As I have grown up being outside has been a huge part of my life. From skating on the lake and snowmobiling in the winter to riding bikes and camping in the summer. Over the years I have discovered that many of my favourite memories have come from the winter. Our family will load up all of our sleds and head for the mountain. A full day of playing in the powder, laughing at your cousins as they fall of or crash and sitting around a campfire for lunch make for a quiet ride home. I have great memories of times spent on the outdoor rink playing pond hockey. We would throw our sticks in the middle and blindly pick teams, always making sure to complain about who we got stuck with. While many people hate the cold and just want to sit at the beach with a beer, I am so thankful that I have grown up where its too cold to step outside somedays, where the air stings when you breath in, and the snow gets so deep that you could jump in and disappear. I am thankful for all of this because it has brought me closer to my family and shown me how to stay young at heart as I grow up.

Canadian Child Care Federation

http://www.cccf-fcsge.ca/2017/07/25/a-blog-the-importance-of-increasing-childrens-outdoor-play-opportunities/

© 2012-2018 The Canadian Child Care Federation 

I find it strange that in todays day and age people think that they should never have to climb the totem pole. Everybody wants everything to be handed to them, nobody wants to work for what they have. I see it every day through my friends and even select family members, laziness. I attribute this quality to the amount of video games kids are playing now a days. There is no competition anymore, you lose at a video game and it doesn’t matter, there will be another round in 2 minutes. When I was younger everything was about competition. Me and my friends would compete for more ice time at hockey, compete to see who was going to lift the most weight in the gym, even compete at things as dumb as seeing who could eat the most. Since there is no competition anymore no-one is afraid of losing, no-one has to face any adversity. When I was still playing hockey I can remember having to fight day in and day out for my spot in the lineup. There were even a few times that I just didn’t cut it and watched the game from the stands. This left a sour taste in my mouth and drove me to work harder so I would never have that feeling again. I think that competition brings out the best in people. I believe that life is a competition no matter how many participation medals we give out their always needs to be a winner.

Overcoming Adversity

Throughout my entire hockey career I got my “bell rung” my fair share of times and it turns out my brain didn’t like that too much. The result, multiple concussions. During my last year of junior hockey I was having a great season, being scouted by US universities and getting my shot at higher levels. All of this was derailed by two bad hits late into the season. My fifth and sixth concussions, the reason I had to stop playing. After hockey I honestly felt very lost, I had all this pent up energy and needed a way to express it. I turned towards the gym since that was all I knew. Luckily one day I was at the gym while one of the classes was going on, I decided to join and have never looked back. The community I felt in those first few classes reminded me of a dressing room and brought my back to my playing days. Fast forward 2 months and I was spending multiple hours in the gym every day. October of 2016 I decided I wanted to start coaching and it has been one of the greatest decisions of my life. I found out that while running a class I could set the tone and shape the environment. I want people to want to come to the gym. Instead of making excuses not to go I want them to be so excited they are making excuses to come to my class. Coaching makes me feel like I have my fire back.

From The Gym To The Box

BY BOB LEFAVI, PH.D., CSCS, USAW

© 2019 Cruz Bay Publishing, Inc. an Active Interest Media company

January 30, 2019

https://www.theboxmag.com/crossfit-training/from-the-gym-to-the-box-9529

At the age of 14 I was lucky enough to move to Kelowna, BC and attend a high level hockey academy. At 14 years old leaving your friends and family behind takes a lot of getting used to. Moving from Williams Lake to the “big city” was an entire world of difference, the bus ride from home to school was now an hour and a half rather then the 15 minutes I was accustom to. Picking your life up and leaving isn’t easy at such a young age, moving into a house with complete strangers, being the new kid at school, these can make you feel pretty alone. I may have been the new kid at the school, but lucky for me I knew 20 other guys from my team that went their as well. From the first day I walked into the dressing room and struggled to learn everyones names I had a new family, 20 new brothers. We spent countless hours together in hotel rooms, riding the bus, at the rink and in the gym. Just like typical brothers we would fight, but whenever things would go south we all had each others backs. Family can make the worst of times better. I remember being 15 years old travelling back from Banff, AB when our bus broke down. It had to of been close to -20 degrees celcius that day, it would have been so easy for us to mope about in the bus and wait for the new one to get there. If you were to drive past that day you would have thought you were seeing things. 20 teenage boys in full suit and tie having a full blown snowball fight on the other side of the barricade. For every story I have like this one I can think of 50 more. When I hear parents say that they don’t want to put their kids in organized sports I think back on some of the best times of my life and all the faces that I feel so close to. Sports give you a new family that you will have for life.

Field Hockey Training https://hockeyperformanceacademy.com/inspiring-story-boys-field-hockey-in-usa/

Copyright © 2018 · Hockeyperformanceacademy.com · All Rights Reserved

January 29, 2019

From the time that I could walk I have been creating pain for my parents. Now that might sound like a terrible thing to say about a child, but bare with me and your opinion may change. When I was 3 years old my dad cut down one of his old hockey sticks and gave it to me, little did he know that this would be where the annoyance started. I would run around the house swinging this stick in every direction, breaking anything that my mom left at my eye level, or for the unlucky adult, shin level. That same winter my dad decided that it would be better for me to play with my new toy outside, so he built an ice rink in our back yard. I spent countless hours out there skating, or as my mom would say, ” falling on your butt”. The only problem with this was that I needed help tying my skates, putting on my snow gear, buttoning my helmet and opening the door, this whole operation would take about 30-40 minutes out of my parents day. Many of you may be saying, ” half an hour a day to keep your child happy is nothing”. Well here is the kicker, we were living in Prince George, BC at the time where temperatures easily drop below -20 degrees celcius, not very friendly for a 3 year old. I would “skate” for 5 minutes before walking back up the steps, crying, and scream for my parents to let me back inside. It would take them 10 minutes to get all of my gear off and start to warm me up. Now comes the most annoying part, as soon as I had feeling in my fingers and toes I would cry and beg them to let me go back outside again. The only part that may restore your faith that I wasn’t the worst kid ever is I wouldn’t go outside unless my mom put my teddy bear on top of the net.

There are many other blogs telling similar stories but here is one to check out.

© 2019 TFP Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Fourth Period™ and Ice Girls™ are registered trademarks.

January 28, 2019

https://manitobamuseum.ca/main/exhibition/hockey-the-stories-behind-our-passion/