My Dog Has Cancer - 03/14/2016

[Brian Davis]

Kind of a strange post for a real estate investing forum but I will tie this back to real estate. I recently realized that writing is a good outlet for me and sharing my thoughts can maybe help someone else so it’s a win-win. I think stories from our lives can sometimes be the most valuable lessons to help move our business in one direction or another so here it is.

Yesterday my dog was not looking good. He was lethargic and throwing up and looked sick. So last night after dinner, I brought him to the emergency pet hospital. They looked at him and said he would be best off staying the night so they can run some tests and make sure he is gonna be ok. We got a call a few hours later from the doctor and she said that from everything she can see, it appears that he has cancer and it seems a tumor in his spleen had ruptured. This means he will need surgery today.

This is not an easy pill to swallow. He is your typical awesome little dog that doesn’t have a bad bone in his body. He always means well and loves us unconditionally. He is our best friend and is my immediate family and he is irreplaceable. We love Scooter and he is good to us.

So I was thinking about it this morning on my run while wiping some tears away. (It's a strange experience running through the streets crying. Probably good it was dark so the neighbors couldn't see me.) Our pets have a much shorter life so we are continually reminded of a huge life lesson that we need to be reminded of as it is an all important truth to remember.

We are not guaranteed tomorrow. All we have is today so we better make the most of it.

Scooter is not dead. We plan to have the surgery today and make sure we can do whatever we can for him. We are hoping that the cancer is not malignant and he will go on to live a long healthy life. He is only 8 years old and the toughest guy you could imagine so my thoughts will be positive. That being said, this experience did remind me of that all important lesson that is crucial to remember.

Tomorrow is not guaranteed so we better make the most of today. Do the things we know we need to do today. Be honest with people. Follow your dreams. Create a new, exciting vision for your life since you only have 1 opportunity to make those dreams a reality.

For real estate: make the calls you need to make to reach the goals you need to reach to make this an incredible life for you and your family. Put up the bandit signs. Mail the letters. Buy the house. Make it bigger and badder if that's what you desire. Think bigger. Get stronger. Be better.

We have only one chance and one opportunity to move through this life. It seems that now would be a good time to start turning our dreams into realities. Now would be a good time to treat people how they should be treated. Now would be a good time to say the things we think but never say. Now would be a great time to be honest with ourselves.

I write this because I understand what I need to do, not that I always do it. So I hope it doesn't come off as preachy. I have been writing for myself as it is therapeutic and it's good for me to reaffirm with myself the things I need to do and hopefully it resonates with someone else. I recently had the conclusion that if I can connect with 1 person out of 100, it's better than connecting with 0 out of a million. So that’s my story today.