At 31, Mo was handed a death sentence. A year later, even the small chance was gone. Choosing To Stay is the story of what he did next, and the questions that experience raised about how we choose to live.
Mo Haque was given a small chance and watched even that disappear. Told by medicine that the options were exhausted, he refused to accept "nothing" as an answer.
This is the story of what came next. A £200,000 crowdfunding campaign for experimental treatment. One unshakeable conviction: I'll raise the money, or die trying.
More than a decade later, he is not only alive. He is thriving. Choosing To Stay goes inside that journey, the despair and the suffering, the hope and the healing, the vulnerability and the authenticity that the experience demanded.
It is, in the end, a book about choice. About recognising the power of choice even in dire circumstances, and discovering meaning by connecting the experiences of a life. About being seen, and finding worth.
Mo Haque is a bestselling author, TEDx speaker, and keynote speaker whose work sits at the intersection of high performance, resilience, and human potential.
After being diagnosed with aggressive terminal cancer and told there were no treatment options, Mo defied the odds and emerged stronger, demonstrating that resilience, focus, and energy can be deliberately engineered. Today, he channels that credibility into delivering measurable performance outcomes for the leaders and teams he works with.
Mo leads two London running clubs, hosts transformational retreats, and authored the bestselling memoir Choosing To Stay. Through keynotes and immersive workshops, he addresses the modern symptoms of distraction, procrastination, and burnout in corporate life, replacing them with disciplined focus, audacious goal-setting, and decisive follow-through.
The engine behind his approach is Absurd Hope, a six-step framework that equips leaders and teams to sustain momentum, convert setbacks into action, and reconnect with the clarity, conviction, and drive that lift organisational performance.
His latest book, Absurd Hope: Making High Performance Contagious and Wellbeing Infectious, distils the principles forged in crisis into a repeatable system, revealing the ABSURD framework and the tools leaders need to act when it matters most.
Available in paperback, ebook, and audiobook.