I didn’t grow up. I just survived long enough to fake it. People think healing looks like showing up, paying bills, smiling at work. But the truth is I never really learned how to live. I just learned how to keep going. How to stay quiet. How to pretend I was okay long enough to make it through the day.

Nobody taught me how to process pain or feel safe or ask for help. So I built walls. I adapted. I survived. And for a long time, that’s all I knew how to do. But I’m not faking it anymore. I did the work. I faced the parts of me I used to run from. I tore down the walls and started building something real. Now I’m not just surviving. I’m finally living. For real this time.

Everyone’s flexing hustle these days. 12-hour workdays. Side projects. Nonstop notifications. If you’re not busy, apparently you’re lazy.

Truth? That’s BS.

A story for you: A young crocodile kept hunting, showing off his catches to the old crocodile. Fish, birds, small wins—he bragged every time.

The old croc? Lounging. Doing nothing.

Then, in one smooth move, the elder caught a massive prey in a single strike.

The young one asked: “How did you do that?”

The old croc just smiled: “I didn’t do anything. I waited.”

Lesson? Hustle isn’t always the answer. Sometimes the smartest move is to pause, think, and strike at the right moment.

Want the full story and why “doing nothing” could actually make you unstoppable? Check it out here → Medium link

Just checking in with you all how you are doing really. Like a friend.

I’m feeling numb so will be nice to connect with people and their stories.

I've been diagnosed with PNET on June 7th at 42 with a wife and 2 year old son in Bangkok, Thailand. It's been an emotional rollercoaster for myself and my family, starting with an initial diagnosis of PDAC, thinking I only had less than a year to live, to finding-out it's Neuroendocrine tumors and learning I'd potentially have 3-5 years.

I've gone through 2 rounds of chemo and one round of targeted PRRT treatment, a targeted nuclear therapy, because my cancer cells have the right receptors to be treated using Lutetium. Have also done a round of RFA to remove tumors on my pancreas that was largely successful in removing primary tumors. This has all happened in a couple months, so things have been moving very quickly.

Aug 20th I got my labs run and we saw improvement in liver function and cancer markers.

Liver function numbers mostly improved • ALP: 322 -> 170 • GGT: 813 -> 603 • AST: 53 -> 68

Improvement in Tumor marker numbers and CEA • CA 19-9: 2,384 -> 743.8 • CEA, Blood: 11.1 -> 7.4

Overall, I'm responding well to treatments. Next steps are to schedule the next PET-CT scan, in preparation for the next PRRT treatment. I'll also be getting another SSA shot today.

My oncologist basically thinks that we should stay the course with PRRT + SSAs until we hit a plateau before adding any new treatment to limit toxicity to the liver.

I've documented every step, not just the treatments, but the emotions, the wins, and the hard moments. If you're going through something similar, you're not alone. I'm sharing my daily journey on a YouTube channel so that others can benefit from my story and gain any insights from my experience.

If you'd like to follow along, you can view or subscribe at:

www.youtube.com/@MyFightWithCancer

We're all pros already

• What exactly are the qualities that define us as professionals?
• We show up everyday. We might do it only because we have to, to keep from getting fired. But we do it. We show up every day.
• We show up no matter what. In sickness and in health, come hell or high water, we stagger into the factory. We might do it only so as to not let down our co-workers, or for other, less noble reasons. But we do it. We show up no matter what.
• We stay on the job all day. Our minds may wander, but our bodies remain at the wheel. We don't go home until the whistle blows.
• We are committed over the long haul. Next year, we may go to another job, another company, another country. But we'll still be working. Until we hit the lottery, we are part of the labor force.
• The stakes for us are high and real. This is about survival, feeding our families, educating our children. It's about eating.
• We accept remuneration for our labor. We're not here for fun. We work for money.
• We do not over-identify with our jobs. We may take pride in our work, we may stay late and come in on weekends, but we recognize that we are not our job descriptions. The amateur on the other hand, over-identifies with his avocation, his artistic aspiration. He defines himself by it. He is a musician, a painter, a playwright. Resistance loves this. Resistance knows that the amateur composer will never write his symphony because he is overly invested in its success and over-terrified of its failure. The amateur takes it so seriously it paralyzed him.
• We master the technique of our jobs.
• We have a sense of humor about our jobs.
• We receive praise or blame in the real world.
• Consider the amateur. One he doesn't show up every day. Two, he doesn't show up no matter what. Three he doesn't stay on the job all day. He is not committed for the long haul; the stakes for him are illusory and fake. He does not have a sense of humor about failure. You don't hear him bitching, "This fucking trilogy is killing me!" Instead, he doesn't write his trilogy at all.
• The amateur has not mastered the technique of his art. Nor does he expose himself to judgement in the real world. If we show our poem to our friend and our friend says "It's wonderful. I love it," that's not real-world feedback, that's our friend being nice to us. Nothing is as empowering as real-world validation, even if it's for failure.

For love of the game

• The professional, though he accepts money, does his work out of love. He has to love it. Otherwise he wouldn't devote his life to it of his own free will. The professional has learned however, that too much love can be a bad thing. Too much love can make him choke. The seeming detachment of the professional, the cold-blooded character to his demeanor, is a compensation device to keep him from loving the game so much that he freezes in action. The more you love your art/calling/enterprise, the more important its accomplishment is to the evolution of your soul, the more you will fear it and the more Resistance you will experience facing it. The payoff of playing-the-game-for-money is not the money. It inculcates the lunch-pail mentality, the hard-core, hard-head, hard-hat state of mind that shows up for work despite rain or snow or dark of night and slugs it out day after day.
• Remember, the Muse favors working stiffs. She hates prima donnas. To the gods the supreme sin is not rape or murder but pride. To think of yourself as a mercenary, a gun for hire, implants proper humility. It purges pride and preciousness.
• Resistance loves pride and preciousness.

Book Two: Combating Resistance - Turning Pro

Professionals and amateurs

• Aspiring artists defeated by Resistance share one trait. They all think like amateurs. They have not yet turned pro. The amateur is a weekend warrior. The professional is there seven days a week. The word amateur comes from the Latin root meaning "to love". The conventional interpretation is that the amateur pursues his calling out of love, while the pro does it for money. In my view, the amateur does not love the game enough. If he did, he would not pursue it as a side-line, distinct from his "real" vocation.
• The professional loves it so much, he dedicates his life to it. He commits full time. That's what I mean when I say turning pro. Resistance hates it when we turn pro.

A professional

• Someone once asked Somerset Maugham if we wrote on a schedule or only when struck by inspiration. "I write only when inspiration strikes," he replied. "Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o'clock sharp." That's a pro.
• In terms of Resistance, Maugham was saying, "I despise Resistance; I will not let it faze me; I will sit down and do my work."
• Maugham reckoned another, deeper truth: that by performing the mundane physical act of sitting down and starting to work, he set in motion a mysterious but infallible sequence of events that would produce inspiration, as surely as if the goddess had synchronized her watch with his. He knew if he built it, she would come.

What a writer's day feels like

• I wake up with a gnawing sense of dissatisfaction. Already I feel fear. Already the loved ones around me are starting to fade. I interact. I'm present. But I'm not.
• I'm not thinking about the work. I've already consigned that to the Muse. What I am aware of is the Resistance. I feel it in my guts. I afford it the utmost respect, because I know it can defeat me on any given day as easily as the need for a drink can overcome an alcoholic.
• I go through the cores, the correspondence, the obligations of daily life. Again, I'm here but not really. The clock is running in my head; I know I can indulge in daily crap for a little while, but I must cut it off when the bell rings.
• I'm keenly aware of the Principle of Priority, which states (a) you must know the difference between what is urgent and what is important, and (b) you must do what's important first.
• What's important is the work. That's the game I have to suit up for. That's the field on which I have to leave everything I've got.

How to be miserable

• The artist committing himself to his calling has volunteered for hell, whether he knows it or not. He will be dining for the duration on a diet of isolation, rejection, self-doubt, despair, ridicule, contempt, and humiliation.
• He has to love being miserable. He has to take pride in being more miserable than any soldier or swabbie or jet jockey. Because this is war, baby. And war is hell.

www.envigblogs.com www.envigsblogs.com

People talk about healing like it’s a glow-up. Like it’s peaceful. But for me? It was rage. Silence. Ugly cries. Days where I didn’t know who I was without the mask. Healing didn’t feel like progress; it felt like breaking. But damn if I didn’t need that break to finally rebuild.

In about 60 days will be Oct 20,2021 when I took that picture when I lost myself during Covid, I gain so much weight, I still lifted but my diet and mental health took a deep dive... decided I wanted to be better version of myself and remember the person that started fitness 10 years ago to make him proud.

Been almost 4 Long years, in 60 days actually, crazy how it’s been that long

I found this simple yet solid advice and thought I should pass it along to others who value motivation. To make it more fun I see it like a game I named "The green game" The goal everyday is to check off more things on the green side than the red side. If you win you win gained courage, gained motivation, self-confidence and overall improved well being. Lets go! 🏁💪✅