It's something that kind of reflects who I am from my last name, but also that effectively I have one eye now. I wanted to come on Swell and talk about that journey. The journey going in was scary. I had no idea what to expect. So many questions unanswered and coming out of surgery, it was successful apart from the loss of vision
phil spade
@Phil · 4:49
And as time went on, I thought, this isn't getting better, and this is getting a little weird. And the first lesson that I want to impart to people is if something doesn't feel right, if something's weird, get in tune with your body, and if something is wrong, get it checked out, get it checked out right away. So that's what I did. I talked to an ophthalmologist and she said, you definitely have something going on
phil spade
@Phil · 4:53
The only thing that I can control is just making sure that my body's prepared for surgery the best way that I can. So I did a lot of things. I worked out. I did cardio, I did a lot of weight training. I did yoga, I did restorative yoga, which was just focused on breathing. I listened to attestations and guided imagery talking about surgery, and I'm forgetting the name of the people that produce the disk that I used
phil spade
@Phil · 4:06
I remember running a few times and then just not being able to see somebody and just kind of getting frustrated and thinking, Man, this sucks. I don't want this to be anymore. I want my sight back. But luckily those thoughts were far and few between. I really didn't have them all that much. And I really started focusing on what mattered more. And I talked to people more
phil spade
@Phil · 4:51
And I've seen people with terrible business ideas, but it's going to pivot into something else if I trust the person and trust that person's vision. And I've seen people with great business ideas that have faltered completely, only to have somebody else come in and picked up that same or similar idea and have either different timing or a different pivot onto that
phil spade
@Phil · 3:33
Or if you know anybody that's going into surgery and they want to know what I did, I'm more than happy to talk to anyone about that. I'm more than happy to help on that. And even if there's one thing that people can climb onto and just say, yeah, that helped, not the whole gamut
But there was about a year period of my life where I was dealing with some health issues, and I wasn't quite getting the answers that I had been hoping for, and it drove me absolutely insane to the point where I think I was causing more damage to myself because I was stressing out
Peter McHugh
@Peterm35 · 3:43
There are also days where I look at the big picture, and I look at things that I have learned and the things that I continue to learn and the things that I continue to evolve into. And I go, wow, this is a pretty challenging journey for sure. But I continue to learn and I continue to grow and very much you like yourself
phil spade
@Phil · 1:23
And as you talk about your challenges, I think you're the real hero. You're the one who's powerful and you're the one who comes with a positive attitude and gratitude. It's humbling and great to hear, and it's energizing. It really is. So I thank you for sharing that and almost had a lot of words. It's me. I've never had a lot of words, but that's about as close as I've come in a long time
phil spade
@Phil · 2:31
Taylor, thank you so much for the kind words. I really appreciate it. And, you know, two things. One, you mentioned that sounded like I prepared for battle, and I did. I had a goal of the best patient they've ever seen. I wanted the doctors to talk about how great of a patient I was to operate on that. I was just the most well prepared, best patient ever. Well, I didn't quite get that
Mark Francis Rahaman
@MarkR · 5:00
And you took me through that. If there was a part of me that wanted to stop listening because I was starting to get fearful. And then I listened to you talk about that and what you did. And then I thought about people I've worked with. We've had this conversation about a client of mine who's very brave in her approach and had tests, got physically fit. We found out she needed to get physically fit before her operation, and it made a huge difference to her recovery
Mark Francis Rahaman
@MarkR · 2:28
Hey, fell, I just want to say one more thing, man. You know, we've all heard the saying that it's not how you what happens to you, but it's how you deal with something and that's what's important
phil spade
@Phil · 3:14
Well, although I may feel better, how does that look comparatively, when I'm 100% and I'd say I'm 100% now, but then getting to the weight loss thing after I got better, it's like, hey, now I want to make up for it. And I want to see my friends again. I want to do the things again. And that led to a lot of coffee meetings and beer meetings. So I had a lot of coffee and beer through that
Mark Francis Rahaman
@MarkR · 3:29
And we're currently, like you just said, we're in the last bit of this round, right? And as you know, fights are one or lost rounds of one are lost right at the end, right at the last few seconds. So we don't want the diet to come along and dazzle. The judges are still around. And that's happened to me a few times. My wife, she's had a hard week, man, and she wants to get something and something nice
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 2:50
It's just slowing down to be with the human behind anything else. So it's just really great to hear this holds conversation unfold. So thank you. And I hope it continues
phil spade
@Phil · 1:56
And I'm going to bring him on as well. I have a meeting with him next week, and I've been meaning to do that. And all he does, he just talks about empathy, and I really think that that is key. It's just very key in business and really just getting to understand other people. And I think that's the real human aspect that you're getting at
I did the mistake of clamming up and not choosing to share about my health issue with people close to me. And in retrospect, I can see how that could have greatly made my anxieties easier to bear had I done that. And you think that my experience would have taught me to stay clear of Google Health diagnosis. But I must admit that even now, at times, I tend to do that looking up symptoms, Ailments and then spending hours fretting over what comes up in my search results
phil spade
@Phil · 1:07
Merely human. Thank you so much for your reply. And I'm really humbled by your words. Really am. So thank you so much and hate to hear about the situation with your mother in law just does not sound good. And it just kind of reminds me just how lucky I was. And am there's people that just face so much worse? I just hate to hear that. I really do. I was just humbled
phil spade
@Phil · 1:55
Nameless Journal. Thank you so much for the kind words. And again, I'm just tumbled. I really am. This has just been not like anything I expected. I really didn't. I don't know what I expected. I halfway thought, you know what? If I tell a story, nobody listens. You are kind of vulnerable when you put that out there. But the response has just been so great. And people like you and merely human humbling me in that way
Sreeja V
@Wordsmith · 1:03
I'm honestly amazed by your positive outlook and your ability to use this experience to reflect and reach out with that most sensitivity and empathy to others out there. Many of us get so caught up with our own struggles and usually make a mountain of a molehill. And I think experiences like yours and the way you handle the situation is such a lesson in humility