The Zen of Cancer

Intimacy with the dark cloud and the unscathable nature of awareness

I found out recently that I no longer have cancer. The whole trip was fascinating, devastating, funny, awkward, and deeply sobering. For your entertainment and vicarious revelations, I offer you a micro-phenomenology of my brief encounter with the grim reaper; sprinkled with some insights into the nature of consciousness; because why toy with death if not for the epistemic gains, bra?

NB: This one is not for the faint of heart.

On a particularly normal Saturday, I strolled onto the balcony of our two-bedroom flat and looked out onto a central enclave containing a native Australian bush-garden filled with water-dragon lizards that nibble your toes if you let them; and bush turkeys, whose sole purpose appears to be making a mess of every good garden. I sat on a blue, velvet chair. But today it wasn’t just the chair that didn’t match the surroundings. It was something in my body.

A weird heaviness. A weird sensitivity. An out-of-orderness. Something just wasn’t right down there — in the strange sparkly-alive-space I call a body. There was a sense of localised roughness, foreign and not right. Inherently concerning not only for its potential implications, the infinity of which the mind can only stumble and fumble explanations.

A few hours of counter-factualising and efforts to explain-away fell through my fingers that landed on my iPhone dialling the local health-line:

“It’s probably nothing, but I thought I should ask…”

“…my recommendation is that you go to emergency”

“…but it’s probably nothing, right?”

“…that is my recommendation”.

I share a few careful words to my partner, who’s reflections tell the next part best:

[Translated from Spanish]

Amor y Fuerza

To you, whose partner one day mentions a lump he's found. He tells you with a half-smile, trying to downplay its significance. He says it could be anything, but you see the worry in his eyes.

To you, who waits for three hours in the emergency room, distracting yourself, pretending the possibility of it being serious isn't looming over you.

To you, who sees him emerge from the doctor's room with wet eyes. Your heart stops, you freeze, wishing the earth would swallow you whole.

To you, suddenly feeling like everything is surreal, as your mind scrambles to understand a world that's falling apart.

To you, now living in an uncertain world, too afraid to seek answers because of the potential truths they might reveal.

To you, who feels like a drifting, weeping, ghost.

To you, looking around and seeing everything differently. All your senses taking on a new meaning and no meaning at the same time.

To you, who goes to bed clinging to him, the one you love most, wishing you could merge into him, heal him, care for him, hold him, hoping for everything to return to how it once was.

To you, who wakes up the next day and for a brief moment thinks yesterday's events were just a nightmare. That everything is fine, and the word "cancer" is still just a reason to run marathons and support a fight that isn't yours.

To you, now understanding the pain carried by that word: its weight, its fear, its confusion, its frustration, and its bizarre reactions in the people who hear it.

To you, who tries to continue with everyday life, but the weight on your heart is ever-present.

To you, who one day sees him differently. You try to connect with his healthier side, but all you manage is to be overly protective.

To you, whose mind races, tormenting you with every possible outcome.

To you, who, as if it weren't enough, is also overwhelmed with guilt. For having thoughts you shouldn't, for feeling ways you shouldn't, for struggling to stay positive, or for being too optimistic.

To you, whose world has turned bittersweet. The beautiful moments are amplified, but they come with a sour undertone.

To you, who finds yourself praying again. Making promises to life, hoping everything turns out fine.

To you, who knows there are others out there, going through the exact same ordeal.

To you, who in your perpetual state of "not knowing what to do," writes.

To you, the reader, who has stepped into my shoes for the past minute.

To you, who have experienced anything like this,

You are understood.

— By Laia Garrigos Marti

..

Part 1: Mountains flattened

I think to myself: ‘Why does he have a weird half-smile on his face, and why is he so rigid and far-away? If he’s about to deliver bad news he’s doing a fucking bad job’.

One of the most fascinating things about cancer are the social interactions; totally weird, every part of them too unusual for familiar patterns and mannerisms to deal with. Docs, nurses, family, and friends; it’s mostly horrible and disconnecting; but in rare cases profoundly real. There are only a few willing to get that real, though. Most prefer to hide and so the impact of the information bounces off the well-meaning shell. But because they have little or no practice with this something; it all falls flat and awkward; unresonant.

If you find yourself on the receiving end of a friend’s illness, begin by avoiding the platitudes. Whatever that fearful initial response is, just give it a second, and breath into the moment. Just listen and feel for a second. Lean into the “wow, what the fuck”, and then lean into what’s under that, and then just have at it. Be real. Let your mind scramble if it needs to, and admit to the scrambling, but don’t feel obliged to offer anything more than your presence. You’ve heard this all before.

Any way, back to the noob doctor:

“According to the ultrasound, you have a tumour...”,

“Do you mean cancer?”,

“Yes, a tumour”,

“Why don’t you just say the word cancer [don’t be a…]?”,

“Well…”,

“Any way… so what now?”

“…We’ll need to run a CT scan and take some blood, I’m sorry, this must be hard to hear”.

He says the words, but he looks more happy than sorry, that smile still creeping; seemingly enjoying the part of his job that he says is the hardest. But it’s just because he can’t contain the experience, so I understand.

I’m on ChatGPT before he leaves the room: ‘If an ultrasound indicates cancer, how likely it is it that I actually have cancer? Don’t provide caveats just answer the question’. The answer is very likely, like 95% or something. Okay, that seems logical.

Then my stomach drops and terror rises as I recall this chronic cough that’s tortured me for the better part of a year with no useful diagnosis. I thumb my concerns with my silicon buddy: ‘Where does this type of cancer spread?’,

Through the lymph-nodes, up to the lungs, and then the brain.

Well that’s it then. I’m cooked. It was a good ride while it lasted.

I walk out of the room towards Laia in a grey haze, focusing on each movement as if my body might not know how to walk. She sees my face, I can’t speak but I gesture her outside the emergency waiting room, focused on traversing the sick and injured. I pace out the door trying to avoid a scene, and she follows, chasing me with her words:

“What’s wrong, oh my god, what’s wrong, what did they say!?”,

“It’s cancer”.

We cry.

I pull it together. I try to comfort her. But I can’t help myself, and I say:

“And this cough…”

She immediately grasps my insinuation. Her world begins to crumble; mine already floating like burning puzzle pieces in space, emptying out into nothing, then coalescing into a sort of almost-familiar order, then burning apart again. In the better moments the pieces drop down into my body where the sadness fills the space, from where I can connect with her and be one in the grief and confusion: a strange respite.

Above it all some unprovoked awareness just watches the whole thing.

Despite the madness I contemplate the fact that something watches the mind scramble and the future fall apart, fascinated by this part of myself that has nothing to do with what’s going on, yet resides right in the midst of it. The body vibrates, the mind justifies, and the awareness watches—I somehow feel gratitude.

Some hours later they inject me with a warm liquid that makes me feel like I need to piss and apparently highlights the sick cells through the magnets that they’re about to pressurise me with, like being buried alive in a noisy, white, sci-fi cofin - ‘Rest in Peace’ - I could use the practice, I suppose. Deaths approach feels like a dark, heavy, cloud, I discover.

Later in the day as the reality only cracks deeper into our bones, and after I’ve explained a dozen times to half as many doctors what happened, a young, Indian-looking, urologist approaches with a clipboard. I know for a fact she has my results. She walks towards the hospital bed slowly with a somber face; much more realistic and connected than the other doctors: I like her. But I’m about to hate her.

“I want you to tell me one more time what happened.”

“I! Want! You! To tell me what my [fucking] results are.”

“I have your results and I’m going to tell you, but first I want you to tell me what happened.”

It takes all my might to grab hold of the fire hose bursting with insults and push them down into my guts, return to my thoughts, and resolve to be kind to her and tell the story just one more time.

Laia sits beside me, next to the hospital bed, beside herself.

I tell the story, slowly, with deep, effortful, breaths between every sentence; my stomach fights each one. She thanks me, as she explains, “you have cancer”. [NO SHIT]. “But the good news is that it doesn’t look like it’s spread very far, but I’m really sorry, it definitely looks like cancer”.

“You mean, my lungs look okay?”

“Yes, we can’t see anything. It’s not conclusive but it’s pretty reliable.”

I explain that her news is (ironically) good news, compared to what I’d imagined. She tells me we need to get into surgery right away, within the week, or things could get really bad. She says I should be alright if we get on-top of it.

I tune into the space of my awareness; that thing I call my existence. I feel left, right, up, and down, and throughout that empty centre of the one that observes: There’s a passive recognition that all semblances of order have disappeared. At least the fact of dying had a certain ground to it.

Part 2: Intimacy with the dark cloud

There’s the revelation of a new form and then there’s the existing with the new form. There’s the making sense and the putting things in their places and the telling family and all that. And it’s all pretty shit; but utterly fascinating. My curiousity about going through this was, truly, a saving grace.

I wish that we might all be curious about the nature of existing, it gives bad experiences some real meaning. Like we get to really be part of this marvellous show. Whatever happens is special and full of new data to gobble up and wonder about.

For example,—to nerd out for second here— my priority landscape had collapsed. The peaks and valleys defining what’s important and worth paying attention to was totally obliterated. What could possibly be important now? That was actually kind of cool. I didn’t give a shit about much any more; and only about things that really did matter, in some very acute present-moment sort of way. It has a certain liberating quality to it.

The day after the diagnosis, Laia and I went out to dinner for some Vietnamese across the road. I thought the pho would be comforting while I try to figure out how I might tell my parents. Causing them suffering terrified me; I guess this was still important.

As I muse around a cloud of thoughts waiting for food, I blow my nose into a tissue at the restaurant. I look down into the tissue in my hands, and there’s… blood. I’m triggered [understatement]. Logic says it has nothing to do with it but my gut speaks louder:

You’re so fucked.

They mustn’t have seen it in the scan but there’s no doubt. I know all-too-well the limitations of medical (human!) inference. I’m being eaten alive by this thing.

A deeply odd part about this whole fiasco is that somehow I knew I was sick, already many months ago. I recall participating in some shadow work in my men’s circle probably six months prior, where somewhere from the depths of my unconscious I told my brothers: “what I don’t want you to know about me is…” [which is how we were starting each sentence as we went around the circle] “…I think I’m sick… I don’t know what with, but I’m just sick. Something’s wrong with my body, I can feel it.”

I still wonder about these premonitions, which come from that same place from where you know a relationship is finished. Gut wrenching truth. I just wish I hadn’t been this right. But there’s also relief in knowing. That background uncertainty was brutal. I knew I was recovering too slowly from training. That I shouldn’t be coughing. That I shouldn’t always be a bit cold. That the doctors didn’t know shit.

I loop around these thoughts but nothing changes. The background of my new reality remains the same. The next morning I walk up the street away from the river towards my local café with all the graffiti and druggy hipsters, and try to write some notes about what that’s all like.

As I sit there with my chai I feel myself merging with this new background darkness; channeling it; turning towards it and getting as close as I can to the apparent form of it. I feel a guilt for the heavy energy I’m bringing with me to this poor café, but grateful to be feeling it so intimately. Suffering is immensely reduced once we’re able to turn towards it.

The pen begins to dance:

Intimacy with the dark cloud

There’s a big,
broad,
giant,
resting his fat hands on my shoulders,
leaning his weight on me,
not with any intent or pressure,
he’s just resting there,
looking tired.

I can’t see him,
but from the corners of my eyes,
I can tell that he has sorrow in his,
and a tired expression.

Though I can’t see his face,
I can see the edges of his silhouette are dark and cloudy.
I can see that he’s resigned to lean on me,
maybe he’s resignation himself.

And it seems to me that it’s just what he does…
for me,
and for countless others,
he just leans and rests his weight on our shoulders,
from time to time.

I don’t hate him,
I don’t even dislike him,
I empathise with the duty he has,
to lean on us,
sinking us towards the ground,
towards the earth,
where we can feel our feet and the cool grass,

…and the sharp pebbles below them.

I can’t see past him towards the sky or the sun,
but he relaxes around my neck and draws my cells towards the truths in life’s corners where the vacuum doesn’t reach,
he seems to weigh me down towards something,
he reminds me of,

No…

he embodies,
the cancer that drags down my body,
and his resting on my shoulders sinks my attention towards that knowledge,
which is a bit hot and a bit bitter,
a bit like scratching a fork on a plate,
attractive,
but elusive,
at times.

But most of all:
The giant and his heavy hands draw me to the testament in my heart of no escape,
of treaty,
of acceptance.

And the offering I have no choice but to give away.

Which is me,
these hands,
the people I love,
and my whole life.

He reminds me of that.

And so I know he works for all of us,
and although he’s a heavy and weary fella,
and his heart is resigned,
he is peaceful in his duty,
he knows his reminder is painful,
but he knows it’s our medicine,
he knows that it’s our reckoning,
and a special teaching.

I feel for him,
and those he visits,
his weight pointing out our tender pieces,
I feel an unusual kind of sympathy for him,
and I feel he sympathises for me, too,

And so we’re together,
in a way that’s really very honest.
We’re both buried,
somehow,
where we can’t see the sky or the sun.

But we do feel the earth,
we do still see
and hear
and feel
and it’s all very real,
being together with a big,
broad,
giant,
resting his fat hands on my shoulders,
reminding me of the cool and dark,
the hot and heavy,
knowledge of my fate:
down there beneath my feat.

..

Awareness watches.

…

There’s something strange about all this that I can relate to, which Barbara Brown Taylor called: “Losing the feeling of being young”. Some innocence is taken away, and some freedom received in return, though I can’t put it into words. It also fascinates me these ‘things’ or burdens we can carry, and how others can see them.

For example, I went to a small gathering at a friend’s new house. An old friend was there whom I’ve had some happy interactions with once every few years for the last fifteen. I was told that he said (some hours after I’d left): “I noticed that Ruben was carrying something on his shoulders, something I haven’t seen before.”

Funny, that. Maybe it’s just the posture, the expression, the tired reactions, or maybe something else. I don’t know. But it’s not something the average person picks up on; some sensitivity is required; suggesting some deeper capacity to look into things.

And then there are those who have such open hearts that they can help you carry the weight; who choose to step inside the dark cloud with you. That astonishes me, and is something I don’t yet know myself to be fully capable of; so I remain in awe and in deep gratitude to Laia, my co-participant and teacher in this drama.

It’s also interesting to think that the whole dark cloud in reality is just information. How words like ‘cancer’ can percolate through our being and fundamentally transform our mind and outlook. Somehow I knew that I could also decide to ignore that information, but that seemed dishonest to what life was calling this mind to undergo.

And then there was that comment on my YouTube interview “…he looks malnourished, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was a breatharian or on some weird diet.” Yeah, well, jokes on you buddy(!), I was slowly dying of cancer.