Reflection 16: Turning the telescope around

 When I was a kid my friends and I had great fun playing with my best friend's new telescope he received as a birthday present when he turned 10 years old. Actually it was two presents in one. If you peer into it one way, the objects in the viewfinder became very close. But if you turned it around, the opposite happened. They were quite far away. But your scope of vision was wider. You get a bigger view. Turning it around gives you a better perspective on what you were viewing. 

 I suggest that lookIng for the best perspective is what being a cancer survivor is all about. It is your new reality. You want the big picture. Treat this new reality as a source of discovery, an act of learning . Revel in the need and satisfaction of learning something new. This in itself is therapeutic. 

 In his classic textbook, The meaning of adult education, E.C. Linderman wrote, "Adults are motivated to learn as they experience needs and interests that learning will satisfy" (1926). With head and neck cancer I certainly have many learning needs on how to function as a deaf-on-one-side person. For example, I certainly have the interest in learning about the taste of various food all over again because I have the phenomenon of "dry mouth". You quickly become an expert in self-directed learning. You learn as needs arise.  

 From 2 June I began to rationalize my cancer from two opposite views. First I could looked at it from a negative and beat-myself-up-approach. Or, I could turn the telescope around and cultivate a positive attitude, a positive frame of mind; treating each step as a learning adventure. Doing the exercise of plusses and minuses on a blank piece of paper, the positive attitude approach came out best. Satisfying needs is a small victory. Learning new ways of doing things you are so comfortable with your entire life such as carrying on a conversation in a crowded and noisy open restaurant is challenging. You are motivated to practice lip-reading. Easy? No. Satisfying? Yes, like most self-directed learning. That is how I am approaching this life-altering experience. It is a positive, learning adventure. It all begins by turning the telescope around.