If you live your life always turning away from challenging situations that frighten you or evoke uncomfortable emotions, your world will grow increasingly small and narrow. On the other hand, if you train to turn towards challenging situations that frighten you or evoke uncomfortable emotions, your world will grow increasingly large and wide as will your capacities for compassion and wisdom. You may glimpse the full wonder and mystery of who you truly are.” Such was the wise counsel offered by a friend, when an out-of-my-comfort-zone opportunity was presented, full of potential for personal and spiritual growth, but one that also terrified me. The mere thought of the activity caused my muscles to contract as if I was trying to run away while standing still at the same time. However, I took her words to heart, participated in the opportunity and experienced a profound, solo adventure that has continued to influence my view of myself and life in a foundational way.
To the best of my ability, I have also applied her counsel ever since, such as when a potentially conflict-ridden topic in a personal relationship needs to be discussed or, before retiring, an invitation to a new leadership role in a professional situation arose. Her advice has served me well.
Never have her words been more important and pertinent than now, as I live with the diagnosis of metastatic breast cancer. When I was first diagnosed in the fall of 2019, I imagine my experience was like most women’s: It was as if the floor dropped out from under my feet and I was in a state of freefall. The life I had known and planned had taken an unexpected, drastic turn and would never be the same. The shock I experienced in the physician’s office turned to grief and tears when I finally got home. I curled up on the couch and wept. I did not know at the time the treatment for metastatic breast cancer had advanced considerably in the last 10 years and is, more recently, treated as a chronic disease. Where once women lived for months, now, with treatment and depending on the type of cancer, women often live for years. I am now entering my 5th year of navigating the disease and its treatments.
I continue to make the effort to turn toward and accept what is uncomfortable or unwanted when I receive disconcerting test results, experience an adverse secondary effect of treatment, reflect on my losses or mortality or when friends or acquaintances say something that I experience as insensitive. “Turn toward what you feel, not away,” I tell myself. This is much easier said than done. I am not always successful. I know, in the long run, it is a worthy effort that will bring me greater ease, peace and freedom.
Recently, in a conversation with friends, someone commented that a friend had passed away at 72 and wasn’t that a tragic misfortune to die so young. I thought to myself, “It is quite possible that I might not see 72,” and felt loss and sadness fill my heart. Reminding myself this disease increases my risk of a shortened lifespan was distressing. I was also interested in my reaction because I do not think 72 is so young! Twelve, 22, 32, 42, 52. These are young ages in my mind, but 72? Someone 72 had a chance to learn about themselves and life, navigate life’s joys and sorrows as best they could and, possibly, discover love, meaning and purpose. I prefer to reflect that it is not the length of one’s life, but how one chooses to live the life one is given that matters. Why was I feeling so sad when I didn’t even agree with my friend’s statement? It was quickly obvious that my cognitive reaction, “It is quite possible that I might not see 72,” triggered the vision of my future death, rather than the gift of my life as it was that day and enjoying my friends, as I had been up until that moment.
I often listen to inspiring talks and podcasts to help me face the truth and cultivate stability as I experience the ups and downs of a cancer diagnosis and treatment. In one recording, Ayya Anandabodhi, a Buddhist nun, seemed to address me directly when she said something close to: “Some people get very short lives. Some people get very long lives. And some people get lives of a length neither short nor long, but in between. This is just the way it is. This is the truth of human existence.” Her words were straightforward, simple and truthful. She articulated the facts without any value judgment. She expressed the truth of death absent additional subjective commentary of this being good or bad, right or wrong. Her words touched me deeply and brought with them a surprising feeling of comfort and ease. I can understand how these words might evoke anxiety or fear in some people and even in me on another day, however in that moment, the truth provided an experience of a calm acceptance. A life could be short, long or something in between. It’s just the way it is. This is not to deny the experience of loss, sadness and grief we experience, but rather to look directly at the truth of the way things are and, potentially, discover within, a wisdom and capacity that can accept and hold this truth. Whatever the length my life will be, it is just the way it will be. It’s very personal and simultaneously not personal. It’s just the way life is. I find freedom when I can accept this.