I walk to find a new way to believe

I took a walk around the neighborhood. I brought Dobby with me and we cleared our heads (and his bladder) for a half an hour. The weather is sunny and warm and there are some kids out playing and dogs in their yards barking and it was lovely.

I was able to tuck away the fear from my previous post. I thought about something I'd been wanting to write about but just...well, no reason I just haven't. So here...

While we were in Houston, during the course of one week I received a couple of care packages from two different friends. One was a small set of prayer beads that I had previously discussed with an artist/blog friend of mine. She made it from a variety of beads, including rose quartz and amethyst, with a silver ring charm in the middle with an encouraging word. The other gift was a single word made out of a slivery material encrusted with sparkley and big rhinestones (I call this last one my "bling!"). I brought these two things home and just last week began to set them, along with all of my other "talismans" on a special table next to our bedroom. This table already had a couple of things on it that I'd previously received from friends, like a plaque, a small statue of a baby dinosaur with a goofy grin on his face, etc. As I lay those two new trinkets upon that table, it struck me that these two, and the one older plaque, all have something in common and that something is rather significant to me. They all include the word, "BELIEVE."

The prayer beads has the silver ring in the middle of it and on the ring the word BELIEVE is enscribed on it.

My "Bling" word is actually the word BELIEVE.

And the plaque I'd gotten almost a year ago from a distant (but close to my heart) friend says BELIEVE all over it!

Duhh. I knew what they all said because I can obviously read! But I didn't know how much it meant to me until I brought them all together on that table.

It got me asking myself, "Believe what?" and "How can I believe in anything?" and "I've believed before but it never worked out anyway so why bother?" But I kept thinking about it and I've tried to believe many things these last few months.

Today on my walk as I cleared my head, again I contemplated this word BELIEVE. At first glance, I can't help but notice the word sort of looks like it says, "BE ALIVE" to me. Aside from that, I started asking myself, "What do you already believe, without question and without doubt?" And I started a list in my head:
That I love my husband with all my heart and soul and that he loves me back just as much.
That I have many blessings such as my house, my healthy family, my dogs, my cats, our stability of life.
That I am healthy right now.
That I'm not bedridden or feeling awful or jaundiced. In fact, when people cross my path they probably have no idea that I have cancer.
That the catchphrase, "Cancer is a word, not a [death] sentence!" is acutally true.

I went on to consider the power of believing because I really think that power can work to make things better. So I narrowed my thought process down to, "What do you believe about this tumor right this minute?"
I believe that this tumor has not spread to other parts of my body.
I believe that this tumor has actually shrunk in size (despite it's swollen-ness post-radiation).
I believe that I am winning this battle against cancer.
I believe that I will see this challenging time through and go on to live a long, healthy and happy life with my husband, my family, my friends and my children-to-be.

And it wasn't like I had to convince myself that all of that were true because I already know that they are! If you believe something strong enough, it can be true. And I realized that my extreme fear was just counterproductive to what I intend to achieve here and that is good health, happiness and peace.

So I'm not dwelling on the darkness anymore and I've put an end to feeling sorry for myself (for now). See how quickly I can pick myself up and dust myself off and go about my life after falling hard to the ground? By this point, you probably would expect nothing less of me, huh?! :)

That's what I believe.