I have cancer. Although I won’t be sharing specifics, I have stellar care and support, from my family, and from a huge team of the best healthcare professionals. My prognosis is excellent. If one must get cancer, you want to have the experience I’m having.

Your intellectual appetites might include knowing the answer to a mathematics problem; the satisfaction of receiving a text from someone you have a crush on; or getting a coveted job offer. These things won’t necessarily cause physical pleasure. They might spill over into physical enjoyment, but they are not dependent on it. Rather, the pleasure is primarily intellectual.

[…] But, for most people, such joy is fleeting. There is always something else to strive for – and this keeps most of us in a constant, sometimes painful, state of never-satisfied striving. And that striving for something that we do not yet possess is called desire. Desire doesn’t bring us joy because it is, by definition, always for something we feel we lack. Understanding the mechanism by which desires take shape, though, can help us avoid living our lives in an endless merry-go-round of desire.

~ Luke Burgis, from How to know what you really want

You may have noticed that I’ve not published a podcast episode since something like May. That’s when I started working through my diagnosis, and that’s when I intentionally pressed the pause-button on some of my current projects. I’ve been a guest on a couple of podcasts this year, and that has kept alive a warm ember of my passion for the wonderful art-form.

Before you embark on any path ask the question, does this path have a heart? If the answer is no, you will know it and then you must choose another path. The trouble is that nobody asks the question. And when a man finally realizes that he has taken a path without a heart the path is ready to kill him.

~ Carlos Castaneda

Over the last five months I’ve been working quietly. I’ve gotten a lot done, but—unless you’re really hanging on my every word and post—you’d not have seen much happening. I’ve been using Casteneda’s advice as a ruler. I’ve been ripping apart some things; Ala my mantra, “when in doubt…” I’ve shut down some things. And I’ve worked a few sprints to “finally” finish cleaning up this, and also some done sorting-out of that.

Some of the most difficult moments in life are moments of having to choose between two paths leading in opposite directions — to tell or not to tell, to leap or not to leap, to leave or not to leave — each rife with losses (even if they are necessary losses) the pain of which you will feel acutely and with gains which you are constitutionally unable to imagine.

~ Maria Popova, from Beyond Either/Or

It’s like Spring cleaning, if the entire span of one’s life was measured as three “years.” I’m Spring cleaning as if I’m at the beginning of that final “year.” One looks at something and realizes it is going to be there (physically or conceptually) when I die. It doesn’t matter if I die tomorrow, or 20 years from now.

Be honest with yourself, Craig, you’re not going to ever finish that thing. Worse, you’re not going to even start this other thing. Why not simply let go of it now? And, gee, it feels nice to have some serenity in place of those things. It feels nice to sit and actually work on something I enjoy!

There are no radical creative choices that do not carry with them an inherent risk of equally radical failure. You cannot do anything great without aggressively courting your own limits and the limits of your ideas. […] There is nothing more powerful than failure to reveal to you what you are truly capable of. Avoiding risk of failure means avoiding transcendent creative leaps forward. You can’t have one without the other.

~ Aisha Tyler

Often, I get lost while writing each 7 for Sunday. I wander off into some Wonderland rabbit hole, only to emerge 30-minutes later, thinking, “that starting point is definitely worth including!” For example: Here’s something about Beauvoir that is totally on theme this week:

For Beauvoir, the existential question lurking underneath the crisis of old age is: ‘Can I have become a different being while I still remain myself?’ In other words, who is this person that I am becoming who appears to be me, but who seems to be someone else too?

~ Skye C Cleary, from Simone de Beauvoir recommends we fight for ourselves as we age

More than a year ago, I’d marked that essay for later reading, long before I was diagnosed with cancer. At the time of that marking, I’m sure I skimmed it, but I obviously didn’t read with today’s eyes. It’s not lost on me how special it is that I set aside that gift for my future self.

I am unafraid as I prepare myself for that day when the artifices and disguises will be stripped away and I shall make judgment of myself. Is it just brave talk, or do I mean what I say? Were they for real, those defiant words I spoke against fortune, or were they just theatre – Just acting a part?

~ Seneca

For more than a decade, I’ve read that quote countless times. It spent one entire year, in handwritten form, above my desk. There’s much one can criticize about Seneca, but not that quote. That quote points out there is only one pile: The stuff that matters.

The First Rule of Artist’s Journey is this […]

~ Steven Pressfield, from The Price of the Artist’s Journey

Pressfield’s style and clarity resonate with me. (I do understand that not everyone feels that way.) I spend too much time trying to figure out if something-or-other is “…just me? …or everyone else too?” that when he writes, “…this shit! …and I’ve a thousand letters from others who say the same!” well, I breathe a sigh of relief. His style and clarity don’t just resonate with me, they accurately portray my lived experience. In fact, his writing made it clear: “hunh, how about that. I am a creative.”

Looking back, it turns out to have been wise to begin writing these 7 for Sunday issues. The writing led me deeper into the dark woods, in what I eventually realized was a journey of self-discovery. And based on the replies I sometimes get, at least some of you enjoy them too. ;)

And since starting with health news is a downer, here’s a bonus, 8th thing to savor this week:

I’ve never seen any life transformation that didn’t begin with the person in question finally getting tired of their own bullshit.

~ Elizabeth Gilbert

Until next time, thanks for reading.

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