The fact that it's taken me so long to sit down and actually write is not because I've been too busy (for a change), but because I've been mentally unable of thinking coherently....
Last Wednesday. HP Software Universe Israel 2009. The culmination of several months of dreaming, fighting, wanting, working, planning, pushing, writing, talking, begging, and making sure the big day is as perfect as it can be.
And it was.
I won't write about the event here today (I'm saving that for my "official' work blog), but I'll write about what it meant to me.
There are successes that everyone can see: the hundreds and hundreds of attendees, crowding the event hall. The executive attendance. The design of the banners, the signs, the demo booths.
Those can be seen, their cost and effort evaluated and appreciated.
And then - there are successes that no one can see. Like walking on stage, without a limp, on both feet - when only two months ago I wasn't sure if I'd walk.
Like being able to stand on stage, not once but twice, and being able to focus on the words echoing into the audience and not on an unbearable pain radiating down my thigh.
Like knowing - in absolute certainty - that no matter what happens during the event, if it succeeds or fails, I have done it right this time around. And I have learned from my previous mistakes, and I have grown.
I planned ahead.
I fought for what mattered and let go of the little things.
I asked for help when I needed it.
I was not alone in a battle, I was part of a troop.
I never doubted it... Or me.
A couple of months ago, a few days into my hospitalization and when it became clear my medical issue was not going to just disappear when I returned home - my manager had asked me to consider cancelling the event, or modifying it to "adjust it" to my condition.
I considered it for a few minuted. Then I said "nothing changes. Full steam ahead". that evening, I send an email from hospital bed (and this is a quote):
"...everything is under control. Moving full steam ahead. Updates tomorrow.Good
night from Sheba hospital...."
As soon I had sent the email, a sliver of doubt entered my mind. I hoped I hadn't committed to something I wouldn't be able to pull off. But I did.
For a couple of months all I did was work on the event, doctors, work on the event, physical therapy, work on the event, medication, work on the event event, hydro therapy...
The came Wednesday - and it made every trying moment worth it.
The many thank you letters and words of appreciation from colleagues, managers and customers are a wonderful shiny wrapper to the real gift of last week: the proof: to the world and to myself - that I. can. do. it. against all odds.
Posts
