“Be Water My Friend”
Good Morning!!! Hope everyones week is off to a good start. If not, today would be a good day to restart! A quick update and a few thoughts.
Natalie and I met with my neurosurgeon yesterday. My MRI after the 30 rounds of radiation and chemotherapy looked pretty good. The decision has been made to have surgery next Wednesday the 31st. Will spend first night in ICU and then 2-3 nights in a regular hospital room. Can’t pretend to be excited about that at all, but I am hopeful it will give me some more time in this life and also will give me a little better health for a while. Originally additional surgery was taken off the board, so I was not expecting this but also feel like it is a good option.
So a few thoughts connected to “water.”
In 2014 my good friend Mark Reding started training me in Jeet Kune Do. I was in good physical shape and enjoyed the physical challenge but quickly realized the bigger challenge was the mental part of training and learning martial arts. Bruce Lee created Jeet Kune Do and Bruce was an amazing physical martial artist but maybe more than that, Bruce Lee was a very intelligent, philosophical, thinking man. He grew this idea from his personal life of “being like water.” His daughter has written a book called, Be Water My Friend, which is the teachings of her father. Definitely worth a read.
Here is an idea I am trying to sit with right now. “Like flowing water, life is perpetual movement.”
Last week was a bad week for me. I found myself discouraged, physically felt bad and was very frustrated. I had hit some markers and had expected my life to get some clarity and direction. That was not the case. I had expected to get through the radiation, chemotherapy, start feeling better and figure out how to get back into some work and earn a little money. That was not happening and now I have to get my head cut open again and work through the recovery process of brain surgery.
“Like flowing water, life is perpetual movement.” Can you relate to that. Life keeps happening day after day. Some days everything goes as planned. Other days things get thrown at us that were never part of our plan. The big challenge is some of those things can be very challenging and had nothing to do with a choice you or I made. Life happens! Much of this life is out of my control.
Water is very adaptable. Bruce said, “Like flowing water, life is perpetual movement.” Amen, to that and I wish it didn’t always work that way. Life is perpetual movement, unless you are dead!!! I am still alive and I am working very hard to be adaptable. To get back to what I can control, my mindset!
At some point I want to feel better, I want to figure out how to make a little money, enjoy my family, friends and make a positive difference in the world around me.
So next week I will have brain surgery. Will then do what ever I can to recover from that, get healthy and start being a little more productive.
How do you need to “be water?” Where in your life do you need to be more adaptable? Where do you need to let go of something out of your control? How can you, “Be Water My Friend?”
I am working on that. Believe and trusting that God is faithful. Trying to live in a way that when I die my life will have made a little difference in this beautiful life.
Remember, you are loved and of great value!
Peace,