I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the impact of “perspective” on the way we view our lives. For example, if viewed through a particular point of view, my life would look like this:
-i had cancer and lost my leg. i’ll never run again, and walking is often painful. people stare and say rude things to me, especially if i’m not wearing my prosthesis. the simplest of things can be hard. i fall sometimes, which is embarrassing. it’s not easy to get health insurance. it’s also quite difficult to be employed with a visible disability. everything is harder for me than for most people. the chance of me getting cancer again is high, due to the types of treatment that i had. i feel unattractive because my body is scarred and assymetrical.
Or through a different lens, I could view it this way:
-Having cancer and losing my leg hasn’t held me back in any significant way. I’m still healthy because I can exercise and eat well. I have medical insurance that allows me to buy hi-tech prosthetics to increase my safety and agility. Having a disability helps me to meet more people than I would otherwise, and has enriched my life as a result of a wider-ranging social circle and new opportunities. There’s rarely anything I can’t do if I put my mind to it and try hard. I have a good parking space nearly everywhere I go & strangers tend to help me if/when anything goes awry with my leg.
My days tend to be a mix of both ways of viewing my life. Sometimes I get stuck in feeling sorry for myself, and other times I feel as though I could conquer the world. I think I tend to the latter perspective–life feels very fragile and brief, so I don’t want to fritter it away feeling bad about the ways things have turned out for me.