Dear People
As patron of New Approaches I send you this reflection.
In this modern, technologically focussed world, it is easy to forget that healing is not just about chemotherapy, surgery and radiation therapy. Yes, they are magical and powerful and necessary, but don’t forget faith, belief and hope. We know some of the science about the ways in which faith and belief and hope can help the immune system fight disease and can lead to beneficial health outcomes, but there is much we don’t know. That lack of knowledge does not make faith, belief and hope less powerful or effective.
Illness is the experience of having a disease. Three people can have the exact same cancer with the same physical involvement and will have three different illnesses or experiences of having the cancer. Much of the differences can be about how much faith, belief and hope they bring to the disease.
Have faith that you can cope with cancer. Have faith in your caregivers, if you cannot, then consider changing caregivers. Have faith that there are energies larger than human that can be approached, appealed to and called on for relief and peace. Have belief in your own abilities to struggle with a disease and to overcome it. Have belief in the connection of all people and of all Creation as you draw on your resources to help with your experience. Have faith in something larger than yourself, whatever you name that something or in whatever form you interact with that something. Whether you use the word God, or Nature, or Creation or whatever, we humans are not the pinnacle of existence, we are merely part of it. We can however, connect with the rest of Creation to draw on what we need to confront crisis.
HAVE HOPE. Hope is anticipation of a good event or outcome.
There is hope and no hope. It might be hope of comfort, of cure, of a peaceful death with supportive family and/or others around. It is important to have hope in the mix, hope improve the efficacy of all forms of therapy and creates the energy to persist. Enlist faith, belief and hope in your experience of cancer. Don’t be afraid to anticipate miracles, they are all around us. Take time to notice the miracles.
Take the time and bother to become one!
Harvey Zarren MD FACC
