Finding Peace

A few years ago, I came face to face with something called liminal space. What the heck is that you might ask? Good question. Quite simply it is the space between two points of existence. It is the space between a beginning and an end. It is that gap in time between the things in your life when you do not know where you are, who you are, and are not sure what your next steps should be. As a fellow traveler on the road we call our blood cancer journey, you and I most likely have spent a great deal of time in liminal space.

The unknown can be uncomfortable

It is not easy being in this space especially for an extended period. The unknown has a way of making us uncomfortable. When comfort is nowhere to be found, we tend to get restless and begin to thrash around and look to end the uncertainty. We will do anything to stop the mental anguish and create a sense of forward movement, believing that action - any action is better than none.

I learned about liminal space one evening driving home in a snowstorm in Wisconsin. All was going along well when suddenly I came face to face with whiteout conditions. The road and the cars ahead and around me disappeared in a cloud of opaque white. Not a great feeling when traveling along at 35 miles an hour on ice. Do I put on the breaks to avoid hitting the cars in front of me? If I hit the brakes and a stop, would I be hit from behind? No answers were apparent but for some reason, I took my foot off the accelerator and let the car drift to where the side of the road had been moments ago. Eventually, the car came to a stop on its own. There I sat safely while hearing cars crashing around me. When the whiteout passed a few minutes later, I was able to see a clear path on the highway and made my way home. Inaction proved to be the best decision that day.

Does action always beat inaction?

When no clear path is evident and confusion reigns, why do so many of us believe action beats inaction? So often when clarity returns, we silently admit that we may have made different decisions if only we had waited to see where the path was leading.

The liminal spaces created by our varied blood cancer diagnosis may offer us some excellent opportunities to transform our lives while allowing us to become the person we were meant to be. Perhaps if we take our foot off the cancer accelerator, we might find that our relationships with family and friends becoming fuller, more relational, more beneficial, and filled with more joy.

A place to gather our thoughts

Liminal space when seen as a place to gather our thoughts and regain our sense of purpose, rather than a place from which to escape, just might become that point in the middle where we don't regret the past nor do we fear the future. Rather, it becomes a place where we learn to live in the presence of self-understanding.

If you apply what I am saying, you may get to know yourself better and be better able to so focus on the things that are important to the reality that is you. Someone much wiser than I summed it up best: “You cannot take control of a situation when you are out of control.”