Strategic Discipline Blog

My journey through Acute Myeloid Leukemia continues with the last segment from Chapter VII from CANCER CURED – Miracle Moment – NO FEAR & DR CARTER’S CALL

(Previous segments of CANCER CURED are available here:  CANCER CURED BOOK -to read from the beginning, you’ll need to scroll through to the bottom to find CANCER CURED – What do You Feed?, which is the first in the series.)

Dr. Carter's Call

It’s late Thursday, July 26^th, 2012. I’m sitting outside on our back patio area (the same area my “friends” had helped fix the concrete) at the patio table reading, when Michelle opened the sliding doors and handed me my phone. “It’s Dr. Carter” was all she said. We both knew why he was calling.

Dr. Carter began by saying, “Doug, I don’t normally call my patient this late at night, but then I don’t normally have this good of news to share with them. The results of your biopsy came back, and it show no trace of cancer. Your bone marrow is completely free of cancer, Doug!”

I was trembling by the time he finished sharing the news. It was the best news I could have heard, and after 7 difficult months in the hospital, it meant I would have a chance to live again. It vindicated my belief, my routines, disciplines, and habits I had struggled with to achieve this result. It also confirmed the message I received on my computer the night before I went into the ICU for 12 hours, “Cancer Cured.”

I shared the news with Michelle and my two boys, Josh and Noah. I can assure you, though, I did a good deal of praying to thank God.

Looking back on that evening and the time leading up to it, I realize I was already living in gratitude to God for delivering the results Dr. Carter shared. The “Cancer Cured” message I’d received 4 weeks earlier gave me a certitude and confidence level to live as if I’d already conquered cancer. Perhaps that’s one reason April Cline-Jones, the nurse whom I interviewed years after my recovery, felt the distance between Michelle and me.

I lived in the conviction I was cured. She lived in fear I was dead.

I’ve heard this sense of assurance called God-Confidence. In my case, it was an understanding of the indwelling Christ, of my union with God, and God’s union with everything He created. If I had faith in Him, He would deliver the outcome best for me.

All the routines and habits of my life led to my faith, “God-confidence,” which prevailed throughout my 7 extended months in the hospital and through the failure of 5 chemotherapies to achieve a sufficient reduction in the cancer in my bone marrow.

The Chinese philosopher XUNZI said, “If a person puts even one measure of effort into following ritual and the standards of righteousness, he will get back twice as much.”

Ryan Holiday shares in Stillness is the Key, “Routines build around us a day and a life that is moral and ordered and still—and in so doing, create a kind of bulwark against the chaos of the world and free up the best of ourselves for the work we do.”

My routines became more valuable when I was isolated in the hospital. Suddenly, these routines provided a sense of orderliness to my day. My routines prevented the influences of drama, this upheaval in my life, from overcoming and controlling me.

Holiday notes, “A master is in control. A master has a system. A master turns the ordinary into the sacred. And so must we.”

I mastered my environment through the routines I followed.  By establishing a new routine, meditation, I conquered my fears and changed,  discovering a path to deliverance.

Later, when I returned to the hospital, Dr. Carter shared the results of a scan of my lungs, revealing I had pneumonia. This would delay the bone marrow transplant, indicating there were still some challenges ahead. Yet I knew the greatest obstacle I had to overcome had been vanquished. I had complete confidence I would dismiss the pneumonia as well.

I went back to the hospital to remediate my pneumonia, and once it was eliminated, the Doctors determined I could take some time off and come back at the beginning of September to begin my bone marrow transplant procedure.

There are so many people to thank, those of you who prayed for me, Alan Fendrich for introducing me to Dr Joe Dispensa’s book, Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself, Wade Hiner, Gayle Richardson, and everyone in Warriors for Doug, my customers who continued to work with me through my time in the hospital, my church, my friends, Steve Swed, my wife at the time, Michelle, my boys, Noah and Josh, including Dan and his wife Kim for digging for and sharing so much information on Monosomy 7.  So many people prayed and helped me!  I will always be eternally grateful to you and them for your faith in me!

Call to Action

Challenge your team, your business, yourself. Contact Positioning Systems to schedule a free exploratory meeting to challenge, inspire, and ignite purpose and passion in your business!  

Create an environment where everyone is inspired to give their best.

Growth demands Strategic Discipline.

I’ve meditated nearly every day since my cancer discovery. This blog, the book, and a new platform for coaching (Neuro Change Solutions) are decisions to help you achieve similar results. More importantly to learn how to change and truly become the person you’ve always felt you can be. Next week, I will share some principles from this coaching and how you can create sustainable change in yourself and your business.

Building an enduring great organization requires disciplined people, disciplined thought, disciplined action, superior results, producing a distinctive impact on the world.

Discipline sustains momentum over a long period of time, laying the foundations for lasting endurance.

A winning habit starts with 3 Strategic Disciplines: Priority, Metrics, and Meeting Rhythms.   Forecasting, accountability, individual, and team performance improve dramatically.

Meeting Rhythms achieves a disciplined focus on performance metrics to drive growth.

Let Positioning Systems help your business achieve these outcomes on the four most Important Decisions your business faces:

Positioning Systems helps mid-sized ($5M - $500M+) businesses Scale-UP. We align your business to focus on Your One Thing! Contact dwick@positioningsystems.com to Scale Up your business! Take our Four Decisions Needs Assessment to discover how your business measures against other Scaled Up companies. We’ll contact you.

NEXT BLOG – CANCER CURED - CHAPTER VII – Change Your Mind. Create New Results