Death Puts Things Into Perspective

I had no plans on writing about what I’m going to talk about today.

Before I sat down to write this week’s soul post, I wanted to write about some of the lessons I’ve learned in the last few weeks of my three month Asia trip, as Ivy and I are flying back to LA in less than 24 hours.

I had written these notes down to be my starting points:

“Be the best imperfect person you can be.

Living in the now versus this painful imaginary future I self-created that isn’t real. that causes uncertainty”

But I just received the news that my childhood best friend’s dad just passed away from cancer this morning.

I didn’t know he had cancer, I haven’t spoken to that friend in a while but that news really hit me hard this morning for some reason.

It reminded me how insignificant things in life are in comparison to death.

Those little issues I was going through this week feel irrelevant to write about today.

If I’m being honest there’s also an element of his dad being around the same age as my dad and that with my history of losing my grandfather to cancer, my previous fiance to cancer that I definitely have that little voice in the back of my head thinking about that stuff.

I’ll be transparent that this is just me “writing out loud” without filters or structure.

But isn’t it crazy how we feel like the world is ending because we hit some bumps in the road, like an employee leaving, having a bad month, getting into an argument with someone you love and we make it out to be this big thing in our head but as soon as death enters the conversation everything becomes so insignificant.

Like an ant to an elephant.

I shed a few tears this morning and it’s making me reflect that everything I write about and do in my life for myself and in service for others is to try to be the best version of myself, the healthiest, the happiest, the most free unedited version of myself simply so that I can spend quality time and create beautiful memories with the people I love.

When you boil it all down, under all the goal setting and self-development and striving for a better life, the thick of it is to be happy, healthy, and have a good circle of people you love and who love you around you.

So to tie it back to this news I got this morning, death puts things into perspective.

… (I paused for 5 mins as my heart didn’t know what to write).

I’m just… grateful to be alive today.

Yes life throws its challenges, yes I have to put out fires here and there but, God do I feel blessed to just be breathing clear air through my nose, God do I feel blessed to have my beautiful and incredible wife Ivy sitting next to me as I’m writing this.

I’m grateful to have both my parents and I wish I could see them more often than I currently do (For context I live in LA with my wife and they live in Quebec, Canada).

I’m grateful for the work I get to do in my business and for a living. I’m grateful for my life journey with all the ups and downs that came with it because I wouldn’t be Me without it and I certainly would not have the life I have without it.

Oh wow, I did not expect to write about that today. This piece might not resonate with anyone ahah but my heart wanted to write it so here it is.

Life is just so darn interesting, you just don’t know what is going to happen next. All I can do is keep showing up as honestly as I can, stay close to the people I love, and trust that the rest will figure itself out.

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading. Feel free to share your thoughts with me.

I appreciate you,

PS. I’m heading off on my monthly digital detox starting May 1st as I take the first seven days of every month to do a digital detox (No phone, no computer, no social media, no work, no emails, etc…) I’ve been doing this for over three years now and it’s changed my life, mental health and joy for life.

So I won’t be posting next week since I’ll be offline, but I’ll be back online the following week to share some of my takeaways from that digital detox as I always learn something new every single time.

Have a good rest of your week and see you next time

Maxime Sigouin