When I woke up to see the clock read 3:22 am, I wasn't surprised. I've been waking up quite a bit in the middle of the night. The pre-chemo steroids amp me up, which is fine during the day, but quite a dread at night. Just like the previous night, I sat at my computer answering emails and pretending there was something interesting enough on the Internet to keep me out of bed. By 4:00am I was lying down again, hoping sleep would come. Our 6-year-old had climbed in bed with us in the middle of the night, so I had a chance to get in some quality snuggling -- with his foot. Truly. He had attached himself to my husband and short of me putting all three bodies in a 3-foot clump on the edge of our king-sized bed, I just grabbed on to any body part he had that was near me, and snuggled. I told myself that if I was still awake by 5:00, I'd get up and start my morning routine. The next time I propped myself up to look at the clock on my husband's nightstand, it read 5:00 exactly. Well, time to get up.
Last night I attended a book signing event at a local wine bar. Nice ambiance. :) The book's author is a cancer survivor from her early 20's who went on to lose her husband about 8 years later to cancer, leaving her to raise her son alone. Her story is about coping with his illness, death, and life afterwards. While the book is surely moving, what struck me most about her is how she turned tragedy around into helping others. She's since established a non-profit called Don't Wait, encouraging people to seek the achievement of goals they had been putting off for whatever reason. Profits from her book sales and Don't Wait pendants help finance the non-profit. She is also promoting a television pilot, a type of reality show during which she seeks out people with Don't Wait goals and helps those goals come to fruition.
Part awe. Part inspriation. Part jealousy. Part guilt. What am I doing with my life? Why haven't I taken advantage of this time off to start another business? To write another book? (Oh wait, I wrote one.) To find ways to make more money? To be that expert on TV offering advice in some area -- education, children, living your best life?
Oh wait, I've done all that before. Was I more joyful when I was running my tutoring company, driving all over the Sacramento area meeting families, interviewing and hiring tutors, matching them with needy students, marketing, sending out invoices, collecting on unpaid invoices? Not really. If I could structure it so that I could get some help, I think I might like it again. I'll process all that and meditate on it and see where it leads me.
What about writing? I obviously love it. I crave it in the mornings and miss it when I don't write. What I don't miss is the feeling that nobody wants to read what I write when publishers deny my submissions. Well, I need to write because I love to write, not because I think I'm going to get anything out of it. Next week I'm going to revisit the book that Mitch and I wrote years ago and start editing. Even if that book becomes an ebook that I just present at conferences, I'll be happy that I'm getting the word out.
Did I like being an expert on TV? Actually, yes. It was fun. Maybe I'll persue that again. I did it for free and had fun changing topics each month. Why not.
All of the above links to my love for education and helping children. If I can work on linking all the above together over the next few months, I can potentially start something significant in my life and in the lives of so many children, parents, and teachers. We'll see where life brings me.
I think that by staying busy with the above will help me release the cancer-patient identy that I've created. My cancer, like the author I met last night, will soon be a distant memory. She mentioned that when she was recently interviewed on a TV show, she forgot to mention she was a cancer survivor. Moreover, when she went back into her memories of the cancer, she couldn't even remember when it started. I long to have cancer as a distant memory. I can't wait until my hair is 2-inches long so I can get extensions, until my chemo is over so I can get into Bikrams yoga and then start at the gym. When I am sitting reading a book, not because I need to rest from the chemo or from a surgery, but because I just want to read.
As Hays' meditation titled "I Let Go of the Need for This Condition in my Life" closes: "But when I am ready to let it go, it is amazing how the smallest thing can help me release it."
(Hay, Louise. Inner Wisdom: Meditations for the heart and Soul. Hay House Incoorporated, Carlsbad, CA. 2000.)
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