#16 Not a Test: How to Rise Through Challenges, Reclaim Your Power, and Lead Yourself Forward

How does it feel when you think to yourself, “The universe is testing me. Or God is testing me?”

What kinds of feelings does that stir up in your body?

For most, that thought triggers a cascade of heaviness—frustration, dread, fear, that subtle hum of I must have done something wrong.

And the next thought usually follows pretty quickly is at least one of these:
This isn’t fair. 

Why me? 

Why now?

Today, we’re going to unravel this topic of the universe testing you.  

Not from fear, but from truth.

Not from victimhood, but from ownership.

And we are going to discuss and explore how to handle challenging situations. 

What’s important when your brain offers you thoughts like this is a few things:

1. The ability to be the observer of your thoughts, to be aware of it. 
2. The ability to challenge those thoughts. 

Ask yourself, Is this really true? 

Is this a fact? A fact is something that could be proven true in a court of law.  

If it’s not,  then it’s a thought not a fact.  

Most of the time our brains are offering us thoughts that we think are facts. 

This means the next time you think that the universe or god is testing you, honestly, it’s just a thought. 

It’s a thought that you have about a neutral circumstance. 

The universe is not testing you. 

You could remind yourself of that the next time your brain tells you that this,  is some kind of a test. 

It’s simply a sentence your brain generated in response to a neutral situation. An interpretation if you will about the neutral circumsntace. 

And the moment you recognize that—
the moment you step into that observer seat—
your whole nervous system loosens.The tension in your body begins to shift. 

What if you switched your thought to something more supportive:

Such as the universe always has my back?

That’s a more empowered thought, right?  Doesn’t that feel better, more light than the universe or god is testing me. 

Here’s another one: Things always work out for me. Or this is happening FOR me. 

I might not be able to see why yet but it’s happening FOR me.

Yes, there are ups and downs in life and sometimes we have to ride those waves. This is part of the universal law of rhythm.  But those are the times that you have to remain in faith and belief. 

When things get hard, when something unexpected arises, when you are faced with a challenge, you have a choice on how you want to look at that. 

Before I share a story about a great challenge that I faced in my life that brought me here today. I want to talk about a challenge vs a test. 

To me, I define a test as something that is not optional, that really has an outcome of pass or fail. It’s often designed to measure your knowledge, skills or abilities.

Just the thought of labeling the same situation as a challenge, I find it much more empowering.  A challenge is simply something that requires more of you.

We find something challenging when it requires more of us. It may require new skills, a new way of thinking, or for you to perform those skills in a more efficient manner to fit a specific time window. A challenge provides an opportunity for growth. 

Remember our brain is wired for survival. It tries to keep us safe and it tries to conserve energy. Those two built in survival mechanisms are the reason many of us automatically would say no to a challenge. 

The newer part of our brain, the prefrontal cortex, is the higher executive functioning part of our brain.  It’s the part that we use to challenge our automatic thoughts. To say yeah, this challenge may be uncomfortable, but look at the growth potential I may have by overcoming the challenge. It knows that those fears are unreasonable. It knows the potential benefit of the person you become on the other side of the challenge. The person with the increased capacity, the increased confidence, and the new skills you will gain it knows who you could become when you persist through and rise above the challenge.

A challenge is subjective as well.  It’s honestly a neutral circumstance that we have decided to label as challenging.  What could be a challenge for me may be very easy for you because we have different levels of skills and abilities. It may not even be a challenge for you. 

Let me share some of my back story and how I chose to look at a great challenge in my life. 

It was December of 2016 i was 36 and I had just come home from winning an award, the Young Optometrist of the year, given to me by my colleagues in the Nevada Optometric Society. 

I was at the peak of my career, the local society president, a speaker for a national company, an assistant professor for the university where I got my doctorate at. 

As I was getting undressed that night, I did a quick self-breast exam. I don’t even consciously remember thinking I’ll do one, and I wasn’t in the habit of doing them that often. They don’t even recommend self-checks like they use to, but something made me do one. 

I remember finding something that felt like a grape in my left breast. I knew that had never been there before. But how long had it been there? When was the last time I checked? 

Fast-forward through the multitude of appointments, scans and a biopsy to the point of getting to the diagnosis of a triple-positive breast cancer. 

I had all the normal thoughts that one has with that kind of news: 

How did this happen? 

Why did this happen? 

How long had it been there? 

How bad is it? 

Has it spread? 

What’s life going to be like? 

How bad is the chemo going to be? 

What am I going to look like? 

Will I survive this?

I even had the thought…why me?

I had already chosen the word gratitude to be my word of the year in 2017.  I remember having the thought. Why is this happening to me? Am I not grateful enough? Is this why I’m getting this cancer?

At the time, I wouldn’t say I was spiritual or religious. I would’ve probably classified myself as agnostic.  I was simply a woman with cancer trying to make sense of chaos.

I also remember giving myself some time to process this. I remember that one of the hardest parts of the whole experience was telling the people that I loved the most.  I decided to wait until after the holidays as to not bring them down during what should be a cheerful time for everyone. 

One evening before I started chemo I drew myself a nice hot bath and I let myself feel the grief. The fear. The unknown. 

And then I drew a line in the sand.

I told myself:
“Once I step out of this tub, It’s time to step up. To step into this challenge. 

I asked myself who do I want to be when going through this

Who do I want to be on the other side of this?

I wanted to be strong, positive, and optimistic. I wanted to continue to make people smile and laugh though this experience. I wanted to be so grateful and thankful to and for the doctors, nurses, my friend, family and husband who were there for me. 

 
I refused to be a victim.
And I wanted to be an example of what’s possible.”

That was a defining moment.
A moment of pure ownership.
No outsourcing of power.
No indulging in “Why me?” longer than necessary.

I kept working through chemo—not because I had to, but because I chose to. How you handle everything is a choice.
It anchored me. It gave me structure and a semblance of normalcy to my week.
It reminded me I still had a life, an identity, a purpose and a future.

As I mentioned before when I was getting diagnosed, I had a lot of questions.  I remember going to my appointment with the breast surgeon with a list of about 20 questions. My brain likes answers to questions and sometimes with these circumstances, you just don’t get answers.

What I didn’t know was that this was the start of a new me. I never could’ve fathomed that my life would be much richer having gone through the experience of cancer. In fact, I tell people that it was one of the best things that has happened to me. I’ve coached about 100 women though their cancer journe.  When I tell them that they look at me with this confused and are you crazy type look. 

I go on to explain that it taught me what was important in life. It brought my husband and I closer together. 

I remember asking him are you going to love me when I’m bald?  He pointed to his head I’m bald. I said I know but it’s different for a woman. People see a woman and tend to think she’s sick. Not oh… look at this empowered woman rocking this chosen hairstyle, or look at this woman with alopecia living her best life, shining with confidence and bravery.

I decided at the last minute to try something called cold capping. You wear a gel helmet on your head at -28 degrees Fahrenheit for hours the day you have chemo. 

They have to be kept on dry ice and changed about every 30 minutes. I think my first chemo session, my husband cold capped me for about 10 hours that day. The cold temperatures cause constriction of the blood flow to the scalp, which means less of the chemo gets to the hair follicle. I knew I was going to lose my hair if I did nothing, so I figured it was worth a try. 

I remember the first cold cap going on in the parking lot of the cancer center. We were following a strict timetable. I had a thought, OMG does my head hurt. I don’t know if I can do this. I remember arguing back with my brain. No, you can. We have gone through work to get the caps overnighted, practiced the night before, my husband ran around trying to find enough dry ice the morning of chemo. I

I remember thinking that ’m not saying that out loud… I am doing this.

To my surprise, it worked. I kept my hair. I felt like it was one more thing that the cancer didn’t take from me.  I didn’t have to have the pity looks. I didn't have to have the conversation 20x per day of what was wrong when I saw each patient. I didn’t have to wear a wig that didn’t look like me in the hot Las Vegas summer. 

This victory with cold capping helped raise awareness at the cancer center of the potential success with using the system. Nurses were asking me what I was doing. Being pleased with the results, I offered to talk to other patients who were about to start chemo about the option of cold capping. 

My amazing doctor would tell her patients about the possibility and put us in contact. I started a Facebook group for local women wanting to cold cap. We welcomed them to our home with an in-person training. I hugged them and listened to them through the happy times and through the tears. I checked in on them during their treatment. 

It planted the seed of the mentor, the coach, the teacher I was meant to become. I got more and more into the life coaching and decided to get certified. It naturally flowed with my passion for personal development that I had always been drawn to. 

My group has grown over the years. We have over a hundred women in there now. As I overcame the cancer, as I mentored the numerous women through their journey, helping them to save their hair with cold capping and emotionally supporting them with my growing group of breast cancer women.  

I’m proud to say that now at Comprehensive Cancer Center they have machines that can do the cold capping for you. It’s such a great step forward as women no longer rely on having someone do the laborious job of changing out the cold caps every 20-30 min and running around getting 50 pounds of dry ice in the morning before treatment. (can you only imagine if you have a treatment around halloween) Insurance is now starting to cover the procedure.

So this challenge showed me my calling. 

It taught me many things:

Cancer taught me the sacred value of time. Time is a resource that we don’t get back. Ultimately, it led me to ask myself the question of are you doing with your life what you want to do? When I asked myself that question, the honest answer was no. 

It just put things in perspective.  That the life I was living was not the life I wanted to keep living. I stopped chasing the awards. I stopped going to all the optional evening dinner meetings. I stopped staying late at work. I would rather intentionally spend that time with my husband, my family or friends. 

It pushed me toward personal development.
Toward life coaching.
Toward manifestation.
Toward the physics and neuroscience that finally made everything click.

And eventually—
it led me here.
To The Make It Happen Project.
To this mission.
To this mic.

It became my mission in life to share the message with others to ask themselves: 

Are you living the life that you really want to live? 

Are you using your time here on earth intentionally? 

That became the mission of the make it happen project. 

I don’t want you to have to go through a life-altering event like I did to have to ask yourself that question. 

What if you just asked yourself that right now? 

 Answer it honestly.
Your life will rearrange around the truth.

Am I doing with my life what I want to do?

 Am I living my dream life? 

It’s time to get real,  let’s talk.

The next time you’re in a hard moment, ask:

✨ How is this happening for me?
✨ Who do I want to be in this?
✨ What could this expand in me?
✨ What will be true about me on the other side?
✨ What evidence will I create for my future self?

When you choose to step up instead of step back, you expand your capacity.
You build internal proof that you can do hard things.
Your identity shifts into the woman who leads herself.

That’s how you raise your ceiling.
That’s how you break the cycle.
That’s how you manifest a bigger reality.

And when you walk into a challenge with this energy—
you become unstoppable.
Not because life gets easier
but because you get stronger. ✨

Before we wrap, I want to coach you on something directly — 

When you hit a challenge, the first thing your brain will do is try to sell you a story about what the challenge means.
It will offer you the most convenient, energy-saving narrative:

“This is too much.”
“This always happens to me.”
“Something must be wrong.”
“I’m being tested.”

Here’s the truth:
None of that is facts, none of it is data.
It’s just your brain trying to avoid effort, risk, or discomfort.

So here’s the coaching…

Stop asking “Why is this happening to me?”  Stop being in victim energy and being in the passenger seat and start asking “How is this happening for me? And Who am I going to be here.

Your power is in your decision.
Not in the circumstance.
Not in the emotions.
Not in the drama your lower brain wants to create.

When you’re in a challenge, I want you to pause and say:

“This gets to be neutral. I’m the one who decides what it becomes.”

Because you are the common denominator in your results.
You’re the one generating the feelings that drive your actions.
And you’re the one who will create the outcome you live with.

So instead of indulging in confusion or “I don’t know”…
give yourself a much cleaner question:

✨ What is the most powerful thought I can choose right now that moves me forward?

Not the thought that feels magical.
Not the thought that eliminates all discomfort.
Just the thought that makes you the leader of your life again.

And from that thought, take one clean action.

Not ten.
Not a perfect plan.
One action that aligns you with the woman you want to be on the other side of this.

Because here’s what happens every time you do that:

You build identity.
You build evidence.
You build self-trust.
You build emotional stamina.
You build capacity.

That’s how you become the woman who can do hard things without collapsing.

Not because the challenge was easier —
but because you became stronger, more brave, and more self-led inside it.

So when life throws you the next wave… and it will…
you won’t label it a test.
You’ll see it for what it is:

An opportunity to show yourself who you are.
An opportunity to expand.
An opportunity to lead yourself.✨

That’s the work.
That’s the identity shift.
And that’s how you manifest from power, not panic.

Before we close, I want to speak directly to the woman who’s listening right now and knows she’s ready for more.

If everything in you is whispering, “I don’t want to keep living the same year on repeat… I’m ready for the version of me I’ve been avoiding…” — that’s not a coincidence. That’s awareness. That’s the moment where your future self starts tapping on your shoulder.

And here’s what I want you to understand:

You don’t step into a bigger life by accident.

You step into it by choosing to.

With support.

With structure.

With coaching that calls you higher instead of letting you hide.

That’s exactly what the Modern Manifestation Academy is built for.

MMA isn’t another course you collect.

It’s the place where you learn how to lead yourself.

Where you learn the science of manifestation through identity, energy, and aligned action.

Where you learn to coach your brain, regulate your nervous system, and align your beliefs with the life you actually want to create.

If this episode resonated… if you felt the spark… it’s because you’re not meant to navigate this level alone.

In MMA, you get the tools, the community, the coaching, and the accountability to actually become the woman you’ve been vision-boarding for years.

And the truth?

Your dream life is not created someday.

It’s created when you decide you’re done living below your potential.

So if you’re listening right now and thinking,

“This is my moment. I’m ready to step into the next version of myself…”

Then I want to invite you to join us inside the Modern Manifestation Academy.

Choose yourself.

Back yourself.

Let this be the moment where you stop hoping for change and start creating it.

You know where you’re meant to go.

Now it’s time to claim it. ✨