While most 21 year old girls are busy with school, guys and parties, Sophie van der Stap was forced to think about the unthinkable:   her diagnosis of a rare and aggressive form of cancer.  In one day, Sophie transitioned from being a typical university student to a young woman faced with months of chemo and extended stays in the hospital.

Shortly after her chemo began, Sophie lost all of her hair.  She could have chosen to feel sorry for herself or lose her will to fight.  She chose neither.  She decided to create a “refuge” from the cancer—a place that made her feel good.  Sophie chose 9 different wigs that allowed her to forget about her cancer for a while.  These “cancer holidays” made her feel like a woman again.  They made her stronger, mentally and physically.

Her message is about finding ways to forget something bad—if only for a while.  It’s NOT about running away from the things we don’t like in our lives.   It’s about finding ways to turn something bad into something good.  It’s about discovering what makes you feel happy and strong. It’s about empowering yourself during difficult times instead of losing hope.

Please take a moment to watch Sophie’s moving story.  I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

Empower Yourself,

Molly

How often do you find yourself upset over small, insignificant things?  It happens to me sometimes, and I must admit, I hate it when I let that happen.  It’s a double whammy because I allow myself to get mad about something that doesn’t matter THEN I get angry at myself for being upset in the first place.  Talk about a complete waste of energy!

How do you stop those feelings from ever getting to that point?  And when is it okay to allow yourself to be upset?

Nobody’s perfect.  In a perfect world, we’d all walk around with smiles on our faces and be happy all of the time.  But that’s not the way life works.  We have good days.  We have bad days.  On most days, we have both good and bad things happen—it’s just the way it goes.  So many things are simply out of our control.  So what CAN we control?

We can control the way we interpret and handle situations.  I am learning this slowly but surely.  Two weeks ago we experienced a flood in our house.  Water was pouring into our kitchen.  The water we couldn’t collect was cascading into our basement.  We recently finished a big renovation of our home and this made the water intrusion even more painful.

A little over a year ago, this episode would have devastated me. But fortunately, perspective was with me that evening.  We calmly (yet hurriedly) worked to empty huge bins of water from our kitchen, used every towel in the house to soak up other wet areas and made the appropriate phone calls.  When the insurance company said they’d send someone out, I told my husband that we could wait until the morning, knowing that other people had much worse problems than we did.  An enormous amount of rain came down that night.

As we were cleaning up, I kept thinking about the people in Japan who had been victims of the devastating earthquake and tsunami.  I thought about people in the Midwest who have lost their homes during this incredibly violent tornado season.  I thought about our friend’s brother who lost his house in New Zealand to an earthquake.  Not only did he lose his house, he lost the lot that it once sat upon.  Can you even imagine?  Even though our house was a mess, we had a bed and a roof over our heads.  We were safe.  No one was hurt or missing.  It wasn’t that bad.

Losing your home would be horrible.  But losing someone you love would be devastating.

So the next time something bad starts to happen, try to put it in perspective immediately.  Ask yourself the following questions:

1. Is everyone safe and out of harm’s way?
2. Is this problem fixable?
3. How could this be worse?

It’s amazing how differently you’ll look at the bad things that happen in your life.  Please share your stories about how you deal with life’s more difficult days.

Smile & Keep Perspective,

Molly

If you want to know the secret to a happy life, ask someone who has lived one.  That’s exactly what John Izzo did.  He interviewed over 200 people, ages 60-106, each of whom was identified by friends and acquaintances as “the one person they knew who had found happiness and meaning.” Happiness came from all walks of life:   town barbers,  Holocaust survivors, aboriginal chiefs and CEO’s.

In Izzo’s book, “The Five Secrets You Must Discover Before You Die”, he repeated a wonderful story from Navajo tradition that you should ponder.

An old Navajo told his grandson that sometimes he feels there is a fight that is going on inside him.   He said it is a fight between two wolves.   “One wolf is evil.  It is the wolf of anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, superiority, fear of healing my body and mind, fear of succeeding, fear of exploring what has been said by others to be truth, fear of walking in others’ moccasins and seeing glimpses of their reality through their eyes and their hearts, using empty excuses that my heart knows to be false.

The other wolf is good.  It is the wolf of joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, empathy, caring for those who have helped me even though their efforts have not always been perfect, the willingness to forgive myself and others, and realizing that my destiny is in my hands”.

The grandson thought about it and asked, “But grandfather, which wolf wins?”

His grandfather replied, “The wolf that I choose to feed.”

To live a happy life, simply choose to feed the good wolf .  Which wolf have you been feeding?

Molly