Soon after my last blog post, I got some terrible news.  My mom, who has been in remission from brain cancer, was found to have a new large tumor deep in her brain.

If you have followed me at all, you might already know how important my mom and family are to me.  This news has been devastating.  But I am so happy to report that she is doing better.  She’s had a few awful setbacks since her second diagnosis, but we are hopeful that she will be returning home with help next week.

I currently am not taking any clients so that I can focus on my family.

Cancer sucks.  No one will argue that.  It puts this awful fear in your heart that is hard to shake.  I was recently lamenting the terrible ups and downs that I have been experiencing as my mom’s health would wax and wane. A friend of mine who is fighting her own battle with breast cancer had some wonderful words for me:

This journey we are on, it’s a bit like being caught in a rip in the surf. You’re a California girl – how do we survive a rip? We don’t fight it, we don’t 100% let it take us away, we swim diagonally across it. We end up way down shore, exhausted and not at all where we planned to be, but we got there. What am I saying? For the most part allow yourself to feel everything this world is throwing at you but control it when it threatens to drown you.

Such incredible words of wisdom.  I find that I have been doing a lot of swimming diagonally lately.  And all this swimming has made me realize something: people are good.  Life is good.  I am well aware that there is a lot of bad in this world, but I am also completely amazed at the beauty that surrounds me.  My life is rich–rich with the love of my family, rich with the love of friends, rich with the love and support of people that I have never met that still have taken the time to hold my mom and my family in their hearts.

I look at my mom and this incredible woman that I quoted above.  They are fighting for their lives.  And they do it with such grace.  My mom says “I just take it as it comes.”  I have learned so much from that.  I, too, am trying to just take it as it comes.

This summer has not been at all what I expected.  I had big business plans, big hopes for new and old clients.  What I have is not what I expected, but you know what?  I’m okay.  And it’s all gonna be okay.  No matter what happens, it’s gonna be okay.

Devastation like the news of cancer tends to center you.  It makes you realize what is important.  I feel like I could have gone a couple of ways here.  I could have been angry at the world and stayed angry at the world.  What I have chosen to do is to have my moments of anger and frustration, sure, but not to live there.  No no no.  Far from it.  Instead, I feel like my heart has blossomed and opened.  I feel like allowing all the love that I feel for my mom, my family, and my friends, to just spill out of me like a rushing waterfall of light and wonder has helped strengthen me.

Love is saving me.

Recently, a friend shared a poem with me, that I completely adore.

I don’t think you need to believe in God to take something away from this poem.  We will all face troubles and obstacles.  Some that seem bigger than ourselves, and how we choose to handle these problems will in part, define us.

How will you define your life?