From Surviving to Thriving

With the two year anniversary of my breast cancer diagnosis (March 19 to be exact), I have been reflecting a lot on my journey.  Wow.  I have learned so much.  I have come a long way.  I am doing this.  I remember about a year ago on my one year anniversary thinking this same thing.   Who thought that I could still have the capacity to learn and grow even more?  And in such great big leaps and bounds?  It reminds me of the famous quote by Aristotle:

Or the one by Albert Einstein:

My life will be forever changed by my diagnosis.  I will never live life the same way again.  I will always juice, and I will always be very conscious about what I eat.  I will always meditate, and I will always do my best to live in a more mindful and conscious way.  This is okay.  It is even a good thing.  It is better than that.  It is a great thing.  Sometimes I forget how great it is...

I have a great group of friends who ask thoughtful questions or give you a thought to ponder on a weekly basis.  A couple of weeks ago the question/thought was:
Notice how it feels when you say "I have to..." versus "I get to..." about commitments, work, events, etc. Then take note about the results in an area of your life where you find yourself saying "I have to...".  Do you feel a difference?

That was a good thought for me.  I thought and pondered on this for a long time.  I often find myself saying on quite a daily basis "I have to juice." or "I have to make dinner." or "I have to go to school.", etc.  Which after I thought about it, what I was really saying was, "I don't have time for these other things because I have to do this stuff."  I was completely focused on the not so fun part rather than the complete opportunity and privilege that I have to care for myself and my family.  I have the ability to stay home and lovingly care for myself and my well-being and to prepare delicious and nutritious foods for me and my family.  I also am privileged to be able to help with the education of my children and nieces.  I completely lost focus and forgot that not all people are able to do this. What an aha moment for me.

And so I realize that as much as I have learned since my diagnosis, I am still learning.  I will never stop learning and growing.  I am a work in progress.  It just keeps getting better and better.  I now realize that it is not just about surviving my monotonous every day life.  It is about taking that life and making it beautiful and noticing the everyday miracles.  It is about those wonderful aha moments.  It is about living fully and sometimes that means changing your perspective to see all of the amazing-ness (maybe this is not a word since my spell check is alerting me...) that surrounds me.

So I have decided that I am no longer just going to survive.  I have decided that I am going to go all out and thrive.  I am going to enjoy the small things.  I am going to love the journey.  People go along in their everyday lives and they just try to get through their days.  They want to get through their week and to the weekend and then through the holidays and then onto vacation, etc., etc.. Somewhere along the way I think that we forget to truly live and smell the roses and to enjoy the beauties and miracles of everyday life.  At least I do.

So now my goal is to live life to the fullest.  I shall now leave you with a quote from the beloved Maya Angelou who says things so beautifully and whose words explain exactly how I feel.  What a great example of humanity and true beauty.

Thank you Maya.