What is the gift life is giving you?

A few years ago, on one beautiful, blue sky and hot Sunday morning I was driving to town when one friend called me. He asked me to park my car and call him back. He needed to talk to me urgently.When I parked my car I called him back. “What is so important? I asked, a bit annoyed as I was already late to get to my appointment. “Janne is dead”, he said, “the paramedics tried to revive him but he did not make it”.

BOOOMMMMMM!!!

Life is short. It truly is.

For some, life ends sooner than it should. And on that day, I had a harsh reminder of this when I received that call to let me know that my first husband unexpectedly passed away, way too soon.

I could not breathe, so I got out of the car in search of air. I wanted to run but was only able to take 2 steps before my legs gave up on me. So I fell on the floor and just stayed there crying, in complete disbelief.

As it turned out, the world did not collapse even if I did, temporarily. It is hard to watch the world keeping on spinning for everyone else when your life suddenly has such a hole in it.

Sometimes life is turned upside down when you least expect it, like it happened to me. Sometimes it is not so dramatic but we all have to deal with difficult situations at some point in our lives: someone offends us, we are treated unfairly, we lose our job, we go through a breakup… Reality is, there are many events in life we do not choose and cannot control.

But life is not just about what happens to you, it is also about how you react to it. Now, I am not saying that you should not be sad or upset if something bad happens. Actually you should! That is normal and even healthy. But there is something else you can do: make a choice.

“The price of greatness is responsibility“ – Winston Churchill

I recently came across this life‘s equation as presented in the book “The Success Principles” by Jack Canfield.

E + R = O (Event + Response = Outcome)

An event is anything and everything that happens in your life and is outside of your control to change. The weather, the traffic, a co-worker’s comment, your partner’s behaviour, your neighbour’s opinion, the death of a dear one…

What most of us do is blaming the events for the things that are not going so well in our lives. We believe that the events in our lives determine the outcome we experience and that there is nothing we can do. We believe E=O.

Jack Canfield tells us that it is not the external conditions or circumstances, that you cannot control, but how you choose to respond (R) to the events that determines your outcome.

Have you ever seen 2 people experiencing the same event but having completely different outcomes? The reason was that they responded differently to the event.

I hate cold and rain. So last weekend when my husband and I went to spend the weekend in the North of Luxembourg and it started to rain, I got annoyed. We had planned to go for walks in the forest and enjoy nature. The rain though, was not in my plans, and I felt that it was ruining my long awaited relaxing weekend. My husband, on the other hand, could not care less about the rain and had a wonderful time. We both experienced the same event. But why were our outcomes so different? I let the event determine the outcome I experienced: Rain = Ruined Weekend. My husband though, decided that nothing would spoil his weekend and he could still enjoy nature, despite the rain. He decided to focus on what he could control: his thoughts, his behaviour, his actions, his response to the event, instead of focusing on what he could not control – the weather.

Having a choice on how to respond to the event is empowering. It means you are in the driver’s seat of your life.

Look, you can blame your circumstances, your boss, your spouse, your parents or the planetary movements for your harsh reality. Or you can take responsibility for your own life. The word responsible comes from 2 words: response and able. So being responsible means that while you cannot always choose what happens in your life, you are always able to choose how you respond.

After Janne’s death and a grieving period, I decided to take responsibility for my own life. I could not change the fact that he died, no matter how badly I wish he would still be alive. Either I would feel sorry for myself and continue suffering or I would look for what life was trying to teach me.

Tony Robbins says: “Some people believe that life is happening to them, and because of this, they get weighed down when something bad happens. Other people believe that life is happening for them, and that each incident — good or bad — is shaping them into the person they are meant to become.” I realised that I was meant to become a role model for women, sharing my journey and my own learnings so that you know you are not alone in your fears and struggles and that if I can move forward so can you. I sincerely hope that what I have learned so far can be of use to you and inspire you to move forward and get rid of your limiting beliefs so you can truly succeed. And this, I feel very deep in my heart, is my purpose in life. This is the gift life gave me after Janne’s death, when I decided to put the R in my life‘s equation.

Only after he died, I started to think what legacy I would want to leave behind when I would pass away. This led me to find out my purpose in life. And since then I am working towards fulfilling it.

Nothing can change the pain that you have experienced in the past or are experiencing right now or you will experience in the future. There are things that happen in life that are tragic, unfair and difficult to accept. But there is always a gift, a lesson to be learned, even in the most painful moments of your life so you can become who you are meant to be.

Choose how you respond to the events intentionally and choose carefully how you interpret the events, how you choose to think about what happened, and most importantly how you choose to act. Remember, you do not control what happens in your life but you can control your destiny, so make it a fantastic one! There is always a gift.