June 11, 2024 • 49 mins
Kevin's story begins with a passion for motocross, fueled by the adrenaline of performing gravity-defying stunts. But life took a dramatic turn when a catastrophic accident left him paralyzed. In a split second, Kevin had to decide between two grim outcomes: staying on his bike and risking a broken neck or jumping off and potentially breaking his legs. He chose the latter, leading to a life-altering injury that would test his resilience and spirit.
As fate would have it, Kevin wasn't new to the world of spinal injuries. Just a few years earlier, his father had suffered a similar accident, leaving him paralyzed. The irony of both father and son facing such challenges is not lost on Kevin, who candidly shares the emotional and physical toll it took on his family. His mother, a beacon of resilience, navigated the turbulent waters of having both her husband and son in wheelchairs.
Kevin's recovery journey is a testament to human spirit and determination. From wiggling his first toe six weeks after the accident to walking and riding again within a year, his path was anything but easy. Along the way, he discovered a new passion in Paralympic sledge hockey, eventually earning a bronze medal in Sochi. This experience led him to a new calling: sharing his story and inspiring others through public speaking.
In his keynote presentations and coaching program, Kevin delves into what he calls the "Hero Mindset." He offers invaluable insights into navigating life's transitions, whether due to disability, career changes, or personal challenges. His message is clear: acceptance doesn't mean giving up; it's the first step toward a fulfilling life.
Kevin's humor and candidness make his story relatable and engaging. From humorous anecdotes about crop-dusting VIP audiences to the heartwarming tales of his current life with his girlfriend and her two children, Kevin's narrative is a rollercoaster of emotions and life lessons.
Join us for this compelling episode of Destiny is Debatable and discover how you, too, can adopt the Hero Mindset to overcome life's obstacles and build the life you want.
Don't wait—tune in now and start your journey toward a resilient and fulfilling life!
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Kevin's Profile (bio, social inks, etc.) :: https://podcast.johnbgrimes.com/guests/kevin-rempel/
Kevins's Website :: https://kevinrempel.com/
🎙️ PODCAST LINKS ⬇
JOHN GRIMES' MENINGITIS STORY :: https://podcast.johnbgrimes.com/blog/destiny-is-debabable-the-story-summary/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Music.
(00:12):
Welcome to destiny is debatable a podcast and movement that will encourage you
to build your life into the one you want,
here's your host a guy who knows possibility is always a possibility john grimes,
hey kevin thanks for joining the destiny is debatable
(00:32):
podcast my pleasure stoked to
be here john great yeah stoked you are um man
you're a wild man kevin i was a little
more chill these days but i think you probably still are at least compared to
some and in particular compared to me you have got quite a story and as a former
(00:53):
motocross guy i think i'm saying that right you i think there's a lot of things
that we can both relate to and kind of things that have happened in our own lives.
So I'm stoked to be talking to you about that. But before we do that,
I have some contractually obligated questions that I have to ask you that the
listeners demand to kind of get to know you a little bit. So can you hang in
(01:14):
there for a couple questions?
You got it. Let's do it. All right. What is your favorite band or type of music?
Oh, that's interesting because I haven't been asked that question in ages.
It really depends, I think, on what I'm doing. I mean, punk rock was definitely
my jam when I was riding motocross and then hip-hop rap for sure,
like for workouts to this day still would be something I love.
(01:38):
We can get into it later if you want. I recently have been going back to church,
got God back in my life and worship music is something that I really dig lately
too. There's a lot of like killer upbeat songs.
So just depends on like what I'm doing, if I'm like doing an activity or a workout or just day to day.
Those would be the top three. Awesome. Yeah. Okay.
(01:58):
What about a reader? Are you a reader?
I definitely do though. I'm guilty of not reading much lately,
but I love reading and I'm proud of my bookshelf.
Okay. All right. So on your bookshelf, what's your favorite book or maybe author
or maybe type of book you like to read?
I like self-development books. I'll give you my top two or three.
(02:21):
Number one is a book called Trust by Ilana Van Zandt.
She's an advisor for Oprah. She's got a wicked story.
But just learning about building the trust within yourself, that's hands down
one of my top three books in my life.
A second top three book of my life. Actually, I got all top three here.
So the second is the book titled Resilience by Eric Gretchen,
(02:41):
uh former navy um seal and
uh him and his buddy return to real life and civilian life
they have a hard time or one has a hard time it's a killer book
and um the other oh my god why is this someone you know um it's okay i put you
on the spot no problem no it's um oh yeah and the third book is titled working
(03:03):
with the law by raymond hollywell and it's about universal laws energy energy, uh, mindset, spirit.
And it's just those, those three books, trust, resilience, and working with the law. Top three.
I got to tell you, not, not too many people have given me three examples and
not too many people have, you know, reached to their bookshelf to grab them.
That's pretty impressive.
(03:24):
So I'd say you're a, you're a, you're a bonafide reader, but you probably go
in there seasons of that. Sure. That happens.
Yeah. I, I, oh my gosh.
I honestly, Honestly, reading, I don't even know what to compare it to in terms
of how it feeds my soul to just take some information.
And even if it's rereading it, like when you read something a second time or
(03:46):
a third time at a different period in your life, it can land differently.
I think reading is such a powerful and just joyful thing to do. At least it is in my life.
I agree. Now, you're a speaker. You've been on a lot of stages.
You've written a lot of stuff, blog posts, articles, and things.
So there's a lot of things that people know about you out there,
I'm sure, of it, but what is something that most people don't know about you?
(04:15):
What is something that people don't know about me?
I don't know, because I'm a pretty open book. That's why I think I'm struggling.
Like, I put a lot about my life online. What's your favorite color, maybe?
My girlfriend asked me that a couple days ago, and I can't even give just one.
I mean, I'm black, white, blue, or red.
I mean, it's a roll of the dice. It depends on where they're at.
Like, clothing versus a vehicle.
(04:37):
My truck's red, but I wear black and white clothing probably more than colorful clothing.
Okay. What's your girlfriend's favorite color?
I haven't actually i'm gonna i'm gonna scratch that because i'm gonna get you
i'm gonna get you in trouble here so never mind let's stop with the girlfriend questions.
Well something that's uh i can share that i don't like post about per se but
(05:00):
my girlfriend jess uh we like she has two beautiful children um they're four
and six years old and uh that's a super joyful part of my life that's not currently
really on social media but um something that i'm totally,
happy to share and love having in my life.
It's such a joy to be a male figure, role model, and support life and people
(05:27):
like a family beyond yourself.
That's something that's new to me that I'm really grateful for.
Yeah. Well, that's your answer. That's a good answer. See, just took a minute to get to it.
Okay, if you could be born any time, past or future, in any place in the world, when and where?
Not that I've ever really thought about that. When people ask the question,
(05:51):
like, if you could meet anybody alive or dead, I'd want to meet Tupac.
So, I don't know if I were to be born in a different era where maybe I was a
bit older as Tupac was on the rise.
Like, I didn't really hear or learn about Tupac until after he'd already passed.
But I think it'd be pretty would have been pretty awesome to
like been an older as
(06:12):
in a teenager in my teenage years when Tupac
was kind of like popping off and go see him perform live
and if I could sit down and just yeah just listen
to anything he had to say that'd be pretty cool cool now what is
it about Tupac uh just when I
was like yeah younger teenage life going
through stuff uh his music was extremely influential
(06:33):
on for me uh and
to this day i mean people still talk about him um eminem
is another one though too it's like you know he's a lot like to
meet somebody alive versus tupac's past um yeah i don't listen to eminem as
much anymore but just played such a significant role in you know kind of finding
(06:54):
who you are or having that resilience or just identifying with someone as you're
growing up. I think music plays such a significant role.
And so those two guys would be pretty awesome to meet.
Or yeah, if I could have grown up during the Tupac era, a little bit older to experience it. Okay.
And finally, speaking of the teenage years that you just referenced,
(07:15):
what advice would you give your 19 year old self?
And do you think he would listen?
The follow-up to your question there is, I think important.
Would that person listen? because I actually received the advice when I was
younger that I would probably give, which is just to be patient.
Like you have so much time and it's hard to understand that because when you're
(07:37):
younger, you don't have the perspective of time.
But now like I'm 41 years old today and you know, like, oh my gosh,
like seven days blows by, let alone months, an entire year can blow by in the blink of an eye.
And, but you can also, you also can look back in your life now and you know,
in your thirties into your 40s and see that, oh my God, in a decade,
(08:00):
you can accomplish a lot of stuff.
So at the age of 20, for example, or like you feel like you want to get on with
life and you're running out of time, but from 20 to 30 years old,
in 10 years, you can do a lot of stuff.
So it feels like life's not moving fast enough or you want it to happen faster,
but just be impatient. That's what I would think about.
(08:22):
That's all the hard-hitting questions, Kevin. You made it. Cool. Success.
Speaking of teenage and 19, I asked that question because my life change happened at 19.
And we both had a big change in our lives. You were, I think, 23 when that happened.
But I think you can relate to this, a motocross guy that's jumping and doing stuff.
(08:44):
I felt like I was 10 feet tall and bulletproof. Like, you know,
I didn't have a care in the world. Everything was super trivial.
I was on, everything was great, you know, until it wasn't, right?
So I kind of want to get into that story to kind of set the table on what happened with you.
Yeah. Just like, as you mentioned, same age, 19 years old and my life turned
(09:05):
around in the blink of an eye.
At 19, me and my dad, we were out deer hunting, building a tree stand.
And my dad was up in the tree when one of the branches he was standing on broke
and he fell two stories to the ground right in front of my own eyes.
As he was laying on there on the ground, gasping for air, I knew something was up.
So I grabbed the keys out of his coat pocket and ran and called 911,
(09:30):
which is our emergency service here.
Take him to the hospital, x-rays taken, surgery, and he's deemed a complete
paraplegic, which meant that he had broken his back in the fall and severed his spinal cord,
which meant that there was no chance of him really ever making a recovery again
to get back on his feet walking.
And my dad was just eight months from retirement. He was He was 52 years old. I sometimes forget.
(09:56):
But yeah, my dad was like eight months from retirement. And all of a sudden,
he felt like, yeah, his life was taken away from him.
And my life and our family's life changed forever.
Yeah. So what is that like witness? Was it just the two of you there?
Yep. We were about a kilometer or so. I don't know. That would be 0.6 miles.
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
(10:18):
Back into the real-time conversion there. Yeah.
Man, you know, because the thing is, at least for me, my dad is, is my hero.
When I go through the things in my life now as a parent myself,
I go through that with the frame of reference of what my kids think of me as their, their father.
(10:44):
I know because I felt that way about my father and And like to see my father
in that type of situation, that's got to be, at least for me,
would be super difficult.
I mean, because dads don't fall. Dads don't hurt themselves.
Dads take care of everything. Dad's always there.
Dad this, dad that. I mean, just the list goes on and on of what dads do.
(11:05):
And to not have dad to be able to do that has got to be difficult.
I've certainly met many people and have many friends where their dad was or
is their hero or superhero.
My relationship with my dad growing up, I would say it was good.
(11:25):
My dad was a great dad. I know that he did the best he could with what he had and what he knew.
When I was younger, he got me into stick and ball sports. But at the age of
10, I started getting interested in motocross.
And through my teenage years, that was my passion. So when my dad got hurt,
we'd actually only about maybe six months prior started to kind of like rekindle
(11:46):
a relationship is the way I would describe it.
So I'm sorry to say my dad wasn't exactly my hero.
I love my dad. I know my dad loved me, but it was definitely the back to the,
like the second part of your question. Yeah, it was absolutely hard.
I mean, it completely disrupted our family and our community as well.
My dad worked for the town, like the municipality that we lived in.
(12:09):
So there was a ton of people that knew who my dad was and when the accident
happened and he had a big social circle of friends too. So yeah, it was very hard.
It wasn't hard for the reason that my dad was my hero. it was just hard that
I didn't really have a good relationship or like the, the relationship I wanted with my dad.
(12:30):
I felt like I was developing it. And then I felt like myself that was taken away.
And after dad got hurt, there was like a lot of arguing and fighting in the
household. And that's one of many things that made it very difficult.
Yeah. You have sibling or two.
Yeah. My sister, she's two years younger than I am.
And we were all like, we were the four of us for living at home,
(12:51):
but when dad got hurt, my sister was, she was out of the house spending most
of her time over at her boyfriend's place.
So I just felt like it was me and mom trying to deal with it.
And yeah, it was very tough.
I can imagine. And a few years later, you get a little bit more into motocross.
Do I have my timeline right there? Yeah.
(13:12):
Despite dad's accident, like I had done some racing, motocross racing prior to dad being hurt.
But around that same time was when the X Games was starting to become a thing.
Like we're talking 1998, 1999.
And I forget if it was 98 or 99 was the first time
that freestyle motocross was introduced into the x games and it
(13:33):
just completely exploded like it took over the x games in
the action sports world so you're all over that
yeah like yeah 1999 i think
was that anyways yeah i i just consumed it
lived it breathed it everything so freestyle became my
passion doing the stunts the tricks that you see on tv superman c
(13:53):
grabs cliffhangers all that stuff and what's the
hardest one to do now this is on a bike and motorized bike yeah
yeah okay uh what's the hardest i mean there's progression
like there's different levels progression and at the time
i was just like trying to learn my
own bag of tricks so the basics knock
knock can can superman c grab cliffhanger those are a few common basic moves
(14:17):
back in the day those were bigger moves like a cliffhanger where you're basically
doing a handstand in the air hanging off the handlebars by your tippy toes like
that was my favorite and And that was my biggest trick at the time.
Okay. So explain that one again.
So when you take off, if you just picture even a bicycle, if you're just riding
a bicycle, like you got your hands on the handlebars and you're kind of in a
squatting position, your feet are on the pedals or the pegs of the motorcycle.
(14:41):
When you take off, you're,
You first bring your toes up to the handlebars to hook them underneath.
And then as in the same fluid motion, you're letting your body drift away from
the motorcycle as you're reaching the peak or the apex of the jump.
(15:02):
And you allow your body to do a full handstand or like standing straight up
in the air with your legs straight and your arms straight above you as if you're
like trying to touch the sky.
And the only thing that's holding you to the motorcycle is your toes hooked
under the handlebars of your, by your feet. Jeez, man. Oh man.
No, thanks. So you, you could do that pretty well, huh? I was getting decent
(15:26):
doing that at the time. Yeah.
So how high in the air are you for something like that? The jumps I was practicing
on the gap was 75 to 95 feet.
You're 20 to 30 feet high, roughly.
Well the gap meeting the in between the two ramps
take off to the landing yeah wow man and
how fast you get going when you when you hit the hit the ramp
(15:48):
in freestyle like you don't chat you don't speak about like miles per hour or
anything like that you just say like second gear or third gear so those jumps
for me were like third gear jumps it's pretty fast is that right yeah i'm sorry
i'm I'm hesitating because there's nuances to it.
You can do a jump that's maybe like a 40-foot gap, but you approach really slowly,
(16:12):
and then you just accelerate at the last minute because you get a lot of pop
in the ramp, so it shoots you really high.
And the airtime is what allows you to pull the trick.
So you can have a shorter gap and go super high and then come back down,
or you can have a longer gap that you may not go as high, but you still have
a decent amount of hang time in the air.
(16:34):
So it depends yeah no thanks for me but
it's super that you guys do that kind of stuff yeah that's how
it sounds pretty awesome but i don't think i'd be able to i don't think i'd
be able to even get close to something like that that's crazy okay so and the
good news and bad news is a lot of these things are are caught on film or people
are taping them and i guess in this age we didn't have cell phones at the ready
but you yeah definitely pre-self well cell phones were
(16:58):
just getting going but like
there was no video recording you could
take a photo on a cell phone there's no way that it would have like
caught anything good from an action movement perspective digital cameras were
just emerging or you probably had like a two gigabyte memory card yeah so we
(17:22):
my photo album is literally a photo physical photo album of four by six printed
photos of when I wrote and you would take a photo and
then you'd have to like hope that it was timed properly and you'd
go get it developed at the grocery store and sit in the parking lot for one
or two hours because you paid for accelerated like printing and then you get
(17:42):
them all and you open them up and hope and then you'd be all pumped if you saw
the one that would like look good yeah so you had to wait like days or what
not not an instant uh recall on your iPhone phone as to what the photo is.
So anybody under the age of, what, like 30 probably has no idea what any of
that even means as far as the film in the grocery store. Crazy.
(18:03):
Let's not date ourselves here because I'm kind of the same way.
So, all right. So you're doing motocross. That's going.
You're on the upward trend there. You're arcing good and things are going. Yeah.
Was pursuing my dream of riding putting on shows and
was looking to get hired i got one
(18:25):
show under my belt but people weren't
really taking me on i ended up starting my own business and then
at my second show i crashed i ended up
hitting the jump first jump of the day i wasn't
mentally focused because i was too worried about the other riders the crowd
it's just making me nervous and the ramps are a bit crooked the wind's blowing
(18:45):
and i was too scared to speak up and say anything i was afraid of looking like
a wuss so i just hurried up and hit the jump i rushed my warm-up and as soon
as i took off it kind of kicked me the wrong way in the air like my rear.
End of my motorcycle was coming up too high and made a split second decision
i either had to decide to stay on or jump off the bike i thought if i stayed
on i'd break my neck so if i jump off i break my legs that's actually a better
(19:08):
day that's like literally what happens yeah and in a
split second yeah yeah so ditch
the bike landed without the motorcycle from 75 feet onto
a steel landing ramp and broke my back broke
my back my pelvis my ribs i was instantly paralyzed and after surgery i was
(19:28):
told that i was likely never going to walk again however the fortunate part
was that i did not sever my spinal cord like my dad i had a fracture dislocated
my vertebrae so my spinal cord, it was pulled,
pinched and swollen and a spinal cord injury is like a brain injury.
You don't know what the recovery is going to be until it actually happens.
So I just had to put in the work and I, for the sake of the podcast,
(19:52):
I'm giving the short version, but like it was about six weeks until I wiggled
my first toe, four months in rehab, 10 months in a wheelchair,
two months on canes, walking and riding in a year.
But it was like three to four years to be on my feet all day,
every day, independent, living
that normal quote unquote normal life that we try to get back to. Yeah.
(20:14):
And that's, yeah. So that's tough, obviously.
Were you awake when you landed? I mean, after you landed, I should say,
like you hit and are you aware of what's happening or are you unconscious?
I was conscious and have memory of the entire event up until I was loaded into the ambulance.
So I remember the entire morning. I remember the crash. I remember the paramedics over my head.
(20:38):
I remember getting loaded onto the stretcher. But once I was in the ambulance
on the way to the hospital is kind of where I start to lose memory.
So you you immediately noticed the feeling
of the injury like you can't you can't move anything yeah it was excruciating
pain knife in my back any like breathing alone or any sudden any movement at
(20:59):
all just felt excruciating i was laying on my left side kind of in like the feeble position,
tried to uncross my legs because i could see that i was see how they were lying
and i couldn't and And when I put my hand on my leg to push my leg off and I,
when my hand, I could not feel my leg. I'm like, oh fuck.
I'm like, I'm paralyzed. Yeah. Jeez.
(21:23):
So how much time had elapsed between your injury and your dad's?
Four years, three and a half, four years. Yeah.
So yeah, it was very, very ironic for my mom and my dad. Cause my dad said, don't get in. Don't.
He was afraid of me getting injured like him. Then I did. And my mom now had
both husband and son in wheelchairs, both spinal cord injuries at the exact same time.
(21:46):
So how does mom, what does mom do with that? it's funny because like we talk
about it today and a little bit here and there and,
my mom's answer is she's like i just did what i needed to do but at
the same time like i know that my mom i'm i
know behind the scenes was probably struggling a
lot more than what she showed i believe my mom's tremendously resilient especially
(22:09):
for all she's been through but what i can say for myself like when i was dealing
with my dad like you also kind of just go numb like you You just kind of go
into autopilot and you kind of become numb to all the stuff that's happening.
Just kind of get in a rhythm.
Yeah. Sometimes it's just survival too. I mean, life with a disability,
especially when you first acquire one anyways,
(22:29):
you know, if you, if you were living an able-bodied life and then all of a sudden
something happens like in that, in those early months or early years,
like it can be, it can feel like and be a shit storm and you're just figuring it out.
Like you might just feel like you're in survival mode for a while
until things i the i describe it as like until the dust settles and then you
(22:49):
start to establish like a new baseline because for spinal cord injury you have
the accident so your bowel and bladder's messed up you got muscle spasms you
got pain you got pins and needles you got like as a result you're on a,
garbage pail of medication of all this stuff to take that's creating side effects
then you have of things like mood swings and fatigue and perhaps depression or whatever.
(23:14):
I was on pills for acid reflex and stool softener and narcotics as well for
pain. There's so many things. So,
When you first, again, I'll speak for spinal cord injury life.
It's like when you acquire that injury or your disability, it takes time for
the trauma of your body to settle.
(23:35):
It takes time to establish what medications are working, not working,
and then to wean yourself off of them. It just takes time.
So it's hard for a lot of people because they just want to get better so fast.
And meanwhile, there's all these things that are throwing a wrench into your
recovery, But that is the recovery.
That is the process is just giving it time and space for things to settle down
(23:57):
and then figuring it out.
And all the while you're trying to understand your new life,
your new abilities or limitations or what you should or shouldn't be doing,
which for a guy that's jumping on off of, you know, ramps, it's probably a pretty
hard thing to, you know, settle down,
(24:18):
stop and determine whether, you know, I don't know if you still wanted to even do that stuff or not.
Or if you you curse that because of what happened but
you still have the mentality i would imagine at least you want to have the mentality
at least i did was i got to keep going but there's a lot of things that i have
to figure out and sometimes these drugs and things that you're taking counterbalance
(24:42):
you know they can counteract with each other and they cause this new thing and.
There's just you you mentioned bowel and bladder stuff we certainly have some
common common area you there.
My situation, which I talk about quite often here, is bacterial meningitis,
which affects the lining of the brain and spinal cavity.
(25:02):
So I had some neurological-related challenges as a result, I guess somewhat
similar to a spinal cord injury. It was an infection in my spinal cord.
And it messed up some of those nerves. Those nerves do not fire anymore.
And bladder was one of them. And I didn't realize laying in the hospital bed
(25:23):
after coming out of sleep for better part of a little over a week,
you know, I had to go, I had to go pee, right?
How do I do that? What do you do? What, how do you do that?
Why doesn't, why doesn't this work? And how am I going to make this work? Because I've got to go.
And you know, the thing about the bladder is it does expand,
luckily, but there is a limit to that.
(25:45):
So just these things that you never thought in your wildest dream,
especially at age 19, 20, you know, early in life, these are not things you're used to dealing with.
Yeah, definitely not given that my dad was injured before me that at least gave me, I,
I do consider it an advantage in my journey and recovery because I had already
(26:10):
seen my dad struggle with his bowel and bladder, everything,
the meds adapting to home.
Like my home was already wheelchair accessible, which is very ironic.
And then at the same time I moved home and me, my dad fought so much that I
moved out after six months into an accessible apartment because I couldn't be
around my dad without fighting.
But yeah, I mean, there's so many lessons to share about the experience and
(26:35):
challenges that are relatable for so many people.
And it also doesn't mean that you have to have a disability to feel this experience.
So as an example, if you acquire a disability or something happens to you at
some point in your life, after you've been living an able-bodied life,
one of the biggest challenges is acceptance, often related to an old identity as well.
(26:56):
So your old identity could be anything and everything
from the sports that you played to the social circles that you had to the career
that you were involved in to your relationship whether that person was with
you for a short term or long term whether they want to stick around or they
want to leave whether you have kids or not too and how you view your situation
and what that looks like going forward.
(27:17):
Both my dad and myself those happened suddenly
meaning overnight you lost
your old identity and had to like find a
way now some people i'll give an
example with like you know getting old like old
age like that's a gradual transition that could
that has its own challenges where slowly over time you
(27:39):
lose your ability to do something that you used to do or it can happen overnight
but that's usually a little more acceptable though because people kind of expect
that you know like they've they've seen people get old we kind of we kind of
know that that's eventually going to happen it doesn't mean it's not any more
or less disappointing that when it happens, but you can kind of expect that.
Yeah. So, I mean, in the world of disabilities...
(28:01):
I honestly enjoy helping people, whether they have a disability or not.
I have a coaching group I know we're probably going to touch on called the Hero Tribe.
And I, in that group, have had the pleasure of helping a number of people who
have acquired a disability, mostly spinal cord injuries.
Another is one who lost their arm, became an amputee.
And of course, people just with mental health challenges or going through relationship challenges.
(28:25):
The funny thing is, as a metaphor, if you're going through a separation or a
divorce, you've lived your life one way for so long, perhaps a decade,
and all of a sudden that changes overnight.
You can still be going through a lot of the same emotions or mental challenges
about old identity and acceptance.
(28:45):
I just love helping people through career and life transitions.
But accepting change is one of the hardest things for so many people to do.
And the faster that you can learn to accept the change is constant and that
it's gonna and that it will happen then the faster you can move forward with
your life yeah i'm at the top of the list there are people that have a hard
(29:05):
time with acceptance on lots of things it's it's tough.
Especially when it comes out of the blue yeah but that's the magic and the mystery
of john Jim Rohn would call it.
It is. And I've also learned with age that everybody has struggles.
Everybody has things that happen.
(29:27):
And if you haven't yet, then watch out because it's coming.
It doesn't mean it's going to be traumatic or insignificant or somewhere in
between, but it happens to all of us.
And at different times, different stages, and we're all in a different potentially situation.
But the great thing about the internet and the community that it can create
is you can find somebody with a similar situation,
(29:49):
maybe not identical, but there are groups, there are people that like to talk
about those things and are willing to and want to talk.
Like you're saying, your group that you work with, maybe those existed 50 years
ago, but they certainly were a lot more difficult to get involved with and to
understand and connect.
(30:10):
Yeah. Peer support as an example is something that's common in the world of
people disabilities, like spinal cord injury, Ontario has a peer support program.
So they'll match you with someone who has a similar, who's at a similar age
and has similar injury, like support groups all around, like even Alcoholics
Anonymous, you can consider is something like that.
(30:30):
And now today we have, there's a number of people like myself who just have
created their own community, their own group to help people through those challenges. And there's.
There's so many niches to get into. Alcohol is something that a significant
amount of the population is affected by or consumes, let's say.
But if you think about things like meningitis or spinal cord injuries, that's a minority.
(30:53):
However, to create a community for that specific niche, there are so many people
that would love to connect with people specifically that have that challenge.
Yeah how important do you think humor plays in the acceptance role or or the
moving forward i think it's pretty important i have you gotta i feel like you
can't take yourself too seriously and you gotta laugh yeah it's necessary like
(31:13):
there's i don't think that i'm i'm the best at telling jokes per se but i can
think of like a bunch of like funny moments and things that happen,
like one that comes to mind this was it's super embarrassing when it happens but like,
when it took me it took me like eight years to really
dial in my bowels so that i wasn't having challenges
let's just call it say but i used to
(31:35):
go to my speaking events and like sometimes if the
bowels weren't on point you'd be like farting a lot and it's like
i'd be at i'd be like the keynote speaker at like a
vip event like crop dusting the audience before i go up there yeah i'd be saying
i'll never forget once i was standing on the top towers of like a one of the
buildings in toronto and i'm like talking to like some executives and And we're
(32:00):
just having a chat and they're like,
oh, what's that smell? I'm like, I don't know.
Weird. I'm going to roll. I don't even smell it. What are you talking about?
Yeah. Yeah. Something must be wrong with you.
That's good. Yeah. At least it wasn't audible. But here, like I'll give you
another example of something that's funny that I loved.
Like before we hit record here, I was telling you about this morning.
(32:22):
Every Friday right now, I hang out with my friend Chris, who is my landscaper.
And chris also has a spinal cord injury he's
full-time in a wheelchair he's an incomplete injury so he can move his
legs but he can't use them to walk he's they're not strong enough they don't have
enough function yeah chris long story short
in his early 20s alcoholic bar fight
ends up wandering the streets middle of night wakes up in jail and they he has
(32:46):
to hire a private investigator to track down what because he woke up in jail
paralyzed and they have to like because when the cops found they were drunk
he thought they were just they thought he was just drunk So they throw him in
the car. Turns out he broke his back.
So they hire a private investigator. Turns out what they think happened,
the most probable solution they could conclude was that he was drunk,
climbed a scaffolding on a construction site and slid down the garbage chute.
(33:11):
And then the impact at the bottom of that probably compressed his vertebrae, broke his back.
Anyway, so Chris said it was the best thing that ever happened to him because
he's going down a dark path and his life's been better because of it.
But today, so Chris is my landscaper as a paraplegic and his business name,
take a guess what his business name is.
Hey, there's got to be a pun involved here. Yeah, there's a pun for sure. Yeah.
(33:37):
Uh i i i would i don't know tell me crippled weeds,
yeah his business name is crippled weeds because that's acceptance right there
yeah and chris is not politically correct in the sense of like you know diversity
inclusion culture and because like he'll roll up and be like yeah i'm not i'm
(33:59):
a crip you know and but but I crippled these weeds as well.
And he just like, he's a hilarious, big hearted, big smiling guy.
And so when I'm out there working with him too, like, you know, I'm off balance easily.
And I wish I could just sometimes like leave my speaking career behind to just
go work full time with Chris and just be the two disabled kids crippling weeds
(34:23):
and pulling out flower beds and smashing concrete walls like we were doing this last week.
But that's what makes it fun. Like we just laugh at ourselves.
Yeah, I think that's That's important. It sounds like he's a pretty cool guy
and got the right way to look at things. Yeah.
So your talks also, it's the hero mindset.
Walk me through the hero mindset and what you tell people about that.
(34:47):
Yeah, just to kind of fill in the last gap of the story for listeners to piece it all together.
So after my accident, well, two things. Number one, my dad would not accept his accident.
And as a result five years
later chose to take his own life unfortunately and as
a result of that i was asked to share my life story for spinal cord injury ontario
(35:12):
so i it was a five-minute talk at a fundraising event and that went well they
said would you do it again and that went well they said would you do it again
and 15 years later keynote speaking is my full-time gig so i I got asked to be,
I, my, my public speaking journey began just after dad passed away.
Just cause I also learned that I can help people with my story.
(35:33):
And then the second thing that happened was it was shortly after that I discovered,
Paralympic sport, specifically sledge hockey.
I played hockey as a kid. It wasn't very good, but this was like a second chance
to kind of give it a, give it a go again.
And yeah, I played, started playing locally. Then I made the provincial team in the third year.
Made the national team played five years we got
(35:55):
a bronze in sochi us has honestly been kicking
butt for a number of years they've you the us now
you've won four gold medals in the paralympics back to back to back to back
wow look at that just a week ago canada won we won our first world championship
i think in eight years seven years
so that was a big breakthrough because yeah us has got a solid squad,
(36:19):
like just bigger population as well to pick from. A lot of double amputees, fast team.
Canada, like every country, I would say outside of U.S., we've always struggled
to like recruit players, which also plays into the sport in terms of like how
competitive other teams are compared to the U.S..
It's been challenging to keep up at times. Canada's been second for a long time
(36:43):
or first and second, like swapping with us and worlds and Paris.
But anyways, yeah, it was a blast. Got to play for many years.
But when I came home from the Paralympics, people kept started calling me a hero.
And I'm like, I was confused because I'm like, I'm not a hero.
I'm just Kevin. I've just done a few things really well over a long period of time.
And people would ask me, like, how did you do it? Like, how did you get through everything? thing.
(37:04):
So I started piecing together, you know, the lessons, the tools,
the strategies, and that's what I started teaching further in my keynotes,
also delivering workshops for corporate audiences.
So if anyone's listening and looking for a speaker to inspire,
motivate their team, or to help provide some tools and strategies to navigate change,
I love to chat, but also my coaching program,
(37:26):
it's more of like a B2C product than a B2B product,
but I just love helping people navigate career and life transition so
as i mentioned like whether you acquired a disability maybe you're
going through a relationship change during the pandemic when
a lot of people like were getting let go from their jobs suddenly they were
reaching out to me like kev how do i accept this what do i got to do next
how do i stay resilient i just love helping people with ship their mindset that's
(37:48):
that's my thing so when people called me a hero they wanted to understand my
mindset that's when i decided to piece together my keynote as titled the hero
mindset and my My workshops and my coaching framework is through something I
created called the Hero Mindset Blueprint.
So it's my own collection of tools, strategies, lessons I've learned.
Some are like many are from other people, but it's in my own toolbox that I
(38:11):
want to help share with you so you can build your own toolbox and have your
own blueprint to help you become a hero in your own story.
Where does that start? What's usually the biggest hurdle for people to get to that point?
Great question. i think it depends if
i were to pick one place to start is self-awareness like
one of the areas of focus is self-awareness i mean ultimately that's
(38:34):
what everything is like some people struggle with habits some people struggle
with visions some people struggle with you know they just don't pay attention
to numbers let's say like i had a vision for years and had a poor habit of spending
money and i just was never getting ahead but in terms of like helping people,
you know, turn things around.
(38:55):
Getting clear on where you are, where you want to go is the first step.
You know, what are the hurdles and obstacles of getting in your way?
There are some people that, you know, maybe have a great life on the outside,
but on the inside, they're suffering because they're, you know,
not facing some truth about their life. Maybe they're not having some difficult conversations.
People with disabilities, I think it's definitely that acceptance piece.
I know a lot of people that, you know, this blew my mind, but I don't respect
(39:19):
the honesty, but I was chatting with someone over Instagram who acquired a spinal
cord injury. She's been injured for about a year and a half and she's unhappy.
She's depressed and feels like her life is in a spiral.
I'm chatting with her. She wants help.
But I asked her, I'm like, you know, have you accepted your injury or are you
ready to do that? And she just flat out said no.
(39:41):
And I'm like, cool, respect. I'm like, when you're ready to accept that and
move forward, I can help you.
But if you're not willing to, I can't do anything for you.
And I can provide you with questions to ask yourself. One of the questions to
ask yourself is, number one, what are you holding on to?
Number two, ask yourself, what do I need to let go of?
(40:03):
And as I mentioned, that might mean you need to let go of past relationships.
You might need to let go of a past identity.
You might need to let go of family members. You might need to let go of an old career.
You might need to let go of an old goal or vision you had for yourself.
But if you stay in resistance about what your reality is, you will stay stuck.
(40:26):
You'll stay frustrated. You'll stay depressed. You'll stay in a mindset where
you feel like you're not moving forward.
And yeah, folks with disabilities, I find that's just the difference.
Like those that accept it are willing to lean into it, embrace it, laugh at it.
Those are the ones that can live a fulfilling and thriving life with a disability.
But if you're not, and here's a punchline to what I said to her and what I've
(40:50):
said to many people, acceptance does not mean giving up.
I think a lot of people, when they say, if I accept my injury,
if I accept that I'm paralyzed, that means my life is over. I'm now a disabled person.
I'll never get back and I might as well stop trying. I'm like, that's not true at all.
It doesn't mean that you stop trying to make your recovery, whether you are
(41:10):
striving to walk again or not.
Acceptance doesn't mean that you stop working to better your life or find a
new career or improve your habits or to become happier.
Year like doesn't mean you stop it just means you stop resisting perhaps
like a false identity or holding on to what once
was versus focusing on what is and then try to create
(41:31):
what could be yeah and that's oftentimes pretty tough
for people to get through the good news is you're just one decision away to
the listeners like you are everything is everything's already within you it's
literally decision away you can decide to say no for another 5 10 15 years or
you can and decide to say yes today.
(41:53):
Let's say yes today, Kevin. This is an audio-only podcast, so nobody will see.
I mean, you can see this on the website, but I don't know if you can see my... Can you see my cup?
Don't wait. My mug, yeah. So this is one of my mantras and kind of what you're
just talking about, I think, is we talked about time and how fast it goes, particularly as we age.
You know, man, I was doing this. That happened... Gosh, that was three months
(42:16):
ago that happened? That feels like it was yesterday.
And I have certainly learned that...
This is it. Don't wait. It doesn't mean you have to make a stupid,
rash decision, but it does mean that you need to always be trying to move forward
and taking the setbacks that happen as just part of the journey with life in general.
But you've got to keep moving forward because if you don't, it will catch with
(42:40):
you fast. I mean, I'm speaking from experience.
I feel like there's lots of things in life that I waited way too long to do
and it's not necessarily a midlife crisis as much as it is just the understanding of.
There's still things I got to do. And if I don't get started on them,
it's just not going to happen.
Yeah. Well, that was the big thing for my dad. My dad waited to live his life.
(43:02):
He waited till retirement to go do the things that he wanted to do.
He waited till retirement to further work on the house or go on some trips that
he wanted to do because it was the old school like mindset or style of thinking,
like work until you retire and then enjoy your last 20 years of your life.
So when dad was eight months away from enjoying his life, the way that he viewed
(43:23):
it, he felt so angry and bitter because it was taken away from him.
And that's why I pursued everything I have in my life. Cause I also don't want
to wait because I've seen how fast it can change.
It can branch breaks and then a split millisecond, your life's never going to be the same.
And through my life in the rehab center too, like other people that have been injured,
(43:46):
I was injured in an extreme sport, which many people might say is the highest risk thing,
or one of, but when I was in my rehab for four months, the other people that
were injured, there were three people that had, were on a four wheeler.
So you're on the ground, you're not jumping.
Three of those people on four wheelers rolled the four wheeler down the hill
(44:07):
sideways. So it rolled on top of them, broke their back.
There was one guy who was working in an attic with his dad, stepped on a piece
of insulation. He thought there was like plywood underneath.
There wasn't. He felt two stories. The ground broke his back.
There were two individuals that went in for elective surgeries that went wrong
and they were paralyzed.
There was another guy that was walking downtown Toronto, got jumped from behind.
(44:29):
Somebody with the butt end of a handgun smashed the back of his neck,
broke his vertebrae in his neck, didn't shoot him, but he had a spinal cord injury.
There's another guy that was at a house party. that got
into a fight on a balcony got pushed off
the balcony over the edge and broke his neck had two
kids it's like there's and there was another lady
(44:50):
not so that was a broken leg not a broken back but like
there's so many there's so
many different things that can happen to people
at any point you don't have to be doing extreme sport to
your for your life to change suddenly of course there's car accidents or
people with car accidents and when i was getting when i was in the hospital
too like just meeting folks has slipped on ice like here in canada fucking there's
(45:13):
a lot of that yeah there is yeah like and i'm not just one more second on this
like i was recently speaking with spinal cord injury ontario and they were telling
you how the demographics.
Of the folks that are injured today are
so different than they were 15 years ago when i was injured they
said the majority of the patients that are currently coming through the facility now
(45:34):
now are elderly like and there's
you know 50s 60s 70s 80s who especially
through the pandemic may have retired and now they're just living that
social life at home and yeah they
slip they slip on ice or they're climbing a ladder they're they
fall off the ladder or fall off a roof they're doing the eavesdrops they're
(45:54):
in their old age and they're trying to stay active and but as a result they're
not as strong and then they're having these slips and falls and then they're
winding a paralyzed way late into their life and i'm like obviously that's awful to hear but it's like,
It can happen in so many different ways. It's crazy to even think about.
Something I saw the other day recently, you posted something on LinkedIn,
(46:18):
which we'll link to all your stuff down below, website and stuff and the show
notes and on the website.
But you posted something. I'm not going to get the quote right.
It wasn't your own quote. And you said you couldn't, I think, remember who said it.
But it was something like, you need to go through your content until your content goes through you,
which i think means your your your
your what you talk about your speech what you do you got to know that like the
(46:42):
back of your hand which sounds to me like you do or at least you work daily
on that so that that stuff just kind of flows through you and i think that's
i think people can tell when it doesn't yeah i mean speaking about your life
helps like i don't forget my life,
yeah and you're you're the resident expert on your life too i would imagine
yeah yeah and in In that post, I was referring to the opening and closing of a speech,
(47:06):
meaning those are two of the most important moments of a presentation to nail
so the audience is engaged and paying attention and leaves with the right message. Yeah.
The journey of speaking has been fun. There's so many different lessons to share
along the way. And it changes as you get older, too.
I was saying my life with Jess and her two girls now is bringing such a different
(47:28):
meaning and purpose after all that I've been through in terms of how I want
to show up and who I want to be. and life's beautiful that way.
Life certainly is beautiful, but it's not always beautiful the way we think
it's going to be or the way we planned it to be, but it certainly can be beautiful.
So I think that's a great way to look at it.
Kevin, I appreciate you stopping by and chatting with us here.
If somebody wants to find more about you and what you do, where's the best place for them to go?
(47:53):
Instagram or LinkedIn are the two places that I post the most content.
I'm real easy to find. My website is kevinrempel.com, R-E-M-P-E-L.
Instagram is at kevinrempel, LinkedIn, same thing.
And if anyone who's listening here is going through a career or life transition
and would like some help with their mindset, I'd encourage you to please reach
(48:16):
out, send me a message too, learn more about the Hero Tribe.
On my Instagram, you can see a number of different testimonials from folks that
have had spinal cord injuries, or like I say, amputee, or just going through
life and the career change or want to go through a career change,
I'm really passionate about helping people, especially people with disabilities,
to, like I said, move into acceptance and shift their mindset and find a way
(48:37):
to live that fulfilling life that they dream of.
Kevin, once again, thanks, man. You are a wild man. I appreciate it.
Thanks a lot, John. I'm stoked to have shared my story with you. Thanks for having me on.
Thanks so much for spending your time with the Destiny of Debatable podcast.
Please rate and write a review wherever you subscribe. It really does help us
grow and reach new people.
(48:57):
For more information, visit johnbgrimes.com.
Destiny is Debatable is a Symblom production.
Music.
Music.
(00:12):
Welcome to destiny is debatable a podcast and movement that will encourage you
to build your life into the one you want,
here's your host a guy who knows possibility is always a possibility john grimes,
hey kevin thanks for joining the destiny is debatable
(00:32):
podcast my pleasure stoked to
be here john great yeah stoked you are um man
you're a wild man kevin i was a little
more chill these days but i think you probably still are at least compared to
some and in particular compared to me you have got quite a story and as a former
(00:53):
motocross guy i think i'm saying that right you i think there's a lot of things
that we can both relate to and kind of things that have happened in our own lives.
So I'm stoked to be talking to you about that. But before we do that,
I have some contractually obligated questions that I have to ask you that the
listeners demand to kind of get to know you a little bit. So can you hang in
(01:14):
there for a couple questions?
You got it. Let's do it. All right. What is your favorite band or type of music?
Oh, that's interesting because I haven't been asked that question in ages.
It really depends, I think, on what I'm doing. I mean, punk rock was definitely
my jam when I was riding motocross and then hip-hop rap for sure,
like for workouts to this day still would be something I love.
(01:38):
We can get into it later if you want. I recently have been going back to church,
got God back in my life and worship music is something that I really dig lately
too. There's a lot of like killer upbeat songs.
So just depends on like what I'm doing, if I'm like doing an activity or a workout or just day to day.
Those would be the top three. Awesome. Yeah. Okay.
(01:58):
What about a reader? Are you a reader?
I definitely do though. I'm guilty of not reading much lately,
but I love reading and I'm proud of my bookshelf.
Okay. All right. So on your bookshelf, what's your favorite book or maybe author
or maybe type of book you like to read?
I like self-development books. I'll give you my top two or three.
(02:21):
Number one is a book called Trust by Ilana Van Zandt.
She's an advisor for Oprah. She's got a wicked story.
But just learning about building the trust within yourself, that's hands down
one of my top three books in my life.
A second top three book of my life. Actually, I got all top three here.
So the second is the book titled Resilience by Eric Gretchen,
(02:41):
uh former navy um seal and
uh him and his buddy return to real life and civilian life
they have a hard time or one has a hard time it's a killer book
and um the other oh my god why is this someone you know um it's okay i put you
on the spot no problem no it's um oh yeah and the third book is titled working
(03:03):
with the law by raymond hollywell and it's about universal laws energy energy, uh, mindset, spirit.
And it's just those, those three books, trust, resilience, and working with the law. Top three.
I got to tell you, not, not too many people have given me three examples and
not too many people have, you know, reached to their bookshelf to grab them.
That's pretty impressive.
(03:24):
So I'd say you're a, you're a, you're a bonafide reader, but you probably go
in there seasons of that. Sure. That happens.
Yeah. I, I, oh my gosh.
I honestly, Honestly, reading, I don't even know what to compare it to in terms
of how it feeds my soul to just take some information.
And even if it's rereading it, like when you read something a second time or
(03:46):
a third time at a different period in your life, it can land differently.
I think reading is such a powerful and just joyful thing to do. At least it is in my life.
I agree. Now, you're a speaker. You've been on a lot of stages.
You've written a lot of stuff, blog posts, articles, and things.
So there's a lot of things that people know about you out there,
I'm sure, of it, but what is something that most people don't know about you?
(04:15):
What is something that people don't know about me?
I don't know, because I'm a pretty open book. That's why I think I'm struggling.
Like, I put a lot about my life online. What's your favorite color, maybe?
My girlfriend asked me that a couple days ago, and I can't even give just one.
I mean, I'm black, white, blue, or red.
I mean, it's a roll of the dice. It depends on where they're at.
Like, clothing versus a vehicle.
(04:37):
My truck's red, but I wear black and white clothing probably more than colorful clothing.
Okay. What's your girlfriend's favorite color?
I haven't actually i'm gonna i'm gonna scratch that because i'm gonna get you
i'm gonna get you in trouble here so never mind let's stop with the girlfriend questions.
Well something that's uh i can share that i don't like post about per se but
(05:00):
my girlfriend jess uh we like she has two beautiful children um they're four
and six years old and uh that's a super joyful part of my life that's not currently
really on social media but um something that i'm totally,
happy to share and love having in my life.
It's such a joy to be a male figure, role model, and support life and people
(05:27):
like a family beyond yourself.
That's something that's new to me that I'm really grateful for.
Yeah. Well, that's your answer. That's a good answer. See, just took a minute to get to it.
Okay, if you could be born any time, past or future, in any place in the world, when and where?
Not that I've ever really thought about that. When people ask the question,
(05:51):
like, if you could meet anybody alive or dead, I'd want to meet Tupac.
So, I don't know if I were to be born in a different era where maybe I was a
bit older as Tupac was on the rise.
Like, I didn't really hear or learn about Tupac until after he'd already passed.
But I think it'd be pretty would have been pretty awesome to
like been an older as
(06:12):
in a teenager in my teenage years when Tupac
was kind of like popping off and go see him perform live
and if I could sit down and just yeah just listen
to anything he had to say that'd be pretty cool cool now what is
it about Tupac uh just when I
was like yeah younger teenage life going
through stuff uh his music was extremely influential
(06:33):
on for me uh and
to this day i mean people still talk about him um eminem
is another one though too it's like you know he's a lot like to
meet somebody alive versus tupac's past um yeah i don't listen to eminem as
much anymore but just played such a significant role in you know kind of finding
(06:54):
who you are or having that resilience or just identifying with someone as you're
growing up. I think music plays such a significant role.
And so those two guys would be pretty awesome to meet.
Or yeah, if I could have grown up during the Tupac era, a little bit older to experience it. Okay.
And finally, speaking of the teenage years that you just referenced,
(07:15):
what advice would you give your 19 year old self?
And do you think he would listen?
The follow-up to your question there is, I think important.
Would that person listen? because I actually received the advice when I was
younger that I would probably give, which is just to be patient.
Like you have so much time and it's hard to understand that because when you're
(07:37):
younger, you don't have the perspective of time.
But now like I'm 41 years old today and you know, like, oh my gosh,
like seven days blows by, let alone months, an entire year can blow by in the blink of an eye.
And, but you can also, you also can look back in your life now and you know,
in your thirties into your 40s and see that, oh my God, in a decade,
(08:00):
you can accomplish a lot of stuff.
So at the age of 20, for example, or like you feel like you want to get on with
life and you're running out of time, but from 20 to 30 years old,
in 10 years, you can do a lot of stuff.
So it feels like life's not moving fast enough or you want it to happen faster,
but just be impatient. That's what I would think about.
(08:22):
That's all the hard-hitting questions, Kevin. You made it. Cool. Success.
Speaking of teenage and 19, I asked that question because my life change happened at 19.
And we both had a big change in our lives. You were, I think, 23 when that happened.
But I think you can relate to this, a motocross guy that's jumping and doing stuff.
(08:44):
I felt like I was 10 feet tall and bulletproof. Like, you know,
I didn't have a care in the world. Everything was super trivial.
I was on, everything was great, you know, until it wasn't, right?
So I kind of want to get into that story to kind of set the table on what happened with you.
Yeah. Just like, as you mentioned, same age, 19 years old and my life turned
(09:05):
around in the blink of an eye.
At 19, me and my dad, we were out deer hunting, building a tree stand.
And my dad was up in the tree when one of the branches he was standing on broke
and he fell two stories to the ground right in front of my own eyes.
As he was laying on there on the ground, gasping for air, I knew something was up.
So I grabbed the keys out of his coat pocket and ran and called 911,
(09:30):
which is our emergency service here.
Take him to the hospital, x-rays taken, surgery, and he's deemed a complete
paraplegic, which meant that he had broken his back in the fall and severed his spinal cord,
which meant that there was no chance of him really ever making a recovery again
to get back on his feet walking.
And my dad was just eight months from retirement. He was He was 52 years old. I sometimes forget.
(09:56):
But yeah, my dad was like eight months from retirement. And all of a sudden,
he felt like, yeah, his life was taken away from him.
And my life and our family's life changed forever.
Yeah. So what is that like witness? Was it just the two of you there?
Yep. We were about a kilometer or so. I don't know. That would be 0.6 miles.
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
(10:18):
Back into the real-time conversion there. Yeah.
Man, you know, because the thing is, at least for me, my dad is, is my hero.
When I go through the things in my life now as a parent myself,
I go through that with the frame of reference of what my kids think of me as their, their father.
(10:44):
I know because I felt that way about my father and And like to see my father
in that type of situation, that's got to be, at least for me,
would be super difficult.
I mean, because dads don't fall. Dads don't hurt themselves.
Dads take care of everything. Dad's always there.
Dad this, dad that. I mean, just the list goes on and on of what dads do.
(11:05):
And to not have dad to be able to do that has got to be difficult.
I've certainly met many people and have many friends where their dad was or
is their hero or superhero.
My relationship with my dad growing up, I would say it was good.
(11:25):
My dad was a great dad. I know that he did the best he could with what he had and what he knew.
When I was younger, he got me into stick and ball sports. But at the age of
10, I started getting interested in motocross.
And through my teenage years, that was my passion. So when my dad got hurt,
we'd actually only about maybe six months prior started to kind of like rekindle
(11:46):
a relationship is the way I would describe it.
So I'm sorry to say my dad wasn't exactly my hero.
I love my dad. I know my dad loved me, but it was definitely the back to the,
like the second part of your question. Yeah, it was absolutely hard.
I mean, it completely disrupted our family and our community as well.
My dad worked for the town, like the municipality that we lived in.
(12:09):
So there was a ton of people that knew who my dad was and when the accident
happened and he had a big social circle of friends too. So yeah, it was very hard.
It wasn't hard for the reason that my dad was my hero. it was just hard that
I didn't really have a good relationship or like the, the relationship I wanted with my dad.
(12:30):
I felt like I was developing it. And then I felt like myself that was taken away.
And after dad got hurt, there was like a lot of arguing and fighting in the
household. And that's one of many things that made it very difficult.
Yeah. You have sibling or two.
Yeah. My sister, she's two years younger than I am.
And we were all like, we were the four of us for living at home,
(12:51):
but when dad got hurt, my sister was, she was out of the house spending most
of her time over at her boyfriend's place.
So I just felt like it was me and mom trying to deal with it.
And yeah, it was very tough.
I can imagine. And a few years later, you get a little bit more into motocross.
Do I have my timeline right there? Yeah.
(13:12):
Despite dad's accident, like I had done some racing, motocross racing prior to dad being hurt.
But around that same time was when the X Games was starting to become a thing.
Like we're talking 1998, 1999.
And I forget if it was 98 or 99 was the first time
that freestyle motocross was introduced into the x games and it
(13:33):
just completely exploded like it took over the x games in
the action sports world so you're all over that
yeah like yeah 1999 i think
was that anyways yeah i i just consumed it
lived it breathed it everything so freestyle became my
passion doing the stunts the tricks that you see on tv superman c
(13:53):
grabs cliffhangers all that stuff and what's the
hardest one to do now this is on a bike and motorized bike yeah
yeah okay uh what's the hardest i mean there's progression
like there's different levels progression and at the time
i was just like trying to learn my
own bag of tricks so the basics knock
knock can can superman c grab cliffhanger those are a few common basic moves
(14:17):
back in the day those were bigger moves like a cliffhanger where you're basically
doing a handstand in the air hanging off the handlebars by your tippy toes like
that was my favorite and And that was my biggest trick at the time.
Okay. So explain that one again.
So when you take off, if you just picture even a bicycle, if you're just riding
a bicycle, like you got your hands on the handlebars and you're kind of in a
squatting position, your feet are on the pedals or the pegs of the motorcycle.
(14:41):
When you take off, you're,
You first bring your toes up to the handlebars to hook them underneath.
And then as in the same fluid motion, you're letting your body drift away from
the motorcycle as you're reaching the peak or the apex of the jump.
(15:02):
And you allow your body to do a full handstand or like standing straight up
in the air with your legs straight and your arms straight above you as if you're
like trying to touch the sky.
And the only thing that's holding you to the motorcycle is your toes hooked
under the handlebars of your, by your feet. Jeez, man. Oh man.
No, thanks. So you, you could do that pretty well, huh? I was getting decent
(15:26):
doing that at the time. Yeah.
So how high in the air are you for something like that? The jumps I was practicing
on the gap was 75 to 95 feet.
You're 20 to 30 feet high, roughly.
Well the gap meeting the in between the two ramps
take off to the landing yeah wow man and
how fast you get going when you when you hit the hit the ramp
(15:48):
in freestyle like you don't chat you don't speak about like miles per hour or
anything like that you just say like second gear or third gear so those jumps
for me were like third gear jumps it's pretty fast is that right yeah i'm sorry
i'm I'm hesitating because there's nuances to it.
You can do a jump that's maybe like a 40-foot gap, but you approach really slowly,
(16:12):
and then you just accelerate at the last minute because you get a lot of pop
in the ramp, so it shoots you really high.
And the airtime is what allows you to pull the trick.
So you can have a shorter gap and go super high and then come back down,
or you can have a longer gap that you may not go as high, but you still have
a decent amount of hang time in the air.
(16:34):
So it depends yeah no thanks for me but
it's super that you guys do that kind of stuff yeah that's how
it sounds pretty awesome but i don't think i'd be able to i don't think i'd
be able to even get close to something like that that's crazy okay so and the
good news and bad news is a lot of these things are are caught on film or people
are taping them and i guess in this age we didn't have cell phones at the ready
but you yeah definitely pre-self well cell phones were
(16:58):
just getting going but like
there was no video recording you could
take a photo on a cell phone there's no way that it would have like
caught anything good from an action movement perspective digital cameras were
just emerging or you probably had like a two gigabyte memory card yeah so we
(17:22):
my photo album is literally a photo physical photo album of four by six printed
photos of when I wrote and you would take a photo and
then you'd have to like hope that it was timed properly and you'd
go get it developed at the grocery store and sit in the parking lot for one
or two hours because you paid for accelerated like printing and then you get
(17:42):
them all and you open them up and hope and then you'd be all pumped if you saw
the one that would like look good yeah so you had to wait like days or what
not not an instant uh recall on your iPhone phone as to what the photo is.
So anybody under the age of, what, like 30 probably has no idea what any of
that even means as far as the film in the grocery store. Crazy.
(18:03):
Let's not date ourselves here because I'm kind of the same way.
So, all right. So you're doing motocross. That's going.
You're on the upward trend there. You're arcing good and things are going. Yeah.
Was pursuing my dream of riding putting on shows and
was looking to get hired i got one
(18:25):
show under my belt but people weren't
really taking me on i ended up starting my own business and then
at my second show i crashed i ended up
hitting the jump first jump of the day i wasn't
mentally focused because i was too worried about the other riders the crowd
it's just making me nervous and the ramps are a bit crooked the wind's blowing
(18:45):
and i was too scared to speak up and say anything i was afraid of looking like
a wuss so i just hurried up and hit the jump i rushed my warm-up and as soon
as i took off it kind of kicked me the wrong way in the air like my rear.
End of my motorcycle was coming up too high and made a split second decision
i either had to decide to stay on or jump off the bike i thought if i stayed
on i'd break my neck so if i jump off i break my legs that's actually a better
(19:08):
day that's like literally what happens yeah and in a
split second yeah yeah so ditch
the bike landed without the motorcycle from 75 feet onto
a steel landing ramp and broke my back broke
my back my pelvis my ribs i was instantly paralyzed and after surgery i was
(19:28):
told that i was likely never going to walk again however the fortunate part
was that i did not sever my spinal cord like my dad i had a fracture dislocated
my vertebrae so my spinal cord, it was pulled,
pinched and swollen and a spinal cord injury is like a brain injury.
You don't know what the recovery is going to be until it actually happens.
So I just had to put in the work and I, for the sake of the podcast,
(19:52):
I'm giving the short version, but like it was about six weeks until I wiggled
my first toe, four months in rehab, 10 months in a wheelchair,
two months on canes, walking and riding in a year.
But it was like three to four years to be on my feet all day,
every day, independent, living
that normal quote unquote normal life that we try to get back to. Yeah.
(20:14):
And that's, yeah. So that's tough, obviously.
Were you awake when you landed? I mean, after you landed, I should say,
like you hit and are you aware of what's happening or are you unconscious?
I was conscious and have memory of the entire event up until I was loaded into the ambulance.
So I remember the entire morning. I remember the crash. I remember the paramedics over my head.
(20:38):
I remember getting loaded onto the stretcher. But once I was in the ambulance
on the way to the hospital is kind of where I start to lose memory.
So you you immediately noticed the feeling
of the injury like you can't you can't move anything yeah it was excruciating
pain knife in my back any like breathing alone or any sudden any movement at
(20:59):
all just felt excruciating i was laying on my left side kind of in like the feeble position,
tried to uncross my legs because i could see that i was see how they were lying
and i couldn't and And when I put my hand on my leg to push my leg off and I,
when my hand, I could not feel my leg. I'm like, oh fuck.
I'm like, I'm paralyzed. Yeah. Jeez.
(21:23):
So how much time had elapsed between your injury and your dad's?
Four years, three and a half, four years. Yeah.
So yeah, it was very, very ironic for my mom and my dad. Cause my dad said, don't get in. Don't.
He was afraid of me getting injured like him. Then I did. And my mom now had
both husband and son in wheelchairs, both spinal cord injuries at the exact same time.
(21:46):
So how does mom, what does mom do with that? it's funny because like we talk
about it today and a little bit here and there and,
my mom's answer is she's like i just did what i needed to do but at
the same time like i know that my mom i'm i
know behind the scenes was probably struggling a
lot more than what she showed i believe my mom's tremendously resilient especially
(22:09):
for all she's been through but what i can say for myself like when i was dealing
with my dad like you also kind of just go numb like you You just kind of go
into autopilot and you kind of become numb to all the stuff that's happening.
Just kind of get in a rhythm.
Yeah. Sometimes it's just survival too. I mean, life with a disability,
especially when you first acquire one anyways,
(22:29):
you know, if you, if you were living an able-bodied life and then all of a sudden
something happens like in that, in those early months or early years,
like it can be, it can feel like and be a shit storm and you're just figuring it out.
Like you might just feel like you're in survival mode for a while
until things i the i describe it as like until the dust settles and then you
(22:49):
start to establish like a new baseline because for spinal cord injury you have
the accident so your bowel and bladder's messed up you got muscle spasms you
got pain you got pins and needles you got like as a result you're on a,
garbage pail of medication of all this stuff to take that's creating side effects
then you have of things like mood swings and fatigue and perhaps depression or whatever.
(23:14):
I was on pills for acid reflex and stool softener and narcotics as well for
pain. There's so many things. So,
When you first, again, I'll speak for spinal cord injury life.
It's like when you acquire that injury or your disability, it takes time for
the trauma of your body to settle.
(23:35):
It takes time to establish what medications are working, not working,
and then to wean yourself off of them. It just takes time.
So it's hard for a lot of people because they just want to get better so fast.
And meanwhile, there's all these things that are throwing a wrench into your
recovery, But that is the recovery.
That is the process is just giving it time and space for things to settle down
(23:57):
and then figuring it out.
And all the while you're trying to understand your new life,
your new abilities or limitations or what you should or shouldn't be doing,
which for a guy that's jumping on off of, you know, ramps, it's probably a pretty
hard thing to, you know, settle down,
(24:18):
stop and determine whether, you know, I don't know if you still wanted to even do that stuff or not.
Or if you you curse that because of what happened but
you still have the mentality i would imagine at least you want to have the mentality
at least i did was i got to keep going but there's a lot of things that i have
to figure out and sometimes these drugs and things that you're taking counterbalance
(24:42):
you know they can counteract with each other and they cause this new thing and.
There's just you you mentioned bowel and bladder stuff we certainly have some
common common area you there.
My situation, which I talk about quite often here, is bacterial meningitis,
which affects the lining of the brain and spinal cavity.
(25:02):
So I had some neurological-related challenges as a result, I guess somewhat
similar to a spinal cord injury. It was an infection in my spinal cord.
And it messed up some of those nerves. Those nerves do not fire anymore.
And bladder was one of them. And I didn't realize laying in the hospital bed
(25:23):
after coming out of sleep for better part of a little over a week,
you know, I had to go, I had to go pee, right?
How do I do that? What do you do? What, how do you do that?
Why doesn't, why doesn't this work? And how am I going to make this work? Because I've got to go.
And you know, the thing about the bladder is it does expand,
luckily, but there is a limit to that.
(25:45):
So just these things that you never thought in your wildest dream,
especially at age 19, 20, you know, early in life, these are not things you're used to dealing with.
Yeah, definitely not given that my dad was injured before me that at least gave me, I,
I do consider it an advantage in my journey and recovery because I had already
(26:10):
seen my dad struggle with his bowel and bladder, everything,
the meds adapting to home.
Like my home was already wheelchair accessible, which is very ironic.
And then at the same time I moved home and me, my dad fought so much that I
moved out after six months into an accessible apartment because I couldn't be
around my dad without fighting.
But yeah, I mean, there's so many lessons to share about the experience and
(26:35):
challenges that are relatable for so many people.
And it also doesn't mean that you have to have a disability to feel this experience.
So as an example, if you acquire a disability or something happens to you at
some point in your life, after you've been living an able-bodied life,
one of the biggest challenges is acceptance, often related to an old identity as well.
(26:56):
So your old identity could be anything and everything
from the sports that you played to the social circles that you had to the career
that you were involved in to your relationship whether that person was with
you for a short term or long term whether they want to stick around or they
want to leave whether you have kids or not too and how you view your situation
and what that looks like going forward.
(27:17):
Both my dad and myself those happened suddenly
meaning overnight you lost
your old identity and had to like find a
way now some people i'll give an
example with like you know getting old like old
age like that's a gradual transition that could
that has its own challenges where slowly over time you
(27:39):
lose your ability to do something that you used to do or it can happen overnight
but that's usually a little more acceptable though because people kind of expect
that you know like they've they've seen people get old we kind of we kind of
know that that's eventually going to happen it doesn't mean it's not any more
or less disappointing that when it happens, but you can kind of expect that.
Yeah. So, I mean, in the world of disabilities...
(28:01):
I honestly enjoy helping people, whether they have a disability or not.
I have a coaching group I know we're probably going to touch on called the Hero Tribe.
And I, in that group, have had the pleasure of helping a number of people who
have acquired a disability, mostly spinal cord injuries.
Another is one who lost their arm, became an amputee.
And of course, people just with mental health challenges or going through relationship challenges.
(28:25):
The funny thing is, as a metaphor, if you're going through a separation or a
divorce, you've lived your life one way for so long, perhaps a decade,
and all of a sudden that changes overnight.
You can still be going through a lot of the same emotions or mental challenges
about old identity and acceptance.
(28:45):
I just love helping people through career and life transitions.
But accepting change is one of the hardest things for so many people to do.
And the faster that you can learn to accept the change is constant and that
it's gonna and that it will happen then the faster you can move forward with
your life yeah i'm at the top of the list there are people that have a hard
(29:05):
time with acceptance on lots of things it's it's tough.
Especially when it comes out of the blue yeah but that's the magic and the mystery
of john Jim Rohn would call it.
It is. And I've also learned with age that everybody has struggles.
Everybody has things that happen.
(29:27):
And if you haven't yet, then watch out because it's coming.
It doesn't mean it's going to be traumatic or insignificant or somewhere in
between, but it happens to all of us.
And at different times, different stages, and we're all in a different potentially situation.
But the great thing about the internet and the community that it can create
is you can find somebody with a similar situation,
(29:49):
maybe not identical, but there are groups, there are people that like to talk
about those things and are willing to and want to talk.
Like you're saying, your group that you work with, maybe those existed 50 years
ago, but they certainly were a lot more difficult to get involved with and to
understand and connect.
(30:10):
Yeah. Peer support as an example is something that's common in the world of
people disabilities, like spinal cord injury, Ontario has a peer support program.
So they'll match you with someone who has a similar, who's at a similar age
and has similar injury, like support groups all around, like even Alcoholics
Anonymous, you can consider is something like that.
(30:30):
And now today we have, there's a number of people like myself who just have
created their own community, their own group to help people through those challenges. And there's.
There's so many niches to get into. Alcohol is something that a significant
amount of the population is affected by or consumes, let's say.
But if you think about things like meningitis or spinal cord injuries, that's a minority.
(30:53):
However, to create a community for that specific niche, there are so many people
that would love to connect with people specifically that have that challenge.
Yeah how important do you think humor plays in the acceptance role or or the
moving forward i think it's pretty important i have you gotta i feel like you
can't take yourself too seriously and you gotta laugh yeah it's necessary like
(31:13):
there's i don't think that i'm i'm the best at telling jokes per se but i can
think of like a bunch of like funny moments and things that happen,
like one that comes to mind this was it's super embarrassing when it happens but like,
when it took me it took me like eight years to really
dial in my bowels so that i wasn't having challenges
let's just call it say but i used to
(31:35):
go to my speaking events and like sometimes if the
bowels weren't on point you'd be like farting a lot and it's like
i'd be at i'd be like the keynote speaker at like a
vip event like crop dusting the audience before i go up there yeah i'd be saying
i'll never forget once i was standing on the top towers of like a one of the
buildings in toronto and i'm like talking to like some executives and And we're
(32:00):
just having a chat and they're like,
oh, what's that smell? I'm like, I don't know.
Weird. I'm going to roll. I don't even smell it. What are you talking about?
Yeah. Yeah. Something must be wrong with you.
That's good. Yeah. At least it wasn't audible. But here, like I'll give you
another example of something that's funny that I loved.
Like before we hit record here, I was telling you about this morning.
(32:22):
Every Friday right now, I hang out with my friend Chris, who is my landscaper.
And chris also has a spinal cord injury he's
full-time in a wheelchair he's an incomplete injury so he can move his
legs but he can't use them to walk he's they're not strong enough they don't have
enough function yeah chris long story short
in his early 20s alcoholic bar fight
ends up wandering the streets middle of night wakes up in jail and they he has
(32:46):
to hire a private investigator to track down what because he woke up in jail
paralyzed and they have to like because when the cops found they were drunk
he thought they were just they thought he was just drunk So they throw him in
the car. Turns out he broke his back.
So they hire a private investigator. Turns out what they think happened,
the most probable solution they could conclude was that he was drunk,
climbed a scaffolding on a construction site and slid down the garbage chute.
(33:11):
And then the impact at the bottom of that probably compressed his vertebrae, broke his back.
Anyway, so Chris said it was the best thing that ever happened to him because
he's going down a dark path and his life's been better because of it.
But today, so Chris is my landscaper as a paraplegic and his business name,
take a guess what his business name is.
Hey, there's got to be a pun involved here. Yeah, there's a pun for sure. Yeah.
(33:37):
Uh i i i would i don't know tell me crippled weeds,
yeah his business name is crippled weeds because that's acceptance right there
yeah and chris is not politically correct in the sense of like you know diversity
inclusion culture and because like he'll roll up and be like yeah i'm not i'm
(33:59):
a crip you know and but but I crippled these weeds as well.
And he just like, he's a hilarious, big hearted, big smiling guy.
And so when I'm out there working with him too, like, you know, I'm off balance easily.
And I wish I could just sometimes like leave my speaking career behind to just
go work full time with Chris and just be the two disabled kids crippling weeds
(34:23):
and pulling out flower beds and smashing concrete walls like we were doing this last week.
But that's what makes it fun. Like we just laugh at ourselves.
Yeah, I think that's That's important. It sounds like he's a pretty cool guy
and got the right way to look at things. Yeah.
So your talks also, it's the hero mindset.
Walk me through the hero mindset and what you tell people about that.
(34:47):
Yeah, just to kind of fill in the last gap of the story for listeners to piece it all together.
So after my accident, well, two things. Number one, my dad would not accept his accident.
And as a result five years
later chose to take his own life unfortunately and as
a result of that i was asked to share my life story for spinal cord injury ontario
(35:12):
so i it was a five-minute talk at a fundraising event and that went well they
said would you do it again and that went well they said would you do it again
and 15 years later keynote speaking is my full-time gig so i I got asked to be,
I, my, my public speaking journey began just after dad passed away.
Just cause I also learned that I can help people with my story.
(35:33):
And then the second thing that happened was it was shortly after that I discovered,
Paralympic sport, specifically sledge hockey.
I played hockey as a kid. It wasn't very good, but this was like a second chance
to kind of give it a, give it a go again.
And yeah, I played, started playing locally. Then I made the provincial team in the third year.
Made the national team played five years we got
(35:55):
a bronze in sochi us has honestly been kicking
butt for a number of years they've you the us now
you've won four gold medals in the paralympics back to back to back to back
wow look at that just a week ago canada won we won our first world championship
i think in eight years seven years
so that was a big breakthrough because yeah us has got a solid squad,
(36:19):
like just bigger population as well to pick from. A lot of double amputees, fast team.
Canada, like every country, I would say outside of U.S., we've always struggled
to like recruit players, which also plays into the sport in terms of like how
competitive other teams are compared to the U.S..
It's been challenging to keep up at times. Canada's been second for a long time
(36:43):
or first and second, like swapping with us and worlds and Paris.
But anyways, yeah, it was a blast. Got to play for many years.
But when I came home from the Paralympics, people kept started calling me a hero.
And I'm like, I was confused because I'm like, I'm not a hero.
I'm just Kevin. I've just done a few things really well over a long period of time.
And people would ask me, like, how did you do it? Like, how did you get through everything? thing.
(37:04):
So I started piecing together, you know, the lessons, the tools,
the strategies, and that's what I started teaching further in my keynotes,
also delivering workshops for corporate audiences.
So if anyone's listening and looking for a speaker to inspire,
motivate their team, or to help provide some tools and strategies to navigate change,
I love to chat, but also my coaching program,
(37:26):
it's more of like a B2C product than a B2B product,
but I just love helping people navigate career and life transition so
as i mentioned like whether you acquired a disability maybe you're
going through a relationship change during the pandemic when
a lot of people like were getting let go from their jobs suddenly they were
reaching out to me like kev how do i accept this what do i got to do next
how do i stay resilient i just love helping people with ship their mindset that's
(37:48):
that's my thing so when people called me a hero they wanted to understand my
mindset that's when i decided to piece together my keynote as titled the hero
mindset and my My workshops and my coaching framework is through something I
created called the Hero Mindset Blueprint.
So it's my own collection of tools, strategies, lessons I've learned.
Some are like many are from other people, but it's in my own toolbox that I
(38:11):
want to help share with you so you can build your own toolbox and have your
own blueprint to help you become a hero in your own story.
Where does that start? What's usually the biggest hurdle for people to get to that point?
Great question. i think it depends if
i were to pick one place to start is self-awareness like
one of the areas of focus is self-awareness i mean ultimately that's
(38:34):
what everything is like some people struggle with habits some people struggle
with visions some people struggle with you know they just don't pay attention
to numbers let's say like i had a vision for years and had a poor habit of spending
money and i just was never getting ahead but in terms of like helping people,
you know, turn things around.
(38:55):
Getting clear on where you are, where you want to go is the first step.
You know, what are the hurdles and obstacles of getting in your way?
There are some people that, you know, maybe have a great life on the outside,
but on the inside, they're suffering because they're, you know,
not facing some truth about their life. Maybe they're not having some difficult conversations.
People with disabilities, I think it's definitely that acceptance piece.
I know a lot of people that, you know, this blew my mind, but I don't respect
(39:19):
the honesty, but I was chatting with someone over Instagram who acquired a spinal
cord injury. She's been injured for about a year and a half and she's unhappy.
She's depressed and feels like her life is in a spiral.
I'm chatting with her. She wants help.
But I asked her, I'm like, you know, have you accepted your injury or are you
ready to do that? And she just flat out said no.
(39:41):
And I'm like, cool, respect. I'm like, when you're ready to accept that and
move forward, I can help you.
But if you're not willing to, I can't do anything for you.
And I can provide you with questions to ask yourself. One of the questions to
ask yourself is, number one, what are you holding on to?
Number two, ask yourself, what do I need to let go of?
(40:03):
And as I mentioned, that might mean you need to let go of past relationships.
You might need to let go of a past identity.
You might need to let go of family members. You might need to let go of an old career.
You might need to let go of an old goal or vision you had for yourself.
But if you stay in resistance about what your reality is, you will stay stuck.
(40:26):
You'll stay frustrated. You'll stay depressed. You'll stay in a mindset where
you feel like you're not moving forward.
And yeah, folks with disabilities, I find that's just the difference.
Like those that accept it are willing to lean into it, embrace it, laugh at it.
Those are the ones that can live a fulfilling and thriving life with a disability.
But if you're not, and here's a punchline to what I said to her and what I've
(40:50):
said to many people, acceptance does not mean giving up.
I think a lot of people, when they say, if I accept my injury,
if I accept that I'm paralyzed, that means my life is over. I'm now a disabled person.
I'll never get back and I might as well stop trying. I'm like, that's not true at all.
It doesn't mean that you stop trying to make your recovery, whether you are
(41:10):
striving to walk again or not.
Acceptance doesn't mean that you stop working to better your life or find a
new career or improve your habits or to become happier.
Year like doesn't mean you stop it just means you stop resisting perhaps
like a false identity or holding on to what once
was versus focusing on what is and then try to create
(41:31):
what could be yeah and that's oftentimes pretty tough
for people to get through the good news is you're just one decision away to
the listeners like you are everything is everything's already within you it's
literally decision away you can decide to say no for another 5 10 15 years or
you can and decide to say yes today.
(41:53):
Let's say yes today, Kevin. This is an audio-only podcast, so nobody will see.
I mean, you can see this on the website, but I don't know if you can see my... Can you see my cup?
Don't wait. My mug, yeah. So this is one of my mantras and kind of what you're
just talking about, I think, is we talked about time and how fast it goes, particularly as we age.
You know, man, I was doing this. That happened... Gosh, that was three months
(42:16):
ago that happened? That feels like it was yesterday.
And I have certainly learned that...
This is it. Don't wait. It doesn't mean you have to make a stupid,
rash decision, but it does mean that you need to always be trying to move forward
and taking the setbacks that happen as just part of the journey with life in general.
But you've got to keep moving forward because if you don't, it will catch with
(42:40):
you fast. I mean, I'm speaking from experience.
I feel like there's lots of things in life that I waited way too long to do
and it's not necessarily a midlife crisis as much as it is just the understanding of.
There's still things I got to do. And if I don't get started on them,
it's just not going to happen.
Yeah. Well, that was the big thing for my dad. My dad waited to live his life.
(43:02):
He waited till retirement to go do the things that he wanted to do.
He waited till retirement to further work on the house or go on some trips that
he wanted to do because it was the old school like mindset or style of thinking,
like work until you retire and then enjoy your last 20 years of your life.
So when dad was eight months away from enjoying his life, the way that he viewed
(43:23):
it, he felt so angry and bitter because it was taken away from him.
And that's why I pursued everything I have in my life. Cause I also don't want
to wait because I've seen how fast it can change.
It can branch breaks and then a split millisecond, your life's never going to be the same.
And through my life in the rehab center too, like other people that have been injured,
(43:46):
I was injured in an extreme sport, which many people might say is the highest risk thing,
or one of, but when I was in my rehab for four months, the other people that
were injured, there were three people that had, were on a four wheeler.
So you're on the ground, you're not jumping.
Three of those people on four wheelers rolled the four wheeler down the hill
(44:07):
sideways. So it rolled on top of them, broke their back.
There was one guy who was working in an attic with his dad, stepped on a piece
of insulation. He thought there was like plywood underneath.
There wasn't. He felt two stories. The ground broke his back.
There were two individuals that went in for elective surgeries that went wrong
and they were paralyzed.
There was another guy that was walking downtown Toronto, got jumped from behind.
(44:29):
Somebody with the butt end of a handgun smashed the back of his neck,
broke his vertebrae in his neck, didn't shoot him, but he had a spinal cord injury.
There's another guy that was at a house party. that got
into a fight on a balcony got pushed off
the balcony over the edge and broke his neck had two
kids it's like there's and there was another lady
(44:50):
not so that was a broken leg not a broken back but like
there's so many there's so
many different things that can happen to people
at any point you don't have to be doing extreme sport to
your for your life to change suddenly of course there's car accidents or
people with car accidents and when i was getting when i was in the hospital
too like just meeting folks has slipped on ice like here in canada fucking there's
(45:13):
a lot of that yeah there is yeah like and i'm not just one more second on this
like i was recently speaking with spinal cord injury ontario and they were telling
you how the demographics.
Of the folks that are injured today are
so different than they were 15 years ago when i was injured they
said the majority of the patients that are currently coming through the facility now
(45:34):
now are elderly like and there's
you know 50s 60s 70s 80s who especially
through the pandemic may have retired and now they're just living that
social life at home and yeah they
slip they slip on ice or they're climbing a ladder they're they
fall off the ladder or fall off a roof they're doing the eavesdrops they're
(45:54):
in their old age and they're trying to stay active and but as a result they're
not as strong and then they're having these slips and falls and then they're
winding a paralyzed way late into their life and i'm like obviously that's awful to hear but it's like,
It can happen in so many different ways. It's crazy to even think about.
Something I saw the other day recently, you posted something on LinkedIn,
(46:18):
which we'll link to all your stuff down below, website and stuff and the show
notes and on the website.
But you posted something. I'm not going to get the quote right.
It wasn't your own quote. And you said you couldn't, I think, remember who said it.
But it was something like, you need to go through your content until your content goes through you,
which i think means your your your
your what you talk about your speech what you do you got to know that like the
(46:42):
back of your hand which sounds to me like you do or at least you work daily
on that so that that stuff just kind of flows through you and i think that's
i think people can tell when it doesn't yeah i mean speaking about your life
helps like i don't forget my life,
yeah and you're you're the resident expert on your life too i would imagine
yeah yeah and in In that post, I was referring to the opening and closing of a speech,
(47:06):
meaning those are two of the most important moments of a presentation to nail
so the audience is engaged and paying attention and leaves with the right message. Yeah.
The journey of speaking has been fun. There's so many different lessons to share
along the way. And it changes as you get older, too.
I was saying my life with Jess and her two girls now is bringing such a different
(47:28):
meaning and purpose after all that I've been through in terms of how I want
to show up and who I want to be. and life's beautiful that way.
Life certainly is beautiful, but it's not always beautiful the way we think
it's going to be or the way we planned it to be, but it certainly can be beautiful.
So I think that's a great way to look at it.
Kevin, I appreciate you stopping by and chatting with us here.
If somebody wants to find more about you and what you do, where's the best place for them to go?
(47:53):
Instagram or LinkedIn are the two places that I post the most content.
I'm real easy to find. My website is kevinrempel.com, R-E-M-P-E-L.
Instagram is at kevinrempel, LinkedIn, same thing.
And if anyone who's listening here is going through a career or life transition
and would like some help with their mindset, I'd encourage you to please reach
(48:16):
out, send me a message too, learn more about the Hero Tribe.
On my Instagram, you can see a number of different testimonials from folks that
have had spinal cord injuries, or like I say, amputee, or just going through
life and the career change or want to go through a career change,
I'm really passionate about helping people, especially people with disabilities,
to, like I said, move into acceptance and shift their mindset and find a way
(48:37):
to live that fulfilling life that they dream of.
Kevin, once again, thanks, man. You are a wild man. I appreciate it.
Thanks a lot, John. I'm stoked to have shared my story with you. Thanks for having me on.
Thanks so much for spending your time with the Destiny of Debatable podcast.
Please rate and write a review wherever you subscribe. It really does help us
grow and reach new people.
(48:57):
For more information, visit johnbgrimes.com.
Destiny is Debatable is a Symblom production.
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