David Katz, MD, MPH

It was the closing keynote and my first official act as Past President of the NWI, and an honor to introduce Dr. David Katz, Yale Prevention Research Center.  I’d met him once before, but last Thursday we’d walked over from the hotel, ate lunch together, and shared stories about our families, career paths, and passion for wellness.  I’d often wondered why he’d chosen to weave poetry into his keynotes, and had been acclaimed the “poet laureate of health promotion”.  Over lunch he told me his mother had been a poet and taught poetry, and now I understood the almost rhythmic nature of his writing and keynotes that ignite the hope, and imagination of audiences and readers around the world.  His newest book is Disease Proof: The Remarkable Truth About What Makes Us Well.     

Americans are Stressed

Americans are stressed out and the healthcare system is a major disconnect.  While Americans think it is important that health care focuses on issues related to stress and living healthier lifestyles, their behaviors do not match up with what they value. Thirty-two percent of Americans say it is extremely important to talk with their health care provider about stress management, but only 17% report these conversations are happening.  Next visit, talk about your “total health” with your health care provider!

Soft Moments

It felt like a shadow or maybe it was the winds slight whisper circling the trees.  Just the briefest disturbance in the air, and then she was there barely moving her wings, flying just above the shore grass, gliding onto our neighbors pier.  After a gentle landing she took a few steps, stopped, and so stood very still.  We all need brief still moments in our day, moments to be caressed by the rainbows that glide in and out of our day.  Soft moments of grace that join us more fully to ourselves and to others.  Moments that brush upon our souls and glow like the memory of a kiss.  Allow your soft moments today to glow like a kiss. 

Sacred Fires of Passion

How do you feed your sacred fires or life passion that fuels your emotions and shapes your life purpose?  Like many, I find my prayer / meditation practices are a daily adventure of just being.  A time I am inside myself, watching the sacred fires in sheer delight.  A sacred fire made of pure joy and whose existence seems to come from nowhere, yet from everywhere.  I paddle deep, increasing the speed of my kayak as I head for shore and home.  Both my parents paddled deep, both tended their sacred fires in different ways, but also maximized the journey of “just being”.  How deep will you paddle today?

Life Moments

2am Saturday, the honey moon slips through our bedroom blinds, and nudges me awake.  Her silent whispers brush against my cheek and I am mesmerized by her pull.  I quietly walk downstairs, out the back door, but only a deep darkness lingers in the pines.  It’s not till I reach our pier that I feel her presence and watch her slow dance with the water grasses.  In my 66 years she’s risen over 800 times and lately I’ve been feeling ripples of images of past moments shared with her, reflections, places, and feelings, hard not to forget.  Life is about moments, not words.  Be mindful of the life moments you live today.         

Cancer Care Day

Somewhere along my cancer journey I started calling visits with my oncologist cancer care days.  Yesterday, we kayaked early, and then headed back to Houston for my blood draws and body scans in preparation for my cancer care day.  A seasoned cancer survivor told me “oncologist visits are like living on a leash”, and for the first few years of my cancer journey, I settled into the wait.  Yesterday, as I watched the sun shimmer on my kayak ripples, I realized I’d stopped waiting years ago, and had chosen a life instead shimmering with ripples of gratitude and joy.  Look for the light today and let your life shimmer. 

Silent Visitor

Did you catch the full moon this morning?  I stopped several times on my way into work to listen to her silence.  She sat low in the western sky and I realized she had been the silent visitor whispering my name that woke me from my deep sleep.  Her amber, almost honey color was soft like a jazz piano player lightly stroking my soul.  It’s the silent visitors I listen to in life, that seem to leave the greatest impressions, and give my life its needed calmness.  Be mindful of your need for silence in your life this weekend.     

Patience

There are times in our life journey we get so consumed with not missing a single blink that we disconnect from life’s natural rhythm.  Impatience fueled by expectations increases negative self-talk and makes it impossible for us to listen.  It’s in these times we talk over or interrupt others and become even more disconnected from the natural flow.  Sitting on the pier watching the mayflies and dragonflies cause tiny ripples as they dip into the lake I begin to feel my breath, and the rise and fall of each moment.   Relax today, and patiently dip your toes in the lake we call life.   

Lessons from Our Blue Heron

He’s the largest bird on our lake, with his slate-gray body, long legs and neck, often standing motionless on a pier, patiently watching lake life.  His liftoff is slow, purposeful, with his neck fully extended, and the slow powerful steady beat of his wings as he soars across the lake to another resting place.  It’s early as I sit on our pier watching a family of geese and the blue heron, lost in morning thoughts.  Slippery thoughts about my journey mixed with gratitude for those I share my days.  In recognizing the fluidness of our thoughts, and focusing on positive feelings we change who we become.  Soar with positive thoughts today. 

Weekend Lake Joy

We silently skimmed across mirrored ripples of blue sky and white fluffy clouds in our kayaks.  A neighbor stopped setting up chairs, waved and walked to the edge of the lake.  In just a few hours he and his wife would renew their wedding vows on the lake that had brought them so much joy.  Both were retired, he managed the feeding tube that kept her live; as they watched the colors of summer invade the lake. Salinger talks of joy being a liquid that can’t be contained, and as I listen to his words of hope I could feel the flow of joy igniting my spirit and energizing my soul.  Take in a splash of joy this week.    

Cancer Survivorship Week - Playback Dinner Theater

Last night MaryBeth and I attended the Art of Survivorship Dinner Theater.  It was an amazing evening where cancer survivors shared their stories and improv actors from the Houston Playback Theater, “played back” these life storms filled with moments of fear, discouragement, faith, joy, and love.  Common to all the stories was the struggle to embrace the whole journey, all of it, its highs and lows, and in this choice learning to thrive, not just survive!  Energize your life journey today and decide to thrive, not just survive!

Cancer Survivorship Week - Gaining Wisdom through Journaling

It was the summer before I started college and I was working as a trail guide for hikes into the White Mountains at a camp in New Hampshire for kids from the Boston ghettos.  My dad had sent me away for the summer for my mom was at home losing her long battle with cancer.  She’d bundled up all the letters I’d written her that summer, and when I look at them now I realize they are a journal for that time of my life.  They are full of life thoughts, deep, insightful feelings from a boy that was losing his first love.  Journaling is a think it, ink it process that provides us moments of reflection that better fuse our mind-body-spirit connections.  Start journaling today. 

Cancer Survivorship Week - Art of Calm

She wore glasses, a funky hat with sequins, was from California, and halfway through a six-week stay at MD Anderson.  Our initial deep breathing exercise changed her stress posture into a relaxed place of calm.  She was participating in an interactive session based on Brian Luke Seaward book The Art of Calm.  The session is designed to give participants the knowledge and tools to better use their five senses to stay centered and grounded.  Centering quiets the mind and provides a space where the heart can be heard.  In this quiet space we are grounded in our life wisdom and spiritual essence.  Find a place of calm today and move from “doing” to “being”. 

Cancer Survivorship Week - Attitude

This is one of my favorite weeks of the year, Cancer Survivorship Week, and all week I will teach “life classes” to patients and caregivers in the Gazebo, 3^rd floor Clark Clinic.  Yesterday, we talked about attitude and we shared stories about how it felt when we were first diagnosed with cancer.  Mark Nepo describes it as feeling like our life glass is cracked and our souls gets soaked with fear, anxiety, and anger.  But life goes on, and in time through love, caring and a positive attitude, we realize our life essence hasn’t changed, and we adjust to our new journey.  Dip your finger in your life essence today and checkout your attitude.

Shared Reflections

Last week I spoke at the Women’s Business Enterprise Alliance Expo in Houston where 150 exhibitors and 1,500 women business owners, corporate and federal procurement executives networked and explored business opportunities.  I had arrived early and as I started to enter the convention center the amazing reflections on the building across the park caught my eye and heart.  I stood for a few minutes and thought about what life reflections others see and feel from me?  What imprints does my life weave and leave each day?  Do others feel my wonder, joy, shared hope, all gifts of my cancer journey?  Today, consider the reflections of yourself, you share with others.