Heroes Not Zombies

Michael J Fox has an illness known as Parkinson’s Disease. It’s a disease of the nervous system which causes both tremor and decreased mobility. Diseases of the nervous system really hit a person’s sense of being in control of their own body. We tend to take it for granted that our bodies will just do what we tell them and when that doesn’t happen it’s a really central challenge to our need for control. Here’s what he says –

I can’t always control my body the way I want to, and I can’t control when I feel good or when I don’t. I can control how clear my mind is. And I can control how willing I am to step up if somebody needs me.

That’s one of the things the illness has given me: It’s a degree of death. There’s a certain amount of loss, and whenever you have a loss, it’s a step toward death. So if you can accept loss, you can accept the fact that there’s gonna be the big loss. Once you can accept that, you can accept anything. So then I think, Well, given that that’s the case, let’s tip myself a break. Let’s tip everybody a break.

My happiness grows in direct proportion to my acceptance, and in inverse proportion to my expectations.

Acceptance is the key to everything.

Which isn’t to say that I’m resigned to it, or that I’ve given up on it, or that I don’t think I have any effect on the outcome of it. It’s just that, as a reality, I get it.

There really is a lot in those little answers! Look at how he deals with the issue of loss of control. What helps him to deal with his illness is knowing what he can still control – clarity of mind and motivation to help others – and those things are more important than controlling limbs.

He speaks of how coming to terms with the sense of loss which his illness brings has better prepared him for death, and in doing so, better prepared him for life.

I also like what he says about acceptance, and how he distinguishes that from resignation. It’s about being real. Isn’t that true? How much unhappiness and suffering do we experience because of our refusal to accept reality, focusing instead on how we’d prefer things to be?