It is not uncommon to hear someone with cancer or another usually life-threatening illness say something like ‘The cancer has been a wakeup call and a blessing in my life.’ Any illness, whether terminal or not, offers us an opportunity to heal the cause behind the illness.
It is recognised in the medical world that physical and emotional/energetic stressors are a big contributor to disease. A doctor can maybe cure an illness through treatments or medications but if we don’t do our part no true healing can happen.
Receiving a breast cancer diagnosis in 2002 surely made me look and feel deeply into what and how I was living my life and how I was feeling about myself, other people, and life – and what I saw was not pretty. I did not love or respect myself; I was very hard, critical, and judgemental with myself and therefore I also criticised and judged others.
I learned that a woman’s breasts are a symbol for nurturing and for self-nurturing. Could that be connected to the breast cancer in my case? I thought I was looking after myself by following all sorts of healthy eating ways and ideals and growing my own food. But for the rest, I was disregarding and abusing my body through lots of alcohol, late nights, coffee and working too hard on the land. I was good at ‘mind over body’ meaning that with my mind (thoughts) I made my body do anything I wanted, not hearing, or wanting to hear when it had had enough. Lack of self-love and self-worth contributed to my inability to truly energetically self-nurture.
I learned to honour and love my body and not treat it like a thing I could just use and abuse. I needed to learn to listen to what the body was telling me.
At first, I could not hear much because I was dulling and numbing myself with food and especially alcohol, which with time I changed.
When my relationship with myself became more loving, gentle, and respectful this also changed my relationships with other people. I can now say honestly that I love people and myself and that feels truer and more natural for me. Before this, I wasn’t truly a friend of people, and I was afraid of them.
I turned my whole life around by turning it upside down and inside out. I made changes in every area, even the way I work and sleep.
I discovered it works well for me going early to bed and getting up early. Also, my sleep is much deeper and more rejuvenating when I wind down and have no excitement or stimulation a couple of hours before sleep.
I also changed the way I move, for example, I now give myself enough time to get somewhere, no more rushing, which also helps with being more present in my body. And I also looked at my emotional well-being, what I was thinking and feeling especially about myself, other people, and life.
There was much to feel and heal, many old hurts to understand and let go of; and a load of stuff and conditions I had been carrying around all my life that were still affecting my behaviour and my reactions and manifesting in my body.
My body had clearly had enough of the disregard and wanted to get it out, to clear it through a tumour – breast cancer. For other people it might be another disease like diabetes or leukaemia.
I have now lived with cancer for the last twenty years which metastasised nearly six years ago, and I was diagnosed as having terminal cancer – whatever that means. Isn’t everybody’s life in this current body terminal? From a medical perspective I can’t claim that the cancer is cured. I sometimes jokingly say ‘the cancer and me happily co-inhabit this body’. It is just there without moving or growing for the last few years, so far.
I do not think about it and am rarely even aware of it anymore except the two days a week when I take what I call ‘chemo in pill form’ or when the effects of that occasionally bother me.
I can now say that I have healed the cancer. I have healed the energetic cause of living a hard life, the lack of self-nurturing and disregard. I have healed many old hurts and harmful patterns and am healing all the effects of the repeated physical separation from my family that I experienced in my early life.
I appreciate this life with cancer and a truer connection to my essence and the All, rather than having no cancer but still living with all the hurts, lies and the separation from God over many lifetimes. The cancer and all its recurrences kept me on my toes, so to speak, to not fall back into old ways, patterns, and behaviours, instead offering me the opportunity to keep learning and evolving.
Cancer can be a great teacher if you are open to it.
Early in life I learnt to conform, to be ‘good’ (in other people’s and society’s opinion), to live a life that was not me but imposed upon by parents, teachers, etc. I learnt to not express from my essence, my Divinity, until, getting older, I had forgotten how to and instead lived a lie, believing this lie is ‘it’, this is ‘me’.
And this is what most humans live. The lies we believe and live are part of the disease.
Our body speaks the truth and through disease it is showing us what is not true and does not belong to us or in our body.
We can learn so much from our bodies and the illnesses it comes up with. People are talking about fighting or ‘battling’ cancer or any serious disease, but I don’t feel that way.
Cancer has taught me to now live a life full of joy, purpose, and true connections.
Ingrid L, Australia
If you enjoyed this article you may also like to read:
Illness as a Blessing
It is recognised in the medical world that physical and emotional/energetic stressors are a big contributor to disease. A doctor can maybe cure an illness through treatments or medications but if we don’t do our part no true healing can happen.
Receiving a breast cancer diagnosis in 2002 surely made me look and feel deeply into what and how I was living my life and how I was feeling about myself, other people, and life – and what I saw was not pretty. I did not love or respect myself; I was very hard, critical, and judgemental with myself and therefore I also criticised and judged others.
I learned that a woman’s breasts are a symbol for nurturing and for self-nurturing. Could that be connected to the breast cancer in my case? I thought I was looking after myself by following all sorts of healthy eating ways and ideals and growing my own food. But for the rest, I was disregarding and abusing my body through lots of alcohol, late nights, coffee and working too hard on the land. I was good at ‘mind over body’ meaning that with my mind (thoughts) I made my body do anything I wanted, not hearing, or wanting to hear when it had had enough. Lack of self-love and self-worth contributed to my inability to truly energetically self-nurture.
I learned to honour and love my body and not treat it like a thing I could just use and abuse. I needed to learn to listen to what the body was telling me.
At first, I could not hear much because I was dulling and numbing myself with food and especially alcohol, which with time I changed.
When my relationship with myself became more loving, gentle, and respectful this also changed my relationships with other people. I can now say honestly that I love people and myself and that feels truer and more natural for me. Before this, I wasn’t truly a friend of people, and I was afraid of them.
I turned my whole life around by turning it upside down and inside out. I made changes in every area, even the way I work and sleep.
I discovered it works well for me going early to bed and getting up early. Also, my sleep is much deeper and more rejuvenating when I wind down and have no excitement or stimulation a couple of hours before sleep.
I also changed the way I move, for example, I now give myself enough time to get somewhere, no more rushing, which also helps with being more present in my body. And I also looked at my emotional well-being, what I was thinking and feeling especially about myself, other people, and life.
There was much to feel and heal, many old hurts to understand and let go of; and a load of stuff and conditions I had been carrying around all my life that were still affecting my behaviour and my reactions and manifesting in my body.
My body had clearly had enough of the disregard and wanted to get it out, to clear it through a tumour – breast cancer. For other people it might be another disease like diabetes or leukaemia.
I have now lived with cancer for the last twenty years which metastasised nearly six years ago, and I was diagnosed as having terminal cancer – whatever that means. Isn’t everybody’s life in this current body terminal? From a medical perspective I can’t claim that the cancer is cured. I sometimes jokingly say ‘the cancer and me happily co-inhabit this body’. It is just there without moving or growing for the last few years, so far.
I do not think about it and am rarely even aware of it anymore except the two days a week when I take what I call ‘chemo in pill form’ or when the effects of that occasionally bother me.
I can now say that I have healed the cancer. I have healed the energetic cause of living a hard life, the lack of self-nurturing and disregard. I have healed many old hurts and harmful patterns and am healing all the effects of the repeated physical separation from my family that I experienced in my early life.
I appreciate this life with cancer and a truer connection to my essence and the All, rather than having no cancer but still living with all the hurts, lies and the separation from God over many lifetimes. The cancer and all its recurrences kept me on my toes, so to speak, to not fall back into old ways, patterns, and behaviours, instead offering me the opportunity to keep learning and evolving.
Cancer can be a great teacher if you are open to it.
Early in life I learnt to conform, to be ‘good’ (in other people’s and society’s opinion), to live a life that was not me but imposed upon by parents, teachers, etc. I learnt to not express from my essence, my Divinity, until, getting older, I had forgotten how to and instead lived a lie, believing this lie is ‘it’, this is ‘me’.
And this is what most humans live. The lies we believe and live are part of the disease.
Our body speaks the truth and through disease it is showing us what is not true and does not belong to us or in our body.
We can learn so much from our bodies and the illnesses it comes up with. People are talking about fighting or ‘battling’ cancer or any serious disease, but I don’t feel that way.
Cancer has taught me to now live a life full of joy, purpose, and true connections.
Ingrid L, Australia
If you enjoyed this article you may also like to read:
Illness as a Blessing