When Every Thing Goes Wrong, Remember This One Thing

I visited my friend’s office, and there I saw a framed entry from his grandmother’s journal, dated September 16, 1977. It reads:

"Today I’m sitting in my hospital bed waiting to have both my breasts removed. But in a strange way, I feel like the lucky one. Until now I have had no health problems. I’m a sixty-nine-year-old woman in the last room at the end of the hall before the pediatric division of the hospital begins. Over the past few hours I have watched dozens of cancer patients being wheeled by in wheelchairs and rolling beds. None of these patients could be a day older than seventeen."

He told me that the journal entry is displayed in his office because it continues to remind him that there is always, always something to be thankful for.

And that no matter how good or bad we have it, we must wake up each day thankful for our lives, because someone, somewhere is desperately fighting for theirs.

I was recently at a birthday party to celebrate the thirty-fifth birthday of a friend’s childhood best friend. Four years ago, she was diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer—devastating news for anyone, and especially for someone so young. Thankfully, she’s now in remission and has been cancer free for the past two years. When we were at lunch, she told us, “I am loving my thirties so much more than my twenties. I’m more confident, I know what I want out of life, know what my capabilities are. I know that life is limited, and that I only get this one life, and I’m doing my best to make the best of each and every day.”

Hearing those words from her was remarkable, because it showed how her perspective on the situation allowed her to view a horribly difficult time as an opportunity to understand what she wanted out of life.

Her example reminded us that happiness is not the absence of problems, but the ability to use them as opportunities to change your perspective for the better.

Think about your own life. What joy and opportunities might you see more clearly if your mind weren’t holding on so tightly to your struggles and disappointments?

Remember, it’s not what the world takes away from you that counts; it’s what you do with what you have left.

Truth be told, inner peace begins the moment you take a new breath and choose not to allow an uncontrollable event to dominate you in the long-term.

You are not what happened to you.

You are what you choose to become in this moment.

Let go, breathe, and begin again...