This has been a surreal experience to say the least.
One day I was sitting having a lunch talking to a business buddy about changing the world and he nonchalantly mentions, “Hey, I nominated you for an award.” (Thanks Rob!) And next thing I know I am being interviewed and spending a lot of time reflecting on Life and my journey thus far.
This was a great opportunity to pause for a second and really take an inventory of what actually has happened in the past few years for me and our community. We should all do this from time-to-time.
What is the Life Re-Imagined award from Avenue Magazine? Here is what Avenue says:
Life Re-Imagined: Celebrating five people who changed their lives for the better
Let’s face it: Everyone at one time or another has dreamed about reinventing themselves and changing their life for the better. But making that life-altering change isn’t always easy. In fact, it’s downright difficult. So, what does it take to jump-start a change in your life? To find out, Avenue turned to five Calgarians who have re-imagined their lives for the better. Read on to hear their stories and be inspired.
I think this is God/The Universe/Whatever-Cosmic-Force-You-Currently-Subscribe-To’s way of encouraging me with a little humour sprinkled in. The fact that we’re called Re:LIFE and we won (I say “we” because there is no way I would have won without the entire community believing in our vision of Life), is pretty neat. So I am thankful and it is with a heart of gratitude I want to thank everybody who has supported our mission and joined this crazy adventure.
For me personally, acknowledgment is great, but my sincere hope is that people put these principles into application. I am really not a fan of all this attention because this really isn’t about me. It’s about the principles of truth that we teach to set people free and grow them into who they were meant to be. But if winning this award gives us a platform to live and spread Life abundantly, I full embrace what this entails.
And big kudos to my stylist Sue, photographers Greg and Colin, and the rest of the team for being able to pull a half-decent photo of me looking sharp in my threads. I was extremely uncomfortable but they coached me well. And also a big thanks to Tracy who told my story authentically which can always be misconstrued in someway or another.
Here is the article:
“Fulfillment, for me, is living who you were meant to be to the maximum potential.” —Ed Kang
Ed Kang
Ed Kang has packed a lot into his life so far. He’s 34 years old and has been an animator and an entrepreneur. He worked in marketing and for a dot.com company, making and losing a million dollars on paper through the boom and bust. He got married and had two children, took a company public on the stock market and even worked as a pastor.
Sounds exhausting, doesn’t it? Kang would be the first to admit that, as of a couple of years ago, he was a burnout with too many loose ends in his life, and too many unmet obligations to work and to his family. “It was a ‘Who are you?’ situation,” says Kang. “You’ve tried all these different things, the spiritual route, the business route and what do you have left, really?”
A friend who had travelled to India with a charity called Impact Nations suggested Kang do something similar in Nicaragua, and that trip in 2009 is what led him to reinvent his life. “It was two weeks of opening medical clinics and feeding centres in the poorest parts of the country,” Kang says. “I was a bouncer; I had to do crowd control; we’d go into a village and set up some tents and awnings, and they would line up and you’d get through as many people as you could.”
On the flight to Nicaragua, Kang says, he knew things were unravelling at home in Calgary, both personally and professionally, and a part of him wished he didn’t have to go back.
“My business was failing because of the economy and the sub-prime mortgage crisis. It seemed like there was an unending train of pressure and I felt powerless and with no purpose,” he says.
The trip to Nicaragua was the catalyst. Ten days in, Kang had a meltdown, begged off the planned outing that night and went back to his hotel room where he decided to make a change in his life.
Kang wanted to redirect his life to focus on social change, but decided to do it in a micro way. When he got back to Calgary, for example, he took advantage of his skill in the kitchen, where he makes a mean lasagna. Whenever he cooked lasagna for his family, he would make eight more, freeze them, and look for families in need who could use the food.
“People would ask to come in and cook; we called them impact kitchens,” Kang says. “That idea caught on, I realized there was really no competition for just helping someone in your community, going next door and saying, ‘Can I help you with something?’ I realized that was a niche and it’s fun.”
Out of this, Kang created a community in 2009 called Re:Life, which stands for Regard for Life. Re:Life is a community of more than 100 like-minded people who work for social change. So far, the group has sent people to Uganda, Haiti and Nicaragua on humanitarian projects. It has raised support for an orphanage in Burundi and a mosquito net project in Tanzania. Closer to home, members also regularly volunteer at the Calgary Drop-In Centre. And, of course, they make lasagna, too.
As for his work, the friend who originally steered Kang to Nicaragua is now his boss. Kang works as a corporate chaplain and business manager in Calgary for the Goliath Group of Companies. Kang says he’s now fulfilled, although he doesn’t equate that with being happy.
“Fulfillment, for me, is living who you were meant to be to the maximum potential,” he says. “People come to me and say, ‘I’m not happy.’ I ask them if they think the point of life is to become happy and they say, ‘Yes!’
“I believe the point of life is fulfillment, and the by-product of that is happiness.”
Please take the time to read the stories of the 4 others who also won the award >
Also if you want to join us for the awards ceremony in Calgary, check our MEETUP.COM here >>
