280 Focus on Health First Says Organik Founder Scott Simons

Scott is an Ecopreneur meaning he puts people, purpose and the planet before profit. Scott’s mission is to inspire a daily practice of health. To fulfill this mission, he created three social businesses. In 2004, he co-founded the Padua Centre, a community wellness. In 2006, he cofounded DESTA Black Youth Network, helping marginalized youth aged 18 to 25 get back on track. In 2006, Scott founded Organik a wellness broker company. Scott is also a yoga teacher, personal trainer and health coach since 2006. According to Scott, his greatest source of inspiration is found in his daily practice of health.

Contact Info

• Company: Organik
• Website: www.BeOrganik.com
• Email: scott@beorganik.com
• Instagram: organikmtl
• Podcast: The Spirit Bros Podcast (Coming Soon)

Most Influential Person

• Steve Sims / Jon Kabat-Zinn

Effect on Emotions

• Mindfulness helps calm down my emotions. It's hard to slow down the reaction. The reaction is always going to be there, we want it to be there; the fight or flight.
• Mindfulness has created a bit more space between the reaction and the response. Initially it went from one second to [longer].
• Now if someone cuts me off on the highway, I can see the emotion come up. Emotions are beautiful, it's just how we deal with them that's the problem or the solution.
• I'll see the anger coming up and I'll choose my reaction much more now. I used to be much more reactive and I could get mad very quickly.
• I could be explosive at times but now I've calmed that down and created the space between the reaction and the response.

Thoughts on Breathing

• The foundation to optimal health is breathing and more specifically conscious breathing. We breathe about 20,000 times a day. How many of those are unconscious?
• Really, the link between relaxation and stress is one conscious breath. I'd say, at the foundation of my meditation practice, and even before that, is the breath practice. It's to just catch myself in any situation. It's pretty much the informal meditation practice.
• When I'm driving, I'll come back to the breath. When meeting with a client or in my yoga classes I'll come back to the breath as much as possible. Just to know that I'm responding from there and not reacting from the ego.
• The breath is the most effective tool to tame the ego, to tame the mind. Instead of that mind being an enemy, or a mean voice in your head, it can become your ally, your best friend, your consultant.

Suggested Resources

• Book: Full Catastrophe Living by Jon Kabat-Zinn
• Book: A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle
• App: Insight Timer
• App: Respi Relax

Bullying Story

• I was born in Quebec City, a very French city. I only learned French when I was thirteen. I knew a bit of French, but I went from English elementary school, to French high school.
• Back then, being the English kid and coming from a big English family, I was an easy target to laugh at with my French accent.
• I never got bullied in terms of physicalness but in terms of laughing at my language, that happened a lot. It would really get me to react in the beginning. I would take it very personally.
• It took me years before I learned not to take my French accent personally. Now I just accept it and I speak much better French.
• In the beginning, that's where people would pick on me the most. Normally the bullying would make me more more shy and I wouldn't speak as much. Sports really helped me out.
• I got really good in basketball and I got more and more friends. I got more respect through the sports and people wouldn't laugh at me as much. I was six foot three [inches] and a bit taller than the others so I could defend myself. I think with the practice of getting better and better at French, as people were getting to know me they didn't pick on me as much. In the beginning, it wasn't super rough but it wasn't an easy ride either.