In a Ted Talk entitled, “The Council of Dads” that is both humorous and poignant, Bruce Fieler talks about his experience as a father with cancer. I found a number of points worth noting but was especially touched by the following:
“As I became less and less human — and at this moment in my life, I was probably 30 lbs. less then I am right now … I had no hair and no immune system…At that moment I was less and less human, I was also, at the same time, maybe the most human I’ve ever been. And what was so striking about that time was, instead of repulsing people, I was actually proving to be a magnet for people… Cancer, I found, is a passport to intimacy. It is an invitation, maybe even a mandate, to enter the most vital arenas of human life, the most sensitive and the most frightening, the ones that we never want to go to, but when we do go there… we feel incredibly transformed.”
I have found this to be true as I accompany my own mother through her journey with lung cancer. I have witnessed and experienced profound pain and fear, and yet have also encountered moments of dark beauty, where we were steadied and held by the tremendous caring and compassion of others.
Spirituality, Therapy, and the Good Life 
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