I recently read the book When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi. It is Dr. Kalanithi’s own beautifully written memoir of how, at 36 years old, about to finish his residency in neurosurgery and embark on a career in medicine, he receives a terminal diagnosis of Stage IV Metastatic Lung cancer. I just can’t imagine what that would be like. What would I do? Would I be angry, depressed, mad at God? I’m not sure. But it’s what Dr. Kalanithi does with the rest of his life that is so inspiring to me.

After the initial shock of the diagnosis, he sets about living whatever time he has left to the fullest—and I don’t mean doing all sorts of “bucket list” stuff, trying to make sure you don’t miss out on anything. He takes stock of what is most important, what would give his life the most meaning and tries his best to do just that—love his family as much as possible and use his talents as a surgeon to help others. It’s a struggle because there are times of severe pain and illness, treatments, etc., but each day he tried to embrace whatever that day held for him, right up until the very end. To quote his wife, Lucy, who wrote the epilogue “Even while terminally ill, Paul was fully alive; despite physical collapse, he remained vigorous, open, full of hope not for an unlikely cure but for days that were full of purpose and meaning.” She also says “Although these last few years have been wrenching and difficult—sometimes almost impossible—they have also been the most beautiful and profound of my life, requiring the daily act of holding life and death, joy and pain in balance and exploring new depths of gratitude and love.”

This book has haunted me since I finished it several weeks ago. I couldn’t quite figure out why, but then it occurred to me that this is way all of us should live always, not just after you find out your time is limited. Isn’t this what God wants us to do—to embrace life fully—the good and the bad?  Sometimes I find myself planning for the future and thinking that as soon as a certain thing happens everything will be better. But our life here is not supposed to be only good stuff. It includes the bad stuff too.  For example, I’m nearing retirement and find myself thinking ahead to when I retire and I can spend more time with my grandchildren, garden more, maybe even draw and paint, and it will be wonderful—no more alarm clock! But shouldn’t I instead be embracing every day right now for what it is? Finding the good in my current situation? God has me right where I am for a reason and I need to make sure I take advantage of whatever he puts before me. I need to be grateful for each day and what it offers, the challenges and the nice surprises that happen too.

I shouldn’t waste any of my days waiting for tomorrow. The challenges that come along make us who we are and strengthen us—they’re blessings in disguise. Who would I be if I hadn’t had to learn to give of my time while taking care of my ailing mother-in-law a number of years ago? Who would I be if I hadn’t had a life-threatening illness of my own a few years back? Who would I be if I hadn’t taken care of my husband and all sorts of things while my he battled cancer a couple of years ago?

I would probably be a more self-centered person focused on doing what I wanted, but instead, by turning to God for his strength and grace, I learned to care for my mother-in-law with love. I had to step outside of myself and do all sorts of things that made me want to say “no way, I can’t do that”. But God showed me how strong I could be with his grace. My mother-in-law and I grew much closer and when she died, I was at peace knowing I had been there to love her and help her through some really difficult times. With my own illness, there were many times when I was really scared, but in my darkest times God was there. I got to experience his most amazing love in some very profound ways. When my husband, Bill, was fighting cancer a couple of years ago, besides worrying about him, I had to step up and take care of a lot of things at work (we work together in our own small business) and at home. He just didn’t feel well enough. Again, God was there with the strength I needed.

Were any of these things easy? No, most definitely not. Would I have chosen them to happen? Again, no, most definitely not.  In looking back though, these events were blessings because they formed me into whom I am today; someone with more depth, more faith, more compassion and understanding for other’s sufferings, someone who can put personal desires aside and find love and grace to go on. I can find joy among the sadness. God is there always loving me and helping me to love others.

But to find the joy you have to embrace all of life, the joys and the suffering, just like Dr. Kalanithi did. As his wife Lucy says: “we have to hold life and death, joy and pain in balance and explore new depths of gratitude and love”. That’s where you will find God and profound peace for whatever life throws your way. I am trying to remember this and treat each day as a new opportunity to serve and love my God in whatever way he wants of me today, and when tomorrow comes, he will be there too no matter what happens.

I will leave you with a quote from one of my favorite authors, Henri J.M. Nouwen, from his book Can You Drink the Cup? that I think better expresses what I’m trying to say.

 “How can we in the midst of our ordinary lives, drink our cup, the cup of sorrow and the cup of joy? How can we fully appropriate what is given to us? Somehow we know that when we do not drink our cup and thus avoid the sorrow as well as the joy of living, our lives become inauthentic, insincere, superficial, and boring. We become puppets moved up and down, left and right by the puppeteers of this world. We become objects, yes, victims of other people’s interest and desires. But we don’t have to be victims. We can choose to drink the cup of our life with deep conviction that by drinking it we will find our true freedom. Thus, we will discover that the cup of sorrow and joy we are drinking is the cup of salvation.