Your Past Forms You

Last evening, I started reading Lance Armstrong's It's Not about the Bike, My Journey Back to Life. I am going to start writing a paragraph each day about something that hits me in the book.

"People die. That truth is so disheartening that at times I can't bear to articulate it. Why should we go on, you might ask? Why don't we all just stop and lie down where we are? But there is another truth, too. People live. It's an equal and opposing truth. People live, and in the most remarkable ways. When I was sick, I saw more beauty and triumph and truth in a single day than I ever did in a bike race- but they were human moments, not miraculous ones. I met a guy in a fraying sweatsuit who turned out to be a brilliant surgeon. I became friends with a harassed and overscheduled nurse named LaTrice, who gave me such care that it could only be the result of the deepest sympathetic affinity. I saw children with no eyelashes or eyebrows, their hair burned away by chemo, who fought with the hearts of Indurians. I still do not completely understand it. All I can do is tell you what happened"

People keep on saying, "Why did this have to happen to you?" My response is simple: it can happen to anyone. Honestly, I do not get caught up asking myself that question. Heck, there are people in far worse situations than I am right now. I haven't been laying around depressed about this news. It has happened. It is not going to go away by feeling sorry for myself. Instead, I am making it a challenge. This disease won't beat me.

"Your past forms you, whether you like it or not. Each encounter and each experience has its own effect."

-Lance Armstrong-