Love Your Life After Cancer

I am teaching a 4-week class at the Cancer Community Center in South Portland, Maine, called Create Your Purpose-Full Life After Cancer. I have met twice so far with the most wonderful group of people! We have been exploring our core values, and next we will create attainable goals from our values.

Sometimes people set goals they want to achieve, but have not done the preliminary thinking about their values, and then end up not taking action toward the goals. (We’ve all been guilty of this, of course!) In doing the preliminary work of getting in touch with core values, we can make our goals more meaningful, and therefore be more motivated to reach them.

Values can be a misunderstood word. People can tend to equate “values” with “morals.” But the kind of values I teach about aren’t necessarily morals at all, but more about what you value most. Values are statements about what matters to you, what’s most important. They are statements about what we want to stand for and how we want to relate to the world around us. They are statements about how we want to be or behave on an ongoing basis.

There are no “right” or “wrong” values in this case. I’ve heard values being likened to taste in pizza. I don’t happen to care for pepperoni, but that doesn’t mean pepperoni is “wrong.” (You might love pepperoni pizza.) I might love pineapple and ham on my pizza, but that doesn’t make it “right;” it just makes it my preference. (You might not touch it!) People could argue all day on what is the “best” pizza to have, and in the end there would in reality not be a winner. It is personal preference only. And so it is with these kinds of values.

Some people value being a compassionate, understanding friend. Some value being a loving spouse or partner. Some value being a stable, responsible parent. Some people may value adventure and risk-taking, while others value stability and responsibility. Some may value autonomy and independence while others value interdependence and closeness with others. None of these are right or wrong, just very individual. And furthermore, you may have certain values in one area of life, like work/career, and have very different values in your home life or with friends.

In exploring our values we can put language around what gives our life a sense of purpose and meaning. We can use our values to guide our actions on an ongoing basis.

When we go through life guided by our values, we gain an understanding that we can have a rich, fulfilling life, even though bad things happen or have happened. (And I know everyone reading this has had at least one “bad thing” happen in their lifetime…)

After a cancer diagnosis and treatment can be an important time for many people to re-assess how they want to move forward in their lives, and exploring values can be a great starting point.

What are your values?

Side Note: I tried to re-write the section above about pizza to be about vegetables, but it just didn’t have the same effect.

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Resolutions are about thinking of the changes you want to make in your life and then taking on resolve or determination to make them. I have to be honest…while I like the idea of resolutions, I’ve never liked the idea of setting new year’s resolutions. It seems like people have good intentions and make resolutions that are important to them. But most people’s “resolutions” are too big, and are made without a plan on how they will reach them. What a set-up for failure!

Especially in post-cancer life, we need to have a better plan, a plan for “success”. Here’s another idea, instead of resolutions, set goals…specific kinds of goals. Set goals that are based on what matters most to you. Pick one thing, one area of life that’s really meaningful to you. Try setting a long term goal that is reachable, but a stretch. Something you would be really proud of yourself for reaching and something that you might have to go a little out of your comfort zone to reach. Anything that matters takes a little bit of work, and sometimes might make us temporarily uncomfortable, right?

I understand that after you’ve been through cancer, you might not want to set any kind of a goal that would make you uncomfortable. You’ve been uncomfortable enough going through treatment! However, you and I both know that in order to get anything we really want, we sometimes have to have a little bit of discomfort here and there.

And here’s the key: take that long-term goal, something you want to reach in 2013, any where from the next several months to a year, and break it down. Get specific about what it’s going to take to reach that goal. Take pen to paper and really break it down until you get to something you can do in the next 24 hours. Here’s where the power lies: the immediate goals. If you think in terms of what you can do in the next day or so, in other words now, you have to get really small. You have to think in terms of tiny baby steps. The power is in the baby steps. Anything we ever do, if you think about it, is built by one baby step after the other. And taking baby steps is how we keep from being overwhelmed.

Here’s an example. Say your health matters a lot to you, as it does to many cancer survivors. Maybe you want to eat a healthier diet and exercise more. That’s a pretty standard one, and it’s actually a pretty huge goal. That’s where a lot of people get held up…it’s just too overwhelming to change your eating habits and your exercise habits all at once. So break it down…pick one thing. Maybe you decide a good starting point is to eat more vegetables and fruits. But you’ve heard that you’re supposed to have like 46 servings of vegetables and fruits in your diet every day. (It might as well be that many!) It feels overwhelming. So instead of trying to do it all at once, maybe you decide you are going to add one serving of vegetables/fruits into your diet every day. If even that feels like it might not be doable, you could decide to add 3 servings each week for a few weeks and see how that goes. Remember, do-able but a stretch.

So maybe this means you have a half a piece of fruit as a snack between meals a few times a week. That wouldn’t be so hard. (Try a half an apple with almond butter smeared on the slices…it’s one of my favorite snacks!) Or you decide you will cook some broccoli or kale once a week to go with dinner. So your tiny baby step is to write “broccoli” or “kale” on your grocery list. Then the next step could be to look up a recipe online that will make broc or kale yummy to eat. Right? One tiny step after the other and each step counts. Read that again. Each step counts because they add up to you reaching your goal if you keep doing them. Eventually you are eating more vegetables and fruits.

You could have a chart with check boxes and when you have that serving, check it off. See how you do at the end of the week and re-assess how realistic the goal was without beating up on yourself. If you didn’t reach the goal, try again the next week. If you did reach the goal…yay! Keep it up and add something to it after a few weeks. Just make sure the long term goals matters a lot to you, so that you have some energy for the baby steps.

So in summary…make the goal reachable but also a stretch, make sure the goal matters to you, work at it and be willing to be uncomfortable temporarily, get specific and break down each goal into tiny baby steps, look back and re-assess with self-compassion. Does that make some sense?

Like what you see in this blog? Sign up for my newsletter! In addition to getting the article before it posts on the blog, you will also get inspirational quotes, self-care tips, and information about services and upcoming events. Just fill in your name and email in the reddish box at the top right of this page to receive the “Love Your Life After Cancer” eNewsletter every other week, as well as a free video series, “7 Ways to Recover from the Emotional Impact of Cancer.”

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I recently spent some time at a camp here in Maine and an hour or two lying on the dock in the lake looking up at the stars. In one particular instance of dock-lying, I was trying to remember the constellations, but could really only identify the Big Dipper. (Pretty sad…) Anyway, it got me thinking about an idea I talked with someone about a while back regarding meaning and purpose after cancer, and just in life in general.

I think many of us who have survived cancer take a look at meaning and purpose in our lives. Sometimes we think there is supposed to be one big thing that is our “purpose” in life or that gives our life meaning…some big thing that makes it all worthwhile, like the right job or the right partner or the right kids or the right calling, etc. I think this idea is a myth, and that we instead have a “constellation of meaning” in our lives. Yes, some people do have that one thing that is their purpose in life, but most of us have a constellation.

According to one online dictionary, a “constellation” in astronomy is “an arbitrary formation of stars perceived as a figure or design.” It can also be “a gathering or an assemblage,” or “a set or configuration, as of related items, properties, ideas, or individuals.”

I think this is perfectly fitting for when we talk about building (or re-building) rich, full, meaningful lives. Sometimes we spend a lot of time and energy trying to figure out that one big purpose, that we lose site of all the little things, sometimes an “arbitrary formation” of little things, that make meaning in our lives. We often look for “the answer” or seek “the truth” for what will make us happy or make us feel like we have a purpose, when actually there are a number of things that bring us joy and meaning.

When stargazing in the beautiful Maine night, it’s not just about the big, bright stars…that’s not all that makes the sky beautiful. Yes, the bright stars are cool, but it’s also about all the tiny, barely-see-able stars that fill up the sky. I noticed when I softened my gaze, when I didn’t try so hard to see what I wanted to see, I could see even more stars, more beauty.

When we think of our lives in this way, it takes some of the pressure off…we don’t have to figure out “Why am I here?” or “What’s my purpose?” (Although those are perfectly fine questions to ask, they can be kind of big, scary questions to answer!) We can think of all of the things that bring us joy and make us feel more connected to ourselves and to others, the things that matter most to us.

We can think of each thing as one of the stars in our constellation of meaning. We can broaden our perspective, soften our gaze, to include a number of things, even small things, that make meaning in our lives. We can begin to see the “gathering,” or “configuration of related items,” that form the “design” of our lives.

What makes up your constellation? Make a list on paper of all the things in your life that matter most to you, be it traits or qualities you possess, abilities you have, relationships with others…anything you truly value. When I look at the list of all the things that contribute to my “constellation of meaning,” I feel a sense of wellbeing and wealth. What do you feel?

Like what you see in this blog? Sign up for my newsletter! In addition to getting the article before it posts on the blog, you will also get inspirational quotes, self-care tips, and information about services and upcoming events. Just fill in your name and email in the reddish box at the top right of this page to receive the “Love Your Life After Cancer” eNewsletter every other week, as well as a free video series, “7 Ways to Recover from the Emotional Impact of Cancer.”

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