Writing Through Cancer

For the past week or so, I’ve been embracing solitude, honoring the need to pull back and retreat from the busyness of my past many weeks of travel, family visits and non-stop activity of the holidays.  I’ve rediscovered the joy of the quiet routine that nourishes my writing life, re-created a place of sanctuary in my study (which served as a guest room for visiting family and friends), and re-acquainted myself with nature’s gifts, ones just outside my back door.  I love the peace, the sense of self-renewal that solitude offers.

I love the stillness of the wood.

I love the music of the rill.

I love to couch in pensive mood

Upon some silent hill…

Here from the world I win release,

Nor scorn of men, nor footstep rude,

Break in to mar the holy peace

Of this great solitude.

(“Solitude,” by Lewis Carroll, `832-1898)

 Our human need for solitude, inspiration or spiritual renewal has a long tradition, whether for religious reasons, to retreat from the demands of the world, or to fully experience nature, as Thoreau did at Walden Pond, or to deepen our understanding of our own lives.

In a world where our lives are bombarded by busyness,  the constant ring of cell phones, crowds of people in shopping malls or on city streets, “breaking news” of natural or man-made disasters, political campaigns, and advertisements for some new hot consumer item, it’s easy to lose ourselves in the melee.  Worse, we begin to feel stressed, dissatisfied, rushed or unhappy with our own lives and not know why.  How do we reclaim ourselves?

Whether in the demands of daily living or in the aftermath of a difficult  life event, it’s easy to become overwhelmed   by the many different choices we have, the expectations of others, and the voices of our internal critics, whispering “but you should be…” in our ears.  It’s hard to make time for ourselves, difficult to admit that we just might march to the beat of a different drummer and that we need space and solitude to reclaim ourselves.

Even in the recovery from cancer or other traumatic events, we hear many and sometimes conflicting messages about what it means to be a survivor.  There’s actually something called “survivor guilt,” when we can feel guilty about surviving traumatic or painful events while others have been less fortunate.  We feel lucky, yes, but guilty too, and we drive ourselves to take on goals, to accomplish more than we might normally do.  That’s not necessarily bad, but sometimes, we wake up and wonder how we got back on that treadmill when what we desire is a sense of peace, quiet or simplicity to discover what we really want our lives to be like.

Nancy, a writer from the Stanford Cancer Center group, described her feelings after treatment and recovery:  In the beginning, it was comforting to think of fighting to survive…  I believe that I should have a powerful drive to accomplish something…a goal for which I need to survive.  But I don’t find that drive in me. 

“I should have…a goal for which I need to survive.”  She dismissed the feelings of “should,” and rather than chaining herself to a goal that didn’t honor her true feelings, she found renewal in the ordinary and commonplace elements of her life:  I love the things I do day by day.  I hike with one beloved friend.  I spend time in the wonderful garden of another.  I meet others for coffee and conversation. I meet these friends with pleasure and leave them with a joy and benefit to my mind and spirit…

In a poem entitled “Directive,” Ann, a poet living with cancer, reminds us of those ordinary moments in our lives that offer a kind of sanctuary,  a refuge from the demands  of a busy world that sometimes threaten to overtake our lives:

Remember the commonplace, the wooden chair on the white planked deck,
trees kneeling in the rain and deer prints
leading into elegant rushes. A kinder place
cannot be found: where you sit at the top
of shadowy stairs, the window lifted.
Consider the slight breeze, almost erasable,
the boundless oscillating atom, its radiance
tactile, in the mirror your shining hair.
Let me speak for you: there’s comfort
to be found in fatigue, in letting principles
fall like stones from your pockets.
Let the flesh of your breath relax,
overlook not the spacelessness of
monogamous self-love. Fall into the ordinary,
the rushes, the deer looking up into your heart,
risen, full in the silver hammered sky.

This week, consider the importance of solitude and sanctuary in healing.  What little islands of sanctuary, those common and ordinary moments of life, that have helped you heal and find renewal?