41WINDRUNNERS – MY FIRST ENCOUNTER

It caught my attention and piqued my curiosity when I didn’t see fear in some patients. They would walk and not be faint. They would run and not grow weary. They would smile and I didn’t know why. I couldn’t tell whether something called them forward, or something lifted them from behind. I came to think of them as the WINDRUNNERS because they ran so well, faster, smoother and longer, as if lifted over the rocks and potholes of the track and their cancer. I started watching out for what was different about them.

 It is essential that you figure out what you are up against and what your own personal war on terror looks like and where it comes from. It's not the war taking place in the cancer center, but the one in your heart, in the shadows, in the dark, quiet all alone times between your thoughts. It seemed the WINDRUNNERS had done that.

BEWARE OF ARROGANCE

I once went to a shrink to help me cope with a problem of loss. Counseling was a fascinating experience and I learned a lot. Somewhere during that time, the psychiatrist said to me "you are anxious." My response was something like, "No way! You’re wrong. Not me. You are way off base there." I think his unspoken reaction was probably “Whoa, another blind bozo masquerading as a know-it-all.” Then he said patiently, "Okay, but why don't you try this pill and you'll feel a lot better – trust me on this." I was thinking, “Alright. I'll humor him, but I'm not anxious. I am successful and I am at the top of my game. People come to me for advice, and, besides, I've seen what anxiety looks like in other people and that's not me.” I was also probably thinking, "It's not cool to be anxious, definitely not manly, not going there."

Well, I took the pill and pretty soon I felt, slept and functioned a whole lot better. It was great. The anxiety that I thought I didn't have was gone. I readily confessed, "Okay, Doc, you’re right and you have my attention. Now let's figure out why I'm so anxious, and what I'm afraid of. I want to get rid of it so I can get off that pill and on with life.”  So we did. I learned what fear looks like to me, and when I did I started seeing it in my patients masquerading as all kinds of less embarrassing totally phony things. I encourage you not to be as arrogant as I was and assume this topic only applies to other people.

Fear is probably playing a lot bigger role in your life than you imagine. It does for most everyone, admittedly in some more than others. I caution you against assuming you are the one with less fear until you have really taken a good look. Most people fear death and a host of other things. So trust me – humor me a bit – while we talk about those fears other people have see, if perchance, any of them are yours as well.

Confidence in your known and proven strengths won't help you much when you face an enemy that has been around for a long time, like fear. But they can give you the strength of a "can-do, can-learn" attitude. Remember fear’s first tactic is to convince you that there's nothing to be afraid of. Its second tactic is to convince you that you're not really afraid.

While most of us would shun another’s duplicitous word or action, that is exactly how we often behave ourselves – in unwitting self-deception. We pretend to think and feel one way: unafraid, while behaving another. The disconnect is between our words, which sound so good, and our behavior that belies them. Pride lets us live in the apparent bravado of our words rather than dealing with the quagmire of our feelings. When words mask the fears inside, the fears simply reign unchecked, to haunt and manipulate you, and to steal your joy, and cripple your run. It is easier to recognize and confess the fears in your heart if you know there is a solution, a way to overcome them. There must be, because the WINDRUNNERS did it.