Befriending the Reality of Death?—?Part 1

“If any Oncologist on this planet tells you that they understand your cancer, then they are lying to you”, said my oncologist to me and my wife.

This was during my first follow-up with my oncologist on January 19, 2012 after my surgery. The tumor was removed from my body, but nobody knew about the prognosis. My cancer was so rare that there was not much research done on it. It was a variant of Osteosarcoma that does not usually responds to the standard Osteosarcoma treatment protocols. My oncologist was extremely concerned about the metastasis. He was very empathetic while breaking this news to us, but at the same time he did not want to give us any false hope. That day I realized how difficult it is to be an oncologist. I have a very special place for them in my heart.

So, there me and my wife were with a big question mark, what’s next? It felt like somebody has just announced a death sentence for me. However, this news did not hit us as badly as the “You have got cancer” news. By this time we were already practicing being in the present moment. However, it took some time for this reality to sink in. While observing my emotions, I realized that there were two things that I was not comfortable with:

• I have not yet lived my life; I don’t want to die so soon.
• What would happen to my family after I die? What would happen to me? Is that the end to everything for me?

There was this regretful feeling of incompleteness within me, and the fear of unknown. In this article I am going to talk about how I dealt with the feeling of incompleteness.

Throughout our lifetime we see many incidences of “untimely” deaths. However, most of us always feel that that won’t happen to us or our loved ones; and that we will live a normal life, and die of a natural cause. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this feeling itself; however, the problem is when we start taking things for granted, and ignore the people and things that matter the most. I was one such person. I was too much focused on my career, and was not giving any time for my family who actually mattered the most. I was not even giving any time for myself. I never asked to myself, “What do I really want to do with my life?”. Till then I never lived a complete life. So, I decided to fix that first. The question was how?

The most fundamental realization that dawned upon me at that point was — I should live my life in such a way that I can die without any regret at any moment.

Spending Time with My Family

That time I had almost a year long cancer treatment journey ahead of me, so I had all the time just for myself and my family. So, it was easy to be with them throughout the treatment. In fact I needed them the most during my treatment. I know that sounds selfish, but nevertheless that was the great opportunity for me to bond myself with my family.

My treatment ended in about a year. The scans also showed no signs of metastasis or local recurrence. So, I was in remission. It was a great feeling that lasted for few months, until the reality hit me that at work I had lost my project, my team, and my career that took me over a decade to build. I had to start from zero; and I was alone. Also, being in remission meant the possibility of relapse was still going to be looming over me for next 5 years.

Cancer survivors are faced with numerous challenges, such as rebuilding their career, dealing with the fear of relapse, financial toxicity, and many more. At Neuhope we have a team of cancer survivors, and cancer patient advocates who understand these challenges very well. We are establishing strategic partnerships with selected cancer focused organizations to address such challenges faced by cancer survivors, by leveraging our innovative Neuhope SaaS platform.

Having a great career and being successful was extremely important to me. I always wanted to feel on top of the world. That was “me”, and I didn’t want to make any compromises there; however, at the same time I didn’t want to end up taking the same path towards building my career that took me away from my family. I wanted my career and my family life to somehow converge at something that would be meaningful to both: me and my family.

I was embarking on a long journey to explore and build the right career for me, and that journey begun with one question: What do I really want to do with my life?

What do I Really Want to do with My Life?

My desire to have a great career was driven by my desire to be successful, which was further driven by my desire to feel on top of the world. I decided to figure out the source of that feeling. After reflecting on my life so far, starting from my childhood days, one thing that stood out was that I always loved helping others.

While I enjoyed my personal achievements, the joy of helping others was always long lasting for me, and that made me feel more complete. I always loved going out of my way to help others. While I worked hard, I hardly asked for raises, promotions, stocks and bonuses. I was fortunate to have all these things follow me instead, but there were patches in my career where that didn’t happen, but that did not bother me as much. For me the feeling of creating a positive change in the lives of many people (my colleagues and our customers) was the most important measure of my success.

There was my “Aha!” moment. I wanted to touch people’s lives! It took me three years after entering remission to figure this out. I further realized that being successful is not a destination, but it is a state of mind when you always get to do what you truly want to do. You don’t have to wait for your success, you can be successful now.

So, it was crystal clear to me that:

• I want to touch people’s lives.
• I want to succeed in doing that everyday.
• I want to scale my efforts.
• I want to get my family onboard with this plan.

It was apparent that if I could do this, then I will always feel complete. I can die at any moment without any regret. This also helped me in effectively dealing with the possibility of relapse. I felt so empowered!

After finishing my cancer treatment and entering the remission, I wanted to help cancer patients. From time to time I would talk to newly diagnosed cancer patients and their families, sharing my success story to boost their confidence; however, I was not keen on scaling my efforts, as I was more focused on rebuilding my career.

Everything changed, once I realized what I really wanted to do. It created a strong sense of urgency in figuring out a way to scale my efforts to help cancer patients and their families in sustainable fashion. Also the definition of the beneficiaries of my efforts expanded from cancer patients and their families to oncologists, oncology nurses, cancer focused organizations, volunteers and social workers associated with them — basically all people who touch cancer patient’s life. This also resonated very well with my family, as together we had been through the painful experience of facing cancer and rebuilding our lives.

It was crystal clear by then that scaling my efforts in sustainable fashion would be the point of convergence for my career, and for my family.

I was already a cutting-edge technologist. At that time I was directly mentored by Tom Laffey. When I expressed my desire of scaling my efforts to Tom, he said “Eventually somebody will solve this problem. It’s a very time and capital intensive problem. If you feel passionate about solving it, then you have to do it by yourself”. Tom was also gracious enough to join me on this journey hand in hand.

This is how Neuhope, Inc. was born with the goal of improving outcomes and quality of life for patients and their families experiencing cancer or any chronic disease.

It has been two years after co-founding Neuhope Inc. with Tom. Every moment ever since then, me, my family and my career are all aligned around the goal of scaling our efforts to touch people’s lives. This makes not just me, but all of us complete. This is why we all have big smile on our faces, in spite of all the hardships of startup journey.

Death is the reality that is always driving us in the direction of finding our true calling. It creates a sense of urgency in figuring out a way to align our entire life around what matters the most. When we succeed in doing that it makes us feel complete.