When I first was diagnosed with cancer, I kept thinking, what are the odds?

If you have a tumor in your throat, there’s a 95% chance that it is NOT cancer.

Then out of that 5%, even with a biopsy saying it is “suspicious” of cancer, there is still just a 50% chance that it really is.

So that brings us down to about a 2.5% chance of it being cancerous.

My surgeon himself told me he was 99% sure my tumor was benign.

But I was that 1%.

This has completely altered my view on “odds”. Telling me there is a small likelihood of something being cancerous, doesn’t mean much to me at this point.

It has changed my outlook for the better, too.

I looked up the odds of landing a job at my dream company. 22% get interview, then it progressively shrinks until only 1% get an offer.

I have started to think…“I was in that 1% group for a cancer diagnosis, what’s not to say I’ll be in the 1% for job offers?”

We are all statistics. We get cancer, or we don’t. We get the job, or we don’t. But there is always a chance to be that 1, 5, 10% that makes it. That hit their goals. That get their dream.

Nothing is impossible. Good and bad.

It has made me cautious in some areas, sure, but it has also made me even more ambitious.

Why not shoot for the other extreme end of the spectrum?