Tempo loves inspirational stories, where ordinary people – faced with seemingly insurmountable challenges – make extraordinary decisions to live, love and thrive. Empowerment coach Randa El Zein relates a heart-warming tale of resilience…
“Last night was a miracle. I think of myself as a pretty positive and upbeat person who sees the bright side in everything and in everyone. But last night, I went out with an outstandingly positive friend who just rocked my world with her positivity.
“With a sparkle in her eyes and a big warm smile on her face she told me about the operation she’s afraid to have. She has pulmonary hypertension and her heart is degenerating with every breath she takes. She is bracing herself for an eight hours’ long operation to have a double lung transplant!
“If you like me (until last night) don’t know what pulmonary hypertension is, I will tell you. It means she has shortness of breath even if she has to climb a few steps, she can’t do any exercise, she can’t play with her 10 year old daughter, she can’t run nor walk a 5K with me, she can’t dance with her husband, and she can’t jump up and down with excitement about anything.
“Imagine a piano with 88 keys and yet she can only play on a handful of keys… no concertos or symphonies, just simple tunes. She lives with the knowledge that her poor little heart wants to give up on her at any time. My friend is only 35, and she was smiling as she tells me all of this. You would think she had won the lottery and was telling me about her plan to take a trip around the world.
“What made this night miraculous for me was when she told me she had been given six months to live. That was nine years ago when she was diagnosed. She was a living miracle.
“Her story got me thinking. She got me to appreciate that all we truly have is This Moment. She took the power of Now to a whole new level for me. She tells me about how life’s little problems are trivial, in the grand scheme of things. What matters most to her is her family. And all her fears about the operation (which she was pushing out of her mind for years) were all related to her daughter. She couldn’t imagine her daughter’s life without a mother. She wasn’t afraid of the operation itself but of what might come after that. Her own mother had passed away giving birth to her and she did not want that kind of life for her daughter.
“So I got her to imagine the life that she wants for herself and her daughter. She promised to create a vision board, and said she would get her daughter to do one as well. She promised to let go of fearful thoughts and replace them with thoughts of what she really wants out of life.
I can’t wait to see her vision board…
I see her running up the steps of Montmartre in Paris, with her daughter trailing behind her and running out of breath first. I see her salsa dancing with her husband. I see her on her daughter’s wedding day with beautiful wrinkles on her face. I see her with more kids of her own too. I see her running the next 5K on Yas Island with me. I see all this because I have felt the fight in her gut and her love for life. I see all this because she is a strong and amazingly positive woman who deserves to grow old.
By: Randa El Zein
Randa El Zein is an empowerment coach at Be You International.
http://facebook.com/randaelzein
