The following is a series of excerpts from chapter 3 of Journeys with the Cancer Conqueror: Mobilizing Mind & Spirit, by Greg Anderson, 1999, Andrews McMeel Publishing, Kansas City, Missouri, previously published under the title: The Cancer Conqueror (1988). Emphasis is added with bold print to draw attention to cancer conqueror traits. Much of the summary is quoted directly from the book, but I also add editorial comments along the way that reflect my own personal convictions, Scriptural support of ideas expressed, as well as research from other resources. These are indicated by italicized print. Portions in blue print that are NOT italicized are direct quotes from another source other than the Bible. ******************************************************************************
Mary is the woman the man met on this week’s journey. She began by asking him a question. “What do you think cancer means?”
“I’m not sure,” said the man. “I know it is a serious illness that will probably end my life pretty quickly unless I do something about it. And the Cancer Conqueror said it was more than physical. To me cancer is the worst nightmare I’ve ever had to deal with.”
Mary smiled. “Those are pretty common beliefs about cancer. Society has conditioned us to think negatively & fearfully about this disease. And while some of that conditioning can be good, it has resulted in harmful untruths like these:
• Cancer means death.
• Treatment options are limited & ineffective & have horrible side effects.
• Once you contract cancer, there is nothing you can do to help yourself.
“The truth is that
• Cancer may or may not mean death.
• Treatment options are many & are becoming more effective, & side effects are less severe every day.
• Once you contract cancer, there are many things you can do – physically, emotionally, & spiritually – to help yourself.
“The untruths lead to beliefs that result in despair. With despair there is no power. But the truths lead to hope. With hope there is significant power."
(When it comes to cancer, we have to search for the truth about the disease. We don’t realize how many common misconceptions most of us hold, because of our narrow exposure to it. If you’re like me, you immediately think of family members, friends, acquaintances, etc. who lost their battles with the disease. The picture we conjure up is usually not very pretty. How many people can you think of who are cancer survivors? How many of these had early stage cancers? How many of them were late stage cancer patients who were supposed to die but lived? If you are reading this & have received the news, “you have cancer,” did you think of the people you knew who lost their battles with the disease first or those who survived first? Which would give you greater hope? Did you immediately assume you were going to die of cancer? Do you know that taking these journeys with the Cancer Conqueror & then applying these strategies can enhance the effectiveness of your medical treatment? Cancer Conquering is not just for late-stage cancer patients.)
“What you choose to believe about cancer is crucial to your journey. Note how the truths match 3 belief areas – the disease itself, the treatment, & your role. Your beliefs about the disease, the treatment, & your role have incredible power over the outcome, & you can choose these beliefs.”
(Each of us has to take whatever time is necessary to process what is happening to us, before we can look at this disease from a positive perspective. I remember watching a Christian woman on TV telling about her experience with breast cancer. She went on about how God used it in such positive ways & thanked God that she had gone through the experience with cancer. I knew I SHOULD feel that way, but I didn’t. Instead, I prayed about it & asked God to help me see it that way. It took another YEAR before I could recognize the many ways in which God is using this experience to make my life better & my health better than it was before I was diagnosed with cancer. I’ve made the statement before, & you’ll read it many more times, because I sincerely mean it. My diagnosis with cancer is one of the best things that has ever happened in my life! Praise God!
This positive perspective has the potential to enhance the effectiveness of my medical treatment, as you will see.)
Mary explained that she learned more about the disease. She learned that more than half of the cases like hers were cured, which meant it was not an automatic death sentence.
Next, Mary asked, “What do you believe about treatments?”
The man paused. “I guess I feel they are probably not very effective. And when it comes to side effects, I’m afraid of all the horrible possibilities.”
Mary explained that she had shared his feelings. She then described her experience with her treatment. She learned that the treatment plan was very hopeful.
The man asked about side effects, & Mary explained that at the beginning of her chemotherapy sessions she “read about the psychological component of side effects. A research study tracked a group of people who were given sterile water injections instead of chemotherapy, & a third of them lost their hair anyway. . .
“The only explanation the researchers could give for the hair loss was psychological [a placebo effect]. They lost their hair because they believed chemotherapy caused hair loss. . . And another 30 percent of the people got sick on their way to chemotherapy. They experienced nausea not after the drug had been administered, not during the administration, but before – in anticipation of chemotherapy.
“I realized my beliefs & attitudes contributed to the severity of my side effects. Of course that doesn’t mean no one will never experience hair loss or mouth sores or be nauseous again. But it does mean that there is a psychological component to side effects, & we can work to control that component."
(We’ve all heard the mind over matter arguments, which are also called psychosomatic symptoms. Some body (somatic) symptoms have no known physiological basis. Symptoms seem more related to beliefs and emotions than to physical damage or biological causes. These are real physical symptoms caused or aggravated by psychological factors such as migraine, back pain and irritable bowel syndrome.
The impact of psychological factors on many health aspects cannot be ignored. For example, stress can affect a person's susceptibility to infection or their recovery from illness. Although the symptoms are real, physicians may have great difficulty in diagnosing an actual illness or its cause.
Because this phenomenon exists, it is frustrating when you have an actual physical problem doctors are unable to diagnose for which you are treated as if it is “all in your head.” I’ve been down this road. After 11 doctors, the 12th took me seriously & did the correct diagnostic test to discover the actually source of my difficulties, which resulted in surgery that corrected the problems I’d dealt with for several years.
Another common factor is known as the placebo effect. This is described as, “The physician’s belief in the treatment & the patient’s faith in the physician exert a mutually reinforcing effect; they result in a powerful remedy that is almost guaranteed to produce an improvement & sometimes a cure.” – Petr Skrabanek & James McCormick, Follies & Fallacies in Medicine. “The placebo effect is the measurable, observable, or felt improvement in health or behavior not attributable to a medication or invasive treatment that has been administered. . .
“A person’s beliefs & hopes about a treatment, combined with their suggestibility, may have a significant biochemical effect. SENSORY EXPERIENCE & THOUGHTS CAN AFFECT NEUROCHEMISTRY [emphasis added]. The body’s neurochemical system affects & is affected by other biochemical systems, including the hormonal & immune systems. Thus, IT IS CONSISTENT WITH CURRENT KNOWLEDGE THAT A PERSON’S HOPEFUL ATTITUDE & BELIEFS MAY BE VERY IMPORTANT TO THEIR PHYSICAL WELL-BEING & RECOVERY FROM INJURY OR ILLNESS [emphasis added; for extra emphasis, read it again!].
“The psychological explanation seems to be the one most commonly believed . . . there are too many studies that have found objective improvements in health from placebos to support the notion that the placebo effect is entirely psychological.
“Doctors in one study successfully eliminated warts by painting them with a brightly colored, inert dye & promising patients the warts would be gone when the color wore off. In a study of asthmatics, researchers found that they could produce dilation of the airways by simply telling people they were inhaling a bronchodilator, even when they weren’t. Patients suffering pain after wisdom-tooth extraction got just as much relief from a fake application of ultrasound as from a real one, so long as both patient & therapist thought the machine was on. Fifty-two percent of the colitis patients treated with placebos in 11 different trials reported feeling better – 50 percent of the inflamed intestines actually looked better when assessed with a sigmoidoscope [‘The Placebo Prescription’ by Margaret Talbot, New York Times Magazine, January 9, 2000].
“It is unlikely that such effects are purely psychological.”
Dr. Walter A. Brown, a psychiatrist at Brown University, & others “believe that the placebo effect is mainly or purely physical & due to changes that promote healing or feeling better. [So, how do we explain the placebo effect?] Some think it is the process of administering it. It is thought that the touching, the caring, the attention, & other interpersonal communication that is part of the controlled study process (or the therapeutic setting), along with the hopefulness & encouragement provided by the experimenter/[physician], affect the mood, expectations, & beliefs of the subject, which in turn triggers physical changes such as release of endorphins, catecholamines, cortisol, or adrenaline. The process reduces stress by providing hope or reducing uncertainty about what treatment to take or what the outcome will be. The reduction in stress prevents or slows down further harmful physical changes from occurring. The healing situation provokes a conditioned response.” http://skepdic.com/placebo.html
Philippians 4:8 “Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things.” This verse tells us where we should focus our thoughts. We are not talking about just positive thinking, but possibility thinking. Think about all the possibilities that are available through a relationship with Jesus Christ. Matthew 19:26 “with God all things are possible.” It’s possible to overcome the side effects of cancer treatment if we maintain hope, rather than mere wishful thinking, & believe God designed your body with the capability to recover. We must believe He WILL facilitate the effectiveness of the cooperation between the body & the medical treatment.)
“In short, the belief we want to encourage is that the treatment is our friend. And as our friend, it is effective in helping overcome the physical aspects of the illness. It is fair to assume, then, that the side effects will, most likely, be very minimal”
Mary continued, “The Cancer Conqueror taught me that I needed to believe in my treatment program even more than the physician who prescribed it did! That was a revelation to me. She went on to say that the treatment program was something I needed to get excited about. I would need to align myself with the treatment, believe in its effectiveness, & think of it as a welcome ally. I admit I spent a lot of time nurturing this belief.
(If you read chapter 11 of “My Story”, you read that Dr. Patel explained that my opinion of & attitude toward the form of treatment chosen is crucial to its success, even though he did not speak of treatment as a possible cure or talk about recovery. When diagnosed with stage IV, or advanced stage cancer, oncologists never use the words cure, recovery or remission in their discussions. They only talk about stabilizing the disease – keeping it from getting worse – & providing “quality of life.” For me, quality of life is more than the state of my cancer, & controlling side effects of any treatment &/or possible symptoms of the cancer itself; it’s living every day to the fullest, with love, joy, hope & peace of mind, which develops through my personal relationship with Jesus Christ. The oncologists cannot provide this, but I am convinced that God works through them to provide medical insight & wisdom to diagnose, treat, & monitor the disease biologically & physically.
At this point, Dr. Patel stated that if I don’t think chemotherapy or hormone therapy will work, it won’t work. This appointment, to discuss my treatment options, was bathed in prayer – our family’s & those of many, many prayer warriors who were praying for us. As I describe in writing chapter 11 of "My Story," we had a peace that was beyond understanding – God’s peace – when we made our choice. My belief in my treatment & its effectiveness was strong, from the beginning, because I knew it was God’s choice for me.
I have talked with others who have described their treatment as their friend, or something similar. It is helpful to maintain a positive perspective on the treatment chosen. Cancer is the enemy, not the treatment. When we have witnessed the heartbreaking effects of treatment on loved ones, in late stages of the disease, who’ve lost their battles with the disease; it might seem that the treatment was worse than the disease itself. These treatments are often done in an attempt to prolong life and/or in hopes of providing more quality of life for the time they have remaining. It doesn’t always work out the way the oncologist or the family thinks it will. For this reason, it’s easy to view treatment as the enemy. We have to change this perspective & misconception; it is actually a narrow view of cancer treatment.)
“But even more important than beliefs about the disease, the treatment, & the side effects are the beliefs we have about our role in the cancer journey.”
(This is what another author, a pharmaceutical scientist, says about this matter: "In practice, people recover when they take placebos. The effect has been shown to cause spontaneous recovery anywhere between 10 percent & 100 percent of people, depending upon the nature of the trial & the type of illness being studied. . . The placebo effect makes you wonder how many of the people who receive a drug in medical trials actually recover due to the placebo effect. Does the drug itself cause them to get well or is it their BELIEF in the drug that caused them to recover?"
Another author states that "belief, motivation, & expectation are essential to the placebo effect." In fact, "THE CRITICAL FACTOR IS OUR BELIEFS ABOUT WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO US [emphasis added]."
I read about a researcher, who was studying the placebo effect of depressed patients treated with drugs, psychotherapy, or a combination of both. After analyzing 39 studies, done between 1974 & 1995, he found that 50% of the drug effect is due to the placebo response.
Our bodies are hardwired to feel every emotion; as it does, our emotions show up as physical “symptoms.” When you cry it is your thoughts & feelings of happiness or sadness that set in motion a series of internal events in your body that result in tears. Your mind is affecting your biology. Similarly, your face may turn red if you are embarrassed. A pleasant thought can alter the rhythm of your heart & even raise the strength of your immune system.
Your biology can affect your thoughts & emotions. These range from hormonal changes to chemical changes in the brain, which can make a person feel emotionally high or low. Certain drugs alter brain chemistry in this manner, as do endorphins, which are the body’s own natural opiates.
The lesson here is the fact that there is a mind-body communication going both ways. A lot of research has been done on this.
A study by “the Institute of Heartmath showed that positive & negative thinking could affect the body’s immune system. Researchers monitored the amounts of salivary immunoglobulin A (s-lgA) after each person in the study thought ‘care & compassion’ or ‘anger & frustration.’ Salivary immunoglobulin A is part of the immune system found in the saliva that can neutralize the bacteria that enter your mouth, from your food. . . A large amount of it indicates a strong immune system, whereas a small amount indicates a weakened system.
Heartmath scientists found that ‘care & compassion’ produced a stronger immune system than ‘anger & frustration.’ In fact, they found that just 5 minutes of ‘care & compassion’ caused the immune system to be elevated for 5 hours, while 5 minutes of ‘anger & frustration’ depressed it for 5 hours. So, we can create positive states of health by thinking positively.” It’s the Thought That Counts, by David R. Hamilton, PhD.
The lesson to be learned from these examples is to examine our beliefs & to be mindful of our thoughts. Don Colbert, MD, in his book The Seven Pillars of Health, describes mindfulness as slowing down so that we do one activity at a time, giving our full awareness to both the activity at hand & to your inner experience of it, paying attention to what is happening to us moment by moment. This provides a powerful antidote to stress since it means letting go of any thought that is unrelated to the present moment & finding something to enjoy in the present moment.
He goes on to explain, “Nothing exemplifies mindfulness better than thankfulness & gratitude.”
". . . An ‘attitude of gratitude’ helps you take the focus off your situation & shifts it to the One who can work everything out for you. Hebrews 13 tells us to give the sacrifice of praise continually, not just when we feel like it, ‘the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name’ (verse 15). Paul said, ‘In everything give thanks [even in the midst of trials & tribulations]: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you’ I Thessalonians 5:18.")
Mary talked about finding books on the role she could assume with her medical team, with the disease, with the treatments, & with her family. She stated, “For the first time I was able to exercise some personal control over the illness. I was able to see my role as managing a total treatment program that included my medical team, my mind & my spirit.
(We know that God is in control of how things play out, but we are to make a plan of action, as we are told in Proverbs 16:3 “Commit to the Lord whatever you do, & your plans will succeed.” And in Proverbs 16:9 it says, “In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.”)
“I spent additional hours on the Internet where I studied & worked. I developed a fighting spirit. I fanned the flames of my will to live. . . There is no question in my mind that my self-education was a crucial part of the process of getting well.
(My fighting spirit is due, in part, to the fact that God hardwired my brain to be stubborn, but it also comes from my spiritual focus that I develop through my personal relationship with Jesus Christ. This is maintained through prayer, reading my Bible, searching for specific Scriptures to help specific situations, & by reading Christian spiritual growth books, written by trusted Christian authors. I also find that contemporary Christian music soothes my soul & helps me to praise, honor & worship God. All these things help me to keep God at the center of my life, as my friend, my guide, my counselor, my source of strength; it also keeps me mindful of the fact that He is in control, so that I consult Him when I have decisions to make. I rely on Him as I read educational research for discernment & insight, so that I am not lead astray, because some research is contradictory to what I’ve previously read & some is based on principles that are contradictory to my Christian beliefs. A combination of prayer & searching for credible sources helps me to uncover the truth. Philippians 1:9-10a “And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more & more in knowledge & depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best.”
Self-education has corrected many misconceptions & helped me understand how this disease affects my body physically. It has helped me to know how my body has been designed, by God, to reverse the disease, if it is working effectively. Yes, I know everyone believes cancer is an incurable disease. However, I’ve now read enough to now know it is reversible by many different measures, besides the usual medical “standard of care”— surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, & hormone therapy forms of treatment. God can choose to spontaneously heal an individual, too. Those are glorious events, for which I praise God. However, I’ve discovered that there are thousands of cancer patients each year who are recovering from cancer or who have gone into remission by consistently following the strategies Greg Anderson lists & describes in his books. He didn’t invent them or base them on his singular experience; he’s interviewed thousands of cancer patients, who were told they were supposed to die but didn’t, to discover these common strategies utilized by thousands of survivors. These folks are the living proof that they work. It is from talking to them or their having filled out a questionnaire that he created the list of 8 strategies survivors have in common – they are incorporated into these journeys with the Cancer Conqueror.)
“Yet as helpful as all those things were, as important as the self-education process was, I always kept coming back to mind & spirit. It became apparent to me that mind & spirit were the key components of my treatment plan. They were also directly under my control. It led me to what I consider one of the single most powerful beliefs I had ever nurtured. I came to see that even though I had cancer, I was not cancer.
(This is a tricky one. You get very caught up in the disease, so that you almost feel as if it “owns” you. It’s like the statement in chapter 2: “I am in charge of my cancer. My cancer is not in charge of me.” You can’t let it totally consume who you are, even if it requires many dedicated hours of your day to fight it, or if you are sick or struggling with debilitating side effects from your treatment. In most cases, that is not a permanent state of affairs. Cancer is not who we are, it’s an illness we have. It’s so easy to get caught up in conversations with others about our disease, treatment & how we are tolerating both that we miss out on talking about those things we would have talked about if cancer was not a part of our lives. Other people don’t know how often we may have run through this same conversation. They mean well & are interested in us. Can we find creative ways to direct conversation to other things that are of interest to us, without ignoring the inquiries? I struggle with this. We need time to feel as if we are a “normal” human being, without cancer getting in the way.)
“. . . I was able to separate who I was as a person from what I had as a disease. I had control over my mind & spirit! And my mind & my spirit had cancer only if I allowed it.
(2 Corinthians 10:3-5 “though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine powers to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments & every pretention that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, & we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” You see, we are always fighting a battle in our minds. Some thoughts have a real strong hold on us. My choice is to allow the Holy Spirit to have control over my mind. Why? Romans 8:6b “the mind controlled by the Spirit is life & peace.” This is how I am able to take those thoughts captive that have a grip on my mind. As an act of my will, I turn them over, surrender them to God. Romans 12:1-2 says, “I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy & pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test & approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing & perfect will.” My mind is a part of my body, which I freely give to God. I give myself as a “living sacrifice,” which means that who I am, as an individual, is not threatened. When I surrender myself to Him, he promises that I will be “transformed by the renewing of my mind.” That is pretty awesome. I will gain a new perspective, God’s perspective on my life & God’s purpose for me. When I see things His way, I will also understand that His will is good. He only wants what is best for me. It is pleasing; the better I understand it the more enthusiastically I will accept it. I will also see that it is perfect, in that it makes provision for every area of my life. 2 Corinthians 3:17 says, “Now the Lord is the Spirit, & where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom.”)
“Who I was as a person was much more than what I had as a disease.”
Mary explained her misinformed belief that cancer cells were eating away at the inside of her body. The Cancer Conqueror corrected this false belief. “Cancer cells don’t eat other cells. Cancer cells are weak & confused cells . . . the cells themselves are not intelligent. They don’t make up a bodily organ. Instead, they have gone mad. They are confused.”
Mary pointed out “another important belief brings a new perspective to our treatment. Right in our own bodies is the mortal enemy of cancer cells, our own immune system.” She made clear that the surgeons, the radiation, or the chemotherapy & other treatments actually “help the body’s immune system heal itself – from within! The medical team plays a supporting role to the body’s own healing power!”
(In the same way that the medial team plays a supporting role in the healing of a broken bone, they do so in illnesses that require other forms of treatment. The doctor who sets a broken bone or a surgeon who places metal rods, pins, &/or screws in it does not heal it; he or she does play a major role in HOW it heals though. I have a long rod, a pin & 5 screws in my left femur, & I have a long rod, a pin & 4 screws in my right femur, as a result of my auto accident, in 1999. I don’t want to think of how they would have healed without the surgeon’s supporting role. I certainly don’t believe I would be able to walk. Even with the surgery & implanting all that hardware, the surgeon predicted that I probably wouldn’t ever walk. Well, he was wrong. Praise God! Although the surgeon didn’t heal my legs, he certainly did play a supporting role! In the same way, my physical therapists played a role in helping me rehabilitate my legs so that I could walk. I shared personal responsibility in following through with following the doctor’s orders & with doing the physical therapist’s prescribed movements & exercises to rehabilitate my legs. The time spent with the physical therapist was not sufficient to do this. The actual healing process took place naturally, even though it took a year before I could walk without any assistance at all. In addition, the food I ate & the calcium supplements I took played a supporting role in providing fuel for my body to produce the chemicals God designed it to produce to enable the natural healing process to occur in my bones & connecting tissues. This is how God designed our bodies. Psalm 139:14 says, “I praise you because I am fearfully & wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.”
As more has been learned about how our bodies work, forms of treatment have changed to help this process to be more efficient, so that recovery is more complete. I believe God helps scientists, researchers, biologists, & physicians to discover new medical information/wisdom so that they are able to better serve & help patients, in their supporting role. Proverbs 2:6 “For the Lord gives wisdom, & from his mouth come knowledge & understanding.” This kind of revelation is at God’s discretion. Think of how many diseases have been wiped out because cures have been “discovered.” Who is ultimately responsible for these “cures” & their “discoveries?” Of course, it’s God!
Our body’s immune system & hormonal system produce many chemicals that are critical in the healing process. To work effectively, they must be supported by optimal nutrition. The brain is the control center that orchestrates the different systems of the body; so, it needs proper nourishment, rest, oxygen, etc. There are multiple connections between the body, mind & spirit. In terms of the physical body, God designed it with AMAZING capabilities. We can work with or against those capabilities. The medical team is attempting to work with them, to support them.
I am absolutely convinced that the hundreds of people who prayed for me throughout my recovery played a very large supporting role, as well!! Praise God!!)
Mary went on. “The Cancer Conqueror taught me that cancer has significant psychological, emotional & spiritual components. We can understand more about these aspects by looking at stress & the way we handle it. The important thing to realize is that mismanaged stress can lead to both a physical & a psychological reaction that primes the body to respond. This priming is a mental phenomenon. If we mentally respond by suppressing or over-expressing, we give the body confusing signals. The result is that our immune systems become compromised & less effective in warding off potential cancer cells, [bacteria, or viruses].
“These essentials are documented in a growing field combining science & psychology called psychoneuroimmunology [PNI]. It’s a scientific discipline that recognizes mind & spirit do affect cellular biology. Thoughts of fear, anger, & guilt can lead to sickness on more levels than just the physical. Yet thoughts of love, joy, & peace lead to health & well-being.
(Nehemiah 8:10d “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” Proverbs 14:30a “A heart at peace gives life to the body.”)
The man asked, “Does this all mean that I gave myself cancer?”
“No, No!” said Mary. “That’s much too rigid a view. You didn’t give yourself cancer. However, the inability to handle stress constructively, to resolve conflicts creatively, & to manage anxieties effectively may contribute to the beginning of illness. Of course, it wasn’t a conscious decision.
(This also means that another person cannot GIVE or CAUSE you to get cancer. There is no way we can know for which individuals this is a contributing factor to the development of cancer. We need to learn to learn to manage stressful situations, to deal with the emotional & interpersonal conflicts, as well as the emotional issues that accompany them, in order to be mentally & emotionally healthier, without doing this out of fear that it might be causing us to develop cancer. That may only add to our stress rather than decrease it. If it’s an eye-opener that motivates us to take steps to learn to better manage those things that cause us to become anxious or stressed, then it is a positive stressor.)
“If you recognize that you may have contributed to your illness, then you must also believe that you have the power to contribute to your recovery. The psychological & spiritual components can work either for us or against us. The choice is ours.”
(Of course, there are factors, besides resolving conflicts, to consider that may have contributed to your cancer. Without realizing it, you made lifestyle choices, in ignorance to their potential contribution to the development of cancer, which you now know may be contributing factors. You now have the opportunity to change or modify these choices because you NOW know they may be contributing factors. In this way, you are contributing to your recovery.
One example is the fact the cancer cells are anaerobic while healthy cells are aerobic, meaning they need oxygen. Cancer hates well-oxygenated tissues. For this reason, breathing deeply &/or getting regular exercise that brings our heart rate up, to our target heart rate, so that we oxygenate our body’s tissues & kill cancer cells. If you have been physically inactive, including a routine exercise program in your weekly schedule is a change you can make that is good for your healthy cells, helps you psychologically, & kills cancer cells!! How’s that for contributing to your recovery?
It was after I was required to change my eating habits that I learned how my previous diet contributed to the growth of my cancer, as well as other health issues. The initial adjustment was very difficult, as I describe in chapter 13 of "My Story," but it’s been worth it all for the benefits of improved health I now enjoy, as well as the continual positive test results. Praise God!! I know this is part of the plan He’s called me to use in fighting my cancer.
Of course, I have written much about the spiritual aspect of my spiritual journey & will write much more. This is the most important component of the journey. It benefits my health & emotional well-being in more ways than I can list here.)
Mary then explained, “Behind all these statements lies a revolutionary assumption that needs to be understood & believed at a deep level. The assumption is this – cancer is a process.
(This whole experience is a process. You continue to learn & grow as the days, weeks, & months go by. With each new step, each test, each test result, new information, every up & down, every new person you meet along the way, you continue to learn & to grow in many dimensions. The ways in which you grow depend on your perspective on life, on the disease, on God. These choices are yours to make. I cannot make them for you. I can only tell you what my perspectives are & how they are working successfully for me. It is my hope that what I share will inspire others to make positive changes in their lives, their thinking, their perspectives, & to trust God as they walk this journey.)
Of course, the man did not know exactly what Mary meant by this statement. She explained that “conventional medical wisdom teaches us that cancer is a thing . . . a physical condition . . . a noun.” While this is true, she says “it is also rather shallow.”
Mary asked the man to examine his cancer experience beyond the obvious appearances. She asked him to open his mind “to the full dimensions of the idea that cancer is more than a physical condition. Cancer is not a disease of which you are a victim. It is a process which you can master.
“The medical community uses cancer as a noun. I encourage you to make cancer into a verb, an action verb! I challenge you to start to think, see, & feel yourself as ‘cancering.’
“The verb cancering shifts our focus away from a disease we have & brings our attention to the process we are going through.
“The evidence is becoming overwhelming. Lifestyle is the key to preventing as well as reversing cancer.
“Cancer doesn’t just happen to us. [About 5% of cancers are the result of genetic predisposition. Another small percentage is the result of prolonged exposure to environmental carcinogens.] It can spring from inner disharmony, physical or emotional or spiritual. And it has two implications. One is responsibility, at least subconsciously, for contributing to the onset of illness. But the 2nd implication is opportunity. Cancer is a reversible disease, & there are patients who happily experience reversal every day. Our central task in recovery is to choose harmony at the level of mind & spirit. Only then can we help our bodies regenerate & achieve physical harmony. This is truly conquering cancer. And in conquering, we may even cure it.
(Have you found peace between what you know & believe in your head & what your heart believes, or is there a disconnect [disharmony]? As long as there is unrest, your body does not have the best conditions for efficiently carrying on its job of ridding your body of cancer cells.
Don Colbert, MD describes how stress affects our lives in his book, The Seven Pillars of Health.
“Good stress is healthy, such as a wedding or a promotion. Stress is also our body’s natural reaction to a threat or perceived threat. It causes a sudden release of adrenaline & other hormones that cause your blood pressure to go up, your heart to beat faster, & your lungs to take in more air among other physiologic events. These stress hormones give you extra strength & mental acuity for a few moments, & they empower you to either fight or flee.
“But when the stress response occurs too frequently or goes on long term, those stress hormones that were meant to save your life begin to actually harm you. They can leave you feeling depressed, anxious, angry, with low sex drive, & predisposed to obesity, type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension, & all kinds of illnesses. The same hormones that save your life in an emergency can actually begin to destroy your health.
“In June 2005, the Wall Street Journal devoted an entire section of their newspaper to how to live longer. The front page article of the section said, ‘Increasingly, researchers are viewing stress – how much stress we face in a lifetime, & how well we cope with it – as one of the most significant factors for predicting how well we age.’ The article concluded that stress ‘kills’ people as much or more than poor health habits like smoking, drinking alcohol, or not exercising.
“Stress is not just a mental problem; it’s the cause of many diseases & maladies . . . Many recent studies have demonstrated this. The renowned Nun Study has shown that elevated stress levels inhibit & deteriorate the hippocampus, the part of the brain associated with memory & learning. A smaller hippocampus is a sign of Alzheimer’s disease.
“A long-term study at the University of London showed that chronic unmanaged mental stress was 6 times more predictive of cancer & heart disease than cigarette smoking, high cholesterol levels, & elevated blood pressure. In a Mayo Clinic study of people with heart disease, psychological stress was the strongest predictor of future cardiac events.
“In a 10-year study, people who were not able to manage their stress effectively had a 40 percent higher death rate than those who were ‘unstressed.’
“Excessive stress long term can make you obese & unhealthy. In response to long-term stress, the hormone cortisol rises, which can cause blood pressure to rise, can cause the release of fats & sugar in the bloodstream, & may cause weight gain, elevated triglycerides, high cholesterol, & blood sugar. Cortisol will save your life if you are a POW or experiencing famine, because it slows your metabolic rate & helps to preserve your fat stores. But most of us aren’t POW’s or experiencing famine, & so the high cortisol levels usually lead to weight gain. . .
“Excessive stress can predispose a person to develop or aggravate every conceivable affliction. Clearly, disease & illness are often the shrapnel wounds from stress.”
This is not the time to merely read this information & mentally agree with it & then just set it aside. You now have the opportunity to look at your own life to determine how you handle stress. Do you need to do some work on learning how to effectively manage it better? Do you need help to learn how to rely on God to help you when you are faced with stressful situations?)
“Cancer is a message to change. . . It is a warning for us to change. The Cancer Conqueror calls this change resolve. When we resolve those areas in our lives where there is unrest, where there is anxiety, we make changes that will nurture love, joy & peace. That’s truly conquering cancer. The body will often respond physically to renewed feelings of hope. The mind’s resolution of conflicts is often followed by the body’s resolution of disease. This is true because body, mind, & spirit work together as one system.
(My journey with cancer has brought many changes into my life. I will admit that I did not welcome all of them, at first. However, I can now say that the journey has been a message to make changes in my life. Those changes have been to make improvements where I was falling short of my own goals I had set for my life a very long time ago. This experience has been a reminder to work on putting my priorities back in order. This is still a work in progress.
It has helped me in making additional progress in terms of overcoming the effects of the permanent brain damage that I continue to struggle to find ways to work around. Praise God!!
Faith doesn’t necessarily make things easy, but is does make all things possible! Praise God!!
I think it’s worth repeating the devotion, from the Foundation for Cancer Research & Wellness, I reprinted in Chapter 2. The verse of the day is James 1:2, but I think it’s important to put it in context with verses 3 & 4 also: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature & complete, not lacking anything.”
“Don't mistake what this passage means. No one expects you to be happy about your difficulties. The word happy comes from the word 'happenstance,' meaning our feelings depend on what happens to us. But we are expected to strive for joy. Joy is a sense of well-being, a sense of security, a sense of peace, no matter what happens to us. Joy is the feeling we want to achieve. Joy is feeling secure and content in every situation, in every challenge and in every way, knowing that God is taking care of us even in the most difficult of days.”
This shines a whole different light on this verse & passage. It doesn’t say we are to be happy about our trials/our cancer; it says we can strive to find joy, despite the fact that we have trials/cancer. This comes from our perception of the situation. Verses 3 & 4 give us the correct perspective we are to have about our trials. They are intended to help us to learn perseverance & to help us to mature. We will be better off for having gone through them. Realize that God meets our needs as we endure the trials. Psalm 46:1-3 “God is our refuge & strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way & the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar & foam & the mountains quake with their surging.”
This perspective takes nurturing, on a regular basis. Maintaining my personal relationship with Jesus Christ through prayer & reading the Bible is vital to this process. I also find that listening to contemporary Christian music helps to focus my mind, as the lyrics fill my mind & lift my heart in worship & praise to God.)
“Choose to become a cancer conqueror!
“In a real sense, what you believe about this journey is what you’ll experience. You will choose your beliefs. Make sure you do not accept hand-me-down beliefs that lead to despair. Make certain that your beliefs empower you, that they serve you well.
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After the visit is a section Greg Anderson inserts titled:
Believe: Recovering a Sense of the Possible
“Beliefs create actions. Actions create results. Results confirm beliefs. This is how self-fulfilling prophecies become reality.
“It amazes me how many cancer patients do not believe they can get well. Think of a bell-shaped curve; I have observed that at the one end [the left “tail”], 10 to 15 percent of patients actually welcome cancer & consider it an honorable way to die. In the middle of the curve, 70 to 80 percent of patients seem to just go along, dutifully fulfilling their passive role assigned by the doctor. At the far end [the right “tail”] of the curve is another 10 to 15 percent. These are the cancer conquerors. The most profound difference . . . is the set of underlying beliefs this group brings to the process.” Greg Anderson 1998 PBS television special, Creating Incredible Wellness
“Beliefs, & the resulting attitudes & expectations, constantly contribute to actual experience in all areas of life, including the experience of cancer. . . Beliefs can be chosen, but we seldom consciously choose them."
I would like to believe that many under the bell-shaped curve, which Anderson describes above, can be inspired to shift to the right, to become Cancer Conquerors, so the curve is skewed in favor of more than 10 to 15 percent Cancer Conquerors.
In closing this chapter, let me share another devotion from The Foundation for Cancer Research & Wellness
“No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” Romans 8:37
When God's people break under the burden of illness and human limitation, over and over again, God reaches out to revive and renew us. In all these ways and countless more, God intercedes, over and over again, to help, to save, to restore and revive us making us more than conquerors over all that rises up to bring us down. In God cancer cannot, will not, destroy us. It may threaten. But it shall not break us because God is stronger than any disease we can know.
PRAISE GOD!!!!
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