The biggest gift one could get

We all have major events in our life that change our path. 

Some are planned, and some are totally out of blue yet radically change everything.  

I'm a Master of Reinvention because it's not about what happens to us, but what we do with it. Can we adapt, reinvent, and bravely take the new path that's being offered?

What happened last year left me broken into million pieces, yet I couldn't afford to crumble. 

I was going back and forth about this post for a while.

Do I share my recent loss with you here or do I just quietly resume my business activities as if nothing happened?

But it did. And I always wanted to be honest. For the longest time, it wasn't easy to post anything cheerful and pretend it was business as usual. I always wanted to be a positive influence in other people's life.

I do appreciate this community so much – and a few of you reached out and supported me throughout this toughest time of my life, even though we just "met" virtually. I’m enormously grateful.

In the middle of promoting my unusual mastermind program back in April last year, my husband Jerry got a devastating diagnosis. We went from healthy to a complete shock without warning. From determination to fight it to a realization within a few short weeks that the enemy was way too big and way too fast to stop, slow down or even influence the inevitable.

I was trained for it. In my previous business, I prolonged or helped save the lives of multiple cancer patients with highly specialized diets to accompany their holistic approach to healing.

Yet I couldn’t do the same for my own husband. That feeling of helplessness was the most devastating of all. We had to accept there was nothing else we or doctors could do - and try to live his last days as joyful as possible. Give each other all the time we can. Something we should have always done. Talk about everything we didn't discuss yet.

Suddenly everything went to a halt. Nothing mattered. No business was more important than this. No stress, no daily to-do lists, just him and me. We played the cards we were dealt with. I’m so grateful we were able to stay home the entire time, the last few days with the incredible help of hospice. I thank Lord he didn’t suffer.

From the day we first learned about it, just 68 days later he was gone. Just like that. Nothing changed on the outside; the world goes on as if nothing happened. As you cry, the sun rises again as any other day.

I was always the lighthouse during crises. That’s why I became a coach. So I can help people to find the strength to reach their goals, overcome their obstacles, to believe in their own abilities. Thanks to that training, I was able to accept much of this and dealt with it as it came. This time, my husband Jerry was the strongest.

But I wasn't OK for a long time.

I know I’m not alone; people go through the same pain and grief every single day. I have had other losses before, of course, lost both my parents and my brother quite young. This was different.

I don't remember my life without him in it. I moved across the ocean, leaving my family behind, so we build our life together here in the United States.

I took time to be whole for my clients again. This was the biggest ask to reinvent my life I have ever faced. Meaningful work is the best medicine for a broken heart. And the best tribute I could build to my special, brave man, with the biggest heart, who had nothing but limitless support for anything I’ve ever done in my life.

I'm a different person thanks to those 30 years of living, working, doing business, creating memories, and loving life, together. I was blessed by his amazing, unselfish love.

If I can only make a difference in someone’s life as deep as he did in mine. I'm who I'm today thanks to his never-ending love, kind mentorship, and support. I'm forever grateful to have him in my life.

There is a lesson in everything we face in our lives. I truly believe it. I hope this could serve as an inspiration to someone who needs to hear it.

Make time for your loved ones, always. Nothing on Earth is more important than that.

It made me rethink everything I do. This is the business and life balance I should have done long before, not after we were suddenly faced with a limited time. But be honest with yourself - don't we all feel that we have unlimited time and we'll get to it, someday?

But we're introduced to guides and mentors at the exactly right time. That's why I turned my coaching around and now help grownup successful women find the balance between life-work, and reinvent their life on their own terms. 

Because if there is this little burning fire inside of you - the feeling that this is not ALL you're meant to do in this world, trust me. Time flies. If unattended, that fire becomes the wildfire of enormous destruction. Even worse, time may run out and you will forever regret not even trying. 

 That lesson was really painful for me. There are things my husband wanted to do but we never made the time, or the desire wasn't strong enough. Now we can't have a do-over. 
 
Take a leap of faith like I did - and let's achieve what you're meant to do in this world, together.  

Don't wait another minute!