Thriving Amidst Uncertainty: Jonathan Gluck's Journey with Treatable Cancer

Russell: 00:00:07

Hello listeners, and welcome back to The Science of Self, where you

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Improve your Life from the Inside Out.

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Today's guest is Jonathan Gluck,

author of The New Book Coming

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Out and Exercise In Uncertainty.

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Jon Gluck: Thanks so much for having me.

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Yeah.

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My name is Jonathan Gluck.

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I was a long time magazine

editor worked at magazines like

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New York Magazine and Vogue.

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And I've also been a cancer patient for

the last 20 plus years and I've written

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a memoir about my experience as you

noted, called an exercise in uncertainty.

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And that's what we're

here to talk about today.

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Russell: you use the phrasing, you

are a, you are a cancer patient.

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can you expound on that phrase a little

bit that you're still a cancer patient?

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Jon Gluck: Yeah, that's one of the main

points of the book actually, is that

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we, there are a group of us who, and

it's a growing group, who are surviving

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longer and longer with cancers that are

not curable, but that are treatable.

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Just to be clear, because it's

something that people really

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aren't used to hearing about or

knowing and don't know a ton about.

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I'm not talking about people who are

diagnosed with cancer and are cured and

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are therefore considered cancer survivors.

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And I'm not talking about people

sadly get a cancer diagnosis and

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there is no treatment or cure and.

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Know, they pass on.

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Unfortunately the group that

I'm in is a middle group.

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Been calling US cancer zombies, not

because we're half dead and half alive,

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but because we're half sick and half

well in that we will never be cured

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of our particular form of cancer.

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But it is treatable.

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Russell: For our listeners that

are interested in self-improvement,

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What can our listeners hope to find

from your book in those regards?

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Jon Gluck: That's a great question.

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I really tried to do two

things with the book.

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One is simply tell my story and the

second is to offer exactly the kind

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of lessons, if you want to call it

that, life lessons or perspective

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that you're talking about and that you

and your listeners are interested in.

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So I'll share a couple

thoughts about that.

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One is I did quite a bit of research

on the subject of uncertainty

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and coping with uncertainty and.

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One of the people I spoke to is

a woman named Kate Sweeney, who

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is a sociology professor in the

University of California system,

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and she has made a specialty

of studying this subject.

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And she has found some

tremendously interesting things

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over the years in her research.

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One of them simply put is that uncertainty

is super hard to deal with whether

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it's a serious medical diagnosis or.

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Even smaller instances of uncertainty.

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It's just not something humans

are great at dealing with.

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So she did, done studies with

people waiting for the results of

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biopsies or waiting for the results

of a bar exam, let's And she's found

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that people hate uncertainty so much

that they'd rather get the bad news.

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Then continue to have to wait.

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So in one study she talks about people

were told they were split into two

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groups and told they may or may not

receive a small electrical shock.

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And the pe and some,

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a surprising number of people, I don't

recall the exact figure would tell the

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researchers, just give me the shock.

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I just want it over with.

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The waiting is driving me crazy.

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So I thought that was fascinating.

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And a real statement about how difficult

it is to cope with uncertainty.

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Now she and other researchers

who study this subject, they

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have a lot of ways to help.

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one is simply distracting yourself.

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Even if that's a distraction,

like a TV show or reading a book.

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Another is trying to find

activities that get you into, what?

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Been popularly called the, recently, the

flow state or in the zone where for a

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prolonged period of time, your mind is

so thoroughly occupied with what you're

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doing, that it helps crowd out the

thoughts and worries and anxieties that

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otherwise, creep into all of our heads.

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Whether, as I say, it's

something day-to-day problem

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or a very serious problem.

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That can be anything.

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It can be for some people it's baking

or knitting or meditation or yoga.

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For me it happens to be fly fishing.

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I like to fish.

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Anytime you can engage in an activity

like that, it can def, definitely help

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you cope with anxieties or uncertainties.

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Russell: Do you practice mindfulness?

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Is it something that's part of your

recovery or part of your approach

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to dealing with the uncertainty?

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Jon Gluck: It is I'm a terrible meditator.

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I guess I would describe my meditation

skills in the same way you just

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described your fly fishing skills.

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I wouldn't say I'm very good at it, but I.

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Enjoy it and do my best.

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And another thing that's interesting

about a serious diagnosis, and I'm

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hardly alone this way, is changes your

perspective in a lot of ways, and I think

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almost naturally makes you more mindful.

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If you want to go back to

your previous question about,

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lessons that all this has taught

me, or that could be of benefit

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to anyone, whether they're going

through a diagnosis like this or not.

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There are a number of them.

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One is, you become very aware as you

might imagine, that life is short, and

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that it's important to take advantage

of whatever time you have here.

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And that's true for all

of us, whether we're.

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Hyper aware of our mortality

as I am in my case or not.

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So for me, that's made me more present

at all times and more mindful at all

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times just simply by going through it.

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It's also made me aware of how

important it is to do something.

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Now if you're interested in doing it.

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so you want to travel to Sri

Lanka, if you want to take up.

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Bocce, it doesn't matter what it is.

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My advice is do it now because none

of us knows how long we're gonna have.

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If you wanna call a friend for that

matter or you're thinking about

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somebody I tend to really be committed

to just doing those things now, more

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or less the minute I think of them

or, if I'm busy at that moment, I'll

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jot down a note to make sure I do it.

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And that's brought me a lot of pleasure.

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I hesitate to give cancer

credit for good, but.

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I suppose it's helped me in that way.

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There've been many lessons that have

come from this, as we're as I'm thinking

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about this now that you asked the

question too, another one that I suspect

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may have come up on your discussions

before as well is this idea of,

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You're stronger than you think you are.

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And you can survive more

than you think you can.

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For me, it's about being,

optimistically realistic.

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I'm going to coin a new term.

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And one of the things about a diagnosis

like this and living with cancer so long

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that you learn is optimistic realism.

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So what I mean by that is.

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Every time I come out of remission

or I get bad news about my scans and

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I get checked up every three months

or six months when that happens,

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there's a moment, sometimes an hour,

sometimes a day, sometimes a week,

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Or more when I am super upset and

feeling really discouraged and not

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particularly optimistic or hopeful.

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And I think that's fine.

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Sometimes you just need to allow

yourself to feel that way for a while.

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None of us are superhuman.

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Even if we could, erase those feelings

immediately, probably wouldn't be that

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healthy to do And that's something

also that I think has been a valuable

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lesson I've learned over the years

is try and look ahead to the best.

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To the extent you can

and when you're ready.

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A good friend of mine when I was first

diagnosed after expressing his sympathies

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and whatnot, said, I can't wait to have a

beer with you on the other side of this.

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I thought that was a lovely thing to say

because it gives you hope for the future.

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I don't happen to be a religious

person, so I don't do a ton of

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praying per se, although, you

know the expression, there

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are no atheists and a foxhole.

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I have occasionally turned to religion

when things are particularly bad

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and done some praying of my own.

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But one of the other interesting

things that's happened to me is.

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I've become very superstitious with

respect to cancer and cancer only.

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My friends and family would laugh at

this because I'm usually not at all

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a superstitious person and I sort of

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people about being superstitious,

but when it comes to my diagnosis and

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anything to do with it, I've become.

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Highly superstitious.

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I have certain rituals I

do before and after tests.

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I'm sure they don't work one way or the

other, but they make me feel better.

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So I do 'em anyway.

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I remember thinking that there's

a death force, and that force was

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closer to me than it had ever been.

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And more powerful in my, a more powerful

presence in my life than it had ever Been,

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Most of us.

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And why not, go through life, not, knowing

rationally that, we're gonna die someday,

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but almost never thinking about it.

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Unless we're forced to, obviously

in this case I had been forced

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to, rather dramatically.

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So I remember thinking like, okay,

I feel the presence of this force

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trying to take me down, so to speak.

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But then my very next thought was, there's

obviously also a life force and there's a

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very powerful human instinct to survive.

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That's mu far beyond our

understanding at this point.

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Even with all we do know

about the mind and the body

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medically and psychologically.

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And that force, that life force was,

just as powerful as the death force.

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And they were constantly battling it out.

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And not to get too Star Wars about it,

but the way I came out that day was I

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needed to believe in the life force.

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And I would say that's probably

the sort of spirituality that,

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that I find myself, having.

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Russell: What is the best

way for me to validate and to

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support someone is receiving.

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News like you've personally and

you share it with someone, how

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can I best support that person?

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Jon Gluck: there are definitely things

dos and don't there, so to speak, i've had

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many of them in my life both when I was

first diagnosed and since, somebody I knew

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said to me when I was first diagnosed, oh,

I understand what you're going through.

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I had a skin cancer scare once,

and it turned out it was benign.

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That was not helpful because

it's apples and oranges.

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And I've realized people are

well intentioned and also

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people get nervous when.

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They hear about a cancer

diagnosis, it can be scary.

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And, we all, when we're nervous sometimes

blurt out things that we didn't intend.

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So I, I try not to be too harsh or

critical of people who, say or do

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the quote unquote wrong thing, but, I

didn't find that particularly helpful.

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On the other hand whenever somebody

simply says to me, it's easy, like

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so many things of this sort, right?

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It's.

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It's, easier than you think.

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You just get in your own way.

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And when somebody just simply

expresses their sympathy gosh,

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I'm so sorry to hear that.

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Or that sucks, I can't imagine

what you're going through,

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but that sounds really hard.

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All of those are extremely helpful.

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So just a basic expression of sympathy.

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And also, an offer to help, even

though it may not be needed, it

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may not even be entirely practical.

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I've had friends who've live

halfway around the world and have

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said, and if there's anything I

can do to help, please let me know.

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What advice do I have or what

lessons, what do I suggest people

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practice in their own lives?

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I guess for me, one of the things

I've realized in thinking about

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this a great deal over the years is,

people talk about the Serenity Prayer.

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Gimme the strength to change the things I

can change and accept the things I can't.

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That's paraphrasing obviously, but that's

the essence of it I've said to people, I,

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I don't know if that's the secret to human

happiness, but it's as close as I've come.

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And I think there's just a

great deal of wisdom in that.

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If you're facing a difficulty do your

best to address it, particularly when

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it comes to cancer and cancer diagnosis.

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Get your regular screenings if

something doesn't feel right or you

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have a suspicion that something is.

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Going on too long, or as I said with

my hip, it was just, almost a year.

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And I had only just done this minor

thing to it and thank goodness I

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finally went back to the doctor

and said, this doesn't seem right.

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Highly advise you to do that.

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If things don't add

up, go see your doctor.

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Get your regular screenings,

early detection is still the

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best way to prevent cancers from

becoming serious or worse fatal.

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Yeah, do control the

things you can control.

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And then on the other side of that

coin accept the things you can't, we

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talked some about this already, but

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try and make peace with the things that

you can't problems that you can't wrestle

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to the ground with your own bare hands

or with the help of friends, family,

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loved ones, experts, whatever it is.

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Because fighting those things or.

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Trying to wish them away or pretend

they're not happening, in my experience

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anyway, only makes them worse.

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So that would be my all

seven habits boiled into one.