It’s funny. There was a time when people were afraid to say the word. They’d look around to make sure they weren’t overheard, then whisper, “She has... cancer.”

 

Those whispers are a form of resistance, denial, a way of wishing it wasn’t true. And they’re a perfectly normal reaction to the intrusion of disease in our lives. But as Tanya reminds us in the following pages, resistance keeps us from moving ahead, getting past our fears, finding cures, and receiving life’s abundant, ever-new healing.

 

Today cancer and its healing are in the news, not to mention in our pink ribbons, pink bumper stickers, and pink socks with sports uniforms. Right now hundreds of people are wearing bracelets that join them in a circle of love embracing a teenager healing from leukemia. Right now countless people are sharing their cancer symptoms and treatments on the internet, as loved ones post prayers and other encouragement. Maybe all this new visibility means that, thanks to teachers like Tanya, the whole world is learning to walk the cancer walk together. We’re letting go of that old resistance, putting aside our fear, and getting better, together. Maybe on some level there’s a growing understanding of the ageless wisdom that we contribute to each other’s sickness and each other’s wellness. When one of us suffers, we all suffer, and when one of us heals, we all heal. Just ask Tanya.

 

You see, as this book shows us, cancer isn’t about life and death. It’s about life and life. It’s about our bodies, minds, emotions, and spirits. It’s about how we’re all muddling through this old world, and how we can choose to do it separately or together, with struggle or with grace, and we have that choice over and over a jillion times a day.

 

In these pages you’ll read about technology and medicine, because cancer usually brings a series of choices and decisions about treatments, doctors, and hospitals. Choices may be radical, conservative, surgical, holistic, traditional, innovative, and/or experimental. Some of the choices may produce the desired results, and some may not. But as Tanya teaches us, it’s not a matter of right and wrong choices. It’s about choosing with courage and faith.

 

So while this book is about cancer, if we listen carefully we’ll hear that Tanya is talking about the ups and downs of being human. It’s a book about the good and bad, and as Tanya shows us over and over, we really don’t know what’s good and bad until we get down the road and look in the rear-view mirror.

 

That’s the beauty of this book. Yes, it’s a glimpse into Tanya’s most private life. But that’s not what it’s about. It’s about all of us, all of life, all of creation.

 

Tanya and I met at a Lakota inipi, or sweat lodge ceremony, and there was an immediate knowing between us. Since then I’ve been one of countless beneficiaries of Tanya’s generous teaching and giving, especially through A Circle of Friends, the meditation group she founded, which now counts loving, praying members near and far. Together we’ve explored the joys of many spiritual traditions and a lot of science.

 

Tanya is a gift to all of us because in her life big ideals translate into tangible, real-world daily living. It’s the pot of soup she brings to a recuperating friend. The smile on her face that says you brightened her day. The dreams she interprets to help us understand ourselves. The books she reads, then passes along. The prayer chains she leads. The feather on the ground that only she notices. Beliefs into action. Faith into steps. Hope into gratitude.

 

Einstein said there are two ways to look at life: as if everything is a miracle, or as if nothing is a miracle. But it seems the reality is that both are true. Tanya’s healing was a true miracle, and yet was not really a surprise.

 

When Tanya writes about the gift of cancer, that’s not pie-in-the-sky, but rather it’s as real as the warm morning sun. Recently a friend of Tanya’s was diagnosed with advanced cancer. Thanks to Tanya, a wide group of people, most of whom didn’t even know that friend, included that situation in their prayers and meditations. When doctors were ready to begin treatment a few weeks later, the cancer was gone. Not a trace. A few years ago doctors gave up on a little boy’s cancer and told his parents to prepare his funeral. Tanya “circled the wagons” of support, ranging from money to emails to prayers, and today that little boy has been happily cancer-free for years. That’s why when another friend’s little girl faced a growing tumor, Tanya was ready to remind us, “Always remember, Hope is Alive. It is alive in me, you, and all of us ... if we believe.”

 

We’ve seen healing miracles repeated many times. But even when the healing didn’t come in the way we thought it should, we’ve been able to see ongoing miracles of love, hope, and discovery. As Tanya says in Dave’s story, we’re all teaching each other how to live. Maybe that’s really where we end up, living together among unfolding miracles that are no surprise.

 

Tanya’s cancer wasn’t a gift for her alone. Thankfully, she used it to create this book, a gift to the world.

 

~Joe Johnston

Author, Artist, featured speaker at the

Gandhi International Peace Conference

www.joejohnstonarts.com

 

Spring 2015