Transcripts
Hello listeners, and welcome back to The Science of Self, where you
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Improve your Life from the Inside Out.
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Today's guest is Jonathan Gluck,
author of The New Book Coming
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Out and Exercise In Uncertainty.
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Jon Gluck: Thanks so much for having me.
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Yeah.
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My name is Jonathan Gluck.
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I was a long time magazine
editor worked at magazines like
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New York Magazine and Vogue.
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And I've also been a cancer patient for
the last 20 plus years and I've written
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a memoir about my experience as you
noted, called an exercise in uncertainty.
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And that's what we're
here to talk about today.
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Russell: you use the phrasing, you
are a, you are a cancer patient.
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can you expound on that phrase a little
bit that you're still a cancer patient?
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Jon Gluck: Yeah, that's one of the main
points of the book actually, is that
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we, there are a group of us who, and
it's a growing group, who are surviving
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longer and longer with cancers that are
not curable, but that are treatable.
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Just to be clear, because it's
something that people really
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aren't used to hearing about or
knowing and don't know a ton about.
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I'm not talking about people who are
diagnosed with cancer and are cured and
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are therefore considered cancer survivors.
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And I'm not talking about people
sadly get a cancer diagnosis and
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there is no treatment or cure and.
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Know, they pass on.
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Unfortunately the group that
I'm in is a middle group.
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Been calling US cancer zombies, not
because we're half dead and half alive,
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but because we're half sick and half
well in that we will never be cured
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of our particular form of cancer.
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But it is treatable.
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Russell: For our listeners that
are interested in self-improvement,
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What can our listeners hope to find
from your book in those regards?
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Jon Gluck: That's a great question.
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I really tried to do two
things with the book.
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One is simply tell my story and the
second is to offer exactly the kind
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of lessons, if you want to call it
that, life lessons or perspective
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that you're talking about and that you
and your listeners are interested in.
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So I'll share a couple
thoughts about that.
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One is I did quite a bit of research
on the subject of uncertainty
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and coping with uncertainty and.
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One of the people I spoke to is
a woman named Kate Sweeney, who
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is a sociology professor in the
University of California system,
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and she has made a specialty
of studying this subject.
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And she has found some
tremendously interesting things
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over the years in her research.
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One of them simply put is that uncertainty
is super hard to deal with whether
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it's a serious medical diagnosis or.
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Even smaller instances of uncertainty.
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It's just not something humans
are great at dealing with.
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So she did, done studies with
people waiting for the results of
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biopsies or waiting for the results
of a bar exam, let's And she's found
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that people hate uncertainty so much
that they'd rather get the bad news.
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Then continue to have to wait.
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So in one study she talks about people
were told they were split into two
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groups and told they may or may not
receive a small electrical shock.
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And the pe and some,
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a surprising number of people, I don't
recall the exact figure would tell the
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researchers, just give me the shock.
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I just want it over with.
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The waiting is driving me crazy.
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So I thought that was fascinating.
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And a real statement about how difficult
it is to cope with uncertainty.
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Now she and other researchers
who study this subject, they
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have a lot of ways to help.
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one is simply distracting yourself.
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Even if that's a distraction,
like a TV show or reading a book.
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Another is trying to find
activities that get you into, what?
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Been popularly called the, recently, the
flow state or in the zone where for a
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prolonged period of time, your mind is
so thoroughly occupied with what you're
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doing, that it helps crowd out the
thoughts and worries and anxieties that
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otherwise, creep into all of our heads.
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Whether, as I say, it's
something day-to-day problem
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or a very serious problem.
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That can be anything.
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It can be for some people it's baking
or knitting or meditation or yoga.
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For me it happens to be fly fishing.
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I like to fish.
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Anytime you can engage in an activity
like that, it can def, definitely help
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you cope with anxieties or uncertainties.
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Russell: Do you practice mindfulness?
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Is it something that's part of your
recovery or part of your approach
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to dealing with the uncertainty?
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Jon Gluck: It is I'm a terrible meditator.
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I guess I would describe my meditation
skills in the same way you just
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described your fly fishing skills.
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I wouldn't say I'm very good at it, but I.
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Enjoy it and do my best.
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And another thing that's interesting
about a serious diagnosis, and I'm
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hardly alone this way, is changes your
perspective in a lot of ways, and I think
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almost naturally makes you more mindful.
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If you want to go back to
your previous question about,
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lessons that all this has taught
me, or that could be of benefit
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to anyone, whether they're going
through a diagnosis like this or not.
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There are a number of them.
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One is, you become very aware as you
might imagine, that life is short, and
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that it's important to take advantage
of whatever time you have here.
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And that's true for all
of us, whether we're.
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Hyper aware of our mortality
as I am in my case or not.
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So for me, that's made me more present
at all times and more mindful at all
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times just simply by going through it.
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It's also made me aware of how
important it is to do something.
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Now if you're interested in doing it.
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so you want to travel to Sri
Lanka, if you want to take up.
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Bocce, it doesn't matter what it is.
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My advice is do it now because none
of us knows how long we're gonna have.
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If you wanna call a friend for that
matter or you're thinking about
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somebody I tend to really be committed
to just doing those things now, more
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or less the minute I think of them
or, if I'm busy at that moment, I'll
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jot down a note to make sure I do it.
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And that's brought me a lot of pleasure.
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I hesitate to give cancer
credit for good, but.
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I suppose it's helped me in that way.
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There've been many lessons that have
come from this, as we're as I'm thinking
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about this now that you asked the
question too, another one that I suspect
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may have come up on your discussions
before as well is this idea of,
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You're stronger than you think you are.
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And you can survive more
than you think you can.
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For me, it's about being,
optimistically realistic.
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I'm going to coin a new term.
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And one of the things about a diagnosis
like this and living with cancer so long
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that you learn is optimistic realism.
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So what I mean by that is.
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Every time I come out of remission
or I get bad news about my scans and
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I get checked up every three months
or six months when that happens,
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there's a moment, sometimes an hour,
sometimes a day, sometimes a week,
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Or more when I am super upset and
feeling really discouraged and not
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particularly optimistic or hopeful.
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And I think that's fine.
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Sometimes you just need to allow
yourself to feel that way for a while.
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None of us are superhuman.
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Even if we could, erase those feelings
immediately, probably wouldn't be that
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healthy to do And that's something
also that I think has been a valuable
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lesson I've learned over the years
is try and look ahead to the best.
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To the extent you can
and when you're ready.
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A good friend of mine when I was first
diagnosed after expressing his sympathies
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and whatnot, said, I can't wait to have a
beer with you on the other side of this.
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I thought that was a lovely thing to say
because it gives you hope for the future.
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I don't happen to be a religious
person, so I don't do a ton of
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praying per se, although, you
know the expression, there
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are no atheists and a foxhole.
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I have occasionally turned to religion
when things are particularly bad
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and done some praying of my own.
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But one of the other interesting
things that's happened to me is.
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I've become very superstitious with
respect to cancer and cancer only.
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My friends and family would laugh at
this because I'm usually not at all
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a superstitious person and I sort of
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people about being superstitious,
but when it comes to my diagnosis and
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anything to do with it, I've become.
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Highly superstitious.
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I have certain rituals I
do before and after tests.
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I'm sure they don't work one way or the
other, but they make me feel better.
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So I do 'em anyway.
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I remember thinking that there's
a death force, and that force was
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closer to me than it had ever been.
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And more powerful in my, a more powerful
presence in my life than it had ever Been,
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Most of us.
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And why not, go through life, not, knowing
rationally that, we're gonna die someday,
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but almost never thinking about it.
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Unless we're forced to, obviously
in this case I had been forced
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to, rather dramatically.
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So I remember thinking like, okay,
I feel the presence of this force
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trying to take me down, so to speak.
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But then my very next thought was, there's
obviously also a life force and there's a
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very powerful human instinct to survive.
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That's mu far beyond our
understanding at this point.
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Even with all we do know
about the mind and the body
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medically and psychologically.
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And that force, that life force was,
just as powerful as the death force.
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And they were constantly battling it out.
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And not to get too Star Wars about it,
but the way I came out that day was I
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needed to believe in the life force.
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And I would say that's probably
the sort of spirituality that,
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that I find myself, having.
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Russell: What is the best
way for me to validate and to
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support someone is receiving.
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News like you've personally and
you share it with someone, how
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can I best support that person?
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Jon Gluck: there are definitely things
dos and don't there, so to speak, i've had
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many of them in my life both when I was
first diagnosed and since, somebody I knew
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said to me when I was first diagnosed, oh,
I understand what you're going through.
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I had a skin cancer scare once,
and it turned out it was benign.
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That was not helpful because
it's apples and oranges.
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And I've realized people are
well intentioned and also
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people get nervous when.
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They hear about a cancer
diagnosis, it can be scary.
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And, we all, when we're nervous sometimes
blurt out things that we didn't intend.
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So I, I try not to be too harsh or
critical of people who, say or do
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the quote unquote wrong thing, but, I
didn't find that particularly helpful.
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On the other hand whenever somebody
simply says to me, it's easy, like
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so many things of this sort, right?
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It's.
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It's, easier than you think.
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You just get in your own way.
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And when somebody just simply
expresses their sympathy gosh,
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I'm so sorry to hear that.
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Or that sucks, I can't imagine
what you're going through,
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but that sounds really hard.
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All of those are extremely helpful.
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So just a basic expression of sympathy.
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And also, an offer to help, even
though it may not be needed, it
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may not even be entirely practical.
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I've had friends who've live
halfway around the world and have
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said, and if there's anything I
can do to help, please let me know.
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What advice do I have or what
lessons, what do I suggest people
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practice in their own lives?
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I guess for me, one of the things
I've realized in thinking about
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this a great deal over the years is,
people talk about the Serenity Prayer.
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Gimme the strength to change the things I
can change and accept the things I can't.
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That's paraphrasing obviously, but that's
the essence of it I've said to people, I,
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I don't know if that's the secret to human
happiness, but it's as close as I've come.
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And I think there's just a
great deal of wisdom in that.
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If you're facing a difficulty do your
best to address it, particularly when
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it comes to cancer and cancer diagnosis.
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Get your regular screenings if
something doesn't feel right or you
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have a suspicion that something is.
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Going on too long, or as I said with
my hip, it was just, almost a year.
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And I had only just done this minor
thing to it and thank goodness I
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finally went back to the doctor
and said, this doesn't seem right.
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Highly advise you to do that.
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If things don't add
up, go see your doctor.
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Get your regular screenings,
early detection is still the
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best way to prevent cancers from
becoming serious or worse fatal.
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Yeah, do control the
things you can control.
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And then on the other side of that
coin accept the things you can't, we
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talked some about this already, but
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try and make peace with the things that
you can't problems that you can't wrestle
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to the ground with your own bare hands
or with the help of friends, family,
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loved ones, experts, whatever it is.
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Because fighting those things or.
229
00:13:12,280 --> 00:13:15,970
Trying to wish them away or pretend
they're not happening, in my experience
230
00:13:15,970 --> 00:13:17,290
anyway, only makes them worse.
231
00:13:17,389 --> 00:13:20,629
So that would be my all
seven habits boiled into one.
