Ep #42: Conceptual Cancer: Healing Social Constructs

In today’s #truthanddarecancer podcast episode I talk about cancer with a different perspective. We have just embarked into a new year and a new decade, and instead of talking about some random resolutions and trivial goals, and give you strategies to achieve them, I’d like to talk about conceptual cancer that I’ve been noticing on many different fronts. It’s too important of the topic not talk about and start the healing process.

What You’ll Learn From this Episode:

+  Why understanding conceptual cancer is important for healing

+  How to approach healing conceptual cancers on micro and macro levels

+  Why healing conceptual cancer is essential for society/humanity

+  Why transforming your life through cancer is essential for your healing and healing of the planet

+  Truth & Dare Quote: Removing the toxicity (or a person) is only the first step. The next step is a call into deeper healing.

Featured on the Show:

+  TDC #23: Emotional Rest

+   WANT TO CREATE A LIFE YOU DESERVE? Whether your goal is to get healthy, change careers, improve relationships, focus on self-care… You can create whatever you desire. If you need help figuring it out, it's time for private coaching, no more waiting for Monday.

+  I’d love to hear your perspective and thoughts about the conceptual cancer topic – just tag me on Facebook or Instagram @truthanddarecancer handle

Full Episode Transcript:

Welcome to Truth & Dare Cancer, the only podcast that teaches you how to supercharge your self-healer, navigate fear, and recalibrate your life by using cancer as a powerful catalyst for change. On this show, we get real about all things cancer. And now here’s your host, cancer survivor, mathematician and certified life coach, Ceca Mijatovic. Hello and welcome back! You are listening to the episode number 42 of the Truth & Dare Cancer Podcast. If you have not yet done so please subscribe to us on Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcast, and like us on Facebook. To access the show notes for this episode go to truthanddarecancer.com/podcast and select episode number 42. I’m your host Ceca Mijatovic and today I’d like to talk to you about cancer with a different perspective. Happy New Year Everyone! We have just embarked into a new year and a new decade, and instead of talking about some random resolutions and trivial goals, and give you strategies to achieve them, I’d like to talk about conceptual cancer that I’ve been noticing on many different fronts. It’s too important of the topic not to talk about it and start the healing process. What is cancer, exactly? The basic definition of cancer is “a disease caused by an uncontrolled division of abnormal cells in a part of the body.” Did you know that cancer can also refer to a metaphorical cancer? Another definition of cancer is “a practice or phenomenon perceived to be evil or destructive and hard to contain or eradicate.” I’ve been thinking of this in terms of challenges plaguing the world right now: the overuse of fossil fuels that is causing climate change and harming our planet. Racism. Antisemitism. Sexual assault and harassment. Gun violence. This is what conceptual or metaphorical cancer looks like on a macro level. These conceptual or metaphorical cancers multiply and spin out of control, causing harm, just like cancer cells in the body. Now I want you to consider conceptual cancer on a micro-level. Where else in your life - besides your physical experience of cancer as a disease - where else in your life are you experiencing invasive negative energy spreading like cancer? Let’s go through different areas of your life and consider where conceptual cancer may be affecting you. Stay open and reflect on each area. Let’s look first at your job or career. Are there any elements that are stressful or toxic? Consider the amount of hours you work, the level of stress you feel, the quality of your relationships with managers, team members and colleagues. Next, consider your relationships with family and friends. Are there any relationships in your life that drain or frustrate you on a regular basis? Where might you need to shift your own thoughts about people? Where might you need to set stronger boundaries? How about your hobbies, interests and passions? Do you have any? If you do, do you allow yourself time to pursue them? Pleasure is a crucial element to health. If you don’t allow yourself pleasure and inspiration, you cannot heal or thrive. Consider what other commitments encroach on time you could spend on activities you truly love and enjoy. What about your spiritual life? Many people go through times of anger and doubt while experiencing physical cancer, which may have a negative impact on their faith or spiritual life. If your spirituality had room for your anger and fear, how would your experience of Universe or God be different? Finally, consider your relationship with yourself. Have you turned on your own body, because you believe that it betrayed you by suffering from cancer? What parts of yourself do you refuse to accept or offer love to? Bringing awareness to how conceptual cancer is showing up in your life and addressing it in small ways is even more valuable than New Year’s resolutions. Now I want to talk about healing - from conceptual cancer and physical cancer. Often, physical cancer is addressed via a radical intervention, like surgery, radiation or chemo. It’s only after this intervention and treatment that your healing begins. I’m going to say that again: It’s only after this intervention that your true healing begins. Cancer is an invitation for us to heal our bodies, hearts, and minds. Likewise, conceptual cancer is the same invitation. Because you can remove a toxic person from your life (like a surgical intervention), but that alone still doesn’t heal your emotional or mental wounds from that relationship. Removing the toxicity is only the first step. The next step is a calling into deeper healing. It’s the same with conceptual cancer on a macro scale. We may remove people from society by putting them in jail for sexual assault or harassment, for example, but collectively as a society we need to heal the wounds of secrecy, complicity and patriarchy that have contributed to these crimes. Extracting the guilty person from the society is the first step of the healing process. So how do we heal from conceptual cancer? It starts with each one of us. The more we heal our own bodies, minds and spirits, the more empowered we become to heal conceptual cancer on a macro scale. We can’t allow humanity to turn on itself, and that’s certainly a direction we are currently taking. As president JF Kennedy famously said: “Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind.” He meant it in the literal sense, and I agree, and I also believe it to be true in a broader sense of creating resistance with people based on any kind of judgement and prejudice. And this concept spans beyond even humanity to really healing the earth: all natural resources and habitat. There are many pathways into healing - let’s talk about a few. These are foundational principles that work on individual level, family and friends circle level, society level as well as global and planetary levels. It pains me to see the latest political developments where our president is playing darts when invited to the chess game of creating wolrd peace. First, healing begins with acceptance. Accepting your pain, your cancer, your current circumstances. When we are fighting against what is, we cannot stay in the present moment, and we cannot heal. This doesn’t mean agreeing with that took place or becoming passive, but rather gaining a deeper understanding of the starting point. Another tool for healing is staying in the present. When we’re constantly dwelling in the past or in the future, we cannot heal. We can only heal in the present moment. Whenever you find yourself ruminating on something that’s happened, or worrying about something that might happen, use your breath to ground you back in the present moment. Again, focusing on being in the present doesn’t dismiss or negate what happened, but rather moves the energy from the energy of victim to the victorious. Being in the present moment raises the awareness of totality of the situation, and being fully aware and self-aware is the most powerful position for making better choices, creating boundaries, for decision making and healing. Next is a willingness to feel emotional pain. We can’t logic ourselves out of pain, and we can’t move through pain until we’ve felt it; unprocessed anger and pain will simply grow and metastasize or spread. As the saying goes, “the only way out is through.” Feeling the pain in small managed doses is possible, I talked about this in more detail in the Emotional Rest episode which I’ll link in the show notes. Furthermore, transmuting the pain to the highest love is paramount for its eradication and healing. Another step toward healing is to tune in to your own intuition - and then listen and do what it tells you. It’s essential to slow down in order to tune in and receive the guidance. Above all, know that you can choose healing thoughts and healing actions, and if you notice negative thought patterns just say to yourself “I choose peace, connection and love instead of this.” There are many paths into healing on the micro and macro level - these are just a few. So as we embark on this New Year and the new decade I invite you to consider healing the micro and macro cancers all around us. Know that by healing yourself you heal others; and by healing others you heal yourself. Love is all, and all is One. And to recap: Consider where you are experiencing “conceptual cancer” - negative energy that’s multiplying and spinning out of control, or burrowing in your mind or heart and infecting your joy. Choose to heal yourself using one of the pathways I described: acceptance of what is (instead of resistance), staying present, being willing to feel emotional pain, turning around your negative thinking and tuning in - and listening to - your intuition. Explore how you can heal your close relationships as well as society and the planet using the exact same strategies. I’d love to hear your perspective and thoughts about the conceptual cancer topic – just tag me on Facebook or Instagram @truthanddarecancer handle. Be sure to tune in to our next episode - it’s an interview with my good friend Sara Dean of the Shameless Mom Academy; in it we discuss Shameless Tips for Moms with Cancer. If you got value from this episode and know someone else that would get value from it as well, please share it with them. And in the meantime, I dare you to find the truth in your cancer! Thanks for tuning in. If you want to stop identifying with your cancer, you can download a free “You Are Not Your Cancer” guide at www.truthanddarecancer.com/podcastfreeguide.

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