Why Your Health Condition Doesn't Have to Kill Your Ambitions

What do you do when your health changes, but your dreams still matter? Today we're talking about illness, ambition, and what it takes to keep going without abandoning yourself. Welcome to Beyond Diagnosis. I'm Rita De Michele. This podcast is for people looking beyond symptoms and exploring what else might be possible for their health. Through expert conversations and real-life stories, we explore functional holistic approaches to healing, wellbeing, and feeling like yourself again. Brought to you by the Beyond Diagnosis Collective, Your connection to trusted holistic practitioners. My guest is Bron Watson, a registered nurse and creator of the Serenity Project. After breast cancer and 5 years later, an incurable blood cancer, Bron had to rethink resilience, healing, self-trust, and how to build a life that can bend without breaking. This conversation is for anyone navigating illness, burnout, caregiving, or life interruption and asking, how do I keep going without losing myself? Welcome, Bron.

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

It is devastating when someone gets a cancer diagnosis, and you've had two. So you know, I was chatting to you before we I pressed record, and you have this amazing vibrancy about you. Like it just doesn't seem to have devastated you in a way that you can't get on with life. Bron, take us back to that first diagnosis. What was the first thing you were afraid of that would change?

Just some context around that. So obviously, yes, nurse nurse educator, and I've had a dual career of marketing of all things. Things throughout that time as well. So I'd started my first business in 2012 and it had morphed into this beast of a business in the mentoring space of building businesses online for small business owners. I was using my marketing experience and then I just seemed to have this gift of being able to strategically look into people's businesses, but it came with a cost. So I built this big business mentoring, you know, you know, member, you know, masterminds, workshops, all of the things, online You name it. I followed what everybody else was doing in the last 10, 15 years and went, oh, well, you know. But through that time, I knew something wasn't right. It just sat in here and it was not in alignment. Building something like that. And then it was about, honestly, like 1:40 on a Thursday afternoon, Bron, you have breast cancer and no, it's not in the early stages. To— I live in regional New South Wales, so driving to Sydney and I'm on the operating table the following Wednesday afternoon for a mastectomy. In terms of Fear. I couldn't even put into words what it feels like to be what I now call the vortex of fear. I'm in that vortex and that thing is spinning so hard. I didn't know what was up and what was down. I've got this massive mastermind, clients, the things, all of the things that you do, plus 5 children. So here I am going, cool, we're gonna have to find someone to mind the children. And my best friend came from Sydney. So in terms of being able to take you through that, um, the terror I can't put into words. At 48. So we go through the surgery. 3 weeks later, we're starting chemotherapy, after which anyone who's been through breast cancer, you know, it's like 30 years old. Like, what the hell? Are we still treating people like this? And there's a lot of research in this space, as you all know. And after that second chemotherapy, I had delivered a Facebook Live back in the day when you delivered Facebook Lives into your groups. So here I am, I deliver this 4 hours after getting out of hospital, out of the cancer institute. What was I thinking? But I wanted to deliver what I said I was gonna deliver because that was my badge of honor. You know, I, I was one of those people who wanted to deliver and be the best I could be for my clients, my family, obviously coming all the way through nursing. Well, it comes from this empathic, empathic, caring nature until that very moment when I caught a glimpse of myself. And I'm looking at myself, I'm looking this way 'cause I literally am looking at myself in the mirror. I'm thinking, who is that person? Round, red face, no hair, still had eyebrows at that stage. Eyelashes are gone.

Mm-hmm.

And I went, if you don't stop what you're doing, you're going to die. And it was in that split second, there was, I can't say fear, but literally my whole life was in chaos. In that split second, I made the decision to back myself because I wasn't prepared. It took that much. You know, I hope everyone listening doesn't have to get to that point to go, what's right for me? And I shut the mastermind down overnight with no plan B.

I can't believe that you would deliver something like 4 hours after.

Silly me.

That's the thing, isn't it? How far removed we've become from ourselves. Now, somebody would say, oh, that's people pleasing or whatever. I mean, people pleasing actually can go in through business or personal, but it goes— I think it goes a lot more beyond that.

It's a lot beyond people pleasing because it was, for me, it was about delivering what I said I was going to do.

Integrity.

It was all about integrity because my top strengths are around authenticity, Integrity, honesty. So I was doing what I thought was right for my, for my people. And it wasn't till I realized at what point was I going to go, you're going to be no use to anyone, Bron, if you keep this up. It took a long, you know, it— I'm great now, but even with incurable cancer, I'm great. Why? Because I've learned so much. We can learn so much to walk away from that You know, resilience, not everyone has it, but you can absolutely learn resilience. And the opposite of resilience is relentlessness. What I was doing, I was relentless because that's what I thought I was meant to do.

You know, 5 years later, you were diagnosed with an incurable blood cancer. So not only did you have breast cancer, it was like, are you listening? Can I knock on you a bit harder? Let me give you something else. To wake up. How did that kind of change your relationship with uncertainty once you got that?

Oh, look, very, very good question. So I've done a lot of work from that moment of going, do you wanna die, through until that 5-year mark. I had done a lot of work for me, on me, for me, not for anyone else. And that all came about in a very random way because I'm at my 5-year clearance. As you know, in Australia, at the 5-year mark, you are considered cured if you're in a curative lane. So here I am. I've been blessed and released from the surgeon. Goodbye. Bless you, Bron. Best of luck. Oncologist, same deal. And it wasn't because my GP said, Bron, you know what, these neutrophils, which are part of your white blood cells, which is all part of, you know, fighting inflammation and infection, they're low. They've been low for 5 years. Never had a problem until then. We might send you off to a hematologist. Go to the hematologist. Hematologist said, Bron, great, you're perfect. Don't need to see you again. 4 days later, got a phone call. You know, Bron, you know those 2 markers, those 2 results that hadn't come in that I'd said to you not to worry about? Well, they're bad. They're like really bad. We're gonna need to do a bone marrow biopsy. Flew around the words multiple myeloma. And being in the country, it took from that date, January 14th, to the 23rd of February to be formally diagnosed.

Wow.

Now that's where— now that, if I thought I had been taken to a hard place, that was, that was way, way worse. Because by that stage I'm Googling and up comes terminal. God, I'm 54 now. I've got these children. They've already been through hell. Now they're about to go through hell Again, what is this? And then I'm linking nurse educator hat. What have I been exposed to? What's the correlation here? Well, Bron, there is none. And we don't have research to do any studies on that.

Great.

Okay. Now what? Well, Bron, you're very rare. At that time, I couldn't talk to anyone. I just cried all the time. I'd sit out the side and I'd look up at the trees and go, please God. Now insert whoever you want to believe in, guys. And I'm looking at the tree. Please God, please God, give me time before treatment. Please give me some time. Go back to get diagnosed. Bron, we're starting chemo next week. Okay, well, that went well. But it was then that I realized that this problem for me to learn how to make peace and certainty, it's one of the— well, it is the hardest thing I've ever done. I continue to do that. I feel like after probably 50 appointments during the last 8 years at a cancer institute, businesses, children, life all around me, I now can walk into those cancer institutes. I am I'm no longer living— I no longer walk in with fear. I actually don't even walk in with anxiety. I used to panic a couple of— because I'm going every month, right? And more. Sometimes it's weekly, sometimes it's monthly. I can now walk in completely in my moment. Because if there's one thing that I've learned, which is where Serenity Project came about— I am the project, the beta test here.

Mm.

And what that means, what I had when I had nothing left, Business, children, the whole thing. Remember, more chemo, stem cell transplant, living in a hospital for a month in Sydney, etc., etc. I went back to this prayer that I had learnt called the Serenity Prayer. Anyone who's in NA, NA, narcotics, and on any of those ones, you'll know the Serenity Prayer. God grant me serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change the thing I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. You know, penned nearly 100 years ago, the guys nailed it. I have worked hard to find what I call my serenity now moment. on a path of healing. And that's where I live with uncertainty. And my world is very uncertain. It can change in a blink of an eye. But I'm— I don't feel very— but I'm very— I have it. And to me, it's not being brave, it's courageous to be able to take responsibility for that space. So, so in the present. But I am— I don't like the word control because it's not control. It's just about— it's— there is a word to put it, but it's like consciously present, I suppose, is the best way to word it. I work hard on that.

To heal and to go through what you've gone through, you can't go through it without having a positive attitude. You can't be in a negative state and think that a positive outcome will happen because they're just on 2 different levels. You know, what surprised you the most about who you became in that time? Did you realize, oh my God, I've got this strength, or I've got this softness, a clarity that you didn't know you had?

I actually look back and I think, well, that, that, that's the old Bron. And I feel that for me, remembering this is my path and we all have our own paths. And just for the listeners, just to understand is that what I'm talking about, insert whatever adversity that has come your way, whether it's health, financial, relationships, you name it, mental health, the whole thing. The way that you get through things is no different. Mine just happens to be cancer. Making peace with grief and gratitude at the same time, because they can coexist. But the way we do that is that when those emotions of sadness come and I— oh man, I'll cry, man, I'll feel all of it. I don't really get angry much, I get sad, I grieve. I don't grieve what I've lost because I can't change that. I can't change the past, you know. That's rumination in my world. I call it rumination. I'm not ruminating about the past. I'm not projecting into the future. I have blood tests again next Tuesday. I'm not even giving it one skerrick of energy until I walk through the double doors and I'm sitting in that office and I go, cool, what are the markers this month, doc? And then we'll see. Then we'll take it from there. It's not rainbows and lollipops. I'm not being a Pollyanna. I'm not going, ooh, I'm cured. No, no, no, no, no. I'm healing.

Mm.

I have good days. I have bad days. But the difference now between the old Bron being the relentless Bron Versus the resilient Bron. The resilient Bron now allows it all. Remember the old— have you ever read Rumi or heard of Rumi? You know, back in the 1200s, right?

Yes, Rumi.

He talks about let it in, open the door, but open the back door. That's pretty much what it is for me. I allow the feelings to come, but when they come, I name them. I name that feeling. The reason why— done a lot of research in this space— that psychologically, when you name an emotion, This is my interpretation. For the experts out there, please ignore the bits that I mightn't get quite right. I allow space and what that space gives me. So imagine this is what it's like when you get a diagnosis, right? You cannot see anything in front of you. You cannot literally— you might be lucky to see out the side. What we do when we start working with finding serenity or finding space or the pause, and we name that emotion, we just push it out just a little bit. I still can't see out there, but I can now see here. So what that does with an emotion— so I'm, I am feeling, say I have a day of overwhelm, or I am worried, or I am anxious because I was given a prognosis. I am very much into my prognosis, people, and it was a one-digit prognosis, and I'm 3 years in. I can focus on that, or I can actually focus on what I have here. And when we name that, when we get that space, What I do for me, I pause. Pause allows me— this is the book that I'm writing, is actually called Be Where Your Feet Are, because in that space, be where your feet are. I look down, I literally look at my feet, and that is how I'm teaching myself to stay consciously right here without making a whole movie in my mind about something that could possibly happen but might not.

Absolutely.

So when I'm in that space and I hit the pause, Then it gives me a chance to reflect, which is, hmm, is this in my control or out of my control? So I call it control the controllables. What can I control? Can't control the bloods that are being processed right now in— I think it's Newcastle. I can't control blah blah. I can't control the weather. I can't control what anybody else thinks and says. Well, what can I control? Well, I control I can be where my feet are and have gratitude and grief at the same time. And then when you can respond Mm. Not react. React is an emotion banging into another emotion. We don't want to do that. We want to respond to the one we have. We work through it, whether it be breathing— literally breathe through panic. You know, this is, this is not for when you're in major trauma and it's sitting on your face, right? This is not in the time when you are literally diagnosed today, because that's— you can't process it. But this is for those who, you know, it's starting to settle a little bit. And you can just push it out a bit physically, metaphorically push that out, and then you go, cool, well, what's here?

Like you were saying, just name that emotion, stay with it, don't go, don't catastrophize out. Would it just be as effective if they can't seem to find a word for it, but they just felt it? They just felt the emotion and just went, I'm feeling this and it's— don't know what it is. But I'm feeling it. Would that work just as much?

Whatever word came in, that's the word.

Don't overthink it.

Don't try to— don't overthink it, right? So just sit, right? And you're bawling your eyes out and you're really, really sad. What's the word? I'm just sad. Okay. It's not about being creative. Okay. Interestingly, the reason why one of the things that I'm in the process of is I call them Serenity Now cards, not like an oracle set of cards, but cards with emotions on it. Where you can flip and see the reframe. So we can change it because sometimes you're right. Well, what word am I going to call it? Whatever drops in is the right word. Whatever the first one is. It's an effing shit show. Okay, that's the one. You know what I'm saying? It doesn't matter. Don't overthink it because that's half the battle. So if when we name it you go, okay, effing shit show, we're going to move you out a bit. Out you go. Thank you so much. Literally. And I'm allowed to say that because I have been to the very dark places. Am I always happy and joyful? No. But I've learned to accept what I cannot change. And, and that is why when it comes to going through illness, burnout, there are going to be things. We just got to work on learning them. And everyone can learn. It's not in— it's not intuition. It doesn't just happen. You can learn it.

As humans, we underestimate and don't put enough emphasis on the fact that just focus on what you can do and don't worry about what you can't or what you can't change or what someone else has said or what someone else did. That's in the past because it's never going to be different. Yeah, we just need to stay like you have and what you teach in the present. Did you feel pressure to step back from what you were doing or to shut anything down or choose a part of your life Oh, absolutely.

Very much so. So obviously, as a business owner with a team, I have the most loyal, beautiful, amazing humans. One of them, one of my— Tennille, she's been with me since the first breast cancer. And so here we go, we ring her again, say, Tennille, there's an— we got another pivot coming. Like, we joke about the pivots, and we all hate the word pivot because of COVID So in terms of the business, we scaled right back.

Mm-hmm.

But I kept it going because of these beautiful humans who had such trust in me. From a practical perspective, we put in amazing systems and we scaled right back and we've plotted through since 2023. I'm really proud of what we've been able to achieve by these incredible humans who supported me. We were able to deliver again. I didn't wear it like a badge anymore, deliver what we say we're gonna deliver. I was discerning on, on who we worked with and who we didn't. You know, because I'd come out of the hole of 2017, 2018, and, and obviously chopping in the three-quarters of the business away and having to evolve out of that. And because I had done training with this beautiful woman called Jennifer, who had been a very senior part of the Barack Obama social media campaign of his second presidency, I figured what she knew was kind of cool. It worked. And that to this day is still incredible stuff that I learned. So I just focused on Social media, Facebook workshops, whatever, back in 2018. So that's where we evolved with the social coach. So we were able to evolve and, and with technology we could bring in the processes so that if I wasn't there, it would be okay. And I'd step— I mean, I stepped out for a month, 2 months at a time, and then these incredible humans kept things going. In terms of the people around us, people going through cancer will understand this, that there are times— there are a lot of people who will just Leave your life because they don't know how to handle it. And it just, it just brings about— it's anyone who's had a serious adversity will understand. There are people who stay and there are people who don't because people come for seasons. So now energetically, I did a lot of work on energy healing. My energy is the most important thing. I've learned how to look after my energy. So through that, yes, lots left. When I say left, I let go, or in In actual fact, because I used to— people used to say to me, oh, Bronwyn, you just gotta let it go. Well, I would if I knew how. I don't know how to let go.

I hate that saying. I hate it when people say that.

Don't, Bronwyn, you just gotta let it go. Well, don't you think I would? But what I realized is John Lennon nailed it. The Beatles nailed it when they sang Let It Be. Because when you let it be, you stop giving it energy.

So you did energy healing, but what did you do?

So there's quantum physics involved. There's spiritual work involved. There's tapping into, into, like, into your gut intuition, into your higher purpose. A lot of the work was the way, because I'm a visual, as you can tell, I, I likened things that had happened in the past, family things, friend things, and they were sort of attached to me like tentacles of an octopus. So when I'm working through What I call— it's almost therapy in some ways, I suppose. But imagine that you've had these things. We would work through behavior patterns that I had learned inadvertently. I didn't know I'd learned them attached to people, places, things throughout my life. So we went right back to when I was little, right through to now. And I likened it to like lifting off that octopus tentacle and letting it go one at a time. Another way to liken it is that we're like a puzzle, you know, and when you're doing a puzzle, you just put little pieces back in. But where I would see, you know, like I was never very good at speaking my truth, meaning my true feelings, not, not for any other reason than not having the strength and the confidence to speak for me. So I'd liken it, well, there's a missing piece. So I did a lot of work around speaking my truth of how I really feel. A couple of months ago, I've just done a— I just did a podcast on it actually, and it was around— I'd met this woman, I thought, right, I'm going to speak my truth, I'm going to, I'm going to speak how I'm really feeling. So, you know what, I'm actually really not okay, but I'm okay. You know, the blood's— one of the cancer markers, it's on the rise, so I'm not— I'm feeling a little bit uncertain. And she went, oh, oh, that's nice. You know what, I'm going on a holiday soon, isn't it fantastic, with all my friends? Or I completely disregarded— I was so shocked because here I am, for me it was such a big deal to Speak how I truly was feeling rather than, oh, I'm great, thanks for asking, or I'm fine. I spoke my truth. And in that moment, Rita, in that moment, I had a choice, which is you can either get offended. Oh my God, I can't believe she did that. That's all about expectation, which is actually one of the Serenity cards. Expectation is emotion. It's not really an emotion, but it's something that you can name, right? So I got— I felt let down. But then I went, hang on a minute, Bron, go you! You spoke your truth. Congratulations. You did it. Finally, you did it. Bang. In goes the puzzle piece. Black hole gone. I learnt that lesson. And it's just a place of calm because I don't have that expectation of, of having subconsciously, you know, Let Them by Mel Robbins. There's a whole chapter on it. It's not subcon— it's subconscious. You don't, you don't, you don't consciously think, well, what am I going to get out of that? But it's just human nature.

Yeah.

So I learnt that lesson of letting go, letting be. It's actually letting be of expectation, but valuing that what I had to feel for myself to verbalize it was the most important thing that I could have done for me.

There are so many layers to us. When someone says, I just can't speak up, there's so much behind that, so much charge behind it. And like you did, you spoke up and someone Diminished it, really. And they just—

100%.

You could either in that moment go into the shame of burdening someone else with your story.

Exactly.

Or you could feel empowered that, you know what, finally I said it. I didn't need a particular reaction from that person.

Exactly.

And do you find that helped you with your overall recovery while you were healing, having that kind of attitude of Wait a minute, I'm first, and then I react to the world this way.

Absolutely. We would go through different— like, whatever came up for me, we'd just address it and then would put it to bed, AKA tentacle off, piece of puzzle in. For me, I have this bizarre feeling that cancer grows in the dark. So in my mind, I wanted— being blood cancer of all things— I want rich, healthy beautiful blood. Why? Because it's the bone marrow, which is where the blood cells are made, which is where the cancer forms. Incurable. Little paraproteins is floating. They can't even pick them up, right? So here I am, I'm thinking how I want to make my blood so beautiful, rich, and red for me as best I can in the moment today, because I don't know what tomorrow's going to bring. I don't know what next week's going to bring. That's what I said. I'm not a— I'm not a Pollyanna. We're not doing rainbows and lollipops. I'm not not saying that I'm not going to have to go back into active treatment. With myeloma, people end up in 6 and 7 lines of treatment before they die, before they pass away. I am living and I'm enjoying every day. So did it help? Absolutely. Because I let it be by literally taking back the energy. But understand that, that by healing me, I'm the best I can be for me. I'll tell you a little bit of a story there. For the last— so from November, not even September, October, one of the cancers has— Marcus has been slowly Rising. This is what happens. They just start coming out of the bag again. And so it's rising. I'm thinking, right. So my questions were in the uncertainty space. Okay, so do they just, do they rise vertically or are we going to get a nice climb over the next couple of years? How do I process this? Well, Bronwyn, it can go either way. You might sit at 50 for a couple of years. Thanks. How do I deal with that? So when I went back in last month, I'm sitting there and I'm waiting and I, as again, no expectation. And he goes, you know, Bron, your cancer markers have dropped right back to the best they've ever been. Remission again, right? So I've had full remission, but it took a long time to get full remission. A lot of people get full remission before they even have a stem cell transplant. So here I'm going, what? So in my mind, my language for it, that's a miracle. I feel miracle. I feel thank you, universe. Thank you, God. I have— I feel like I've been given a leave card. Because when you're on an incurable path, shit goes down. It just does. But it's how we respond in the moment that matters. And that's where I feel that I'm very, very excited because every— we can learn this stuff. You know, if I had my way, remember nursing education hat on here, I would love to lose the word cure and put everyone on a path of healing. Not healed, healing.

It's constant.

Constant healing.

Constant. It's every day, you know, It's to the day you die. I liken it— when some people talk about it, it reminds me like they're talking about an eating plan. Oh, I'm going to be on this eating plan until I lose X amount of kilos, and then that's it. No, you're meant to be on a healthy eating plan all your life. Sometimes when you get rid of the big emotions and the big— you've processed a lot, well, then it's just a continuous— like a car, isn't it, in a way, if I can say?

Absolutely. No, it is.

Mechanistic way. It's Fine-tuning, fine-tuning. Oh, this popped up for me today. What's this about? It's about being curious, asking what is this? Oh yes, yes, you know, and just fine-tuning and questioning what's coming up for me. And that way you're always that mind-body connection. You're always speaking to yourself. Your body's always responding. Beauty, what I love about you is you've, you've done the work. You don't kind of just sit there and think, oh, I'm going to pray to the universe and Oh no, no, no, no. You don't go, I'm going to say my affirmations and everything's going to be right. No, you've got to do the work.

When people go, oh my gosh, Bron, all that, I don't have it in me to do all that work. Okay, so this is the way I like to think about it. This is the way I sort of share this thing, right? You and I are on the basketball court, right? You and I are on the same team. We're going for the shot. We're playing and we're in the offense and we're down there and I miss the bloody hoop. Coach, timeout! You lot, get off the court. In that moment, the coach has 2 choices. The coach can either undo what's just happened. Oh my God, Bron, how did you miss the shot? Like, it was a dead giveaway. I know you can get that. I've seen you do it a thousand times. Or we can focus on the next play.

Mm.

So when things are coming to you, we don't focus on the whole game. We don't focus on the whole season. We're focusing on the next play. So when something happens for me, and I love what you've just said, I couldn't agree more. A trigger. Something happens and you're triggered, right? One, hopefully you're living in a place where you even notice the trigger. Uh, it's usually like, oh my God, how dare they say that? What? So I will turn that— I'm learning, learning, learning to turn the mirror around and go, cool, curious. Where does that come from, Bron? Oh, expectation card again. Great. Thank you so much. Thank you for bringing that up, because remembering, if we can name it or we can acknowledge it, you're halfway there. And that's when, when we're focusing on the next play, which is the one next step, not the 20 next steps, just the one step, the very next thing, that's when change and the good stuff happens. And it happens over time. I know I will. I just don't know how. For someone who was the control freak in nursing, 5 children, in business, I know I'm on a path of healing. I know it 100%. That is my goal. I even wrote it as my— I haven't done a business plan or a strategy for 3 years because I didn't have it in me for the business, right? But this year, I've actually written in pencil, mind you, but I've written in pencil, my primary goal in business is healing. And then all of the things in life, in business, in health, all goes around healing. And the best way to liken that, because I, I know I will, I just, I don't know how because I don't know what's coming, but I know I will.

You left that sort of toxic hustle in business, and it sounds like you've left the toxic hustle in life because you can have a hustle in business and you can hustle in life the same way. And it seems like you've left both. On the business aspect, just give us a snapshot of what this Serenity Project is and how it helps.

It's come about literally by just me working through this stuff. So I call it— it's the gap. So I call it the third space between science and soul and evidence and perspective. So what happens in the treatment of disease or anything, medicine will silo. They'll look at the clinical, they look at the tumor, they look at the blood. But there's actually a whole human being attached to that. But the system doesn't allow that unless— if I was in Sydney, I can have some integrative medicine. Well, I'm not— I can't get it here. You know, people travel hundreds of kilometers just to come to our radiation unit here in Port Macquarie, you know. So medicine is one aspect. And then we have soul, which is all the stuff we've been talking about. And then the evidence is that— I've done a lot of research and I surround myself with with experts, psychologists, rehab counselors, scientists, people who know the things that I will never learn. Like, I can read a scientific article about multiple myeloma, but do you really think I'm going to understand what's going on? The chances are not good, right?

No.

But I know a scientist who does. Hey, what does this mean? And then the perspective comes because, again, that rare word, is because I have worked for 3 decades in nursing as an educator at the bedside. I cannot tell you how many hundreds Hundreds, if not thousands of people I have seen and been a part of when they were diagnosed with cancer. And I never gave it a second thought. I just knew they'd be toddling off to the cancer institute and oncologists and radiations and surgery and la la la, right? Very compassionate at the moment. That was the end of my thought process. Until you're the person in the bed, whole different story, especially when you know what's going on. Some knowledge, which, you know, I'm not a doctor, I'm not meant to know. I have amazing doctors around me. But I— but in that space, I am an active participant, and I'm the CEO of Bron. So whether the CEO of my business, but I'm also the CEO of Bron, my e— I call it an ecosystem, my ecosystem. So what the Serenity Project does is provide a space, the third space, for those people who are looking more than just, you know, beyond the pillar. Because we've got alternative over here, we've got medicine, and it shouldn't be an either or an or, it should be an and. In some places you can have the end, you can get the whole shebang, but not here. A lot of in Australia we don't have all of that. So that's where the community is designed for, so that we can have a large enough people. I want to create a tribe. Think Seth Godin here. I need a tribe for when we go to speak to the Minister of Health, because here's your treatment plan and I want to have a beautiful hot pink— well, here's your roadmap. I can't do it on my own. So this is where I'm using my business acumen, I'm using my nursing profession and me. And it's not just me. I'll have a team. I have a team. I've already got people on my team of experts.

It—

but it's, it's just empowering people to go, hang on a minute. I had a guy last night email me. He said, said, thank you for the conversation because it was on— I was on a livestream into a group in the US. It's brought about— he goes, I've awakened up a part of me that I had forgotten. Thank you for reminding me. On the other side of that, I've had another person say, Bronwyn, why are you bothering? You know, why are you doing this? It's a great question. Well, it's not my identity because it's bigger than me, but it's something that I have. I have enough vision and enough experience because I'm in this very weird space that I can at least start something. But I look after me first all the time. Bronwyn's cup is full. I can promise you that. And the overflow, that's what you guys are seeing now.

A fantastic mission. My mother had a catastrophic stroke, but she survived 14 years. But in between having a stroke and then leaving the hospital and going into a nursing home, because it was, you know, she couldn't move, etc., there was a person there that was lost, that was still whole, but it was just too, uh, like you say, siloed. In the hospital, they did the best. They saved her life, all the rest of it.

Of course they did.

Beautiful. Beautiful. But it's all siloed and it was never really looking at the person. You know, they came up to me at one point and said, your mother won't stop crying. We might have to move her because she keeps crying. I said, well, I think it's because she's just lost everything in her life. She can't— she's paralyzed and she can't speak. She's trapped.

It's just got her trapped in her heart, in her body. She knew exactly what was going on.

She did. She had a full—

she knew.

She had a full mind. But there was nothing else. Like she— you were saying there was nothing else. for her, you know, there wasn't any, um, and it was left to us is what I'm trying to say, to try and find the holistic treatment, to try and work out how to help her psychologically. And, you know, and then how to—

And the pains in her hands and her feet that aren't moving anymore, there's pain involved with that. And it's, it's just, just so people understand, the system is doing the best it can with what it has. It's not an either/or. It's got to be an and for all. You know, we talk all inclusivity in life nowadays, NDIS, the whole thing, aged care, the whole thing is all about all inclusivity. Okay, let's put— let's just put this down here now.

That's right.

Let's bring it about. It's got to happen.

I mean, that's, that's my mission, why I've got the podcast, why I've developed the collective of, you know, functional and holistic practitioners to make it easier for you to find. Because you may not— like you, you don't want to accept a limited prognosis.

I don't. But you may not be right. But I'm not being ignorant either. Please understand that.

Exactly.

I'm not fighting against a system. I'm working with that. And I would love to connect your people to Serenity when we have our community opening. It's opening in June. Because why? That side of our soul, our spiritual space, is so important. As important as medicine. It is medicine. That's the whole point. It's that everything is medicine.

Bron, tell me, for someone who's, you know, uh, facing illness, grief, crisis, what do you want them to know about protecting their well-being and their dreams?

What I would love them— first of all, I'm going to say I'm really, really sorry that's happening to you, and it sucks. I really want to acknowledge you and what you're going through. Because acknowledgement rather than, oh, you'll be right. Oh, really? Thanks a lot. Versus, oh my God, that sucks. I'm so sorry. That really sucks. And where I would suggest they start with that, no matter what the adversity, is start the practice of being where their feet are. You might need to remind yourself every 3 minutes, you know, but you want— you may need to keep coming back. Why? Because your brain, when it is in And fight and flight, as we know, is stuck down here, which is your reptilian brain. Your frontal lobe, which is where your higher purpose and higher decision-making processes take place, they will separate during fight and flight. So we gotta physically, physiologically bring that closer together. And that's what happens when we consciously work on being where we are. And just look at your feet. Start looking with your feet and go, okay, cool. Nice slippers, Bron. No, literally, whatever. I'm not joking, really. And then we want to look at naming that emotion. I've already just been through this. Control the controllables. Write it down. You know, one of the best things you can do is journaling. You know, I don't know if you remember— do you remember The Artist's Way from the '90s?

Yes, I do.

And the morning pages? Oh my God, yes. You can just write, it sucks. I would write something which is, you know, doctor's such a jerk. You are such a jerk. Such— can I swear?

Yeah.

I won't say a bad word. D-head, right? You are such a D-head. Because that's what I was feeling. That's naming my emotion, right? Scrunch it up, light a candle, blow on it, burn it, take it away, and then let it be. Don't try to fix it because once you've named it and you've acknowledged it, you'd be in that— in the spiritual space, people do it all the time. Because we want to just name it and let it out and let it be. Don't look for a solution. Don't go down the control track. Don't go down the control factor.

That analyzing.

Don't analyze it. Don't look for solutions. Get off Google. Get off AI. It's not going to help you right now. Just let it be. And guess what? It will pass. But it passes without bringing That negative, Dr. So-and-so, you're a dickhead. I'm not leaving it in me. I'm allowing it out. Literally, if you haven't got a candle, just— you've got to write it down. Write it down because psychologically, again, when we write things down, it's telling our brains, oh, that must be important. Screw it up.

Throw it away.

But then, but then honor yourself by letting it and not fester it back in again. Don't let it back in. You've already just let it out. And then you leave it to whatever you believe in to take care of it. That to me is the most powerful, you know, to the point with my— with one of my specialists who I love dearly, he rang me on Christmas Day 18 months ago with my blood results because that's the relationship I have with him. But I earned that. And it's not because of my background. It's because I'm an active participant. I want to be there. I want to be a part of it. CEOs make the decisions, right? So who's on your committee?

That's a big part of why I do what I do.

Exactly.

You've got to be an advocate for yourself. No one knows you better than you. And who's going to advocate for you better than you? If you can't do it, what, you're going to expect to put it in someone else's hands? Yeah, you know, I mean, there'll be There are times when someone can't, and that's when you need someone.

You do need an advocate. I absolutely agree with that.

When you can walk into a room and speak and breathe and all the rest of it, that's when you have to be an advocate. And if you want something different to what they're saying, ask for it.

Ask some questions. This, this, this person here, the active vice— the active participant, she wasn't there all the time. Man, I just— nursing, do as you're told.

Oh, okay. Exactly.

Wrong. Only if it's right for Bron.

Yes.

If I had my time again, would I have allowed myself to be on an operating table 6 days after a diagnosis? Absolutely not. No, Bron, we need some processing here. We need some experts to come and help you through this tragedy because it was a tragedy, you know.

Absolutely.

And I had a single mastectomy. And I asked for a double mastectomy and he said, there's no clinical indication why you need that. Well, he must have forgotten that a woman lives behind this piece of amputation that's going on, because that's what it is. But it's not called that. Do you see what I mean? If I had my time again, that's what I would advocate more. And the outcomes would have— would they change? It's not going to change the tumor. Sure as hell going to change me.

Yes.

You know, so I get a bit excited and I apologize for that.

No, no.

And it's because that's what the pause does. That's what a pause does— gives you that space. I didn't allow myself the space because I was too far in the vortex of fear, because I didn't know what I didn't know.

I always say to people, they go, oh wow, you looked after your mother for 14 years. Yes, there's a whole gamut of emotions behind that. Oh, the biggest personal growth I've ever had in my life was looking after her and having to advocate for her, because you grow When you need to do that.

Oh, absolutely.

It's an incredible experience.

And to understand that the carer, the supporter, the wing guy, they are in this trench with you. My husband Paul has been with me the whole time. When he— when I can't do anything, he has stepped up again and again and again. Not every person can do that.

Yes.

So we've got to find people who can. The one person, you know, that's why there's a— that's why we're doing this. I'm doing this community because there may not be a person in that person's, you know, in breast cancer, there's research done because partners leave because their wives are no longer able to be who their wife was. It's horrendous.

That is just—

But that's a whole other story.

Yeah. Braun, thank you so much. I love your mission. I love your wisdom and your energy. What a fantastic project. What an amazing experience you've had in life, and it's obviously taught you so much, and you've grown from it. Congratulations.

Oh, thank you.

And for everybody who has loved what Bronwyn has been talking about, all her details will be in the show notes. Go there, check out the Serenity Project for yourself. Or for someone who is going through an illness or an adversity. Thank you so much.

Oh, thank you for having me. It's been great.