Life has funny ways to teach us lessons. Cancer was the rehearsal practice I needed before embarking myself into entrepreneurship. It was life supporting me (believe it or not) with an intense apprenticeship to what it was ahead of me.

When I was diagnosed with cancer, I had a career that I loved. I had worked in recruitment for 10 years and I thrived on helping people get new jobs and clients hiring their best people.

But deep down I had been hiding from my own dreams. I had been too scared to risk anything. I had been playing safe because of a childhood trauma when my dad lost his financial stability and consequently I experienced what was like not to be safe financially.

I settled for the safety of a paycheck.

When cancer knocked on my door, I woke up to a different way of being and feeling. I started to take action from a different place as all of sudden, I wasn’t sure how long I had to live.

Cancer gets you facing your mortality pretty quickly even when you thought you were invincible your whole life.

Yes that was me before cancer – the invincible “me” who had to re learn how to live again. This time with a different focus and intention.

IF YOU DON’T LOVE WHAT YOU DO, QUIT DOING IT

If I had told you I knew when you would die, you would want to know how long you had left so you could decide what to do with the time you had right?

Would you keep doing what you hate daily?

Would you follow that dream that you have always wanted or settle to give up?

Would you tell yourself that the goal you have always had in mind was possible or would you tell yourself it is not for you?

We can create different options to ourselves when we have the right frame of mind.

If all we do is to keep playing the same song in our head over and over again and not do anything about it, nothing is going to change.

Quitting what you don’t love doesn’t have to be irresponsible, but you need a plan. You need to take action daily to quit what you don’t love and create what you do love.

THE TIME TO FOLLOW YOUR DREAM IS NOW, NOT IN THE FUTURE

It is so easy to say to ourselves a bunch of excuses around why we can’t change rather than decide to go for it right?

Let’s face it! We might fail and nobody likes the sound of that, so we settle. We settle for the self sabotage, for the excuses because we think we have unlimited amount of time and guess what? We don’t.

If you have a dream or a goal that you have always wanted to pursue, stop waiting for life to get easier. Stop waiting for you to have more time and more money. Stop waiting for everything around you to support you because I am afraid to say, it is not going to happen. If you want to follow your dreams, rest assure there will be challenges now and always but conquering and overcoming each part of the process is what life is all about.

TAKE RISKS 

Taking risks doesn’t have to mean taking irresponsible actions but there is a level of risk with change. When you quit your job and start a business, you are taking the risk that you might not succeed straight away. But staying in a job that you hate might make you sick in the long term.

Starting a business, pivoting your business, writing a book etc – all of it comes with a level of risk. 

When I started my business, I realised that I could no longer stay in my job even though I had gone back to work after cancer treatment and it was ok. 

The issue is I didn’t love it anymore and I knew it was affecting my energy and with time it would only get worse.

So yes I quit and I went all in. I showed up daily. I learned a bunch of different things, I invested on myself. I focused on my goals day-in-day-out and it paid off big time.

FOCUS ON WHAT YOU CAN CONTROL

Before cancer, I was a worrier. I was a control freak and spent a lot of my time and energy trying to control things I couldn’t control.

You can only control yourself. If you are a worrier, remind yourself that you can only worry about yourself. If you are a control freak, focus on solving your control issues. This is not to do with anybody else other than you.

You are not God and last time I checked, trying to control the future is not something anybody has ever been able to do it.

Focus on how you can create better self control by changing your mental and emotional habits and start managing your inner world more efficiently. That is all you can do.

LIVE LIFE WITH THE END IN MIND

Sorry to break it to you but you are going to die and you don’t know when. So the quicker you remind yourself of this daily without being too morbid, the better you can get on with living a life on your terms. 

Does that mean you are never going to encounter any challenges or have any issues? Hell no. 

Be prepared by focusing on you daily, on your physical and mental habits so you can create strength physically, mentally and emotionally.

DON’T BE SCARED TO F***UP

I was not even on social media when I started my business. I was so scared to share my story, my life, my family. But my dream to help others to not go through what I had gone through was bigger than my fears. Does that mean that I cruise through the process of putting myself out there? Not really. It was scary as hell at the beginning, but I have been blessed to not only help my clients change their lives, but I have received tons of messages from people thanking me for how my posts have helped them.

YOUR BODY IS THE FOUNDATION OF YOUR BUSINESS

I see so many entrepreneurs abusing their bodies in the process of building a business. They are then left with the bank filled with money YAY but they are overweight, anxious, depressed, having sleep issues, lonely and sometimes dealing with a diagnosis. (NOT SO GREAT!)

I have also seen so many entrepreneurs not able to continue to pursue their dreams because a health issue has stopped them from doing so. They have run their bodies to the ground. They thought they had time to catch up with the abuse they put their bodies through, but the abuse caught up with them.

Again, I was blessed that I had cancer before starting my business because I knew not to fall into that trap again. Working yourself to the ground is a true saying because the cemetery is filled with people who have done it and still do it.

If you are not looking after your body and mind daily with your habits, you are going down the wrong road. There is no 2 ways about it. Financial success is very important but without health means absolutely nothing.

Cancer has given me a different perspective in life not only in theory but also in practice. We are a set of habits and these habits either benefit us or harm us. It is up to us to decide which habits to practice daily. It is not about perfection but the ability to be real and raw with ourselves so we can keep steering our ship in the right direction whilst not compromising on our health, our values and dignity as human beings.