Building Joy Together
Hi, we’re Steven and Nick—partners in life, and the two people behind everything you see here.
For more than two decades, we’ve built a life together around creativity, community, wellness, giving back and a shared belief in the importance of human connection. Life has also handed us our share of unexpected turns. Through a long cancer journey, a stroke, recovery and challenges of our own, we’ve learned that joy doesn’t have to replace struggle. The two can sit beside each other. And sometimes, the smallest moments of joy are what give us the strength to keep moving forward.
That belief is at the heart of JoyFirst. For years, we worked alongside students from kindergarten to Grade 12, teachers and school leaders, bringing wellness to life through playful, hands-on experiences. The kids taught us that joy can be simple: curiosity, movement, laughter and connection—even in the middle of a hard day.
When I faced another cancer setback and a stroke in 2025, Nick began shaping JoyFirst as a way to help me find my way back through the Joy of Movement, the Joy of Others and the Joy of Self.
The students, educators, school leaders and close friends who kept believing in us helped us find our direction again. Now we’re bringing the practice of joy and emotional fitness to everyone: healthcare teams, workplaces, nonprofits, volunteers, caregivers, families and communities.
Sunflowers remain a shared passion, and our sunflower photography has its own home in our Shopify art store. Our cats, meanwhile, are never far from the story.
More About Steven
Artist. Cancer Survivor. Wellness Advocate. Community Builder. Joy-Maker.
Steven Csorba is an Edmonton-born artist (b. 1964), storyteller, and lifelong advocate for using creativity as a force for healing. For more than two decades, his work has been rooted in a simple belief: that being in someone’s corner — through creativity, compassion, kindness, and community — can change a life.
Before illness reshaped his life, Steven was an award-winning brand strategist whose creative work for clients such as Apple, Industry Canada, and the Department of National Defence was recognized by the Smithsonian Institute for innovation in risk-managed digital brand building.
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Steven's first major battle began in 2003, when he was diagnosed with Stage 3 throat and neck cancer at age 38. What followed was a grueling ordeal:
A 14-hour surgery to remove the cancer
Seven weeks of intensive radiation treatment
Four years of recuperation
Eight reconstructive surgeries over ten years to repair a deteriorating jawbone
During his decade-long journey (2004–2014), Steven embraced Arts in Medicine Therapy and became one of the first jaw reconstruction patients at the Institute for Reconstructive Sciences in Medicine (IRSM) in Edmonton — later becoming the first patient to sit on its board.
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A Legacy of Service
Steven has long believed that helping others makes us stronger. Over the years, giving his time, creativity and energy to community projects became an important part of his life — and, in ways he could never have anticipated, a source of strength during his own battle with cancer and the difficult years that followed.
That service has included helping lead iHuman’s All In! campaign, which brought together more than 140 companies and 500 volunteers to help create a 22,000-square-foot home for vulnerable young people, and donating artwork to causes including the Buchanan Centre for Parkinson’s Disease, where one piece helped raise $260,000.
Steven has never seen moments like these as individual accomplishments. To him, they are examples of what can happen when generous people, businesses and communities choose to come together. He is deeply grateful that his art has been able to play even a small part in bringing people together, creating joy, and helping others feel supported.
Today, that belief feels even more important to him. Steven sees community as the abundance we all carry within us to show up for others — to offer kindness, creativity, encouragement and hope, whether we know the person or not.
Sometimes community is simply being in someone’s corner when they need it most.
Sunflower Fine Art: JoyKits
