Free How to Be Sick by Toni Bernhard, Sylvia Boorstein Page B

Tuesday. But two days after Tony left, I lost the benefit I’d been experiencing from a new treatment and had a big setback in my condition. I had to cancel our visit. She said she could visit on Wednesday instead, but I had to cancel that too. I was just too sick.
     
    Come Friday night, I suddenly felt resentful that, knowing I wasn’t doing well, Dawn hadn’t checked in with me. As soon as that resentful thought arose, the “penalty” kicked in, meaning I had to cut off the negative thoughts that were about to proliferate and, instead, immediately contact her. I forced myself to pick up my laptop and send her an email. I wrote a short paragraph about my rough week and then asked how she and her family were doing. She wrote back right away. Her email started with this sentence: “I had been thinking about you, but I think I was afraid to ask you how you were doing. I won’t do that again.”
     
    Here I’d been judging her negatively only to find out that, not only had she been thinking about me, but she had a reason for not getting in touch; sometimes it’s just too hard for people to hear how poorly a friend is doing. In addition, it turned out she’d had a particularly busy week—hosting visitors from out of town, taking care of two of her grandchildren, negotiating the purchase of some property that was located a few hours from where she lived. A full plate indeed. Once again, the storyline I’d spun regarding someone else’s motives failed to reflect what was really going on.
     
    Practicing compassion is the act of reaching out to ourselves and to others to help alleviate suffering. By using the practice I just described, instead of allowing stressful thoughts about family and friends to proliferate and then fester, I consciously shift my mental state and take action. That action has never failed to alleviate my suffering and, as a bonus, give me a big lift.
     

Patient Endurance
     
    The second way I cultivate compassion for myself is to practice khanti , usually translated as “patience.” (Warning: it’s part of another list!) Khanti is one of the ten “practices of perfection” (also called the ten paramis ). Two of the four sublime states—metta (loving-kindness) and upekkha (equanimity)—are also on this list. The paramis are ten qualities that a buddha, or enlightened one, has perfected. The other seven are generosity, moral conduct, renunciation, wisdom, energy, truthfulness, and determination. In Being Nobody, Going Nowhere , Ayya Khema said of the perfections : “We have their seed in us. If that were not so, we would be cultivating barren ground.”
     
    Ayya Khema was a native German Jew who, after escaping the Nazis, became a Theravada Buddhist nun in Sri Lanka. She translates khanti as “patient endurance.” At a retreat in Northern California in 1996, she told us that maintaining patient endurance is the most difficult part of Buddhist practice. Ayya Khema’s rendering transforms what could be seen as a passive state of mind (“just be patient”) into an active practice. Patient endurance suggests that, in addition to being patient (that is, serene and uncomplaining—two synonyms for the word “patient”), we actively “endure.” The dictionary definition of endure includes “to survive when faced with difficulties,” and “to experience hardship without giving up.” I also like to compare the practice of “patient endurance” to the instruction given by César Milan, the “Dog Whisperer.” He tells dog owners that the most effective way to work with their pets is to maintain a “calm and assertive” mind state. In other words, take charge, but in a calm and patient manner.
     
    I include patient endurance on my list of compassion practices because it can help alleviate our suffering as we face the many difficulties that result from being chronically ill. One recurring difficulty is the uncommon number of hours spent navigating the healthcare system, whether