Thank you for reading my last blog entry, it had over 298 shares at the last view. I am still waiting for my results from the tests but my breathlessness as become quite bad, so I have ordered a wheelchair. This is not a bad thing, I am looking forward to be able to leave the house again independently, and maybe go queue jumping at Disney land! Also my sleep is much better due to purchasing a recliner chair.
I want to share something very personal that not only helped me in the past few years, but also I believe can be life changing.
What stops us in life of doing things that we want to do or reaching goals that we want to? What can we do to just make ourselves unstoppable? and simply just do it.
I have had to see the past few years as almost a journey, it has not all been bad, cancer can take you on a journey of growth and self-discovery. In the past 4.5 years each turn seems a surprise, each surprise seems to teach.
If this sounds pretentious then I can prove this by simply looking back on my life. I now can measure the distance of this teaching by imagining if a cure for cancer suddenly was found, I visualise what I would do, and who would I be. I would not be the person who worried about the small stuff like I did in the past. My reactions to external events would change to how I used to react.
When I think back to some of the problems in my life in the past, the ones that used to keep me awake at night, 80% (if not more) seem trivial, almost man-made, pointless. If you have a problem and it can be solved easily then that’s not a problem,it’s simply a blip of life to sort out, life is full of them.
BC, (Before cancer) I was a very different person, I would take insults very personally, I would try and be liked, and if someone didn’t like me, I would desperately try harder. At work, If I did anything accidentally wrong, I would punish myself more than anyone manager could.
A few years ago I worked with a person who very determined to climb the next step on the corporate ladder, she didn’t mind who she stood on to reach that next step, and the thing is, she used me a few times, and even more annoyingly, I let her.
We all can talk about our lives like its a story, a structure of moments. These moments may be introduced to you by others, or external things that we have no control over. The power-mad person at work bullying, you have no control over and you can’t control being told you have a terrible disease, but what you can control is yourself, and how you react to these moments, we can not guarantee what happens in our lives, but we have the power to at least steer.
There is also a third type, your inner-voice. An inner-voice gives constant commentary from a voice within that tells us what to do with our lives. The inner voice, the one that can be on your side, when your running a race, or when its telling you to push yourself to win can also be your enemy. It can tell you you’re not good enough, tells you that you have fucked up again, tell ourselves we are not intelligent or worthy.
The thing is, when I got cancer, me and that inner-voice decided to do a deal, no more negativity, no more “no you can’t”, or “whats the point” or “what have you done”, my inner-voice is now my friend, one who encourages, one says “Yes you can”.
Life is hard enough as it is to have a inner-voice editing your life and not for the good. I have read up on the inner-voice, it is something we get in childhood, it protects us, but it has no logic, by saying “no you cant” means you never fail, but what’s a life where you don’t try and see if you can.
Life will thow obstacles in your direction, people will challenge you, and we all have that inner-voice, but how we react to any of these is the real truth that we create. If we decided it can not effect us, then the problem is lesser.
There is no way I would of written a blog like this a few years ago, I would worry what people would have said, people would think I am crazy! and who am I to even write this, what’s my right or qualifications? This could be what people think or just my inner-voice shouting “don’t”, but now, I just don’t care, simply because I choose not to care.
With this new philosophy, I believe you can achieve anything, there is nothing stopping you.
Using this belief life has become more exciting. I have experienced being on the news, I have been on daytime tv, my business has won recognised awards. I have put myself forward for things which in the past I would not have dared.
Ironically that the only thing that stops me achieving what I want now, is not the worry of failure, or what others might say, or my inner-voice, but now my health. But the majority that read this can. It has helped me change from self-doubting to self-believing, and that has made me so much more confident, and for the ones like me, with cancer, I also recommend, it can help you out of dark places, and it can help you stand up to the biggest fight of your life.
At the core of all of this, what I have learnt in the past few years is finding what’s truly important to myself, and just at the very least try letting go of everything else that isn’t, it didnt come naturally at first as there was years of conditioning that needed to be changed, and I still fall at times. life is short, Clear your mind of “you can’t” and replace it with “you can”, and even that simple act can be the start of a life of empowerment.
Thanks again for reading my blog,
Hope you enjoyed.
Carl.
Silence the Inner Voice That’s Stressing You Out (Phycology today)
Three Ways to Change Your Inner Voice (Huff post)
What does your inner voice say to you? (Guardian)