When They Found a Mass in My Abdomen (and I learned to live in the waves)
Do you feel like you are getting hit by rounds of waves after waves of life’s obstacles?
The words hit me hard, “We just got the results back from your cat scan. There’s a mass on your ovary. It could be cancerous.”
One week later I was in the office of a gynecological oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering. The doctor held up a picture of the 25 cm mass, “You need surgery, immediately. And the recovery time will be at least 4-6 weeks. We’ll do a biopsy on the table to see if it is malignant.”
After the visit, my husband and I sat outside his office, allowing the tears to come and holding one another. The Big C might have made its way into my life. Cancer has always been one of my greatest fears.
But there was so much to do in the meantime.
We were six weeks away from our 3-day event, “The Big Comeback” (originally planned to be Oct 13-15th). I was in fifth gear.. We had more than 100 attendees registered. Our hustle was working. The news about my surgery made my heart sink. But I did what I needed to do – we moved The Big Comeback to December.
Two weeks later, on September 24th, I went through open abdominal surgery where they removed the mass, my uterus, cervix and my right ovary. Who knew I was carrying a small melon in my belly? I don’t even like melons!
Thank goodness, the mass was benign. And now I’m healing at home. Plus – I’m going to have a pretty bad-ass scar to show for all of this.
On my third day in the hospital, my husband and I received terrible news. One of our closest friends in New York had fallen, hit his head and passed away. He was 45 and left his wife and 5 year old son. The funeral was on Tuesday of this week. It is devastating.
I know if these events had all happened even 5 years ago, I would have caught myself asking, “Why me?” and “Why now?” I would have made up a story about how these were signs, and I would have let worry and fear get the best of me. Perhaps I would have just stopped working all together.
But there was something that happened during this period. I knew I was standing in an ocean.
You see, clients always ask me, “Monica, when will it stop being so much? When will my personal life clear itself up so I can finally focus on my business? When will my business stop having these crises?”
My answer: “Never.”
I believe that our lives are like standing in the middle of the ocean. And the waves never stop hitting us. Some of them are large and they knock us backwards, taking the breath right out of us. Sometimes the waves even take us out of the game for weeks or months. Sometimes they are smaller: they cause us to fall over but we get back up. There are moments where the water is calm – and I’ve come to see these periods with immense gratitude, hoping they will last forever, but knowing they will not.
Our life isn’t about waiting for the waves to stop. It’s about leaning into them. It’s about not resisting them. Seeing them, responding to them, and then allowing them to pass by.
Not that any of that is easy. But it’s the deep work I do every day – the spiritual work that makes me stronger. And I know it’s the work that you do too.
That’s what bonds us together as entrepreneurs – we run our businesses through some pretty tough shit. Whether it’s a mean note from a client, or a child in the hospital, or our own health scares. We ask ourselves to keep going. And in the end – that makes us some of the most courageous, positive, resilient people on the planet.
Don’t get me wrong – I’ve had LOTS of emotions about these waves. But wishing them away isn’t something I allow myself to engage in for too long. Because I’ve come to see the ocean as my home.
What helps me ride the waves is spirit. I know it does for so many of you too. When I was lying in the hospital I must have listened to 5 guided meditations a day, along with spiritual music and chants. It was the only thing that brought me comfort. Especially during the nausea brought on by the painkillers.
Now that I’m home, I’m changing the plans for the next three months of Revenue Breakthrough – and there are some real moments of fear. I don’t have all the answers for how it will work out. The waves can feel daunting, especially because I can’t control them.
Even now, I find myself going to spirit for help. Monday was the first day I opened my computer since the surgery. I felt myself get caught in panic and overwhelm, made worse by the pain from my surgery. I closed my computer and chanted a mantra 108 times – it brought an air of calm that was sorely needed.
Little by little new strategies are dropping in – new plans are coming together. I’m so thankful to my super strong team for holding down the fort while I took a break. And I’m very grateful that we had a strong plan to begin with – so I have something to alter instead of starting from scratch.
My invitation to you this week: consider adopting the notion that you live in the middle of an ocean. Allow yourself to see the waves, to not be surprised or angered by them, to even laugh as they come in. And don’t forget to lean into your own spiritual practice to help you ride them.
This wave-riding is a life-long practice, and I’m no expert – but it seems like the real work of our lives is learning to surf, over and over again.
PS: In case you need to create your comprehensive plan for 2022 – one that you can count on no matter what – please join us at our Big Comeback Event, Dec 8-10th, virtual. We’ll come together to complete a 14-step Certified Revenue Breakthrough Plan. And I’ll teach you how to adapt that plan, no matter what waves come up in the process.
