Vulnerable Power
As a 5th generation entrepreneur, the notion of vulnerability with my emotions is not something that comes naturally to me. We tend to be the rugged individual type 😝...to say the least. That being out there, it's obvious that I have done a good deal of soul bearing in this process of cancer, and as a human I try to be as authentic with my feelings as I am able, even when that ability is limited.
What I am learning in this journey is multifaceted. However, I have been repeatedly admonished by others who are fearful of my negatively expressed emotions that "I shouldn't harbor any negativity, but stay always focused on the positive". This so to prevent spread of my cancer.
Ok, so that is just impossible! When confronted with a life threatening illness there is inevitable fear, inevitable suffering and inevitable pain. None of these feelings can be cloaked in positivity all the time with authenticity. Not only is that a horrific burden on an already heavily laden situation in someone's life but it is just not real. When people recommend that to me I realize they have either never been where I am, or they are simply covering their feelings in denial for fear that they add one more perceived burden to their own illness.
What I am understanding is that yes, it is VITALLY important for me to spend time each day focusing on the positive and things that bring happiness. These intentional times of bringing joy increase my body's ability to fight disease of all kinds, especially cancer, increase my endorphins and are natural pain reducers. Even scripture admonishes us to "give thanks in all things". But there is a difference between choosing to give thanks in difficult situations and denial that the difficult situations are indeed...difficult! All of life is shrouded by difficulties, it is part of the human condition in which we find ourselves here on earth.
I think what I have and am and hopefully will continue to learn is that it is far MORE important for me to feel the FULL range of my emotions, happy, fearful, sad, joyful and grateful etc. The critical thing for maintaining my health is not to always be positive, but to hold all my emotions long enough to feel them and then to let them go in a healthy way, like water over a rock fall. Probably more important is the intention to not let any emotion get stuck where it can fester or create nostalgia where I remain in a desire to stay in the past. Normally I tend to want to always be moving forward, on to the next thing. I am learning to be in the present even when that present is an unpleasant reality. I am learning to receive hard things just long enough to BE grateful even for the difficult moments. That doesn't mean I always like it 😖.
I have begun to understand, amazingly enough over the last decade or so, that the posture for receiving AND letting go is the same: open hands.
Those open hands are not clenched fists. As such, they are vulnerable. That vulnerability is surprisingly, at least to me, a position of power. Not sought after power, but power in that when we share what is most true in us, we share what is most common in us and that sharing is a place of vulnerability. But that vulnerability gives us platform for strength because in it we find we are NOT alone. We have risked reaching out and we have in a place of courage and vulnerability found that others are there, and that God never intended for us to be alone but rather to walk these difficult AND happy journeys together. In so doing we find that our joys are multiplied and increased and our burdens are shared and so lessened. These are authentic happy thoughts. 😘
I continue to recover from round 3...neuropathy, GI issues, and fatigue persist but I forge ahead and continue to seek wisdom for the path ahead. This is the difficult stuff. I take great joy that I get a break now until August 30 while we take time off to be with our children in Wisconsin during the last week + of August. That is a source for great joy!!