Hope4Cancer: Day Twelve: The Journey
This day as I walked into the IV Room, my friend David was trying to convince Geoveni, another kitchen staffer, and me that we needed to experience a particularly tasty combination of rice bread, almond butter, and pears. It was delicious and became one of our favorite breakfasts.
But today, David was also planting the creative seeds in us for doing a documentary of all of our stories. He wanted to understand from our perspectives what we are learning at Hope4Cancer. Like those used by marathoners, he was a pacer and saw himself as our pacer. It was a wonderful analogy because, from the start, I was tired and sick, and he kept me going.
It was a shock and a good experience for me to find how I fit with everyone around me. In my typical style, I love being the leader, cheerleader, or person bringing people together. But this time, I needed my friends to go before me. I realized that sometimes to honor others and myself, I need to be behind the pacesetter and not be the pacesetter.
It was inspiring and a relief to hear David talk about his journey of hope and his desire to take this experience to the next level and teach others that there are opportunities to heal. But primarily, he was a marvelous leader of faith and loved cheering us on. From my limited perspective, it was like putting together a puzzle of an image that I couldn’t see; but David saw the big picture. He was an expert puzzle-solver. And from him, the lesson I learned was that you can’t force God’s timing.
I wanted to skip ahead in the healing process to make things fit together to completion. All my life, I’d had my eye on the finish line, and I’d been climbing one mountain and then jumping onto the next one to get to the end. But a fundamental understanding of my journey was revealed when I surrendered to the process, allowing the pieces to fit while I listened to the divine timing.
I found it ironic that my entire life, I’d been drug-free and was super healthy, but I hadn’t paid adequate attention to my immune system. As a result, I had become extremely worn down. And that day, as many days, they had trouble starting my I.V., so the nurses worked on me together as a team, jump-starting it with a heat pack. They then decided to keep my I.V. in permanently for two days to give my system an extra boost. I felt cradled by love and was so grateful.
That vascular issue, however, meant I couldn’t go on the beach or in the water, and again, it gave me a crystal awareness of my life. I had to stop and consciously choose to slow down to follow my pacer.
My friend David taught me one of the most important lessons I’d learned at Hope4Cancer: for the rest of my life, I want to have patience and run the race of my life with joy and with a focus on the journey—so I can take in the beautiful scenery along the way—and not just aim at crossing the finish line.
