Monthly Archives: October 2012

Why Forgive?

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We are designed to love and be in relationship. I find the human heart and emotions to be one of the most amazing miracles in God’s creation. But like I wrote on Tuesday we are imperfect and we wound each other…and by choosing to love you are always risking the possibility of being hurt.

“Love anything and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give your heart to no one. It will not be broken, it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The only place outside of heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all dangers and perturbations of love, is hell.” C.S. Lewis (The Four Loves)

When our hearts get hurt we then have choices about how to deal with it. We can choose to forgive or hold on to our righteousness and focus on all the ways we have been wronged. It can feel good for a moment to think about revenge or justice…it can even be comforting to hold on to anger and bitterness. Here are a few of my thoughts on why forgiveness is essential for freedom.

  • Choosing forgiveness means you are no longer controlled by the emotions of a situation. You are not captive to anger and bitterness but let it go and open your heart to life and love. This takes a tremendous amount of humility and courage.
  • You can’t receive forgiveness without being able to give it…one of the great spiritual paradoxes. If we REALLY accept our identity as ABSOLUTELY forgiven by God…forgiveness should flow from us.
  • Choosing to forgive means you let go of being a “victim”
  • Choosing to forgive is a gift you can give yourself
  • Choosing to forgive DOES NOT mean we continue to subject our self to unhealthy behavior but recognize that we can’t change the past and don’t want to be controlled by it.
  • Forgiveness should never be forced but if your heart is honestly open to it have faith that you will find it

You can live a small life focused on how others are mistreating you or you can actually become a proactive person full of life and love. There is so much hope and beauty in forgiveness.Blessings,

Lynnea

The Power of Vulnerability

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I am not going to add many words to this post. I thought this was a great video to follow my post yesterday on wounds. Our wounds prevent us from embracing vulnerability.

Vulnerability is scary and uncertain BUT it is the birthplace of joy, creativity, belonging and love.

Please take the 20 minutes to watch until the end. If you’re reading this in an e-mail you will need to click over to the blog to watch.

Blessings,

Lynnea

Wounds

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What are wounds? When most of us think about them we probably think of physical wounds. We think of the time we fell off our bike and scraped our knee or cut our hand while cooking. Wounds HURT. They compromise the integrity of our skin defense and allow bacteria in. They typically require action on our part to clean them and bandage them to prevent infection…but sometimes they become infected despite our best efforts.

Emotional wounds are harder to recognize and even harder to treat. We all have them. Some have more than others. They are the product of hearts interacting in an imperfect world. We can wound people even when we don’t mean to. We can especially wound people when we mean to. We can have wounds from our childhood and family or previous relationships…we can inflict them on ourselves with our choices. They can be caused by an action or a lack of action. A harsh word or a lack of love and acceptance. They are painful places in our heart that can drive choices without realizing it. They ache. They allow us to believe lies about ourselves and look for quick fixes. Our wounds might tell us we will never be loved and therefore we will seek out unfullfilling relationships to fill a void. Our wounds might tell us we will never be good enough and therefore we are always striving for perfection or not trying at all. Our wounds might tell us we will never succeed and therefore we never try accomplish anything because we are afraid of failing. Wounds feed addictions and insecurities. They can cause us to react in ways we don’t recognize.

The danger with emotional wounds is when you don’t know you have them. They have a lot less power when you can name them, treat them and actively fight against them. I have an insecurity every time I push the publish button on this blog. What if people don’t like what I write? What if it’s not good enough? I have a wound around perfection = acceptance. And I counter those questions with…Do I like what I wrote? Yes. Is it perfect? No. Am I happy with it? Meh..Yes? Good enough…PUBLISH. In the end who cares if no one likes it. Of course affirmation is nice but it shouldn’t drive my choices. I have to choose to be myself regardless. If i didn’t realize that wound existed I may never have started this blog because I was paralyzed by what people thought. Aren’t you guys lucky? ;-) Guys? You there? Just Kidding.

God tells us he is the healer of the broken hearted and wounded. When we are insecure in ourselves we can be secure in Him. Quick fixes wont work. But God promises he will heal us if we only ask…not always in the way we expect but always in the way that we need.

Blessings,

Lynnea

Pink Ribbons Inc.

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I got some very sweet responses to my post yesterday about why I wont claim “Breast Cancer Survivor” for myself…thank you for that. :-) I wanted to follow up with a bit more awareness on the Pink Ribbon Culture that surrounds Breast Cancer and swallows the month of October. I am a member of the Zeta Tau Alpha Fraternity and have been around the Susan G Komen foundation and the “Pink Ribbon” for over a decade but I had NO idea what was actually happening. Here is the trailer for the documentary “Pink Ribbons Inc” that does an excellent job of outlining how corporations use my disease as a cause to promote their bottom line. I am not begrudging capitalism but breast cancer is epidemic…we need REAL research into causes and prevention. I know that if women really become aware of how the “research” money is being spent and if we get vocal enough things will change. (Note: If you’re reading this in an e-mail you’ll need to click over to the blog to watch the video)

We do not need more awareness. I don’t need the white house to become a pink house. I don’t need Estee Lauder to sell me some pink lipstick that actually contain carcinogens and then donate a penny to Komen. I would love a nuanced approach to Breast Cancer treatment rather than the current slash, poison and burn. We need to understand this thing!! SOOO much money has been raised with really not much to show for it.

  • 60% of funds raised and donated in North America are being put back into awareness campaigns. Currently only 5% of funds raised and donated in North America are being used towards prevention research. If you’re not AWARE of BC at this point, honestly, you’ve been on the moon…even there you may see the pink lights. :-)
  • Only 20-30% of cancer occurs in women with “known” risk factors and only 5-10% of that is inherited. That’s at least 70% where we have NO CLUE where it comes from and only 5% of the research money going towards it. Tough to cure a disease when we know nothing about it.
  • In the 1940′s 1 in 22 women were diagnosed with BC, now it’s 1 in 8. That may be because of better screening but quite possibly we are polluting our bodies in a way that needs to be understood and stopped.
  • Susan G Komen died 30 years ago…and honestly her prognosis would not be much better now. How have we not made ANY progress in stage IV treatment in 3 decades with all the money raised?

There are a lot more statistics and the problem is one that is endemic of the big pharma system. This is not meant to be a disheartening message. :-) I know people love me and want to help me…honestly buying pink products doesn’t do that…it helps the companies. Signing up for prevention based research organizations like the Army of Women does.

I had debated whether to include the “real” face of breast cancer in this blog because it may be difficult for some people to look at…hell it’s difficult for me to live. But if you really want to see the reality…post surgery…post chemo…post radiation…pre healing/reconstruction click here. But be warned it’s not a pink ribbon. Things NEED to change.

Sorry for the heavy (but important) message on a Friday…have a good weekend. :-)

Blessings,

Lynnea

Why I’m NOT a Breast Cancer Survivor

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…and I’m OK with it so everyone else should be too. :-) Even now that I have completed all the treatments and have been released into the maintenance (Tamoxifen) stage I still don’t consider myself a Breast Cancer survivor. I do, however, consider myself a survivor of life.

What is a survivor? According to dictionary.com a survivor is someone who:

  1. A person or thing that survives (Ummm, really?! thanks for that)
  2. A person or thing that continues to function or prosper in spite of opposition, hardship, or setbacks. (OK…that one is better)

The world is immersed in “Pinktober” right now and we are being blasted with pink ribbons and breast cancer from all sides. I don’t like pink…I’ve written about that. I don’t have a problem with the ribbon per se, but I do have a problem with the “Pink Ribbon Culture”. In order for all those companies to sell their products the face of breast cancer needs to be hopeful and one of overcoming…so companies like to use words like warrior and survivor. Still, I don’t have a huge problem with it. My problem comes when we pick and choose the breast cancer patients we label “survivor”. 59,000 women in North America die from breast cancer every year…and they are all stage IV metastic patients. These patients get 1 day out of the entire “Breast Cancer” awareness month…1 DAY!! And yet they are the ones that desperately need the research and a break through cure. There is no maintenance phase for them. They are some of the strongest women I have met but often they will never be labeled a “survivor”.

I won a lottery no body wants to win…I got cancer. However, once you’ve won the big bad lottery I got a bit “lucky” on my pathology. I was stage IIb, hormone positive which is considered one of the most treatable. I am absolutely a survivor through this. Would I be less of a survivor if it had spread to my liver or bones? Surviving has everything to do with my attitude and nothing to do with my pathology or even whether I will actually “survive”. Why label me a survivor and not my breast cancer sisters with metastic stage IV? It makes it seem like they are somehow doing less than me…when in fact they are facing so much more.

Nope…I’m not a Breast Cancer survivor…I am a life survivor who happened to get breast cancer…and I am absolutely 100% OK with that.

Blessings

Lynnea

Just Breathe

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My posting has been non existent this past week because I spent the week on the Mediterranean in Spain…fairly disconnected from all things digital. It was glorious! And sorry to make you jealous. :-) I have spent the last 7 months feeling like the ground was falling out from beneath my feet. Every time I thought I had re-established my footing the bottom would drop out again. I was exhausted and tired of reinventing myself…having emotions and tears wrung out of me like a wet dish cloth. A friend of mine had been offering to host me in Calafell for ages and this seemed like the perfect time so I decided to take him up on it (Thanks Richard!!!) I collected my jetlagged mother at the airport in Schiphol and off we went.

Typically I like beach vacations for about 3 days and then I get a bit antsy to “do” something or “see” something. Calafell is 40 minutes south of Barcelona by train and I had grand visions of day trips into the city and exploring nearby villages. It was an amazing opportunity to explore the Catalan region of Spain…BUT that was not what I needed. This was a photo taken on my first morning there and it proved to be very difficult to move me from this spot for the whole week. Can you blame me? :-) It was my own private retreat and I finally had the head and heart space to just sit and let God pour into me. So honestly, I didn’t do much except sit, pray, read, write and look at the ocean…and breathe. It was a complete blessing.

I am coming out of this week knowing with every fiber of my being that my God loves me… Lynnea. He knows my name. In the midst of the billions of people on this planet He created me and absolutely adores me. He loves me in spite of all the ways I let him down and break his heart. He paid a huge price for me and I have done nothing to earn it. That love does not mean that things are easy, in fact it means that in the darkest times I feel it most profoundly because I know how little I can do on my own. Truth be told it is actually a pretty cool place to be. Crazy right?

“Don’t be afraid, I’ve redeemed you.

I’ve called your name. You’re mine.

When you’re in over your head, I’ll be there with you.

When you’re in rough waters, you will not go down.

When you’re between a rock and a hard place,

it won’t be a dead end –

Because I am GOD, your personal God,

The Holy of Israel, your Savior.

I paid a huge price for you.

all of Egypt, with rich Cush and Seba thrown in!

That’s how much you mean to me!

That’s how much I love you!

I’d sell off the whole world to get you back,

trade the creation just for you.

Isaiah 43:1-6 (The Message)

Trade all of creation (read universe) just for me? Wow. Happy Wednesday everyone.

Blessings,

Lynnea