Hell Mask

When I began my cancer journey, I was told that I would receive radiation 37 times over two and half months. Every day I would don a mask, have it screwed to a metal table and lay there while a machine hovered over me delivering what might save my life, but would undoubtably change me forever. The radiation did not save me. Nor did the chemo. I have permanent changes in my neck and throat. My salivary glands will never be the same and every time I take a bite of food it's a little adventure.

Seven years later I reflect on those days, not that long ago. I was scared, helpless yet full of hope. This mask represents the literal hell that those treatments were. Still, it was my job everyday to go there, so I made myself look as good as I could so I could remind myself not to give up. The mask is both ugly and beautiful because it represents my triumph as a person, yet its failure to do its job and its ruthless and torturous beating. I didn't fail it, it failed me. It also reminds me, there is always another path. Don't be afraid to take it. Here I am.

A big part of my personal mental wellness journey is rooted in The Power of Now by Echart Tolles. The Facing the Mask: A project of Self Reflection resonates with me because through studying this book I see the mask we wear as part of the helmet of existence., a helmet that we all wear whether we are athletes or not. Your helmet is your worldly possessions, the external trappings that society often mistakes for who you are.

The logo on the helmet, a symbol of your affiliations, your achievements, or even your status, becomes a proxy for your identity in the eyes of the world. It's what people see, and, over time, it's what you start to believe defines you. This is the essence of ego, and just like in football, it's the mask we wear that completes the helmet and the persona we construct.

The reality is that the helmet, the logo, the external possessions - they are not you. They are transient, and the law of impermanence with the passage of time and the ever-shifting sands of life. They are distractions that can take you out of the present moment and into the realm of ego.

Your mask is your ego. It's the character you've played so well that you've mistaken it for your true self. But the truth is that your inner being, the essence of who you are beyond the mask, is infinitely more profound and timeless. It's the consciousness that exists in the now, beyond labels, beyond possessions, beyond the ego.

I wrote peace on the inside of the mask because peace can only come from within. My goal in life is to live in peace - good and bad, happy and sad, are inevitable. Beyond all those emotions is peace, and that is where I want to reside.