Deep Survival and Health

        When your health fails, you are in a survival situation. The number of parallels between recovery from illness and wilderness survival is striking. Despite their hardship, both kinds of survivors report being grateful. They are attuned to the wonder of their world. They survive by surrendering, even while doing the “next right thing.” They embrace and treasure the survival experience, and almost feel sorry for those who haven’t had to survive.

        Here are some concepts from Deep Survival that people battling illness have found most useful and inspiring.

• Perceive and Believe: The first step in managing a survival situation is admitting the trouble you’re in. Many a mountain climber has died by ignoring black clouds on the horizon. Many people have died by ignoring a lump in a breast or the early signs of prostate cancer. This message, examined in detail in Deep Survival, is a vital first step in combating illness. Survivors do not engage in denial.
• Be Cool: Stress or high emotion interferes with clear thinking. Those who can learn to think clearly and make good decisions under stress survive better. Learning this skill before you are diagnosed with an illness can save your life.
• Think/Analyze/Plan: The best survivors do not concentrate on the enormous job before them. They break big achievements into small, manageable tasks. “My leg is broken,” they might say, “but I know I can crawl to that rock over there.” In this way, little by little, they work their way out. People who survive serious illness report the same strategy: Taking it one day at a time.
• Be a rescuer, not a victim: The best survivors always report that they were doing it for someone else–a parent, spouse, child, even a pet back home. Maintaining that connection, helping others, is vital to survival. It makes you a rescuer and frees you from being a victim. When illness strikes, people with strong family and social connections survive better. Survivors do not engage in self pity.
• Laugh and Celebrate: Survivors never loose their sense of humor, even in the most horrible situations. And every time they make a little progress, they celebrate their success. Even in Nazi concentration camps, people played music, put on plays, and celebrated birthdays and anniversaries. People with serious illness who maintain their humor are harder to threaten and therefore survive better. Survivors never take themselves too seriously.
• Survival is a spiritual transformation Survivors of all sorts of situations–including illness–report that at some point, they saw the beauty of the place they were in, let go of their fear of death, and had a spiritual transformation that allowed them to go on. Survivors recognize that they are on a spiritual journey.