What Do You Say to People with Cancer?

When I was a very young rabbi, I would eagerly accept any offer to speak to any crowd, even if I had no business doing so. So, this is back in uh it's got to be I don't know 2005, I got a call from an organization called Gildas Club. Gildas Club is named after Gilder Radner. Allah Shalam who was a comedic actress and a Jewish woman who passed away at a very young age because of ovarian cancer and her husband Gene Wilder all of a shalom also a Jew in her memory he's he's passed away since but after she passed away Gene Wilder created an organization called Gilders Club and it's a it's like a clubhouse where people with any form of cancer it's not specific which form but anyone who has cancer can come there. It's not a medical facility. It's a it's a social services organization and they provide social uh programs. So I got a call from Gildas Club and they said, "Rabbi," and I don't even know how they found me. Like this is before as I remember this is before like the the ubiquity of Google. This is probably like a yellow pages type thing. So they they probably were just going randomly through the yellow pages, but they they they called me said, "Rabbi, would you come and speak at Gildas Club about faith in the face of adversity?" And I'm like, "Yeah, no problem." Okay. So then I realized these people are all there because they have cancer. And I'm going to speak about faith in the face of adversity. Like who am I? And the most likely outcome is I'm gonna say something I think is inspiring and I'm I'm gonna offend them, God forbid, which is the last thing that I want to do. And and but this only occurred to me as I was pulling up to the place. I was really eager. I had my whole talk and everything's for the good. And then I'm like, are you going to tell people who are battling a serious illness everything's good? Everything's good. Like what am I doing here? So, actually, I was pulling up and I and I had a change of heart. I was going to drive off. The lady I really was about to drive off. I got carjacked. Not literally carjacked, but effectively the lady who was the organizer of the place, she saw me. She recognized me. She opened up the door of my car. She opened the door. She's like, "Rabbi, come on. They're waiting." So, I was stuck. So, I'm walking with her. We're walking down the steps. There was like these It was in a basement. It was in a in a like a social hall in a basement. So, we're walking down the steps and I'm thinking to myself, "This is terrible." Okay, here's what I'm going to do. If at any point they say to me, "You're offending us." I made up my mind already. I'm just going to say, "You're right. I'm sorry." And I'm going to be done. And that's it. That's all I'm going to do. By the way, I did not make that decision when I walked into here tonight. So, you can tell me I'm offending. I'm going to keep going. But as I'm walking down the stairs, I'm like, "That's it. If they tell me you're offensive, I'm going to be like, you're right. I'm wrong. I'm sorry. And I'm just going to stop." Okay. So, then I was relieved. At least I have a plan. But I go a couple more steps down the stairs. I'm like, "No, this is not a good plan. There's a flaw to my plan." The flaws my plan is I don't know if you guys realize this but people look at me and they tend to associate me with Judaism. Yeah. I was in the airport last week. I was in Atlanta. Some guy comes over and he says, "Rabbi," I'm like, "Yeah, how do you know?" I forget. So, it's not a good plan because it's okay if they think I'm an idiot. It's not okay if they think that 3,000 years of tradition is irrelevant or offensive or anything like that. God forbid. It's called It's called desecration of Hashem's name. It's not It's not cool. So, I'm like, "What am I going to do? What am I going to do? What am I going to do?" And I had to go I was walking up already. So, I came up with a plan on the fly. I'm like, "Okay, here's what we're going to do. I'm totally just going to make something up. Okay, but here's what there was a method to the madness. I'm going to totally make something up. If they like it, we'll leave it alone. Okay, if they don't like it, if they say, "You're offending us." So, here's what I'm going to say. I'm going to say to them, you know, I really regret that I made this all up. I should have told you what Judaism has to say. You get that? Okay, don't judge me. That was I had like two seconds to come up with a plan. Okay, but you get it. Like I have an out. I can always throw myself under the bus and be like, "Yeah, that was just something I made up because I'm an idiot. That's not what Judaism says. Next time get a real rabbi and he'll tell you what what Judaism says." Okay. The best I could come up with on the fly. So, I get up there and I say, and I'm just I'm going to make something up completely made up. So, I get up there and I say, "I was thinking the other day." Well, that part wasn't made up because I had been thinking previous to that event, but not about what I said I was thinking. It wasn't even true. I don't even know why. Why do people do that? Like the other day, just why does it make it more Anyways, I was thinking I I wasn't really thinking the other day. I thought about it that moment like on the spot. I said I thought I was thinking the other day about French new wave cinema about the novel vag and they were very into what they called otour theory author theory the the the French new wave cinema filmmakers they weren't just filmmakers they studied cinema and they would talk a lot about what makes great cinema so one time they were sitting around they're having like a little cinematic fabangan as I envision it and one of the guys there was Fran Tufo and uh they asked him well they asked everybody who's the greatest ur who's the greatest film author and they all have like their different answers and they came to Trufo they said who's the greatest film author so Trufo says hands down Alfred Hitchcock Alfred Hitchcock's greatest film author okay I'm not going to tell you whether that's my opinion or I'm telling this is this is this is how it happened. This what Trufo said. Hitchcock's the greatest film author. So they said Francois that's great but why why is Hitchcock in your estimation the greatest film author? So, Trufo says one reason because in his entire career, in his entire massive body of work, all the hours of film that he put on the screen, and there's not one single superfluous shot. If Hitchcock put it on the screen for even a second, it had meaning. It had to be there. It was integral to the storytelling. There was no filler. So in my estimation that's what makes Hitchcock the greatest film author. That's what Trufo says. So my guild's club I say I'm asking myself this question and yeshiva they taught me how to like make logical arguments. So I'm thinking to myself like this. Could I say as much for God and the film that he's making about me and showing to me that God has managed to do as well in that movie as Trufo says Hitchcock managed to to do in his career. I thought about that and I said to myself, well, it's ava logically, yes, it must be because who made Hitchcock? God made Hitchcock. So, if Hitchcock could do it, then the one who made Hitchcock could certainly do it. So, yes, it is possible I could say that my life is a story without a superfluous shot. Now, let me explain what that means. That does not mean that it's all pleasant, agreeable, likable. No, not at all. However, that actually makes sense to me too because once I start thinking about it in narrative terms, protagonist, antagonist, conflict, resolution, three-act structure, that whole thing. Well, then it becomes obvious to me that a good story isn't a story with all good moments. In fact, we would say that's a very bad story. That's a boring story. Nothing happened. Nobody ever threw a novel across the room and said, "I can't believe what trash this is. The main character who I'm supposed to like wants something and he keeps on not being able to get it." Nobody said that that's a bad story. To the contrary, that's called a page turner. Let's see if he gets it. He's down for the count. There's no way he can come back. That's compelling. That's a narrative. That's a story. That's a good story. And the more impossible it seems for the protagonist to eventually accomplish his goal and then to accomplish it anyway and it not to be a contrivance, that's storytelling. So, is it possible? There are moments of my life that are unpleasant. Horrific. Moments of my life that are horrific. And yet if I'm looking at as a story, it's it's it's not a bad story. It's not a bad story. He's not wasting my time. You know the BMP taught that everything we see and everything we hear is a message from God. This is not just talking to the prophets who actually heard God's voice. The Bashto said each and every one of us who is awake to reality will see communication teachings from the creator in everything that occurs to us. everything that happens. That's how God speaks to us through our lives. I heard somebody once say that in school, you you you're given the lesson and then you take the test. And in life, you take the test and you're given the lesson. How do we learn? We learn through experience. School of Hard Knocks. Now, I don't wish it on anyone. Certainly not myself. I wish us all an easy life. I told you already if I were running for God, no more paper cuts. But I can understand if I'm looking at it purely from a narrative perspective, I get it. I get it. I get it. I can say from my director of my film that he's at least as good as Hitchcock. He's at least as good as Truo thought Hitchcock was. So, but hold on here. I told you already that I made that up. That was my ability that if they got offended, I'm going to apologize and going to tell them I'm just some crackpot who says stuff that he made up. So at that point I heard a voice and I want to explain something to you as best as I can try to convey this. You know how sometimes you're aware of somebody's presence before you've actually looked at them. You haven't really with your five senses. Maybe you don't know they're there but somehow you're you know that they're there. There was a woman in the room who was a very strong presence and it's almost like I felt she was going to speak the whole time and at one point at this point I hear a booming voice and she said one word she said rabbi and it was like that that's the best impression I rabbi like a booming voice like that and I looked and I was like oh yeah I can't explain it other one in any other way than to say I looked I was like oh Yeah, like yeah, that's that's you. I don't know who she was. I never met her. I don't think I had looked at her at that till that point. But I was like, "Yeah, that's that energy that I was aware of." And and and I'm like, "Yes." And she says, "I have to say something." And in my mind, I'm trying to work out something something else now because I already have a plan. I'm about I'm about to apologize. But at this point, I'm trying to adjust the booming voice with this very frail body because she was very, very frail. In fact, when she spoke, she stood up. And I remember thinking to myself, distinctly, I remember thinking to myself, I hope she doesn't hurt herself because when she was standing, she was so frail when she stood up, I was afraid she was going to get hurt. But her voice was booming. So she's like, "Rabbi." And she stands up. I have to say something. Yes. And I'm ready. And she says, "My friends all think that I'm crazy." When I tell them, "No, I don't wish that. I don't wish that I never got cancer." They say, "Oh, no. You're giving up. You She says, "I'm not giving up. I'm I'm I want to live many healthy, happy years." Oh, so you wish you never got it? No, I don't wish I never got. She says, "We get into this loop that's like this silly semantic argument to them. It is." And she says, "It's very frustrating to me and I feel very lonely because this is very important to me. This is a very important idea to me and I cannot communicate it to my friends. No, I don't wish that I never got it. I don't wish that I never got it. I don't I want to live. Yeah, I want to live, but I don't wish that I never got it." And I don't know how to explain that paradox to them until now. She says until now. Now it's very simple to me how to explain it. There's only one reason why I don't wish that I never got it. One reason. And the reason is because I did. I did get it. That is what happened. So now retroactively to wish to have not gotten it means to wish for some other life because that's not what happened in my life. In my life I did get it. Now in my life, I'm looking forward to living. That's the future. That's open. But as far as the past, that's what happened in my life. So to now wish that that wasn't what happened in my life would be to wish for some other life. She says, I don't want to live some other life. I don't want to live some other story. I want to live my life. I want to live the story that God is telling me. This was like the most powerful moment for me. For me in my personal life, the most powerful moment of just that's what faith is. That's what faith is. That's what it is. That's what it is. She said it. She said it. I don't want to live some other life. I don't want to live some other story. I want to live my life. My story. the story that God is telling me. That's what faith is. That's all it is. That's everything. See, because you want to know, you want to know, you know what? You want to know what it means that this woman wanted to live. Animals want to survive. Animals want to not die. They have a survival instinct. She was a human being. She wanted to live. You know what it means to want to live? To want to live doesn't just mean to want to stay alive in the future. To want to live means to want your life. To want your life, not some other life. Not some imagined life. Not some alternate universe life. Not some theoretical life. Not the life that you should have had, that you could have had, that you imagined that you were going to have. To want to live means to embrace the perfection, the imperfect perfect of your life. Every detail of it. Every detail of it. What's going to happen a second from now? God has a big wide hand. Miracles can and do happen. We're not fatalists. God forbid. We're not dooming anybody that the situation will remain as it is. But everything until this point is exactly the story. And my director of my life doesn't put anything on the screen that doesn't need to be there. Yeah. He puts stuff on the screen that scares the hell out of me. He puts stuff on the screen that brings me to tears. He puts stuff on the screen that I say, "Why? Why are you doing this? I don't like this. Stop this." But he's not getting it wrong. He's telling a perfect story. And not just a perfect story in the in the general universal sense, the perfect story for me. Zusha, why weren't you Zusha? I can show up for the entirety of Chase's life. That's what I can do. That's it. Every moment of it. Even the moments that I say to myself, I never thought that would happen to me. Or how about even better? I always thought if that would happen to me, I would die. And I'm here, so apparently not. Apparently, I got that wrong, too. Add it to the list of things that I don't have any idea about. That's humility. And it's not that hard to be humble before infinite wisdom. If I had infinite wisdom, if I were God, I would also create the world exactly as it is right now and see how somehow it's perfect. But I'm not infinitely wise. So I don't see how it's infinitely perfect. But I know that it is. And therefore, who cares? Who cares if I know that it is? I'll tell you who cares. I care because when I know that it's perfect, even if I don't like it, I can show up for it. Not only I'm empowered to show up for it. It's a moral imperative for me to show up for it. Because if I don't show and what you know what I mean when I say show up for it. I don't just mean physically to bring my body. Although sometimes that's the best I can do. And if that's the best I can do today, fine. I know God gives me credit for that too. But if I can possibly bring my my five senses and I can possibly bring my mind and my attention and my focus, then yeah, I'm going to do that. I'm going to do that. And I'm going to have my life minute by minute by minute by minute by just accepting all I got to do is show up. All I got to do is show up. All I got to do is show up. That's it. That's it. All I got to do is show up. And you want to know something? Let's not be entirely like morbid over here. There are plenty of moments of life that are easy to show up for. Let's not forget that. Please, let's not forget that. There are moments that are nice and pleasant and not terrifying. There are some pretty nice moments that are easy to watch. But even the moments that are not, you know what? It's my life. I don't want to live some other life. Okay? So, we're all going to meditate. We're all going to think about how the created universe has no onlogical independence. We're going to think about the ongoing existence of this world as a dynamic product of an infinite act of God choosing meticulously every detail of reality at this second. and we're going to show up minute by minute, second by second, and we're going to live our lives. Hey, this is Shay Stab. You were just watching a clip from this class. If you want to get the full context, the full class that this clip that you just watched was from, you watch right here. Click right here. Here.