I just checked my journal; today is, indeed, 5 years from the day I began chemo, or at least checked into the hospital for that purpose. That was sure an exciting day. Got my port in, had to delay infusion because of bilirubins or something, and discovered the utter joys of anti-nausea medication through an IV (mainly incoherence and the shuddering halt of my digestive system).
My message today doesn't have to do with chemo specifically, but with another aspect of my cancer treatment.
I read this quote in Relief Society today:
“Faith is the moving cause of all action.” [Lectures on Faith, lecture
1.] If you stop to consider that for a moment, I think you will agree
that it is absolutely true in temporal things as well as in spiritual
things. It is true with us in our own acts, as well as with the acts of
God. … (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Fielding Smith, (2013), 84)
I thought about a temporal action I perform that requires faith. The one that came to mind was standing up from my chair. I have faith that when I go to move, my legs will support me. Even writing this post is a form of faith, that you guys will understand the language I use and that my fingers will type with proficiency.
A natural following thought was "What people don't have faith in such basic temporal actions?" And then I remembered that was me.
See, when I had the big surgery they kept me in the hospital for a few days until I could perform certain basic tasks, like walking around and going to the bathroom by myself. One of those checklist items was an ability to go up and down stairs. Guess what I couldn't do? Or at least couldn't believe that I could do.
Well, I made it up the stairs okay. With a bit of coaching and a lot of reliance on the banister, I successfully climbed all three steps of the makeshift staircase. But then I got stuck. I remember standing there, convinced that I couldn't step down, couldn't put weight on my injured leg ("Do you know how big of an incision I have?" I could imagine myself haranguing the physical therapist. "I have
severe trauma and
missing muscles and you expect me to support myself? With only the banister to help?"). And I didn't see why I had to. How many stairs was I
really going to encounter the rest of my life?
Here's the thing about going down the stairs: you lead with your injured leg. You don't just drag it behind you like when you go up the stairs. It has to make the first move. And I was pretty sure that was not a thing that was going to happen.
Here's the other thing about going down the stairs: I had to in order to go back to bed. The physical therapist wasn't going to call someone to carry me down. There was only one way and that was to lift my injured leg (the leg with the giant incision and the
missing muscles and the pain, that leg) and let it down onto the lower step. But that was not a thing that was going to happen!
I had zero faith I could walk down the stairs, as evidenced by my immobility. If I'd had faith, I would've done it already.
Similarly, when I am paralyzed by inaction in my life, that shows that I need an increase in faith. If I am acting contrary to my knowledge, I need an increase in faith. Faith causes action.
Anyway, I made it down the stairs eventually. And the next time they had me test my ability to climb up and down stairs, I was able to do it with a little less trepidation. That is a good example of Elder Bednar's "spiral of faith" (my words, not his).
Here's the talk, but to paraphrase there are three basic elements of faith: "(1) faith as the
assurance of things hoped for that are true, (2) faith as the
evidence of things not seen, and (3) faith as the principle of
action in all intelligent beings."
For example, I had the
assurance of the physical therapist and my mom that I would not fall down the stairs (all three of them) and break my leg, so I made the
action of taking the step. Once I had done that, I had the
evidence that I had successfully made it down the staircase. From that experience, I had greater
assurance that the next time I had to go down the stairs, I wouldn't die, so I was able to take the
action with further more
evidence that my faith was not unfounded. And so forth. That's why it's called a spiral.
I hope you enjoyed this parable.
