Embrace the Suck

Terry Tucker is a man of many talents, careers, and skills. Listen in as he shares his incredible story of fighting a terminal form of cancer over the past ten years while staying motivated, inspired, and embracing the suck! The power of hope keeps him positive and determined every day.

Key Takeaways

• Staying Determined in Moments of Despair – Allowing yourself to feel the pain, frustration or anger but then choosing to face the problems and live as best as possible afterwards.
• Diagnosis and Grief- Having a terminal or concerning diagnosis of any kind can be terrifying. We often go through the stages of grief as a way to cope with a medical diagnosis. It is normal to go through all of them, anger, denial, etc.

You mention that grief cycle and grief is not linear, and you know it hits you at different times and you may think you’re past something and then it brings you back.

• Mindset Over Matter – Realizing what may no longer be within your control and choosing to respond/react to it in a way that benefits you both in the long and short term. Making the conscious decision to not find blame but find motivation.
• Bad Days Happen – Be patient with yourself, these moments can be frightening and lonely and difficult, not every day will be patient, not all days will be good – and that’s ok.
• Blame and Your Health – This can be very common, when there is something going on with your health you look to find answers, however, many times we don’t have them. While it may feel natural to explore reasoning as a sort of comfort, it is important to remember that yourself and others are rarely responsible for a terminal disease. Even so, if something is medically life altering (like someone pushed you in the pool and you ended up paralyzed) the fact of the matter is, your diagnosis doesn’t change.
  • Also note, self-blame is far more harmful than productive.

Basically he did a very simple experiment. He took rats and he put rats in a tank of water that was over their head and he wanted to see how long the average rat could tread water and the average rat treaded water for about 15 minutes. And just as the rats were getting ready to sink and drown, he reached in, grabbed them, pulled them out, dried them off and let them rest for a while, and then he took those exact same rats and put it back in that exact same tank of water. And the second time around, on average, the rats treaded water for 60 hours.

• The Power of Hope – Remaining hopeful is a power beyond measure. If we believe that things can improve or that we are leaving a positive mark, hope can keep us going.
• We Are Only Capable of What We Believe We Are Capable Of – Our bodies and minds can stretch much farther than we believe they can. We are only capable of something once we are capable of it. We push ourselves and our limits to continue to reach greater lengths than we ever thought possible.
• Nothing is a Quick Fix – Changing your mindset and perspective take time, there is no quick and easy fix. This is a time to acknowledge things that are difficult and take the time to truly understand ourselves and our thoughts.

Mental is to physical as 4 is to 1…your mind or your mind set is four times more important than anything your physical body is going to do.

• Embrace the Suck – When things are hard or bad, we need to find a way to make the best of the situation. Realizing that your physical body is nowhere near as important as the rest of you.
• “No” is the Best Word in Your Vocabulary – Realizing that “no” is what allows us to do all the things we want in life. “No” gives us space and time and comfort. Our days should be filled with no’s.

Spend more time worrying about your heart, your mind and your soul, because that’s who you really are.

Where to Find Terry

• Website – MotivationalCheck.com
• His book! Sustainable Excellence (link to Amazon)
• And he’s on LinkedIn! Terry Tucker

Credits and Thanks

• Many thanks to our friends and families (our “villagers”) for listening, and for your continued support.
• That’s a Hard No is a joint production of Clever Girl Marketing and Purposeful Growth & Wellness.
• Marketing and Production Coordinator, Maura Del Rosario.
• Production Support, Evergreen Podcasts, Noah Foutz, Producer.
• Music: “Whiskey for Lunch” by GG Rigs.