Using the “C” word

It is 8:29 pm Friday 8th September. Just got home, busy day! Work, kids, future plans, money, regrets, house sales, a head full of thoughts.

8:30 pm my younger brother calls, he tells me he has cancer, and it has advanced and passed into a secondary area of his body! It seems, for just a moment that the world has stopped spinning. What I considered important 30 seconds earlier suddenly has become totally irrelevant – my poor brother, and what about his wife…his kids? The youngest has just started school this week. What about Mum and Dad? This seems so tough.

 

Then the world starts spinning again; I can not even imagine how hard it must be for people that don’t have faith in something bigger than what we can see.

 

Surprisingly the overwhelming emotion is that of gratitude and thankfulness and a desire to make every moment count.  There is so much in my life that I need to be grateful for, including my brother and his family!

 

8:42 pm wished my brother good night, and we prayed together.

 

People are precious, and with a heavy heart, I think of times I have wronged people, where I was too abrasive or did not see the best in them, even put them down or let them down, or simply did not do what I said I would do. I wish I could turn back the clock and do things differently, but I can’t! We can’t! I think back to the schoolyard rhyme “Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never harm me.” But bones heal………..

 

In a funny sort of way, this has been a special week. I drove down with my kids for a couple of hours to see my brother, and we just hung out. We have spoken a couple of times each day on the phone just checking in on each other. Normally I could go a few weeks without talking to him. Why does it take a crisis to focus on what is important?

 

In very simple terms cancer is a cell in our body that gets damaged, and that starts to reproduce more and more damaged cells overpowering our healthy cells.

 

It’s so easy to infect ourselves with virtual “cancer” of the heart, by holding on to hurt, unresolved bitterness and pain. We are not beholden to our past, and we are not defined by our mistakes or the people that have hurt us. Life is simply too short, and people are too precious not to live life, loving, with arms opened wide!

 

I am believing my God for a miracle, a miracle that gives me 40 more years walking with my brother. But, if it’s 4 weeks, or 4 months or 4 years I hope to remain grateful for what I have had, rather than what, I might have lost. I guess like me; you are not one of the 1 billion people on this amazing planet of ours that live on less than $1 per day. Let’s not race to the bottom in self-pity, but increase our love for those who have it worse than us.

As part of your life seems to go up in flames, it might just be the smoke signal needed to attract heavens blessings.