Hi ho hi ho, it's off to work I go

I have returned to the working world this week, teaching a leadership program for a beloved client here in Wellington. I was anxious about this. These are long days and teaching is a high energy, full body experience. I needed to wrap my head back around the content and be there for the participants and not let Keith down. (Though in truth, Keith has always been clear that I could leave at any point and he and our other partner Jim decided long ago that Jim would just be nearby, doing other things, so that he could step in at any time if I got overwhelmed or exhausted. I have very very good partners.)

It has been both more exhausting and more life giving than I had imagined. I admire these participants and the work they do.  I am excited about the ways our work together might help make their lives better—and help them accomplish more of the work that they and I care about. I love the work I do and the things I teach and the people I get to work with, and I was overcome with how lucky I am to get paid to do work that matters so much to me. I was more comfortable in my evolving and healing body than I feared I would be, and I got into the flow of teaching again (after a few minutes of self-conscious nerves that are unusual for me). I wasn’t at 100%, but I felt I was doing a good enough job and supporting them in important ways. This is a helpful reminder about the ways my work keeps me zingy and alive, the ways the relationships I develop with the participants feed a piece of my heart and my soul.

And at the same time I was exhausted. I didn’t notice the pain when I was in the front of the room, but it came thrumming back afterwards. I missed my nap. I was nearly incoherent at the end of the day and weepy before bed. The participants and I struggled to find a way to talk together about my cancer—they wanted to express their care and their curiosity, and it's hard to know how to do that. We were awkward at first trying to find which words we were each comfortable with (clearly some people hate to say or hear the word "cancer") and what information was public versus private. I have been finding the many ways having cancer is  a connector to people (like you reading this now). It turns out it is also a kind of divider as others and I need to find a whole new rhythm in our connection, as we navigate the new territory of life and death and sickness and prognosis and fear and pain. Isn’t it funny that even in my work—where we so often talk about whole-bodied and whole-hearted experiences—that these topics are rarely a part of our conversation. We so rarely talk about death at work; this makes me wonder how much we really talk about life at work.

Even with all of this lovely focus on getting away from the cancer and into my work, I am still feeling the way cancer controls my life. I had been clear with the folks who schedule the doctor’s appointments that I was teaching these three days, but still, the only appointment with the chemo oncologist they offered me was Wednesday morning—the last day of this program.  And with only the moment’s hesitation that it took to sigh, I accepted the appointment, took Jim up on his offer to stand in for me, and told my participants that I’d be in as soon as I could be. So tomorrow begins with a trip to another doctor. I think (I hope) there will be no surprises. I know that I will need chemo, know that it’s an important part of increasing the chances that I will live a long life. So I am not sure really what terrors this doctors appointment holds, but I also know that now doctors and fear are braided together. I remember with great fondness the first 43.5 years of my life when doctors weren’t terrifying (probably they were terrifying the first 10 years, too, now that I think of it).

All of this helps remind me of how vital a part of our lives our work should be and how sustaining of our biggest selves. Work is a life or death matter for us all, because so much of our short lives are spent on the job. I feel overcome with gratitude today that the days and weeks and months I spend working are so bursting with meaning, surrounded by people I love to teach with, clients I love to teach, and ideas that make people’s lives better. May your worklife be so blessed.