How Dan MacQueen Rebuilt His Life After a Brain Hemorrhage

The Morning Everything Changed

Dan MacQueen was living the kind of life most twenty-somethings dream about. He had a fast-paced tech job in London, traveled often, and kept a full social calendar. Then one morning on the tube, his vision went black. Within days, he was undergoing emergency brain surgery.

That could have been the end of the story. But it was just the beginning. Dan woke up four weeks later from a coma. And he had to relearn how to walk, talk, and even smile.

Surviving Was Just the Beginning

When Dan regained consciousness, he couldn’t speak. Tubes were everywhere. He was in a wheelchair. Still, he motioned for a pen and paper and scribbled out a message to his brother:

“Get me out of here.”

That wasn’t just a plea to leave the hospital. It was a vow. Dan was choosing to fight.

And that fight was brutal. There’s one moment he shared that hit me right in the gut. He was wearing a splint on his leg during rehab, and the pain was excruciating. At one point, the clicker to call the nurse fell to the floor. He looked at it. Then he crawled. Not because it was brave. Because he knew every single choice mattered.

That story says everything about the kind of mindset he had to build—one painful inch at a time.

The Power of “Better Than Yesterday”

Dan doesn’t believe in skipping past the hard stuff. He doesn’t coat his story in positive affirmations. What he does believe in is movement. One small step forward, again and again.

Two phrases helped him hold on:

• Aim small, miss small
• Better than yesterday

These became his anchors. On days when the finish line was nowhere in sight, Dan focused on walking one more block. Repeating one more speech therapy exercise. Showing up when it didn’t feel worth it.

And when a second brain injury wiped out his progress, he started over. Not because he felt good about it. But because he had already built the habit of choosing to try again.

Motivation Comes in Layers

This was one of my favorite parts of our conversation. Dan shared what he calls his three horsemen of motivation:

1. Proving people right – A friend believed he’d walk again. He wanted to show her she was right.
2. Proving people wrong – A nurse joked that some kids didn’t think he could talk. That was enough.
3. Serving others – Today, Dan speaks on stages to help people who are in their own fight.

Motivation isn’t one-size-fits-all. And it’s not always noble. Sometimes it’s just about doing the next hard thing because you want to win back some piece of yourself. Dan makes that clear.

You Don’t Need a Map. Just the Next Step.

Dan said something that stuck with me. He told a story from The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy. The boy is walking through the woods and says, “I can’t see a way through.” The horse responds, “Can you see your next step? Then take that.”

Dan didn’t have a full plan. But he had a compass. And he followed it toward the life he wanted.

That’s the biggest lesson I took from this conversation. You don’t have to know how the story ends to take the next step. You just have to keep choosing it.

If this resonates with you, I invite you to hear more of Dan’s story. It’s raw, honest, and full of moments that might shift something in you too.

🎧 Listen to the full episode at www.thelifeshiftpodcast.com