Some of you may remember a Nike video from early 2010 called The Human Chain featuring Lance Armstrong as well as both amateur and professional athletes from martial arts to bull riding to gymnastics. This video and the music around it is one of the most inspiring sequences I have seen for everyone, not just cancer survivors.
The song is by the Hours who go through a number of examples in history of folks who were hit with difficulties or tragedies and found the strength to grit their way through those situations. In the song, they talk of Ludwig Van Beethoven and how he went deaf and didn't give a damn. I am sure he did give a damn and he was pissed off at the inability to hear the music he was creating and had created but he did not let that stop him.
What has knocked you down lately? Is it a long lasting relationship that has ended? Have you been hit by disease like I have been? How about loss of job, being passed over for a promotion, or financial difficulty? Everyone has been knocked down and no one is going to remember you getting knocked down. The only thing that matters is how you are going to respond to that tragedy. Even the bible talks of Job getting hit again and again and again by successively more difficult stressors. The point of the story is not the difficulties but the way he stood fast.
I got knocked down 10 years ago with my first diagnosis, knocked down again with my second surgery in 2003, again in 2008 with my third surgery, and just recently with the resurgence of the tumors. I intend to continue to get back up again and keep fighting this disease, knowing I can keep knocking it back down. As long as I am alive, I will continue to fight this disease. Perhaps it will eventually win but it will not win without a fight.
Keep fighting, Ron. I pray that you keep getting back up again like you have been doing. God will give you the strength as long as you need it.
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