Former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki’s ‘most important lesson’ revealed in final message she wrote while dying of cancer

YouTube has released a closing statement from former CEO Susan Wojcicki revealing her “most important life lesson” before she died of lung cancer in August.

Wojcicki, who served as CEO of YouTube from 2014 to 2023, wrote the short message in “the last weeks of her life” and planned to publish it this fall, according to current CEO Neal Mohan.

In the message she talks about her first diagnosis, her support for cancer research and the most important lesson she wanted to pass on to her fellow human beings.

That lesson was to enjoy the simple beauty of everyday life.

‘Having cancer has not been easy. As a person I have changed a lot, and probably the most important lesson I have learned is to focus and enjoy the present!’ she wrote. ‘Life is unpredictable for everyone, with many unknowns, but there is a lot of beauty in everyday life.’

Wojcicki also revealed how surprised she was when she was told she had cancer.

‘I had virtually no complaints and walked a few kilometers a day at the time. “I had never smoked before so I was completely shocked by this diagnosis,” she wrote.

Then she started unearthing some surprising statistics about lung cancer, showing how women are disproportionately affected.

She pointed out that about two-thirds of lung cancer cases among non-smokers are women. Women who have never smoked do more than twice as likely lung cancer than men who have never smoked.

Not only that, current research also indicates that lung cancer is increasing among non-smokers, regardless of gender.

Wojcicki and her husband Dennis Troper, who had already donated to various cancer causes, increased her involvement in lung cancer research after her diagnosis.

‘We soon discovered that lung cancer was under-researched and misunderstood. Since then, we have given millions of dollars to support early detection research, new immunotherapy options that could cure cancer, building a community of genotyped patients to better understand the disease, and basic research to understand the mechanisms and science behind the disease. to better understand cancer types,” she wrote. .

She ended her note by saying, “My goals for the future are to enjoy the present as much as possible and fight for a better understanding and cure of this disease.”

YouTube shared her post since November in Lung Cancer Awareness Month.

Wojcicki and her husband Dennis Troper shared five children together

Wojcicki’s death came months after her son Marco Troper (center) died of a drug overdose

Wojcicki died on August 9 in Santa Clara, California.

Wojcicki was a well-known figure in the tech world, especially when she was at the helm of YouTube.

Earlier in her career, when she was an executive at Google, she was credited with pushing Google to buy YouTube.

Eight years after the $1.65 billion purchase in 2006, she became CEO of the video sharing site.

Wojcicki and her husband shared five children together, but their family experienced tragedy in February when their son Marco Troper was found dead of an apparent drug overdose.

Marco, 19, was a freshman at UC Berkeley and was found unconscious in Clark Kerr’s dorm.