This post is the last of three in which I respond to themes in Paul Kalanithi’s beautiful book, When Breath Becomes Air.
Kalanithi’s said: “Severe illness wasn’t life altering; it was life-shattering” (120). I agree.
To observers who don’t have (because no one can) access to my inner experience, it likely seems that cancer has altered, rather than shattered, my life. After all, I moved from serving as a pastor, not into disability, but to teaching in a university. I’ve slowed down, but I’m still on my feet. Though it takes me longer to recover, I can do many of the things I did before undergoing the effects of cancer and its treatment. Alterations.
The shattering is more internal, especially of illusions which I was foolish to hold in the first place, illusions of control and immunity. I’d been making plans for how my 60s and 70s would unfold; I based them on the assumption that I’d continue to enjoy good health and that I’d be in a position to move steadily toward new expressions of my calling and, eventually, to retire paid work. Shattered illusions.
This illness has wounded my inner life in other ways, and it has brought long-ignored experiences of earlier brokenness into painful awareness. My body has been battered; and, in ways too personal to describe here, so also have my senses of worth and identity.
Reynolds Price called the moving memoir of his struggle with spinal cancer, A Whole New Life. He described a wholeness which emerged from his confinement and pain and a newness which rose from the collapse of his old freedoms and assumptions.
Not long ago, I told a therapist that I wouldn’t want to be without the lessons cancer is teaching me or, even more, without the life which his being born in the shadow of death. I don’t believe that God gave me cancer; I could not love such a God. I do trust, though, that the Spirit of Jesus is at work within me and will not waste my suffering.
Here, then, is my astonished witness: I am more whole than I was when I was healthier. I am more alive than before I had a terminal illness. My inner life has been shattered. It is being refashioned. The stark loveliness of Hemingway’s line is becoming true for my heart and spirit, though not for my body: “The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places” (A Farewell to Arms)
I guess we all visualize our future minus chronic illness. Age Related Deterioration and chronic illness are not even related to each other. Your being an important and influential man in so any ways and then having cancer and sharing each step with us, has given us a "hero". You are bigger now than before you got cancer. I find that sad, but you have shown so many people how not to be defeated. We are saved by our faith in Jesus Christ as you teach, but we can find hope and reason to survive by what you have taught through your example of living with cancer. I cannot in good conscience say "thank you" for that, but I can say you have blessed many people and shown what faith and walking with Jesus through the "valley of the shadow of death" truly means. You are a blessing and obviously God’s man in our world of pain. Still praying.
Sue, thank you so much for your reflections and, most of all, for your prayers. Best, Guy
"You must give up the life you had planned in order to have the life that is waiting for you."
When I read your words, I was reminded of this quote from Joseph Campbell. Not to agree or disagree with your posts as much as to affirm. Your words become an interpreter or guide for me. Walking with you, though at a distance, I can echo every word that you write. I hope you know how much I appreciate you as a minister and a person. Blessings!
Thank you so much for your gracious affirmation and for walking with me at a distance. And, thank you for the reminder of Campbell’s wise and powerful words. Grace and peace to you.