Why is it that we approach new opportunities with “it’s not the right time,” “I don’t have enough time for that”, or maybe “once down the road once I’ve accomplished x, y, and z I’ll get to that.”

Up until May of 2022, I told myself each of those phrases numerous times when faced with a potential opportunity for growth into an uncertain future. Then this little word that speaks fear and uncertainty in all of us came into my life: I was diagnosed with cancer, the rare, incurable version. Ocular Melanoma left me with two distinct feelings: overwhelming uncertainty about how much time I had left and the immediate wake up call to treat that time with intentionality and purpose.

Nothing helps you rethink how you spend your time and energy quite like being shown the exit door. So my purpose is to shine a light on my claw machine experience with cancer: which felt like being picked up out of a comfortable reality and dropped into the vast uncertainty of four life-changing words, “you have incurable cancer.”

The way I perceive time has changed a lot over the past two years, and I believe that shift in perspective has been paramount in helping me inspire others to slow down and take time to see how it is actually on their side by :

• The best way to measure time is not by the beginnings and endings, but by the magic of the time in between.

• Reframing our ability to think we know the best timing for our life so that we don’t limit opportunities that will spur growth and change

• Tempering feelings as data that can help us power through difficult times rather than perceiving them as facts that can stifle us

• Embracing the truth that everything in our path that has felt like wasted time has prepared us for something greater

My story is not a sob story. It’s a tale of revitalization with renewed purpose and an appreciation for time that I’m excited to share with the world!