How I Live a Healthier Life...

...and created a website to help others

My name is Lauren and I live just outside of Boston, one of the healthiest cities in the United States. I have always tried to live my life as best as possible including being fit, eating healthy, and pursuing my dreams.

Unfortunately, like most people, the house needs cleaning, the dog needs to be walked, work is 40 hours a week with the commute another 10. Finding time to buy the groceries is hard enough, nevermind trying to workout. Your weekends seem to fly by with no hope for free time on the horizon.

That was until I found my solution.

Now, any day I choose can be part of my weekend and my workout schedule was mine to control. So were the hours I worked, the hours I relaxed, or the hours I spent doing whatever it is I feel like doing.

I find there are a lot of people who really wish they could be living their life the way I do. I know so many people who have said, I wish I could do what you are doing, but I don't know where to start or if it would even work.

I am living proof that it can work. I was able to overcome these setbacks and take control of my life and live it how I wanted, and so can you. How? Read my story....

A Setback for Most, a Blessing for Me

I was always active and healthy. I grew up playing sports including soccer, basketball, and karate. I ate right, loved to travel and was active whenever I could be.

My life was no different than any other child's or teenager's until one day my world got turned upside down.

At the beginning of my sophomore year in high school, I came down with a rather severe flu after playing a long soccer game in cold, rainy weather. As a result, I developed a high fever and some swollen lymphnodes. The fever went away but the lymphnodes in my neck never did.

The doctor prescribed me medication, but the lymphnodes still would not reduce in size. After lots of tests and about a year of trying to figure out what was really wrong with me, I was sent in for surgery to have the lymphnode removed and to have a biopsy taken.

That's when the phone call came.

We're sorry but you have been diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma.

How Having Cancer Saved My Life...

I remember crying on the couch with my mom the night that news came in. I had just turned 16 and the thought of not making it to the age of 17 was devastating. But I was determined to win. Lucky for me, hodgkin's lymphoma is a very common cancer among young adults and very curable. After undergoing 6 months of chemotherapy and radiation, my cancer has been in remission for over a decade.

I strived to live my life to the fullest, stay healthy and live every moment as if it were my last. I stayed active in sports and continued to study martial arts. All was going well until I decided to add a second major my junior year of college.

I had to give up some of my activites to study for my courses and as result started gaining weight. By the end of my junior year, the late night snacks, the long hours of studying and no time for extra physical activity had caused me to gain 20 pounds. I could not believe after all I had been through that I could let my body slip away from me.

I did not feel good. My clothes weren't fitting as well as they used to. I had gone from 135lbs my freshman year to 156lbs my junior year. I saw pictures of myself from a trip I took to China and I was embarrassed by how I looked. At five foot four, an extra 20 pounds spreads out quickly. I did not want people to take pictures of me because I hated the way I looked. I knew I did not fight so many years ago for my life only to have it ruined by a self-destructive lifestyle.

I knew I had to make a change.

I took up boxing my senior year in college and played rugby. I started cooking my own meals at school. I stayed away from the dining hall where unhealthy desserts were placed at every meal. No more buffet style breakfasts, lunches, or dinners. By the end of my senior year, I was back down to 137lbs and one mean fighting machine.

I was no longer embarrassed about taking pictures, my self-esteem had greatly increased and I was back to the person I wanted to be.

A Second Tragedy Strikes Urgency...

I was never the same after my experience with cancer. Yes, I was healthy, yes I was eating well and working out again, but you always have that fear in the back of your mind. For those of you that have survived cancer or know someone that has suffered through it, you may know that there are many consequences to chemotherapy and radiation. They include developing a secondary cancer or long term side effects such as heart and lung complications.

I always felt a sense of unease. I felt I was not living my life to its fullest potential working and commutting 50 hours a week to a job I was not fully passionate about. I felt suffocated and stranded with nowhere to go dreaming about retirement in 40 years.

That's when life threw its second curve ball.

In April 2008, my aunt was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She was given a year to live. She passed away the following April at the age of 51.

At the age of 51!

I had just turned 26 at the time and realize that I could have already lived half of my life. The greatest sense of urgency had set in. I was wasting my life away not doing the things that I love to do.

The Pursuit of Happiness

I love fitness, but I am also a musician. I love writing songs and performing. Pulling 16 hour days (8 at work, 8 in the studio), I was able to record an album. By the end, I was completely exhausted.

I was stuck, like so many others, in a 9 to 5 job.

Do not get me wrong, I had a good paying job making a lot more money than most of my friends and family, but it did not drive me the way music did. I found myself bored with most jobs within the first year, so being able to stick with music for well over 10 years was inspiring.

I set a goal for myself:

I will find a way to make a living where I am happy to wake up in the morning, where I can pursue my love of music, and where I can live life on my own terms.

Sound unrealistic?

I have learned that nothing in life happens by luck alone and when you put your mind to it, nothing is impossible. Absolutely nothing! Seriously think about your life and want you want to get from it? Are you happy with it? If not, take action. I know we all have that little critic in the back of our heads that says stay safe and don't take risks. All that did was get me into a job with "great benefits" that I was bored to tears with.

I realized no amount of money was enough for my personal time. I would no longer be a slave to a 3-week vacation plan.

The Solution....

Make a living doing what you love! How? I'll show you how I'm doing it.

Fitness and health is my passion. Yours may be travel, writing, motorcycles, underwwater basket weaving, or whatever it is that makes you happy. And now you can do it in your spare time.

In my pursuit to figure out how to retire early and get out of my slave life, I stumbled across SBI. SBI stands for Site Build It! and helps you to turn any hobby or skill into a profitable online business. You probably don't even realize that almost any topic can make money with a website.

Build a website?! I know you're probably rolling your eyes and thinking I should check my medication because there is no way you can build a website. Well, I'm no computer guru or graphic designer (in fact, I knew nothing about HTML when I started), but this website was built with SBI. Anyone can do it.

You need no programming skills or web design knowledge, no business and no products to sell. Just bring your brain, your ideas, your desire and motivation. SBI has all the tools you need, and they teach you step by step how to use and do everything you need to do when building a website.

They have a great video action guide that helps you find the perfect topic for your site, teaches you how to build it and get traffic from visitors, and then they shows you how you can make money from your passion no matter what it is about!

Have a look at the Video Tour to get an idea of how it works (or the Quick Tour if you're on dial up).

And have a look at this: hundreds of successful SBI websites, built by normal people like you and me. All these sites are in the top 1% of the most successful sites on the web.

You can also see that there is a wide variety of topics listed here. You really create a website on just about anything. You are only limited by your imagination.

I started this very website in June 2008, by the next year it started to make money and by April 2010 I was making enough money that I took the plunge and quit my job. All I did was write about something I love. Life doesn't get any better than that.

Yes, in the beginning, it is a lot of work. But when you are doing something you love, it never really feels like work. And if you are not in the mood to work, you don't have to. Sometimes I want to sleep in, and that's excatly what I do.

The main thing is, it's totally risk free. SBI has a full money back guarantee. They're happy for you to try it out to see how you like it.

How do I make money? I make a lot of my money through advertising. You may have seen the links throughout the site that say "Ads by Google". Every time someone is interested and clicks on one I make money. Sometimes it's a few cents, sometimes it's a dollar, but when all those clicks ad up, you can make a substantial amount of money each day.

Currently (March 2011) I make about $50/day in Adsense income alone. That's not a bad chunck of change every day.

There are countless other ways to make money with a website like creating your own product, making money from commissions, referrals, etc. The possibilities are endless and SBI shows you how to do it.

You can get some more ideas from what other SBIers are doing. Just have a look at the case studies.

I know a lot of people that wish they could be doing what I'm doing, and my response is always the same - YOU CAN!

So what are you waiting for?

You only have one life. Make the most of it.

Try SBI - because if I can do this, you can!