I've talked about my friend Ruth before. She has breast cancer. Come to find out, it's spreading rapidly through her lungs. She only has a few months left to live, if that.
The last time I saw Ruth was about a month ago. It was the second to the last week of school and I was waiting for my daughter to come out of school. Ruth was there waiting for her son who is in my daughter's same grade. She was winded, could barely breathe, and finally had to sit down because she looked like she was about to pass out.
The first thing I thought of was my cat Scrappy.
Scrappy had this small tumor on her belly. It looked like a swollen nipple. The dummy of a vet I took her to decided to squeeze the reddish-purple pimple looking thing, making my poor cat scream and squirm until I told the idiot to stop it.
Apparently it burst the tumor that was inside of her because within mere days, Scrappy couldn't breathe anymore. She was winded and miserable.
I put her to sleep the week after and never took another animal to that moron of a vet ever again.
Ruth reminded me of Scrappy which I probably shouldn't admit to because I know it sounds bad. But that's the first thing I thought of...the cancer was spreading. And fast.
Then Ruth's husband emailed me and told me that Ruth was in the hospital but he still wanted to bring his 2 kids to my daughter's recent birthday party. He had told me that the cancer was spreading throughout her lungs.
Unfortunately...I already knew that.
I asked to see her in the hospital which would be a grueling 3-hour round trip but I didn't care. However, before I knew it, she was home and I'm patiently waiting for a day when the chemo doesn't knock her so hard on her ass that I can visit with her for even a few minutes.
Ruth is barely a couple of years older than I am and she's quickly dying. From what I've learned, breast cancer is much more aggressive in younger patients. And that sucks. She has a 7-year-old and a 5-year-old.
Sometimes life just f****** sucks!
I knew the moment that Ruth started dying. She was trying to get into a clinical trial earlier this year...since about February or March. It was to take place in Phoenix. She even drove all the way out there in May, just for the doctors to tell her that she didn't qualify for the trial because her cancer had already metastasized...not once but twice.
When she told me, I could see that the last bit of hope she hung onto had left. And I knew how dangerous that was because I remember when it happened to my mom and when they told her the cancer in her brain had doubled in size only 6 weeks after they tried to remove it. My mom went from functioning and full of hope to dead only 2 months later.
I saw that same look in Ruth. And it was only a few weeks after that when I noticed that she couldn't breathe anymore.
When you lose hope, it's over. Hope is sometimes the only thing that can hold you together.
I started to think about something. What if it were me? What if I had only a few months left to live? What would I be doing? What would I be thinking about?
Weirdly enough, I thought about my books. I order A LOT of books every month, mostly on business, marketing, and investing. For some reason I thought, "I guess I'd stop ordering and reading those business types of books because...I guess I wouldn't need to know anything else about business or investing."
I'd close down my office immediately and I would completely stop working in my final months. Why bust my ass in a salt mine when the final days of my life are ticking away?
I'd certainly get my affairs in order to make sure my daughter would get everything. I'd dump much more into her six-figure college education fund to ensure that she wouldn't piss any money away without at least giving herself a reasonable chance in life. After all, her dad would probably convince her to blow most of the money because of the pathetic loser that he is.
I'd type my ass off and write a memoir to the best of my collection but it would be different. It would mostly be a manual to be successful mixed with my own personal stories and experiences. I'd do this for my daughter mostly and, if I had time, I'd have it mainstream published for others to benefit from.
I think I'd meditate more and get a massage daily until I die. Maybe I'd take my daughter for a 2-month trip throughout Europe even though I hate traveling. I'd want to give her the best final memories possible.
And that's it. That literally would be it for me. There would be nothing more to do, right?
Shouldn't we all be living like we're dying right now? Have you created the life for yourself to enable yourself to live like you want to? To give yourself more options? To make you happy while you're here, alive and kicking?
Because if not, you need to sit your ass down and seriously start thinking about what you can do to live a better life.
If you're not happy with your work, fix it. You have options.
If you're not happy with money, fix it. There are tons of opportunities to make more money.
If you're not happy with your relationships, fix it. Kick people to the curb, be a nicer person, whatever you need to do. Stop settling.
It's very simple, folks. If you don't like something, fix it. Change it. Do something different. It's no harder than that.
Now, I can't help you with relationships, as everyone knows that this is my weak point.
But I can help you with everything else.
Click on this link to find out what I have up my sleeve this time:
http://www.monicamain.com/detroit_seminar_2015
In the meantime, feel blessed and grateful for being healthy and alive...with many more awesome years to come. Not everyone is that lucky.
See you at the top!
Your mentor,
Monica Main
www.MonicaMain.com
