Hello, hello, and welcome to the Borealis

experience. I'm so excited to have Broc with me today, he will

share a very, exceptional story. And yeah, I picked him out

because he's also very active on Facebook and posts a lot of

very, like inspirational posts and videos. His latest video

here that I watched is about the importance to know your limits,

and to not burn yourself out sometimes when we very ambitious

and very driven, we forget that Yeah, we have a body to take

care of we might have a family, we have loved ones, that we have

to spend time with a want to spend time with. Not only for

their sake, but for all our own emotional and mental well being.

So yeah, I'm very, very happy that Brock made the time for us

to be here today. And I would like to invite him to share a

little bit of background story of what ignited all these

beautiful gratitude

videos and other important messages that you are sharing

with us right now. So that people yeah, learn about you and

what is driving you. Welcome to the show.

Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

They said

it's kind of different getting the opportunity to just speak

about it. Because usually I'm just reading messages back to

people that have said something or a comment on. I called them

the Tuesday tips and my gratitude Wednesday videos that

I'll post out there, just on Facebook. But the journey

started just over a year ago. For me, a lot of the messages

that I come up with only just kind of been in reflection over

this last year, I've gone through a difficult journey with

health. And I was definitely as you had mentioned that a lot of

people kind of burn the candle at both ends and are working

hard to move forward and perhaps their career or whatever it may

be that their passions, their passion, maybe. And I love my

work. And I love what I did to do every day for work, but I

can't be your only thing and come to that realization over

time. So if I go back and a little bit and give you a bit of

my background, I live here in Lethbridge. And I grew up in

southern Alberta. I went to the University here and a couple

other universities, colleges have your vehicles out front.

Unfortunately, not in the mountains like you right now.

But

yeah, so I went to university here and then went to university

ODC at Queen's University and did my masters down in the

States at Gonzaga, and

had the opportunity to come back home and teach. And I then

became a principal fairly quickly

27 I got my first administrative position as a principal, and,

and have been doing that since. But I've got the chance to build

some other businesses in between there and get the chance to

work. And I guess you would say coach or mentor people that are

going through those similar experiences of building teams

out and trying to change school cultures or trying to change

your business culture. And I've been blessed to be able to do

that. And so, unfortunately, last year, I was having social

distancing drinks for some of my buddies. My work is at our cabin

in British Columbia with her mom doing some painting we had just

kind of finished up building and

I wasn't feeling well and

the guys had left for the evening and I had a really bad

stomachache. It's maybe I thought maybe I had food

poisoning or something. And

so I decided, you know what, I can't sleep I'm not feeling

well. I'm just gonna shower and get ready and go to work and go

to work a few hours early. So on my way to the washroom just was

heading over to the bathroom and I passed out. I had a massive

what they call a seizure.

And I passed out in the washroom and when the ladies that work up

to assistance that take care of me in the school, and

and when I wasn't there because you stand there the first first

one of the day

They knew something was up and then called my emergency

contacts that are like, thank goodness, we don't have cellular

coverage. Otherwise it worked too much. And

they sent my emergency contacts my parents, and what am I, and

it's over to my house, and they found me in the bathroom. So

I think I'm pretty lucky. I know, a minute either way. Now I

might not have made it into the bathroom could have been hurt

somewhere else. Or another couple of minutes later, I would

have been in the shower, and I could have drowned. So no, Count

your blessings that way and just say, you know, I was fortunate

that happened. And they were able to get me stable here in

Lethbridge. And I got to thank the docs there for that. And

then was flown to the ICU unit in foothills by stars. And

there, they got me stabilized. And they found that add a couple

of brain tumors from there. So

because of my seizure, I had to wait quite a while before they

did take me in for surgery. news about six weeks because I just

wasn't strong enough to go through this surgery. And let's

move on brain surgery and had two tumors removed one about the

size of an orange, and then the other one about the size of a

walnut. So

it was a different experience.

I had no telltale signs of having cancer beforehand.

Healthy, like you said, I would admit that I was a workaholic.

But I had no issues with staying healthy and being able to handle

a 16 hour days.

Not just for work, but doing things for the community

fundraising and things like that. But yeah, it definitely

was a surprise to me, my family. And ever since it's been a

journey of recovery. And I've had the opportunity from there

to, like I said, share some tips, I guess you'd say, and in

my experience going through this and what I've learned and some

of the lessons I've learned throughout so that's, that's the

year in a nutshell. And now I'm in a situation where I'm kind of

in recovery. But as any cancer patient would know, it's more

like, you just kind of wait month to month to hear what's

going to be coming next you have an MRI, and then you wait a few

days and you hear or you sit down in front of zoom or you

meet with your oncology team. And they tell you, okay, this is

where we are, this is what we see. And so you're doing this

for the next month, or we're going to see you I'm hoping in

my meeting on August 3 that they're going to say you know

what we did to push up your MRI step every three months now,

which is hopeful and which means that things are looking good. So

that's, that's where I hope on that at the end of the month

here and then beginning of August. So

just as kind of a basic of what's happened to me over this

last year. But

yeah, like you said, a lot of people ask Brock, how do you

stay positive and upbeat about your situation and I've kind of

learned to say you know, the things that you're not in

control of you don't need to worry about in your life.

The things that you can control. The biggest one I've always

talked about this with my staff and, and friends and family is

is your attitude. Nobody else is in charge of that. But yourself.

You, you know, Charles Darwin was a famous quote, it's like,

life is 90 or 10% what happens to you 90% on how you react to

it. And, you know, that's the truth like 10% there's no way I

would have known that I had cancer, that's 10% of what I'm

not in control of. But I'm a draw at 90% of everything else

how I'm going to react to it. So I'm in charge of what I intake

into my body and eating healthy exercising, keep a positive

mindset and you're doing my best to stay as positive as I can be

but also support my family through this experience because

you know, I'm not the only one going through it. They are going

through it just as much as I am so

yeah, that's the basics.

Some friends come in and say hi, sorry. She's walking by my son

is coming up. Gonna Say

hello.

See you guys

sorry, they're just down asleep over on the trap last night so

I'll just come back with a sleeping bag so Oh, that's so

adore to wind down the river yesterday. So they're pretty

excited.

Wow, this is

yeah man. Thank you so much for for sharing.

The whole story with us again, and it must have been such an

intense, like moment to to know that, okay said, My body is not

healthy, my mind is still, you know functioning I'm, I'm driven

to continue but all of a sudden you have to take care of your

body now. And maybe before the diagnosis, you were taking care

of your body, you were exercising and drinking and

sleeping enough. But then all of a sudden, you've realized, okay,

I have to do more, I have to

be more careful with myself. And I can see that a very ambitious

person, a person with a big heart who's caring for others

might feel selfish at times and doing things for yourself. And I

feel a lot of men are trapped in this caring provider role. And

then when they do something for themselves, they either have

their children or their spouse complaining that they want to

spend more time with them, or their internal beliefs are

telling them, hey, you're being selfish right now. And you can't

spend alone time. Or you can go on a hike by yourself.

How was it for you? Like, do you have dedicated self care time?

Right now or? You tough? Now, it's definitely more balanced

than it was while I was working extensively right now I'm off on

disability, of course, and still in recovery. But I'll agree with

you in that situation, I'd often feel guilty

if I tried to do anything specifically for myself.

Because I was very much caught up in the provider role doing as

much as I can at this kind of what I call the high earning

years. For most people during I'm 40. Now, so I'm very busy at

this wall was very busy at that time trying to

see expression, make hay while the sun shines do as much as I

can to provide for my family. And I got caught up in that

mentality. Definitely. And so my downtime, lend up being, I

guess, an overlap of social time and work. That makes sense. I

would, you know, say, I'm going to have a beer or drink or sit

down or something like that with a friend, but typically was a

business meeting, if that makes sense. So it was never really

any personal downtime. I was never really, you know, just

going for a walk by myself or

I would not say I'm great at meditating. My wife really works

on those kinds of things, and has tried to teach me to do

those things more. And but I was quite reflective, always I would

journal and reflect. And I would always have a gratitude journal

with me and just write things down. But my main mind would

never ever turn off. I was always thinking of what else

could I do in order to support my family, take care of my

family, and do those things. And my wife's been really working

with me over this last year on how to, you know, just realize

you don't have to always be in that state of mind will be okay,

you know what it doesn't matter about, you know, if we have no

big home on the coolies, and a cabin and BC and those types of

things, just realize that the most important thing is just is

our family and our kids. And so that's been, like I said

something that I've had to come to grips with, even though she

totally understands that I love my job, which I really do, I get

a great deal of personal satisfaction from it. And also a

great deal of satisfaction and seeing a difference that I can

make in that role. So yeah, that's it's a constant, kind of

battling back and forth. But it has been an adjustment but also

just saying, okay, there's my cap, and I can only fit so much

in my cup. I have to make sure that the big rocks of my family

and my friends and my just work work at school have to fit in

there first, before I can do any of the other things of, you

know, supporting others, building real estate teams are

supporting other companies or helping charity organizations

even though I get satisfaction from those. They just, there's

not enough room in the cup. If that makes sense.

Ah, so I just got to make sure that those those big rocks are

taken care of first. Yeah, yeah, I love that picture. And it

helps a lot of people to, to realize, like, Where am I

putting my energy? And where am I not putting any energy and

maybe wondering why relationships are falling apart,

you know, for guys not in your case, but for guys who are

caught in the provider role again, and then they come home

and they feel like, oh, they're not really, I don't know, they

don't fit in into the family anymore, because they are doing

their own thing now that you're gone and just focusing on making

money. It's, it's a very tough balance. And

a lot of people like you who have to go through and tense,

like situations

have the possibility to to have that reset, and to see, okay, I

have to change things. And a lot of people who don't go through

through pain, keep doing and burn themselves out and then

face divorce. And, ah, but but both like, I don't want to say I

wish cancer on a person, but but both situations are just as

painful. Would you say that this situation brought you closer to

your spirituality? Like closer to yourself? Again?

Yeah, you know, what, it's, it's interesting. Um, as I go

through, and I reflect on, you know, kind of the lessons that

I've learned well, some of the lessons I learned First off is

that how much stronger my my family is that I thought they

were strong My wife is

where I was thought that I had to be that rock, and I was the

person that was trying to carry the family through things.

It's probably the exact opposite. She's She's really the

one that is, is the leader in the household and the leader of

our family, and where we're trying to learn how to adjust to

that now, and learn the balance with that, within that now, as

far as spirituality and, and reflection on those components.

I think that there's been a real transition as to what most

people define is spirituality, if that makes sense.

I think that if you do any studying or research of what if

specifically, what people would say is religion has been in, in

Canada in particular, there's been a very big transition.

Never has there been a time as long as the research hasn't

changed lots in the last 10 years, but I'm sure that the

change has only increased. Never has there been a time where

fewer people have gone to church?

And never has there been a time that people have wanted, or

expressed spirituality ever in Canada, in the last 80, or the

last, I think it's 65 years, you'd have to talk to a doctor

maybe at the universities, the premier sociologist of religion

in the country and North America. But that's the basics

of his courses, just that fact that people are just yearning

for, for spirituality. But that doesn't fall within the confines

of what is typical religion anymore. It's individualized.

That is, that's just the entire trend in in the world. And

society today is individualization of everything.

You know, I want something to be specific to me, I'm looking for

something that's specific for me.

Like I said, when I do mentorship or coaching with

people, they experienced a lot of difficulty with with their

teams often or their, their organization's because they've

transitioned to having employees that millennials now that are

used to things being individualized to them, and then

feeling that it's a connection to them, in particular. And

that's very different. When teams and organizations get

large, whether they're, you know, if they're five or six,

you can still maintain almost like a family mentality, if that

makes sense. And you can find that connection point. But if

you get to a company that becomes let's say, or an

organization that becomes, you know, 80 people, or 100 people

or even 1500 people, how do you maintain connection? And how do

you maintain, like you said that individuality spirituality, that

family on such a large scale, and so, you know, that's an

adjustment for

Everybody, and I've been fortunate to help groups go

through that. But for me, it's been the exact opposite. How do

you go back to making sure when you go home that there's that

connection, and making sure that you're on the same page with,

with your spouse, with your life partner, whoever it may be, and

with your children, right, especially if you're not there

with them enough. And, you know, that's been the realization for

me over this time is that, you know, time Trumps all things,

and being there with them, Trumps all things and, and touch

and field as I'm very much. You know, as the love languages go,

I'm definitely somebody that, you know, is expresses love

through touching emotion, that way, I still hold my kids, even

if they don't want to be held, I don't care, my son, he's eight,

he said, he'll come give me a hug.

He's in middle school now. And he has no issue with running

over with his buddies around and giving me a hug, which is

awesome. For me, I still feel great that my junior high boys

are not embarrassed at all to give us down a hug. And know my

little girl, she's just, you know, it just will sit in your

lap all day long if she could write. So, you know, I love that

because it speaks to my love language. And, you know, you got

to connect that way. But it's quite awkward in the workplace,

if you're going around, you know, it depends on your work

situation. But I had zero issues, I will COVID was a

different experience. But pre COVID, I would sit there and the

buses would show up at school and every kid would come up and

give me a hug. And so, you know, at my pocket would be full for

for an entire day right then and there with, you know, hundreds

of kids getting off the bus giving you hugs, and you get the

chance to say goodbye to them, give them high fives and stuff

like that throughout the day. So it doesn't get much better than

that. Just imagine if we lived in a place where the Walmart

greeter you felt good enough with them that you can give them

a hug every time you went into the store. Right? That's what it

is, like, for me when I get to go to work. And, you know, I'm

pretty blessed that way, not only with the kids, because

they're younger. But even when I was at high school, and at the

end of the year, the big guys that I would coach and and teach

and I was that I was principal of would go across the stage at

grad and pick me up off the ground and big bear hugs in

there, you know, these big, these big men now that are 18

that, you know, are bigger than I am just a skinny rat compared

to them. So yeah, it was just, you know, it's always been

awesome that way. And

it's it's a different experience with staff too, though. But I

consider all of them, you know, somebody I truly care for. And

they know that and when this experience took place, they've

been there for me they reached out as much as they could, they

would come and sit on the front desk like I am right now. And

socially distance appropriately and, and be there just to spend

time with me.

At the start when I would still have seizures, I'm on seizure

meditation. In fact, it's great here today that I haven't had

yet and then I just go through and just make sure that I'm

doing okay because they were just trying to get my meds kind

of regulated at that time. So yeah, they're just yeah, I'm

blessed in every way and I feel fortunate so Huh, oh, my

goodness, that's so precious. What you're sharing here with us

like the first thing that that I remembered now is that you said

you can control things that are out of our control. And the

second or there were many messages in between but what you

touched on right now with the love languages is such a big eye

opener for for a lot of men and women out there and it is so

beautiful. I like to to listen to you and use say okay, this is

your love language and and that makes me get to know you on a

deeper level as well. And the same thing, and even more like

intense it goes when you're in a romantic relationship or when it

is among friends

that you start to to read your partner or your friend and how

they understand love how they receive love, and it's a very

powerful tool to have in your tool bag.

It is definitely and you know even even as a leader in any

role, yeah understanding our how your hierarchy

Staff. And like you said, your friends and family, how they

would like you said, what their love languages are how they like

to receive gratitude.

You know, there's some staff that love that coffee in the

morning that you picked up for them, that, that shows that you

went out of your way to show your appreciation and your

gratitude for them. Other people just wanted a caring note that

that's kind of to the point of, like the words of affirmation, I

saw you working with the kids the other day, and you were

incredible. And it needs to be specific, it needs to be

heartfelt. But when you connect with somebody, that way, they

know how much they care about you and how much you'll go out

of their way, you'll go out of your way to support them. And

then they start to take an interest in what your love

languages, right. And they perhaps they don't use that

terminology, but they learn on how you like to be lifted up or

supported. whatever that might be, like you said, so whether

that be, you know, just quality time, which is my wife's love

language, I know that. And that's where it was a big

struggle when I was a workaholic. Because I would work

until we got home, I would get home late at night, kids have

already eaten, I would get the chance to, you know, the kids

kisses and hugs Good night and say good night. And then Steph,

and I would be usually tired enough to get ready to go to

bed. Or I'd step into a little bit more work. But like you

said, I realized that, you know, in order for this relationship

to work, and that's what I realized over this this past

year, that I need to make sure that I've carved out that time

for us to just go for a walk with a dog and talk.

And that means without the kids. So there's going to be another

walk with the kids. So that we're all spending time together

as a family. But yeah, just learning those things.

And that gets those goes that goes along with some of the

message that I tried to share on Tuesday tips and gratitude.

Wednesday's is just, you know, some of the things you got to

realize that you got to, you got to do before, I just said, you

get put in a situation like I've been placed. And

and, yeah, that's the basics of what I do on those Tuesdays. And

Wednesdays is just going through messages like that. And

hopefully, you can do those things before you're forced to,

like I said, or you don't get the opportunity to do them at

all. Like, it's very easily that I could have just passed away.

And I left a lot of things undone in my life. So, you know,

I just be thankful that I get this, like you said the second

chance to do it. So yeah, yeah. So what I hear is that with the

love languages, you can intensify it work better your

relationships, at work, even like you can be a leader, with

the heart and in learning their language, they will learn your

language, and the work is going to be even more productive

people are going to go out of their way in order to reach

success. And they're going to feel so deeply appreciated. And

it's just a work environment that we should all thrive for.

And another thing that I hear here is that you are setting

yourself apart from the warrior.

And you join the kings, the men who live in the king energy I

read such a beautiful article here the other day about

warriors being you know, the go getters, ambitious men and the

guys who get things done. And the king is the person who at

the same time

cares so deeply about his queen, and about what she needs, the

way she receives love, and deeply cares about his community

and lift other people up and is not only concerned about his

ambition, and to have that awakening yet to see all of a

sudden, oh my god, like my my wife felt neglected for all

these years and was nagging and was you know, maybe not your

wife but some women start Oh, no, no, there's death. There's

definitely times where we had conversations in which I have to

be honest Aurora that I was just like, put my head down and be

like, you're 100% correct.

I don't know if I will realize that as much as I should have.

But no, I was definitely that person. That situation where I

was not given enough time to my family into my

Life. Yeah. And

well, definitely learning that lesson in no going forward that

I need to ensure that there's that balance. But I love that

analogy. But I really would just put it down to what you have is

your definition of a leader. Honestly,

I believe in it. Like I believe in servant leadership, I believe

that a leader is there to serve their, their employees, their

family, whoever it may be their friends, is that if you're not

doing your job, right, as as a leader, then your employees

can't do their job or right. And I, I believe in that servant

mentality that I would never ask anybody on my staff to ever do

anything that I wouldn't do first, or lead by example.

So I think that, that goes back to just like you said, being

there for your people showing them that you care, and then it

becomes reciprocal. And that's way, I hope you never go into an

environment like and I've said this in, in Tuesday, tips like,

life is too short not to love what you're doing. So if you're

going to be spending, essentially a third of what your

a third of your time working, that's what you know, the

typical environment is, with eight hours a day sleeping for

eight hours a day at work, and maybe a few hours a day with

family, then you better love what you're doing. And you

better love being around the people that you're with, if not

quit, honestly quit. And I don't say this often. But I've left

very successful positions in the past, because the people that I

should be looking out to, I was not inspired by them. In fact, I

felt I I don't know if I want to say not disgusted. But I felt

like they were not the type of person that I aspired to be. And

so, you know, if I, if I can't look up to the leadership of the

person that is responsible for me, that is my leader, then I

don't want to be there. And I'm fortunate here in Lethbridge

right now that that my superintendent and who's in

charge of the Lethbridge School District, she is a true warrior

as you might put it, and she inspires and she works so hard.

She has such a big heart, she's

reached out to me many times to see if I need any support. And,

and I know what's genuine. And those are the kind of people you

want to go work for. And those are the types of environments

you want to be in. And, but I've been in other places where like

you said, you might feel appreciated at times. But you

also know that that's not genuinely coming from that

person, they haven't made an investment in you. So, you know,

I always try to go into any of those situations with an

investment, knowing that not only not only am I going to do

everything I can to this person, but I know that that's going to

come back to me from them as well.

I'm going to share a tiny story if I can, because I think it

really pertains to it.

There's an old teacher and he is a mentor of my wife's actually.

And he's a teacher out in Tabor. And he was a biology teacher at

high school. And

there's a math teacher that was across the hallway. And they

came up to a student and said, Why did you do so poorly on your

your math test? The student was quite academic and did very

well. Why did you do so bad on your math test on on Tuesday?

Usually you do, you usually perform much better than this.

Well, I also had a biology test on that day. And I didn't want

to disappoint Mr. Cleveland. And so they obviously spent more

time studying and preparing for the exam for Mr. Cleveland

because they had that emotional connection, that relationship

with Him. And so goes right back to what you said, like you have

an environment that's significantly more productive.

an environment that is has reduced sickness has people that

are happy, less stress, when there's connection there. But

that needs to be individualized to each person. And the

leadership's job is to find what that connection is. And to

encourage you to create an environment where that will

thrive. And if you haven't done the job successfully, you're

gonna have internal strife stress, you're gonna have

fighting, you're gonna have an unsuccessful company, you're

gonna have an unsuccessful environment and you're gonna

have clients

that aren't going to be happy with you. So for me, my

experience is going to be parents that are upset children

that are upset, kids that aren't learning stuff that are dating

along, you know, in a school that's in disarray, as opposed

to a school that staff care about each other parents are,

it's

exceptionally happy that their kids are, are going to their

school or going to that school, and they trust you with their

most prized. I don't want to say possession, but the things that

they love the very most in this world. That's an honor for

somebody that allow you to do that. It's like, man, I can't

think of something better than this, like in life then to be

trusted enough with us somebody's child. That's, that's

pretty special. So, and, yeah, like I said, I'm lucky to have

something inspires me each day to get up and go to work.

I always joke my, my brother in law, he's in oil and gas, but

his both his parents were teachers. And he always says,

Why is it that teachers always say, I'm going to school, but

I'm not going to work, where he goes, when I say I'm, I'm going,

I'm going to work. teachers say, I'm going to school. You know

what, for most of us, we absolutely love what we do.

And I hope that's the case for anybody in whatever they do. And

that they're proud of what they do that they stand up and have a

voice and say, you know, hey, I'm proud of what I do every

day, and I make a difference. And so, you know, that's why I

think some people become a workaholic, too, because they

love what they do. And they put those other things on the

backburner and they still need to be able to love themselves as

much as they love the kids that they're making a difference for.

So yeah. Oh, man, this was such a nice little story that you

shared here at the end. And, and I, I can see already how

everybody will understand your message that Yeah, hard driven,

not ego driven is the future. And this is how we can build

very strong families and communities and strong, thriving

businesses. And I'm so endlessly grateful for you to making the

time today and sharing your light equestrianism and yeah,

I'm excited to share this episode around with with

everybody

will be feeling touched at the heart. Thank you so much for

being here.

My pleasure, all the best and can't wait to see it all the