A Lesson From Michael J. Fox

I was watching Racheal Ray and Michael J. Fox was the guest on and he said something so profound I just had to write it down in my blog:

"However well you plan out your life and whatever courses you take and whatever degrees you get, your life is really going to get most interesting when it goes off the rails, when it blows up and something happens that you didn't expect - you have some loss or some misadventure," he explains. "If you're open to what happens next and you don't try to do something to change it - you just kind of accept it for what it is - you're going to learn something and your life will improve."

How true is that? Such a wonderful lesson from someone whose life did go off the rails and who did learn something from it so that his life could improve despite the Parkinson's Disease that has seized his body. Well my life also went off the rails and blew up in my face but I just haven't been able to open up to what has happened in my life and accept it for what it is. Instead I haven't been able to accept what happened to me. I planned my life to be an actor and singer whether on film or Broadway and I tried it, but something unexpected happened and life blew up in my face and I have suffered ultimately with the loss of that life, of that plan. But Michael is saying that life gets most interesting when it derails and something happens that you didn't expect - "you have some loss or misadventure." I have never really thought of my life, as it is now - derailed - as interesting. I have suffered emotional and physical pain and the loss of what used to be an interesting and exciting life. What I have now, I don't think is interesting. But perhaps, if I could just take his advice and accept my life for what it is now, I may learn something and in consequence of that, my life will improve.

Well that is precisely what I am trying to do - accept my life for what it is now. But that would mean accepting my scars and that is very difficult for me to do because it is those scars that have caused me to cry and not recognize myself when I look in the mirror. How can I accept something that causes me great pain? How can I accept the loss of a life that I planned my whole life for? But that is exactly what Michael J. Fox is asking me to do. And I trust what he says because his life was derailed when he was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease. And he was also an actor, like myself. But Michael was able to accept what happened to him and his life improved. I mean, he went back to doing acting, even though his roles are usually guest appearances but he is DOING it! And that's what matters most. That gives me hope that maybe, with the graces of the good doctors I have, that I too will be able to return to acting. But I may also have to accept that life has blown up in my face, derailed, and taken a different direction and THAT is something I don't know if I'll ever be able to accept. However, if I don't accept it, how will I ever be able to move on, learn something from it, and ultimately improve my life from what it is now? To accept what happened to me and be open to it is the only way to improve my life. Michael is so right.