Live Life to the Fullest, Feat. John Coffman

Live Every Day to the Fullest: What a 23-Year Cancer Battle Teaches Construction Leaders About Life

There are podcasts about production systems, about Takt planning, about procurement and schedules and quality. And then there are conversations that make all of that feel small, not because the work does not matter, but because something larger is sitting in the room. Podcast 526 is one of those conversations. John Kaufman, a lifelong builder, Purdue-trained engineer, and one of the finest humans Jason Schroeder has known in construction, joined the show to talk about something he has been living for twenty-three years: what it means to face your own mortality and choose, every single day, to keep living. His most recent visit to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston ended with the news that treatment is no longer an option. And yet he got on his bicycle two days later and rode sixty-three miles. That is the kind of man he is. And what he says about life is worth stopping everything to hear.

The Problem That Shows Up Long Before the Diagnosis

Most construction professionals are excellent at managing risk on paper. They track schedule float, monitor procurement lead times, and identify quality risks before they compound. And then they go home and spend years of their actual life managing personal risk with paralysis: deferring the career move that feels too uncertain, skipping the family trip that costs more than the budget allows, declining the investment in their own development because it does not have a guaranteed return, avoiding the conversation that needs to happen because it feels too exposing to start. They are waiting to see whether the wave comes before they will agree to walk on the beach. The wave may never come. And while they wait, the sunset is happening without them.

John Kaufman has talked with people battling cancer, Parkinson’s, ALS, MS, and cardiac disease. He has designed wheelchair ramps through the Texas Ramp Project for people trapped in their homes by a four-inch step at the front door. He has sat with the sick, the grieving, and the afraid for more than two decades. And the single most consistent thing he has observed is that difficulty does not determine outcome. The response to difficulty does. Some people choose to spend the rest of their life dying. Others choose to spend the rest of their life living. Both groups have the same diagnosis. Only the choice is different.

The System That Keeps People on the Sand

This is not a personal failure. The culture that most people operate inside creates strong pressure toward safety, toward waiting for certainty before committing, toward managing the downside before pursuing the upside. That culture shows up on construction projects when teams wait for perfect conditions before starting a phase that needs to begin now. It shows up in companies when leaders defer the training investment because the budget line is tight and the return is not immediate. And it shows up in personal life when people stand at the edge of the water, watching the waves, unwilling to walk in because they cannot guarantee they will not get knocked down.

John’s gift to every person who hears this episode is a different frame entirely: the wave is coming whether you walk in or not. You do not get to choose whether the waves come. You only get to choose whether you spend the time between them afraid.

The Man on the Beach in Maui

John was in Maui early one morning, standing on the beach in the dark before sunrise, waiting for the light. A man was standing nearby. As it grew lighter John said something about what a beautiful sunrise it was going to be. The man said he wished he felt better so he could enjoy it. Something was weighing on him. When John asked, the man said he had just received a cancer diagnosis. The doctors had a protocol with a good success rate, but if it did not work, he might have two years. His doctor had told him to go ahead with the vacation and try to put it out of his mind.

John told him directly: you cannot put it out of your mind, and you should not try. But he offered something better than denial. He offered a reframe. You have been given a blessing, he said. You know you may have two years. Do you know how many people will drop over dead in those two years who were never told they had two years? Heart attacks, strokes, accidents, ordinary Tuesdays that turned out to be the last one. If someone had told them they had two years left, would they have done something different? You have been given that chance right now. You are in possibly the most beautiful place you have ever been, celebrating an anniversary with the love of your life. Do not put it out of your mind. Make memories. Do something differently. That is the gift.

Walking Between the Waves

The metaphor most people reach for when describing a serious illness is a roller coaster: ups and downs, highs and lows. John rejected that metaphor years ago. What it actually feels like, he says, is walking from a beach out into the ocean through waves. The first one hits you at the knees and knocks you around. You walk further and the next is bigger. You see it coming and turn sideways so it does not hit as hard. Sometimes a wave picks you up and shuffles you back. A big one knocks you down. In Hawaii, the shore break waves will wash you fifty feet up the beach and you just hope the water leaves you there rather than dragging you back out.

The waves can be physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual. Sometimes they are all four at once. The physical ones you can see coming. The emotional ones arrive out of a clear sky without warning and knock you flat to your knees. And then the wave washes away, and you realize you feel all right. You can stand back up. You walk on. The challenge, the one John has worked at for twenty-three years, is to walk between the waves without spending every moment afraid of the next one. Because the distance between the waves is life. Spending it in dread is giving the waves more of your time than they are entitled to take.

What Living Fully Actually Requires

John’s approach to his illness, and his challenge to every person listening, can be understood through the things he has committed to that fear would have taken away:

• Riding his bicycle even when the news is devastating, because nothing changed between Tuesday when he could ride and Thursday when he still could
• Walking out to watch the sunrise even when the body is not feeling its best, because the sunrise does not reschedule
• Saying yes to conversations with strangers on beaches in Maui, because those conversations sometimes turn out to matter more than anything else on the trip
• Designing ramps for people who cannot get out of their own homes, because usefulness does not require perfect health
• Calling people back, showing up for others who are struggling, being present in the community that holds everyone together when the waves come

None of those things require a terminal diagnosis. They require a decision that today is worth living fully, made before the wave arrives, not after.

You Do Not Have to Be Dying to Live Like This

This is the turn in the episode that makes it relevant to every construction leader who has ever deferred something important because the conditions were not quite right. Jason reflects on this directly. He and Katie cashed in his entire Hensel Phelps retirement account to start Elevate Construction. With eleven children and a few thousand dollars in savings, they are building something that requires them to walk into the water every single day. There are business investments that need to be made that are gut-wrenchingly scary. The budget does not always cover what the next step requires.

And listening to John, the clarity arrives: they are doing the right thing. Not irresponsibly. Not recklessly. But fully. Walking into the water instead of sitting on the sand hoping the waves never come. The people who live that way are not foolish. They are the ones who, when they reach the end, can look back on a trail of accomplishment rather than a list of things they were going to do when the conditions improved.

What the Construction Industry Needs From Its Leaders

The same principle that John describes in living, committing to the day in front of you rather than retreating from it in fear, is the principle behind every lean system Elevate Construction teaches on projects. Here is where that parallel becomes most visible:

• Takt planning requires committing to a production rhythm even when the outcome is uncertain, trusting the system rather than waiting for perfect conditions
• Psychological safety requires leaders to remain present and engaged even when the project is difficult, modeling the behavior they want to see in their teams
• The morning worker huddle requires someone to stand up and lead even when the day ahead is hard, because the team draws energy from the leader’s posture
• Roadblock removal requires addressing problems before they become crises, which means walking toward the difficult thing rather than hoping it resolves on its own
• Crew preparation requires planning for tomorrow before today is finished, because tomorrow’s success is built in the hours before it arrives

All of that is walking between the waves. All of it is choosing to live the day fully rather than managing it from a safe distance. If your project needs superintendent coaching, project support, or leadership development, Elevate Construction can help your field teams stabilize, schedule, and flow.

We Are in It Together

John received a call two weeks before this recording from a contractor friend he had not spoken to in two years. The man had heard what was happening and called not knowing what to say. John told him: what you say matters, but what matters most is that you said something. That you showed up. That we are in it together. The wave that knocks you down is survivable when someone is there to help you stand back up and walk on.

That is the deepest thing John carries from twenty-three years of illness and community. We are not meant to walk between the waves alone. The calls matter. The showing up matters. The friend who drove to Houston and sat in the waiting room matters. The contractor who called after two years of silence matters. And the leader who notices when a foreman is struggling, who stops the meeting to check in, who sends the note that nobody required them to send, is practicing the same thing John practices on the beach: being present for someone who needs a hand getting back up.

Faith, Attitude, and the Bicycle

John’s cycling partner told him that cycling, attitude, and faith were what kept him going. John corrected the order: faith, attitude, and cycling. His doctors have noted that his fitness level has contributed to his ability to survive this long. So he keeps riding. He keeps walking into the water. He keeps facing the waves. Not because he is not afraid, but because he has decided that the beach is where he lives, and the only direction worth walking is forward. As he put it with the simplicity that only someone who has genuinely lived it can offer: do not spend the rest of your life dying. Spend it living. Make that choice.

On we go.

FAQ

What is the central lesson from John Kaufman’s story for construction leaders?

The choice to live fully is available to everyone, not just to people facing terminal illness. Most people are deferring that choice out of fear of waves that may or may not be coming, and John’s twenty-three years of living with cancer while riding his bicycle and designing ramps and watching sunrises is proof that the choice to live fully is made before the conditions are perfect, not after.

What does the wave analogy mean and how does it apply to everyday life?

Serious difficulty arrives like ocean waves rather than a roller coaster. Some you see coming and can brace for, others arrive without warning and knock you flat. The discipline is to walk between the waves without spending the distance between them in fear of the next one, because that fear gives the waves more of your life than they are entitled to take. The wave is coming whether you walk in or not. The only question is what you do with the time before it arrives.

What did John tell the man on the beach in Maui and why does it matter?

He told him that receiving a time horizon is a gift because it creates the opportunity to decide now whether to do something differently, rather than living as if time is unlimited. He encouraged him not to deny the diagnosis but to reframe it: he was in a beautiful place, celebrating something important with someone he loved, and the right response was to make memories and walk forward. The reframe is available to everyone facing difficulty, not just those with a medical diagnosis.

How does the principle of walking between the waves connect to what Elevate Construction teaches about project leadership?

Committing to a production rhythm in Takt planning, maintaining presence and energy when a project is struggling, running toward the hard thing rather than managing it from a distance: all of that is walking between the waves. The construction leader who chooses to engage fully with the difficulty in front of them rather than deferring it or minimizing it is practicing the same discipline John practices on the beach every morning.

What role does community play in John’s approach to facing difficulty?

Community is what makes getting back up after the waves possible. The contractor who called after two years of silence did not know what to say, and John told him it did not matter: what mattered was that he called, that he showed up, that they were in it together. On construction projects and in life, the decision to show up for someone who is struggling is what makes the distance between the waves walkable for both of them.