Living Now

Some time ago a good friend sent me a postcard. The front of the card contained just two words: in bright and bold letters it said 'Enjoy Now.' I smiled and put the card on the office wall, beside the door, and turned to some mundane task or other.

Had someone then challenged me – are you really enjoying now? I would have said (without thinking too much) yes, of course. If pressed I would have added, I'm trying. Then some setback or disappointment would occur and my gaze would linger on the postcard. It stared back at me implacably, posing a tough question about how I was living my life that I didn't know how to answer. So I would look away, sometimes with a sigh, and get on with things.

This situation persisted for years, during which I finally left my job (with an early-exit package) and became a full-time writer. On leaving the office I took the card with me. It got bundled up with other things.

Several months ago I found the card again and put it in my bedroom, on the chest of drawers facing the bed. Now it is the last thing I see before going to sleep and the first thing I notice upon waking.

Actually doing what the card advises isn't so difficult anymore. I am learning to live in the here and now. With short-term horizons, my path seems clearer. Either I do things or I dont. I avoid maybe's. This brings a focus and an intensity to my living.

'Take care of today, and tomorrow will take care of itself.' This derives from Matthew (6:34) and I now feel its truth. In the past, I spent a huge amount of time and energy trying to take care of tomorrow

The change in me has of course been wreaked by the illness. When your longer-term survival is actively in question, everything becomes different.

Yet the big question of life is posed for everyone – and truly, nobody knows. So most people go around avoiding thinking about this challenge (with real determination), like I did for all those years.

Perhaps you're wondering whether I've become a Buddhist? Despite spending several nights in a temple on top of a holy mountain in Japan, going to sleep as if it was my last day and rising as if it was my first remains beyond my reach. As does living with no possessions other than saffron robes and a begging bowl (I'm glad to have the comfort of my home and the financial package I left work with).

What seems to have happened is that the traumatic power of the illness broke down the edifice of the old me. It left me in pieces. But unlike Humpty Dumpty, I have put myself back together again. In this process I did need some help (from local cancer charities, instead of all the king's horses and men). And through doing so I've become more truly and fully myself.