memories tonight.  I don’t think we cooked a meal that we had to prepare for a month after Chris passed away.  It was an amazing way that people told/showed us they were supporting us.

When we got home tonight, our house was sparkling clean, just like every Wednesday.  That’s when the cleaners come.  Except, we’ve never hired cleaners.  Another anonymous (yes, we are pretty sure we know!) supporter has organized weekly cleaning for the past year.  We are amazed, humbled and grateful for these things.

There was a situation at work today where colleagues were discussing a family situation in which there was an unexpected and severe illness of a spouse of a colleague in their department.  I provided the example of the cleaning and how much it has affected us in a positive way as an idea for consideration to answer the constant question of what can we do to help.

My sister Grace last night talked about the flower delivery person showing up at her door on the 1st anniversary of her husband’s passing and suggesting it was her lucky day.

Thankfully, those kind of interactions have been very very few and far between.

Instead we have been blessed again and again with thots, prayers and actions of support…like Rice Krispy Squares and a clean house!

Categories
Be The Best.

What’s the future?

December 2009.

I had been contacted by a writer to answer some questions for a profile on a blog/website.

I hadn’t reread this until last week when circumstances caused me to find it in my sent file.

This was only 3 months before we lost Chris.

Obviously there is some irony in the answers…looking forward to the future, kids in college etc.

However…and it’s a BIG HOWEVER, the core of these answers remains as true today as the 2009 December evening on which they were written

The questions are not mine.  The answers are…and I stand by each one even today as we journey forward.

We don’t know our exact futures, but I do believe we can know why we do what we do.

We can know what’s important to us.

Here’s an exact word for word excerpt with professional/education/work related questions and answers removed for the sake of brevity.

—————————-

What is your proudest accomplishment?
My family. Through the ups and downs of babies, young kids and now young men (18 and 16), my wife and I are seeing our boys begin their adult journeys that we believe will help change the world positively through their actions and relationships.  My family is truly my greatest accomplishment and everything else to me is icing on the cake!

What is your foremost passion?
Creating art with music, watercolour and people.  I used to think my passions and hobbies were very diverse and perhaps they are, but the core is very similar.  I find myself again and again playing the role of a conductor, arranger, or producer.  With music and art, I mix music tracks or colours…each on their own telling only part of the story, but absolutely integral to the story.  The same is true for my management style, I believe.  Each person and relationship is integral to the overall success of the department, division or organization.  When you have the different components working together, that is when you have achieved a song, painting or highly functional working environment.

What are three random things no one knows about you?
That I have a music album on jamendo.com
I used to clean carpets for a living
I will squash you at ping pong

What do you want people to know about you that they don’t already?
My masters thesis centered on the topic of the interplay between change management and knowledge management. What? Yah, I didn’t understand it much either.  I’ve worked a lot in the area of change in my career.  I’ve found that we (managers, business owners) often underestimate the human element and the human power when change is present.  Relationships are the key to everything.  You can systemize, model, and even lead, but ultimately if the people are not ready and willing to come with you, change will be short lived or non-existent.  I believe we all have a HUGE impact on people’s lives.  Simple words and actions followed with consistent behaviour over time are the real ingredients to successful change.

Where do you see yourself in 5, 10, 20 years?
5 years – BCIT classrooms overflowing with students, my clients prospering, my kids solidly in college.
10 years – Readying for early ‘retirement’ from day job to concentrate on writing, teaching, speaking and the arts….oh and wife says we have to go to Europe for 6 months
20 years – 4 months in Hawaii, 8 months in Canada – changing the world, one relationship at a time.

Categories
Be The Best.

On my mind

AC, my sister Cathy, aka Auntie Cathy to Chris and many others wrote a very cool post on her blog today.

She has experienced the loss of a young teen-aged nephew on both sides of her family.  You can read the full post, but here’s an excerpt.

The question has come to me – how will you then live?  How will we all live?
There is a quote by St. Irenaeus that has come to reside deep within me –

‘The glory of God is a human being fully alive’

To be fully alive is perhaps the best answer I can give….to choose to be present, to choose life, to choose gratefulness, to choose to take risks in following dreams and passions…to fully live….is how I can say to these two boys I love…….Trevor & Chris…..you are on my mind

I love that concept of being fully alive.

People ask us how we carry on.  How can you deal with this kind of tragedy?

I tell them that first you choose to live and live with purpose.

We’ve said that Chris’ passion will fuel us.

I’m still discovering what that means, but living with purpose and being fully alive is certainly part of that equation.

I can’t believe it’s 11 months.

I simply can’t tell you what an aching heart feels like, but I know many of you also have known the pain of loss.

The thought that is continually in our minds and hearts is the knowledge that a pain so deep only exists because of a love so deep.  And because of that love, we will live our lives with purpose using Chris’ passion and others to fuel our journeys.

Have a Be The Best weekend…oh and Go Canucks Go against Boston tomorrow.

I’m allowed to say that right?  Oh yah, it’s my blog.

Categories
Be The Best.

An intro to two.

I’m going to intro you to a couple of people that I don’t know.

But..with the world of social media, the web CAN be an amazing place to connect on the journey of the new normal.

The first is Steve Ewen.

I’ve never met him.

He’s a reporter with the Vancouver Province and he’s battling cancer.  It’s a tough battle.  He’s called his blog, ‘I’m sad and mad about getting cancer’.  Actually no…he hasn’t.  His blog is called, Crush the Tumour with Humour.

It’s some amazing stories of someone going through a very tough fight but remaining positive and using humour to negotiate the new normal he and his wife find themselves living.  If I can figure it out, I’ll add it to my ‘links’ section, but here’s a quick direct link if you want to check it out.  Here’s an excerpt from today:

The bad news is that the new stitches in my back has led to our surgeon, Dr. Robert Lee, limiting my arm movements for the next two weeks. The really bad news, at least for the people at G.F. Strong and the general public around King Ed and Laurel in Vancouver, is that they’ve given me a power wheelchair.
Oh. Mercy. Think of the havoc I can cause with a motor and wheels?

Keep rockin it Steve!

The second link is from Gillian Berg, the Mission mom who lost her husband and father of their four children at Christmas.  Her writing is deep, spiritual and an amazing work of strength and vulnerability rolled into one.  An excerpt from her latest:

Last night, as my daughter asked for help, begged for prayers that would take her fear away, the fear that something else might happen, the fear that she is still in danger, I realized again that like the work needed to heal the physical wounds, there was going to be gruelling work needed to heal the emotional ones.

We, each one of us, will have to choose to stand slowly, painfully upon the limbs of our broken dreams; to endure the attacks of relentless discouragement of working towards something new; to fight for something better, something healthier.

To Steve and Gillian I would say, we all haven’t chosen our situations.  It happened.  Life happens. There is no big answer to the ‘why’ question….at least not one that may be evident in this lifetime.  We”ll simply stand with you on your journey of the new normal as so many have and are standing with us.  This is a link to the first time the term ‘the new normal’ entered our lexicon.  It’s been a fixture ever since.

Categories
Be The Best.

Be The Best – Andrew Bromley

When you turn on the TV and watch the news, you usually don’t get a great story about a young adult doing great stuff.

But that doesn’t mean those stories don’t exist!

The Burnaby Mountain Selects gang have started putting together profiles of local athletes who are going on to college…and then on to changing their worlds!

I LOVE to think about the impact of hundreds of these lacrosse players over time getting their educations, finding rewarding careers and then helping to change the world around them in a positive way.

The story that I’ll link you to specifically is about Andrew Bromley, a local player off to college and doing great things.  Chris and Andrew would have been together in the BMS system in 2008.

Excerpt:

What role did your family have in helping you get to where you are now?

The only reason I am where I am really. From immediate family, my mom making the paper work happen (important), my dad for pushing me, my little brothers (trying to show them the way), and the endless support from extended family from my irreplaceable grandmother to my aunts and uncles who would always pump my tires up a bit when I was feeling stressed or down.

What is the best piece of advice that you have ever received?

Man that’s a really tough question, I have been a part of many, many big speeches with meanings too long for this piece. I am going to have to say a piece of advice from Gord Lawton, “Its going to be the hardest thing you’ve ever done kid, go to the net like no ones going to stop you, play within the team, but don’t lose your individuality” or a line said by many of the great enforcers of the previous NHL era’s, “Be for the boys, there all you’ve got in here, no one ever questioned the integrity of a guy who would drop ‘em for a team mate”

LOVE IT!

That’s Be The Best.

And for all of us parents and coaches and relatives and friends out there…we can never underestimate the positive power of our words and actions with the future generation.

Congrats Andrew.  Great stuff!

Here’s the link to the full article and other stories.

Categories
Be The Best.

If you like sunsets, you’re in luck.

I can’t tell you how many sunsets I took in last year through the months of April, May, June, July and August.

They were like medicine for me.  Whether it was the feeling of the closing of a day is the reminder of a new one to come, the powerful display of dark and light with the clouds or simply getting a little glimpse of life beyond this earth and a connection with Chris.  All of those and more.

As we all know our Vancouver weather doesn’t provide us with too many great sunsets between Oct and March and so Ingrid and I set off to find some.

If sunsets bore you, close your browser now!  If you like em, here’s a few that happened this past week…so they’re ‘fresh’!

PS You can click on each pic to see a larger view. Feel free to use or share.

Categories
Be The Best.

A tattoo…for your car.

I know many of us remember Chris is so many different ways.  I still see many of those wrist band things when we’re out and about. Awesome.  We’ve worn ours every day for 10 1/2 months and I’m not sure when we’re ever going to stop.

I’ve seen more than one tattoo.  Cool. (again, from a parent’s perspective, we’re not pushing tattoos, but we understand the DEEP meaning of getting one and we are incredibly humbled and honoured when someone makes that personal decision to honour Chris in that way!!)

I’ve seen email accounts, twitter accounts and facebook stuff all acknowledging and remembering Chris.  Love it.

But one thing I had not seen…until now.

What would a tattoo for your car look like?

Well, I think Will VH, a good friend and lacrosse bud of Chris’, figured that out.

He just received the one and only set of CF 2 license plates in the entire province of British Columbia.

Cool.

Take a look at the pic below.  I think it says it all.

Love it Will.  Drive safe and Be The Best!